Nobody Asked Me, But… No. 269 Hotel History: Paso Robles Inn (1891)

Stanley Turkel | August 2, 2022

By Stanley Turkel, CMHS For centuries, the local Salinan Indian tribe enjoyed the hot mineral water that bubbled up in what is now the center of Paso Robles. They named it “Heaven’s Spot” because of the curative powers of the sulphur springs. When the Franciscan padres arrived, the tribes’ population was greatly reduced in just four generations. The Spanish colonial government intended for their California missions to be temporary institutions which they mistakenly thought would quickly convert the Indians to Catholicism and teach them Spanish and farming methods. In 1857, James and Daniel Blackburn purchased land in El Paso de ...