The Mansion House Hotel, designed by Thomas Beck, is the oldest surviving commercial facility in the Pajaro Valley. It is the only Second Empire building in Watsonville. When it was new, it was the leading first class hotel in central California and housed such dignitaries as Ulysses S. Grant.

The Mansion House Hotel was built on the corner of Main and Beach Streets where it fronted on both streets and had visible exposures on three facades including the rear. In 1914 it was moved to its present location to make room for the Lettunich Building. After the move, the building was visible only from its Main Street facade and rear facade.

After the move it continued to serve as a fine hotel until the late 1920s when more modern hotels were then built in Watsonville. By the 1950s, the hotel had become a cheap flop house. It was finally condemned in 1968.

In 1978, the property was purchased by Hoffman & Associates just twelve days before its scheduled demolition. Hoffman & Associates completed a $1.9 million rehabilitation project in 1981.

Adapted from the NRHP nomination submitted in 1983.

A historical marker reads:

Buildings that Moved

It's not just that the people of the American West are restless, the buildings themselves sometimes pack up and move when - for one reason or another - the neighborhood no longer suits them or the neighbors no longer want them or opportunity waits down the road.

And when buildings remain in place, they are often searching for their identities.

Of the buildings and structures we have visited, the original Reno Arch holds the record for number of moves. It has been moved five times since it was built in 1926.

Jax Truckee Diner holds the distance title. The building moved from New Jersry to Pennsylvanis in 1948, then from Pennsylvania to Califonia in 1992.

Probably the most ambitious relocation occurred on July 4th 1904, when the Southern Pacific Railroad loaded most of the town of Wadsworth, Nevada, onto rail cars and transported the town thirty miles west to create a new town which became known as Sparks.