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Santa Cruz Attractions

Capitola History

Photograph courtesy of Covello & Covello Historical Photo Collection

Camp Capitola: This was Capitola around the time that Frederick A. Hihn was trying to figure out how to make big money from Capitola by the Sea. It's almost a fact now that Capitola was named after the romantic heroine of the Capitola novels. You can see the novels at the Capitola Museum. Folks used to believe that it was named Capitola because locals wanted the state capital there, but not anymore. --Bruce Bratton

The Hidden Hand, Or, Capitola the Madcap
By E.D.E.N. Southworth
The name "Capitola" comes from the feisty, cross-dressing heroine of this 1859 adventure novel. ("E.D.E.N. Southworth was one of the most popular and prolific writers of the nineteenth century and her Capitola Black, or Black Cap... was so well-loved that the book was serialized three times between 1859 and 1888 and was dramatized in forty different versions... The pace is fast, the action wonderfully unbelievable. This is escape literature at its nineteenth-century best, with a woman at its center who makes you feel strong, daring and reckless." -- Erica Bauermeister, 500 Great Books by Women)