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1849 - 1999

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Built to serve as a public school and town meeting hall, Colton Hall is now a museum and is open for public viewing.

California's first Constitution was drafted in this historic site in October, 1849. Colton Hall is a landmark in the City of Monterey, once the Capital of Alta California.
Colton Hall

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  • Christmas in the Adobes. Evening candlelit walking tours of historic Monterey and the adobes. Participating buildings are decorated with period ornamentation. Refreshments and entertainment. For information call 831.647.6226. Friday, December 9 & Saturday, December 10, 5:00 �9:00 PM.


Walter Colton built Colton Hall and in his diary (published later as Three Years in California), he notes:

"Thursday, March 8, 1849. The town hall, on which I have been at work for more than a year, is at last finished. It is built of a white stone, quarried from a neighboring hill, and which easily takes the shape you desire. The lower apartments are for schools; the hall over them - seventy feet by thirty - is for public assemblies. The front is ornamented with a portico, which you enter from the hall. It is not an edifice that would attract any attention among public buildings in the United States; but in California it is without a rival. It has been erected out of the slender proceeds of town lots, the labor of the convicts, taxes on liquor shops,  and fines on gamblers. The scheme was regarded with incredulity by many; but the building is finished, and the citizens have assembled in it, and christened it after my name, which will now go down to posterity with the odor of gamblers, convicts, and tipplers. I leave it as an humble evidence of  what may be accomplished by rigidly adhering to one purpose, and shrinking from no personal efforts necessary to its achievement."

More about Walter Colton ...Walter Colton

Soon after the American occupation of California in 1846, the Reverend Walter Colton was appointed to serve as Alcalde or Chief Magistrate of the Monterey district. Reverend Colton, a chaplain for the U.S. Navy, served as the first American Alcalde in California from 1846 until 1849.

The Colton Hall Museum operates under the Museum Division of the Monterey Public Library. The Division also operates the Presidio of Monterey Museum, and collaborates with Library staff on the Art and History Activities for the City of Monterey.


Colton Hall Museum
Location and Hours of Operation

Colton Hall Museum is located on Pacific Street, between Madison and Jefferson streets. The museum is open daily 10:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m., except Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Years Day.  Click here for map.

Phone: 831.646.5648 / Fax: 831.646.3917

Mail: Colton Hall Museum, City Hall,
Monterey, CA 93940

Email: Colton Hall

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Rev 12/06/05 - D. Holtzman - http://www.monterey.org/museum/index.html