Off the Record

MONTGOMERY WOODS STATE RESERVE, as it’s called, is located on the lightly traveled Comptche Road linking Ukiah to the Mendocino Coast. In the old days, it was the primary link between the County seat and the Coast. Not many people stop in these days to gaze at the Woods’ old growth redwood core, but the park itself it keeps getting bigger as the Frisco-based Save the Redwoods organization has steadily added to its protected acres now totaling about 3000. Even less known is that this important set aside began out of the agitation by an eponymous Mexican American, Ynes Mexia, whose work for preservation of that old growth led to the creation of Montgomery Woods. Born in Texas to a Mexican diplomat, Mexia married twice, the first time to a German-Spanish merchant named Herman de Laue, the second time to Augustin Reygados who seems to have had diplomatic responsibilities for Mexico, Ms. Mexia, having shed her husbands, moved to San Francisco, studied botany at UC Berkeley, and became a well-known botanist herself. She was an early member of the Sierra Club and, in between collecting excursions to Mexico with her more famous colleague, Alice Eastwood, visited Mendocino County where she found the old growth core to what became Montgomery Woods and agitated for it until it was set aside. Mexia is also credited with the discovery of many new plant species.