Originally built as a general store at the corner of Telephone and Wells roads - sometime between 1887 and 1910, an exact year hard to pinpoint - the building was later used as a church and then started traveling.It is believed that the small chapel was also once moved to the Santa Paula area where it served as a rural church for farm workers.Rosewood Park Partnership moved the chapel to Darling Road in 1987 and restored it with the idea to turn the building into a wedding chapel and museum, a plan that failed to materialize.The chapel remained vacant and over the years attempts to donate the building to any nonprofit willing to move it also failed. Rosewood Park Partnership was considering reopening the chapel for public use when it burned.Five VCFD engines, one truck, two battalion chiefs and a light and air unit attacked the fire but the structure collapsed and was completely destroyed.It took only 15 minutes to bring the blaze under control, the sad end of the saga of the Sacred Heart Chapel on Darling Road.
Historic Darling Road church destroyed by fire
August 19, 2005
Santa Paula News
It was perhaps the prettiest scene in Saticoy, the historic chapel on Darling Road that for years was trying to find a permanent home.
By Peggy KellySanta Paula TimesIt was perhaps the prettiest scene in Saticoy, the historic chapel on Darling Road that for years was trying to find a permanent home.Sacred Heart Chapel just east of Wells Road burned to the ground early Wednesday morning, a probable act of arson according to a Ventura County Fire Department spokesman.The chapel had been moved to the site in 1987 and sat on the framework from that move, often surrounded by fields of flowers grown adjacent to the church property. Utilities were never hooked up at the chapel, which served over the years as a background for films and wedding photos.County firefighters were called to the chapel at about 3:30 a.m. Wednesday but upon arrival found that the building was fully involved in fire.It is believed that the chapel is among the oldest wood churches in the county.
