Hearst Castle, known formally as La Cuesta Encantada (Spanish for "The Enchanted Hill"), is a historic estate in San Simeon, located on the Central Coast of California. Conceived by William Randolph Hearst, the publishing tycoon, and his architect Julia Morgan, the castle was built between 1919 and 1947. Today, Hearst Castle is a museum open to the public as a California State Park and registered as a National Historic Landmark and California Historical Landmark.
George Hearst, William Randolph Hearst's father, had purchased the original 40,000-acre (63 sq mi) estate in 1865 and Camp Hill, the site for the future Hearst Castle, was used for family camping vacations during Hearst's youth. Soon after the death of his mother, Phoebe Hearst, in 1919, William Randolph commissioned the architectural pioneer Julia Morgan to build "something a little more comfortable up on the hill", the genesis of the present castle. She worked in close collaboration with Hearst for over twenty years; the castle was under almost continual construction from 1920 until 1939, with work resuming after the end of World War II until Hearst's final departure in 1947.
Originally intended to be a family home for Hearst, his wife Millicent and their five sons, by 1925 Hearst's marriage was effectively over and San Simeon became the home of him and his mistress, the actress Marion Davies. Their guest list included many of the Hollywood stars of the Roaring Twenties; Charlie Chaplin, Cary Grant, the Marx Brothers, Greta Garbo, Buster Keaton, Mary Pickford, Jean Harlow and Clark Gable all visited, some on multiple occasions. Political luminaries encompassed Calvin Coolidge and Winston Churchill while other notables included Charles Lindbergh, P. G. Wodehouse and Bernard Shaw.
Shortly after starting San Simeon, Hearst—who had a passion for collecting so strong he was dubbed the "Great Accumulator"—began to conceive of making the castle "a museum of the best things that I can secure". Foremost among his purchases were architectural elements from Western Europe, particularly Spain; over thirty ceilings, doorcases, fireplaces and mantels, entire monasteries, paneling and a medieval tithe barn were purchased, shipped to Hearst's Brooklyn warehouses and transported on to California. Much was then incorporated into the fabric of Hearst Castle. In addition, he built up collections of more conventional art and antiques of high quality; his assemblage of ancient Greek vases was one of the world's largest. The castle and Hearst's lifestyle was satirized by Orson Welles in his 1941 film Citizen Kane, which Hearst sought to suppress.
In May 1947, Hearst's health compelled him and Marion Davies to leave the castle for the last time. He died in Los Angeles in 1951. Morgan died in 1957. The following year, the Hearst family gave the castle and many of its contents to the State of California and the mansion was opened to the public in June 1958. It has since operated as the Hearst San Simeon State Historical Monument and attracts about 750,000 visitors annually. The Hearst family retains ownership of the majority of the wider estate of 82,000 acres (128 sq mi) and, under a land conservation agreement reached in 2005, has worked with the California State Parks Department and American Land Conservancy to preserve the undeveloped character of the area; the setting for the castle which Bernard Shaw is said to have described as "what God would have built if he had had the money".
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