Capitola is a city in Santa Cruz County, California on the coast of Monterey Bay. The population was 10,033 at the 2000 census. Founded as "Camp Capitola" by Samuel A. Hall in 1874, Capitola was named for the heroine of The Hidden Hand, a novel by the popular author E.D.E.N. Southworth, favored by Hall's daughter Lulu. Capitola is known as the oldest beach resort on the West Coast.

Capitola is a popular tourist town because of its trendy shops and restaurants on the shore directly connecting to a fishing wharf and its large, sandy beach. From the mid 1970s to the mid 1980s, Capitola Village was well known for its annual downhill race, the Capitola Classic, a skateboard competition that drew world class skaters and made its name in skate history. Capitola lies west of the census-designated area of Aptos and east of the census-designated place of Live Oak.

Geography and soils

Capitola is located at (36.976250, -121.954750) .

According to the United States Census Bureau, the city has a total area of 1.7 square miles (4.4 km²), of which, 1.6 square miles (4.2 km²) of it is land and 0.1 square miles (0.2 km²) of it (4.14%) is water.

Capitola sits on the northeast shore of Monterey Bay. Steep cliffs mark access to several popular beaches, including New Brighton Beach, or drop directly to the rocky shoreline of the Bay. Downtown Capitola sits in a depression among the cliffs so that the popular tourist and shopping area leads directly to Capitola Beach. Colorful houses and hotels line the slopes of the town leading back up to the higher clifftops.

There have been a number of historic fuel releases to the soil in Capitola; among these the following locations have been identified by the County of Santa Cruz or the California Regional Water Quality Control Board: 819 Bay Avenue, 1649 41st Avenue, 2210 41st Avenue and 1700 41st Avenue. {Earth Metrics, 1989)

Demographics

• KSCO, 1080 AM
• KUSP, 88.9 FM
• KZSC, 88.1 FM
• Free Radio Santa Cruz, FRSC 101.1 FM
• KHIP, 104.3 FM
• KPIG, 107.5 FM

Newspapers

• Santa Cruz Sentinel - (daily)
• Watsonville Register-Pajaronian - (daily)
• Metro Santa Cruz - (Weekly)
• Good Times - (Weekly)

Magazines

• 831 Magazine - (a reference to the 831 area code)

Miscellaneous facts

In the summer of 1961 hundreds of birds attacked the town. Most of the birds were sooty shearwaters - a normally non aggressive species that rarely comes to shore. Alfred Hitchcock was a regular visitor to nearby Santa Cruz and read about this episode. He went on to direct a film - The Birds - based on the idea of hundreds of birds attacking humans. The reason for this attack remained unknown for over 25 years until it was discovered that the birds had been affected by domoic acid, a toxin produced by red algae.

Line note references

• Earth Metrics Inc., "Phase One Environmental Site Assessment, Parcel 34-11-31, Capitola, California", Report 10226, October 4, 1989.