El Presidio Real de Santa Barbara

The El Presidio Real de Santa Bárbara, also known as the Royal Presidio of Santa Barbara, was a military installation in Santa Barbara, California. It was built by Spain in 1782, with the mission of defending the Second Military District in California. In modern times, the Presidio serves as a significant tourist attraction, museum and an active archaeological site as part of El Presidio de Santa Barbara State Historic Park. The park contains an original adobe structure called El Cuartel, which is the second oldest surviving building in California; only the chapel at Mission San Juan Capistrano, known as "Father Serra's Church", is older. The Presidio of Santa Barbara has the distinction of being the last military outpost built by Spain in the New World. The Presidio was listed on the U.S. National Register of Historic Places in 1973.

The current El Presidio de Santa Barbara State Historic Park site sits between Anacapa and Garden Streets on East Canon Perdido Street in downtown Santa Barbara. The main portion of the site is across the street from the Santa Barbara city Post Office, and is about two blocks from city hall, De la Guerra Plaza and two other museums, the Santa Barbara Historical Museum and the Casa de la Guerra.

Only two portions of the original presidio quadrangle survive to this day: the Cañedo Adobe, named for José María Cañedo, the Soldado de Cuera to whom it was deeded in lieu of back pay when the Presidio fell to inactivity, and the remnants of a two-room soldiers quarters, called El Cuartel. The Cañedo Adobe is currently the visitor’s center for the state park, and El Cuartel is largely unmodified. The site’s operator, the Santa Barbara Trust for Historic Preservation (SBTHP), reconstructed the rest of the site, with the most recent construction—two rooms in the northwest corner of the site—finished in May 2006. The reconstruction is ongoing, with the construction of two more rooms in the northwest corner beginning in December 2007.