Completed in the 1880s, Pico Cottage was the home of oil driller Charles Alexander Mentry (1846-1900). In 1876 Mentry drilled Pico Number 4, the first commercially successful oil well in the western United States. Mentry became superintendent of California Star Oil Works' operations in Pico Canyon. Other superintendents and foremen and their families also lived in the house, also known as the "Big House." The cork-lined ice house is still intact.
