USA > California > Los Angeles County > Los Angeles > A history of California and an extended history of Los Angeles and environs : also containing biographies of well-known citizens of the past and present, Volume I > Part 54
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All of the pioneer steamships of the Southern Coast that called regularly at San Pedro in the early '50s had by 1857 found or formed new lines of trade or had gone to Davy Jones' locker. The Goliath was put on the Sacra- mento as a river boat. The Southerner was
wrecked on the coast of Oregon. The Sea Bird became very unreliable in her flights up and down the coast and was finally withdrawn from the Southern Coast trade. The Senator was put on the lower coast line in 1856 and became a great favorite with the people. The Senator shortly after she was put on the southern route broke all previous records. She made the voy- age from San Francisco to San Pedro-stop- ping at Santa Barbara-in thirty-six hours. The time schedule of the other vessels was from forty-eight to sixty hours. On this ar- rival of the Senator, Timm's stage broke all previous records, making the trip from San Pedro to Los Angeles in one hour and fifty-five minutes. The Senator and her urbane captain, T. W. Seeley, became very popular. An op- position steamer was put on the route and for a time the fare was reduced, but the opposition could not compete with the Senator and was withdrawn. The fare then between San Pedro and San Francisco was fixed at $25, which was a great reduction from what it had been a few years before ($55) and time four days.
In 1855 the imports at San Pedro were 2,465 tons, the exports were 3,849 tons. In 1856 the imports were 3,422 tons, the exports 3,959. This was the last year in the history of the port that exports exceeded the imports. In 1875 the imports were 80,548 tons, exports 14,841 tons.
CHAPTER XLVII EVOLUTION OF THE INNER HARBOR
For a decade after California had become legally a part of the United States there had been no change in the Bay of San Pedro. Vessels still anchored out beyond Deadman's Island, and communication between ship and shore was made by boat. Government had made no improvements. It had ordered made in 1852 what Professor Bache, Superintendent of the Coast Survey, called a "hydrographic reconnaissance of the Bay."
harbor easy of access to shipmasters, a survey is absolutely necessary, and instead of wasting money in surveying the islands of the coast the department should at once commence op- erations at the Bay of San Pedro. Why, after what is known of its importance, it should be treated with neglect is a matter which seems difficult of comprehension." We find by a report of Lieutenant Davidson made in 1855 that the coast trade of San Pedro ranked next to San Francisco at that early date. He says: "The coasting trade of San Pedro is now greater than the aggregate of all the
Professor Bache, of the Coast Survey, in a report made in 1855 says, "The Bay of San Pedro is the most important port between San Francisco and San Diego. To make this other ports south of San Francisco. An ap-
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San Pedro Wharf, 1884
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propriation had been made by Congress for the erection of a lighthouse, but it had been lying in the treasury unused because the government had not procured a title to land where it was to be located." The land was in a Spanish grant and the grant had not been con- firmed by the claims commissioners.
In March, 1858, the citizens of Los Angeles held a public meeting and sent a petition to the Superintendent of the Coast Survey, ask- ing that a survey of the bay be made and a lighthouse erected. The reply to the petition- ers was that the government was still survey- ing the islands, but that surveyors were work- ing down the coast and would eventually reach the Bay of San Pedro.
But little is known of the early history of San Pedro town or of the struggles of the pioneers of the early '50s to develop the com- merce of the port. I copy the following de- scription of San Pedro from the Los Angeles Star of May 16, 1857. It is the best descrip- tion extant of the port of San Pedro when all the shipping interests were confined to the outer harbor and what is now the inner har- bor was known as San Pedro slough :
"San Pedro is not a place of much preten- sions in the way of houses; but the few there are occupied in the most profitable manner. At the landing of Banning & Wilson there is an extensive blacksmith shop, also a carriage manufactory, a saddlery and harness making establishment where the wagons and harness required in their extensive transportation business are manufactured and repaired. There are also extensive warehouses, stables and corrals, also a grocery, provisions and liquor store and a hotel.
"The Custom House is at this landing, the duties of which for a long time have been discharged by Deputy Collector J. F. Stevens (the collector of the district was stationed at San Diego). For the accommodation of the public a wharf has been erected on the beach, at which boats receive and land passengers and freight. A short distance from this point is Timm's Landing. A pier of considerable extent has been erected there for the shipment of merchandise; ample storage is provided in an immense warehouse; barges and boats of all kinds for conveyance of goods and pas-
sengers to and from the steamers and sailing crafts are also on hand."
. In the succeeding pages I give the story of the creation of the inner harbor and the founding of new San Pedro. More than a quarter of a century before the first attempt was made to utilize the inner harbor Alfred Robinson, in describing it, outlined a plan for its development. He says:
"Due north from the place of anchorage is a narrow creek communicating with a shallow basin, operated upon by the tides, where at this time thousands of hair seal might be seen at low water, basking on the sand banks.
"The channel here when at full flood has ten feet of water over the bar; so that in moderate weather, vessels drawing nine feet can easily pass over and anchor sufficiently near the shore to discharge their cargoes without the aid of launches. With very little expense it might be made a place of anchor- age for large ships, either by digging out and deepening the present channel, or by closing up another outlet to the north of the island, which would bring the whole strength of the current through one passage, and thus wash away its sandy bottom."
In 1858 the shipping interests at the bay were divided between Banning and Timm's. Banning was located at the old landing of hide droghing days. The old warehouse built by the Mission padres in the early '20s had been enlarged and a lodging house and store build- ing erected. Timm had a warehouse at a point on the outer bay. This location for many years was known as "Timm's Point." (Don David W. Alexander, for many years Banning's partner, had been elected sheriff in 1855, and they had dissolved partnership.) Each kept stages for the transfer of passen- gers from the bay to Los Angeles and teams for forwarding merchandise. Passengers were transferred from a short wharf at old San Pedro to the steamer on Banning's famous steam yacht Medora.
Capt. Phineas Banning, to put a greater distance between himself and his rivals, Timm and Tomlinson, founded a new town on the inner bay, or San Pedro slough as it was then called. The ceremonies of the founding took place September 25, 1858. This town at first was known as New San Pedro, but eventually
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came to be called Wilmington after Banning's birthplace, Wilmington, Del. The initial cere- monies consisted in the landing of passen- gers and freight at the short wharf that had been built at the head of the slough. The saving of nearly five miles in distance and the avoidance of the hill to Old San Pedro gave Banning a decided advantage over his rivals. It was not his intention to abandon Old San Pedro, but fate or old Neptune decreed other- wise.
The festivities of the founding of the new town were scarcely over (the success of the undertaking had been pledged in bumpers of wine by a festive assemblage of the elite of the land), when old Neptune, as if in revenge for the attempt to escape from his domain, vented his wrath on the old landing. The Los Angeles Star of October 2, 1858, the next issue after the one that chronicled the found- ing of the new town, thus notes the devasta- tion wrought by a fierce southeaster :
"The rains of the beginning of this week were accompanied with heavy winds here, but at San Pedro a regular southeaster came up, doing considerable damage to the small craft anchored in the bay. We are sorry to say that Mr. Banning's famous yacht Medora suffered from the envious winds and waves, whose swiftest course she has frequently out- run. Laying quietly at anchor, they rose in their might against her, drove her from her moorings on to the beach, where they pre- vailed against her and broke her up, scatter- ing her fragments on the shore. A large barge was also broken up; another, having dragged its anchor a considerable distance, was brought to by the anchor fastening against a rock.
"The wharf at San Pedro was very much injured, a large part of the flooring having been carried away by the violence of the sea. A large quantity of lumber stored on the beach was floated off by the high tide and the violence of the storm."
After this disaster Banning directed all his energies to building up New San Pedro. The old shipping point that for nearly a century had been the commercial entrepot of Los An- geles and the embarcadero of mission days was abandoned and all of Banning's business transferred to the new port.
A local notice in the Los Angeles Star of February 5, 1859, four months after the founding of the town, says: "The place is rapidly filling up with buildings, having now all the essentials enabling it to be considered and styled a city-a grocery, hotel, black- smith shop, etc. It will soon have a bowling alley and billiard saloon. It has also stores, offices, warehouses, workshops, corrals, all things necessary for carrying on the extensive business of Captain Banning. The county road is progressing favorably. It is much heavier work than we anticipated. The gov- ernor of the city is pushing forward the com- pletion of the wharf for the landing of pas- sengers, and altogether the city of Newport- that is its name up country-is a bristling, thriving, pretentious, ambitious city, which if helped along kindly will become quite a place one of these days."
A correspondent of the Star under date of February 12, 1859, asks: "Have you ever been down to New San Pedro, or Banning- ville, which the new town should be called, for if it ever comes to anything more than a little seaside village to Mr. Banning will the honor be due. It is by his enterprise that this new landing has been started and by his enterprise and stubborn energy that houses already sprinkle the plain."
The petition of the citizens of Los Angeles sent to the head of the Coast Survey in March, 1858, asking for a survey of the harbor and setting forth the great importance of San Pedro as a shipping point, finally brought re- sults. The United States surveying schooner Active arrived at San Pedro June 4, 1859, and began a survey of the harbor. Captain Allen, in charge of the schooner, found from soundings on the bar sufficient depth of water at high tide for his vessel to enter the inner harbor, or lagoon, as Lieutenant Davidson called it.
The Star of September 24, 1859, says: "We understand that the survey of the harbor of San Pedro has been completed; the topogra- phy was performed by W. M. Johnson and Charles Bache; the triangulation by Capt. W. E. Greenwell, the hydrography by Captain Allen of the steamer Active. The chart is complete and has been executed with that neatness and precision requisite in work of
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this kind and which these gentlemen are so well qualified to perform.
"The survey extends a mile back from the shore line, reaching up to the Laguna and surrounding lands, exhibiting the heights, curves and varieties of the surface of the banks and hills with the courses of the inter- secant ravines. Every curve and indentation of the coast line is accurately traced and every knoll, tree, shrub and description of vegeta- tion covering the land within the scope of the survey marked and correctly indicated; also the houses, fences, and, in fact, everything just as it appears.
"There are thirty houses, including those in New San Pedro, exhibited on the sheet. The sheet embraces the portion of the coast ex- tending from a point about a mile west ot Point Fermin to about a mile to the eastward of the mouth of the San Gabriel river; show- ing an outside or extended shore line of eight miles, including Deadman's Island, touching the point of and running along outside Rattle- snake Island, exhibiting within its compass twenty miles of road and an area of fourteen square miles.
"We find the following distances shown on the sheet which may be interesting to the public. From Banning's old landing to the wharf at New San Pedro by the channel is four miles; by the road, five and one-fourth miles; from Old San Pedro to Diego Sepul- veda's, by the road, two and three-fourths miles; from New Town by way of the slough to the mouth of the San Gabriel river, about two and a quarter miles." If this old chart of fifty-six years ago is still in existence a copy of it should be secured to show the numerous changes that man has wrought in the configuration of the harbor and coast line of San Pedro bay.
Southeasters, that were the dread of sea- men in Dana's day, still continued to visit San Pedro. There was a fierce one December 1, 1859, but old Boreas found nothing to de- stroy. There were no wharves on the bay, those had been demolished in the great storm of 1858. Banning had all his boats and scows and the little Comet that had taken the place of the wrecked Medora of the year before all safely anchored up at the head of the lagoon
or inner harbor and he could view the storm with indifference.
The freight rates from anchorage to Los Angeles in 1860 by Banning's Transfer Com- pany would be considered excessive now. It cost $15 to freight a thousand feet of lumber to the city and fifty cents per hundred pounds to carry merchandise.
War usually retards all development, but the Civil war of 1861 to 1865 had the opposite effect on New San Pedro. The arena of hostilities was two thousand miles distant from the town. In 1861, Camp Drum was established at New San Pedro as a rendez- vous for California soldiers enlisted for the Civil war.
The first camp established in Southern Cali- fornia was Camp Latham on La Ballona rancho, near the present site of Redondo. Several hundred soldiers were stationed there. Captain Banning, recognizing the value of a military camp in a business way, deeded the United States government twenty acres of land within the limits of New San Pedro. In September, 1861, Camp Drum was estab- lished on this land. The government built a hospital, officers' quarters, barracks, ware- houses and a wharf. To bring water to the camp and town it built a ditch from a point on the river seven miles above to the barracks. Two hundred soldiers were employed on the work. An immense flume three or four miles long was constructed.
In October, 1862, the soldiers from Camp Latham were moved to Camp Drum and that post abandoned. The soldiers at Camp Lath- am at the September election took possession of the polls and cast over two hundred votes for the Union candidates for the legislature, defeating the Confederate sympathizers on the Democratic ticket. A great outcry was raised by the defeated candidates over the outrage and the vote of the precinct was thrown out.
Military expeditions for Utah, Arizona and New Mexico were fitted out at the camp, and at times from two to three thousand soldiers were stationed here. All supplies were hauled from New San Pedro across the desert to the various posts where soldiers were stationed.
In January, 1862, Carleton's column of two thousand troops was fitting out to march to Arizona and New Mexico. Their train was
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to consist of two hundred wagons and twelve hundred mules. The steamer Wright was bringing down from the north five hundred mules for the column's train. The captain, to save lighterage charges on the mules (the charges were quite heavy), undertook to run into the shore and land his mules. The vessel struck a sunken reef about half a mile from shore and he had to throw his cargo of mules overboard. One hundred and twenty of them either went to Davy Jones' locker or into the corrals of the paisanos, at least they were not present or accounted for at the round-up. Carleton's column had to delay its march until more mules could be brought down from up country. The establishment of Camp Drum greatly increased the growth and ac- celerated business at New San Pedro. A daily stage ran between it and Los Angeles. Pleasure parties frequently came down to visit the soldier boys. Travel by steamer was greatly increased. At one time in January, 1862, there were three steamers unloading troops and supplies in San Pedro bay.
In 1864 a postoffice was established at New San Pedro. The town and postoffice assumed the name of Wilmington, but it was a decade later before the port or landing was officially named Wilmington. The steamship com- panies in San Francisco sold tickets to an- chorage in the harbor or bay of San Pedro. They did not agree to land passengers. The passenger was at liberty to pay $1.50 for a trip up the slough to Wilmington on one of Banning's tugs or swim ashore to Old San Pedro. The tourist on his first trip usually bestowed a liberal quantity of abuse on the steamship company for this arrangement, but he had to submit all the same.
The most tragic event in the history of the inner harbor was the explosion of the boilers of the passenger boat Milton Willis, better known as the Ada Hancock, which occurred on the 27th of April, 1863. She was heavily loaded with passengers going to the steamship Senator. Only seven escaped entirely un- hurt, and among them, strange to say, was the engineer. Among the lost perhaps no one was more sincerely mourned than the commander of the Senator, Capt. T. W. Seeley.
After the end of the Civil war Camp Drum, or Drum Barracks as it was officially named in 1863, was abandoned. The buildings un- tenanted were going to ruin. In 1872 Con- gress passed an act deeding back the twenty acres to Banning and Wilson. The buildings were sold at auction in August, 1873, bringing a mere pittance of their cost. The ditch and flume to bring water to the camp, built at a large expenditure of money and labor, went to ruin, and all traces of them have disappeared. An account of the building of the Los Angeles and San Pedro railroad in 1868-69, which came to a stop at Wilmington and did not reach San Pedro for a dozen years later, and its transfer to the Southern Pacific railroad, are given in Chapter XL of this history.
The work of developing the inner harbor began in 1871. The government had made several preliminary surveys with this object in view. Congress in 1870 appropriated $200,- 000 for the work. The first part of the scheme was the building of a breakwater from Rattle- snake Island to Deadman's Island, a distance of 6,500 feet. Rattlesnake Island at that time was an irregular shaped strip of land about five miles long lying to the southeast between Wilmington slough and the ocean. It was not really an island, but rather a peninsula. It was only at high tide that it was cut off from the mainland. About a mile and a half from Rattlesnake Island and a quarter of a mile south of the mainland was Deadman's Island, famous in the history of San Pedro bay. It was then about a mile in circumfer- ence at its base.
Between these islands was a stretch of shoal water about a mile and a half in length through which the tide ebbed and flowed and the waves dashed in a storm. Between the mainland and Deadman's Island there was a gap or gate about a hundred and fifty feet wide. Through this gap the commerce of the inner harbor had to pass. It was only at high tide that it could do so. At the beginning of work on the breakwater there were but eighteen inches of water on the bar at low tide. There is still living in Los Angeles an old pioneer who boasts of having waded across this inlet. Through the gap between the islands the southeast gales swept with such force as to make the inner harbor unsafe for ships. These
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gales carried sand and silt into the estuary and filled the channel.
To close the gap between the islands would stop the inflow of sand and silt and break the force of the waves. The outflow through the narrow inlet would deepen the channel by cutting away the bar. This in brief was the plan of improvement proposed.
The first survey with the object of improv- ing the inner harbor was made by Colonel Williamson in 1867. He recommended a breakwater of solid granite blocks. The gov- ernment at that time was not making liberal appropriations for unknown harbors on the Pacific coast and this plan was abandoned as too expensive. Later a survey was made by General Alexander. His plan was a series of cribs filled with rock, but nothing came of this. Congressman Houghton in 1871 secured an appropriation for $200,000, the money to be expended under the supervision of Colonel Mendell, a government engineer. His plan was to construct a wall of wooden piles across the shallow part and a wall of rock across the deeper opening between the islands.
In June, 1871, the work of pile driving, working out from Rattlesnake Island, began. The job was let by contract to a contractor. After building a few hundred feet he failed, gave up the job and the work for several months was at a standstill.
In January, 1872, Congress made an addi- tional appropriation of $75,000. Lieutenant Sears was given direct charge of the work un- der the supervision of Colonel Mendell. The work was pushed vigorously. Seven piledrivers were kept in operation and a force of from one hundred to six hundred men was employed. The men encamped on Rattlesnake Island and that convolved island of ominous name was a lively camp.
The following description of the Wilmington breakwater, as it was called, I take from the Los Angeles Herald of October 4, 1873, which copied it from the Resources of California, a long since defunct periodical which during its existence did much toward the building up of California :
"Starting at the southwest corner of Rat- tlesnake Island the breakwater runs southerly to the northwest corner of Deadman's Island, a length of 6,500 feet. It is a gradual curve on
an arc of an immense circle, the curve towards the southeast, the point from which the heav- jest winds and breakers come. The piles are of Oregon fir; heavy iron bands are placed around these and they are connected by heavy iron rods. The material to be used for the deeper portion of the channel is huge boulders of rock ; these will form a barrier against the thousands of tons of sand washed against the breakwater on the windward and tideward side.
"The wall of piles is made of heavy timbers thirty feet long and one foot square set close together and driven into the ocean. Inside of this, a second row of thick plank twelve inches wide by four inches thick is driven so as to break joints. This double trunking rises four feet above high tide. Just below the top both inside and out heavy stringers are bolted. This makes a barrier watertight and stormproof. This work extends 3,700 feet from the original shore. Beyond this for 1,000 feet double lines of such work extend, set twelve feet apart, which being heavily ballasted below, strongly bolted through by strong iron rods and firmly planked over above, form a very strong pier.
"From the outer end of this double work to Deadman's Island, where the water is deepest and the surf the strongest, the work is to be of rock boulder, varying in weight from one to ten tons, and piled in such quantities as to make an immensely heavy sea wall. Wing dams on the outer side will be constructed to divert the current and tides from striking with full force against this sea wall. Three and one-half mil- lion feet of lumber and thirteen thousand tons of stone for rip rap work have been used so far. The timber is treated by the hydro-carbon process to preserve the wood and to prevent boring by the toredo.
"On completion of the breakwater some two million cubic yards of sand and silt that have for years been accumulating along the main channel will be dredged.
"Lieut. Clinton B. Sears, of the United States engineer corps, in charge of the work, estimated the cost of removing the sand and silt at twenty-five cents per cubic yard, or about $500,000 to clear the main channel. After dredging, vessels carrying sixteen feet can cross the bar at low tide."
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Work was continued on the sea wall until it was carried to Deadman's Island. The rock for this portion of the wall was brought from Santa Catalina Island on scows carrying one hundred and twenty-five tons of rock each and making three trips a week. The boulders or blocks of rock weighed from one to ten tons. The length of wall from where the piling ended to Deadman's Island was about two thousand feet.
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