An illustrated history of Los Angeles County, California. Containing a history of Los Angeles County from the earliest period of its occupancy to the present time, together with glimpses of its prospective future and biographical mention of many of its pioneers and also of prominent citizens of to-day, Part 54

Author: Lewis Publishing Company. cn
Publication date: 1889
Publisher: Chicago, Lewis Pub. Co.
Number of Pages: 1092

USA > California > Los Angeles County > An illustrated history of Los Angeles County, California. Containing a history of Los Angeles County from the earliest period of its occupancy to the present time, together with glimpses of its prospective future and biographical mention of many of its pioneers and also of prominent citizens of to-day > Part 54

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" The year 1876 also saw the organization of a company to operate in what is known as the Sespi Oil Region, about thirty iniles west of San Fernando district, which was composed of citi- zens of this city and known as the Los Angeles Oil Company. They were successful, and their first well produced for a time 125 barrels of oil every twenty-four hours. This well was lost some years later, through ignorance, and the company ceased operations.

" Owing to the lack of demand, the producing of vil remained stagnant for a period of years up to. 1884. From that time until the present much greater activity was displayed and the opening up of a new district in the Puente Hills, twenty miles east of this city, still further in- creases the vast field for development.

"The immediate cause of this activity was the demand for fuel oil. The organization in March, 1885, of the Los Angeles Oil Burning and Supply Company, for the purpose of intro- ducing this liquid fuel, both for manufacturing and domestic purposes, sold in the first year 137,000 gallons of the distilled product, which was used solely for domestic fuel through the medium of their patent burners."

SAN FERNANDO is located on the Southern Pacific Railroad, twenty-one miles from Los Angeles; it has an elevation of 1,061 feet. The climate is delightful and the situation beautiful. Between this town and the mountains, one mile away, is a grand, rolling plain, which is pretty

341

HISTORY OF LOS ANGELES COUNTY.

well occupied by cozy homes. Hon. Charles Maclay laid out the present town of San Fer- nando in 1874. In April of that year a free excursion train was run from Los Angeles to at- tend the first auction sale of town lots. The lots sold at prices ranging from $6 to $20.

The village contains a neat, substantial Methodist Episcopal church, a commodious, at- tractive public school building, and a large three- story brick hotel. San Fernando is the location of the Maclay Theological College of the Uni- versity of Southern California. Senator Maclay has endowed this institution with $150,000. He also erected the buildings at a cost to himself of $50,000 more. They were finished and occupied early in 1888. This institution is under the control of the Southern California Conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church.

This section is watered by artesian wells and mountain streams. Wheat and barley never need artificial watering, but fruit trees demand somne irrigation. San Fernando is forty minutes by rail from Los Angeles, and there are several trains each way daily.

The Southern Pacific Railroad, in going from the town of San Fernando to the town of New- hall, passes through a tunnel one and one-third miles long, with two exceptions the longest on the Western Continent. San Fernando Town- ship was formerly a ranch of nearly 125,000 acres, and belonged to General Andrés Pico, who made the treaty with General Fremont at Cahnenga in 1847. General Pico sold the ranch in 1846 to Eulogio F. de Celis for $14,000, and in 1853 he repurchased one-half of it for $15,000.

This ranch has since 1876 been one immense wheatfield, and although subdivided and belong- ing in tracts of a few thousand acres to a num- ber of owners, yet it has still remained almost exclusively a wheat-producing territory, some of the fields comprising not less than 20,000 acres. These immense tracts, however, are rapidly being subdivided into small farms of five to 160 acres, which insures a more rapid de- velopment of the county's resources and a greater

diversity of products. The same is true of large ranchios in many other portions of the county.

In about the center of this township is the Mission of San Fernando Rey, founded in 1797. in honor of Ferdinand V., King of Castile and Aragon. The old church building is now a picturesque ruin, as are many other buildings formerly connected with the Mission, while others are yet well preserved.

One of the most prosperous and picturesque mountain resorts in Southern California is MONTE VISTA, situated in a beautiful, fertile valley, be- tween the Verdugo and Sierra Madre Mountains. Monte Vista is twenty miles north of Los An- geles, and four miles east of Monte Vista Station, on the Southern Pacific Railroad.

GLENDORA .- Among the several towns which skirt the foot hill slopes of the Sun Gabriel Val- ley, the gem of Los Angeles County, Glendora is one of the most beautifully situated. Built on a gentle sonthern slope at the foot of the Sierra Madre range of mountains, 700 to 900 feet above the sea-level, and near the head of the valley, it commands a charming view of the entire valley, embracing many square miles. Glendora is twenty-seven miles east of Los An- geles, on the main transcontinental line of the Atchison, Topeka & Sinte Fé Railroad. It was founded by Mr. George Whitcomb, a Chicago manufacturer, and a gentleman of energy, wealth and culture, who came to Southern California for the improvement of his own and his family's health, and being highly pleased with the cli- mate and beauty of the San Gabriel Valley, purchased a tract of 200 acres of land, and asso- ciating with himself Merick Reynolds, John W. Cook, and his two sons, Carrol S. and William C. Whitcomb, as the Glendora Land Company, and adding more land to the original purchase, laid out the town of Glendora. The name se- lected for the place is a happy combination of the word glen and the last part of Mrs. Whit- comb's name-Ledora. About 300 acres were surveyed off in town lots, of which some 300 were sold at the first sale on the last of March,

342

HISTORY OF LOS ANGELES COUNTY.

1887, the papers being executed on the first day of April. Mr. Whitcomb, who has been at the head of the enterprise, has made every improve- ment with the idea of permanency and the future welfare of the place in view. Six broad, well-graded avennes extend from the mount- ains sontliward to the railroad, and these are erossed at right angles by nine fine avenues, comprising in all over eight miles of streets, each one of which is bordered on both sides by pretty evergreen pepper-trees, planted and cared for by Mr. Whitcomb at the expense of the company.

The water supply for the town comes from the Big Dalton Cañon, and has been developed by the Glendora Water Company, with a paid up capital stock of $50,000, who have constructed two large tunnels under the cañon, one over 1,200 and the other 600 feet long. Two large storage reservoirs, of nearly 2,000,000 gallons capacity, receive this pure mountain water from two and a half miles of ten-inch cement supply pipe. The water is distributed from these reservoirs along every street through the best wrought-iron water pipe, with a vertical pressure of eighty feet, sufficient to force it over the top of any building in the place. The water supply is ample for domestic purposes of a considerable larger population, but not for general irrigation.

Glendora has had a prosperous, steady growth up to the present season; between 700 and 800 lots have been sold, and the town now contains seventy-two residences, business and public build- ings, including a fine two-story school-building of four rooms, ereeted at a cost of nearly $10,500; a handsome hotel of some twenty rooms, built by the company at a cost of over $7,000; two churches-a Methodist Episcopal and a Chris- tian church-costing about $3,000 each. The first dwelling built after the town was laid out was erected by Edward Humphrey, and the first business house was built by Messrs. A. E. and J. P. Englehart, who are now one of the leading mercantile firins of the town. Glendora contains two dry-goods stores, one of which also carries

groceries, and the other clothing; one hardware one furniture, and one drug store, a millinery store, and a new fruit-drying establishment, all of which are doing a fair and prosperous busi- ness,

The altitude of the town site places it within the warm or thermal belt, and renders it almost entirely free from frosts, and its distance (thirty-five miles) from and height above the ocean render it comparatively free from fogs, while the land-tempered sea breezes make the climate mild, salubrious, and exceptionally healthful. As no saloons or other resorts of questionable character are allowed in the town, the community is pervaded by a healthy moral atmosphere. The attention of the citizens in and about Glendora is being directed to the cul- tivation of fruits, particularly oranges and raisin grapes, peaches and apricots, for which the cli- mate and soil are well adapted. Fruit-growing promises to become the principal industry of that locality.

Mr. Whitcomb is boring for oil on the town site, having reached a depth of 1,883 feet at this date (Angust 20, 1889), and purposes to con- tinne 300 to 500 feet further unless kerosene is struck before. He has expended about $18,000 in the enterprise up to this time, and entertains strong hope of success.

ALOSTA .- This place lies adjoining Glendora on the south, and was started as a rival town about the same time-in 1887, by Messrs. George Guard, Underwood and Washburn, nn- der the corporate title of the Alosta Land and Water Company. The town plat consisted of eighty acres lying on both sides of the railroad. A fine two-story hotel containing over fifty rooms was erected in the spring and summer of 1887, S. C. Correll being the builder and secur- ing an interest in the property for his work. The structure was well built and cost nearly $16,000. A smaller hotel, two or three stores and some other business buildings were ereeted near the railroad track; quite a number of lots were sold by the company and some twelve or fifteen cottages were built about over the town

343

HISTORY OF LOS ANGELES COUNTY.

site. In the contest between the two rival towns for the depot building Glendora won; the projectors of Alusta were non-residents, while Glendora had an able and energetic managing head in the person of Mr. Whitcomb; the one was a real-estate speculation, the other was founded for a permanent and prosperous settle- ment. Alosta Hotel was nicely furnished, and after having several proprietors successively it was vacated and the furniture sold off, and the building offered for sale at about one-third its original cost. Two of the stores have been moved away and the remaining business build- ings are all vacant. The water supply for Alosta is obtained from Little Dalton Cañon, and is piped direct to the consumers, there having been no storage reservoir built.

AZUSA is situated on the trans-continental line of the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe Rail- road, twenty-two miles east of Los Angeles, thirty miles from the Pacific Ocean and near the east end of the beautiful San Gabriel Valley, that portion of it being locally named Aznsa Valley. The town is located npon a gently sloping plateau at an altitude of about 800 feet, near the base of the Sierra Madre Range, and a mile directly sonth of the month of the canon through which the San Gabriel River escapes from the embrace of the mount- ain fastnesses in its tumultons flight from Old Baldy to the sea. Azusa was founded by a company of Los Angeles capitalists, with J. S. Slauson as president, who bought the site as a real-estate investment and laid out the town, consisting of eighty blocks of twenty-four to fifty lots each, on April 1, 1887. The streets lie with the points of the compass, crossing each other at right angles, and are from sixty to 100 feet in width; 1,600 feet of excellent cement sidewalks, constructed at a cost of $15,000, line the principal streets. The business houses of the place embrace dry goods, drugs, clothing, groceries and provision, shoes, hardware, books and stationery, furniture, bakery, and meat mar- ket, a fine livery stable, and one of the most

commodious and best managed hotels in Los Angeles County, kept by S. F. De Voin.

The Azusa News, an eight-page local paper of four columns to the page, is published every Saturday by George Bentley; E. O. Judd, Editor. The News was started by its present publisher in Los Angeles January 4, 1886, as a real estate and hotel reporter. It was subsequently changed to a seven-column folio, weekly newspaper, and in the spring of 1888 was moved to Azusa, where it has been published ever since. The office is fitted out with a good hand-power news- paper press, a jobber and other printing mate- rial constituting a well equipped country office.

A new four-room school building has just been completed, costing about $10,000. The town contains three churches: The Presbyterian, a fine edifice which cost some $6,000; the Method- ist Episcopal, costing 81,000, and the church of the Holiness Society, erected at an expense of about $1,200. The town also has a city hall and a prosperous public library.

The near proximity of the San Gabriel River to Azusa gives it an abundant water supply, which is distributed from a mammoth reservoir of 2,000,000 gallons capacity, seventy-five feet above the town, through the streets in pipes aggregating 55,800 feet in length. By closing the gates of the irrigating canal higher up, a water pressure of 150 feet is obtained, sufficient to flood the roof of any building in the place. The principal streets of the town are sewered, which, with fine natural drainage and equitable climate common to the foot-hills of San Gabriel Valley, render Azusa a remarkably healthy place. In the immediate vicinity of the town large quantities of strawberries are grown, which are noted for their superior qualities. Citrus and deciduous fruits of various kinds are also produced in quantity. Fifty car-loads of oranges were shipped from Azusa this last season. The potato crop is one of the staple productions, and is shipped extensively. Azusa, like all the young towns of Southern California, is suffering from the blighting effects of the recent speculative

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HISTORY OF LOS ANGELES COUNTY.

boom, but a brighter future awaits it upon the lifting of the financial cloud, through rifts of which prosperity's sun already shines.

DUARTE is a settlement upon the southern fout-hill slope of the Sierra Madre Mountains in the San Gabriel Valley, eighteen miles east of Los Angeles, and 600 feet above the sea. It takes its name from Andres Duarte, a Mexi- can military officer, who received from the Mex- ican Government a grant of some 4,000 acres of land, of which this is a part, and settled upon it some time in the Forties. He built a fine adobe dwelling, planted a small vineyard and some fruit trees, and dug a water ditch to the mouth of Gabriel Canon. Proving un- successful as a farmer, he became involved in debt, and the Rancho Azusa de Duarte, as it was called, passed into the hands of Mr. Wolf- skill, and from him to Alexander Weil. About twenty-five years ago Dr. A. Beardslee, a keen- eyed discerner of good soil, selected and pur- chased a choice piece of 300 acres from the rancho, and known as the Beardslee Tract, on which he settled. He performed the great work of constructing a ditch three miles in length, connecting his land with the old Duarte ditch. In 1872 Alexander Weil had the remainder of the rancho surveyed and subdivided into forty- acre lots, which he sold to settlers who began to come in quite rapidly about that time. Mr. Asa Ellis bought 200 acres and planted the first orange orchard in the Duarte district.

It being quickly demonstrated that the climate and soil were adapted to the growth of citrus fruits, many thousands of trees were planted on the foot-hill lands within the few years follow- ing. Gradually the orchards came into bearing lands, rose in value, and Duarte had fairly started on the prosperons career which it has since en- joyed. Duarte oranges and lemons stand at the head in quality and popularity of the citrus fruits grown in Los Angeles County. The area in orchard and quantity of product has been steadily increased until over 100 carloads of oranges were shipped from Duarte last season, besides those sold for local consumption.

Up to 1878 the Duarte people had claimed one- half the water from the San Gabriel River; but a serions controversy arising between them and the Azusan settlers over their respective water rights, the dispute was finally and permanently settled by Duarte accepting one-third of the flow. In 1881 the water rights of the Duarte settlers were consolidated into two incorpora- tions -- the Beardslee Water Ditch Company, representing the district of that name, and the Duarte Mutual Irrigation and Canal Company, thus embracing the greater portion of irrigable land in the rancho. Since then improvements and more economical methods for conducting and distributing the water are being continu- ously adopted, in the putting in of miles of iron and cement pipes, until the water supply and distribution in Duarte are among the best in Southern California.

Duarte contains two general stores, a drug store, the Highland Hotel, a handsome structure of over thirty rooms, built and owned by the Duarte Hotel Company. It was erected in 1887, at a cost of about $15,000, and stands on a commanding site comprising two acres and a half of beau- tifully ornamented grounds. Duarte's public- school accommodations consist of a two-story four-room building, erected in 1885, and costing about $5,000. The number of pupils enrolled during the school year of 1888-'89 was 115. The district of Duarte contains but one church edifice, which was built by the Baptists in 1883, and cost $2,700. It was sold to the Methodist society some two years ago. They still own it and worship in it. A. Brunson started the first store in Duarte about 1877. It has since changed hands several times, and is now owned by W. H. Payne & Co., who also have a small store down by the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fé depot, three-quarters of a mile south. Be- sides the citrus fruits, considerable area is cul- tivated in Duarte to deciduous fruits, chiefly the apricot and wine grape. The apricot crop of the district in 1889 was 7,500 tons. The Duarte is not only one of the prettiest sections, but one of the most fruitful and prosperous in

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HISTORY OF LOS ANGELES COUNTY.

Los Angeles County, and its citizens are ener- getic, intelligent and progressive.

LANCASTER, on the Southern Pacific Railroad, is a flourishing little place, supported by a pros- perous agricultural and horticultural community. In 1884-'85 M. L. Wicks took an interest in the town and established a newspaper, since which time the growth of the community has been more marked.

WILSON'S TRAIL.

This was made by B. D. Wilson up the Sierra Madre, on the summit of which is Wilson's Peak,

where the largest telescope in the world is soon to be mounted, through the generosity of ex- Mayor E. F. Spence. Midway up is a cabin called the Half-way House, where Wilson in pioneer times made the first shingles in the county. The scenery along the route is wild and picturesque. A company has been or- ganized to build a railroad to the top of this peak, 6,000 feet above sea level. A very large sanitarium will also probably be erected here.

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HISTORY OF LOS ANGELES COUNTY.

MISCELLANEOUS.

CHAPTER XXIII.

SPANISH LAND GRANTS.

¿S early as 1784 Governor Pedro Fages granted to Manuel Nieto and Juan María Verdugo the temporary occupancy of the lands which they desired.

In Angust, 1802, the following ranches were mentioned in Los Angeles County: Nieto, Dominguez, the two Verdugos and Felix. The Simí was held by Luis Peña and Diego Pico, and Las Virgenes was held by Miguel Ortega. The Conejo Ranch was granted in 1802 or 1803 to José Polanco and Ignacio Rodriguez.

Warner says, in the Historical Sketch: "Sub seqnent to the establishment of the missions, and before the close of that century, the Spanish Government, acting through the commanding officer of California, did, at different periods of time, grant four large tracts of land lying in this county to four individuals. The area. of these tracts was from ten to twenty, or more, square leagues each. They were granted to the following persons, who had come to California as soldiers, and who had been discharged or re- tired from active service on account of their age or other canses. The Nietos Tract, embracing all the land between the Santa Ana and San Gabriel rivers, and from the sea to and including some of the hill land on its northeastern frontier, was granted by. Governor Pedro Fages to Mannel Nieto, in 1784. *

* The San Rafael Tract, * lying on the left bank of the Los Angeles River, and extending to the Arroyo Seco, wasgranted by

Governor Pedro Fages, October 20, 1784, and the grant was reaffirined by Governor Borica January 12, 1798, to José María Verdugo. The San Pedro Tract, lying along the ocean, and the estuary of San Pedro, was granted to Juan José Dominguez by Pablo Vicente Sola, December 31, 1822.

" There is much circumstantial testimony tending to show that both the Yorba and Do- minguez grants were made during the past century. Antonio María Lugo, a prominent citizen of Los Angeles, giving testimony in the District Court at Los Angeles, in 1857, said his age was seventy-six years; that he remem- bered the Pueblo of Los Angeles as early as 1785. That he had known the Verdugo, or San Rafael Ranch, since 1790. That Verdugo had had his ranch since 1784, and that it, ' San Ra- fael,' was the third oldest ranch in the county -the Nietos and the Dominguez being the oldest. * *

* Governor Borica, in 1798, issned to José María Verdugo a new or con- firinatory grant of the tract of San Rafael, which had been granted to Verdugo by Gov- ernor Fages, in 1784, so it is probable that the first title papers for San Pedro had disappeared, or were not presented to the United States Land Commissions for California. Don Manuel Do- ininguez, one of the present proprietors of the San Pedro Ranch, states positively that the grant of that tract was made in 1784."

In 1852 an act of Congress created a com- mission for the purpose of settling private land

347

HISTORY OF LOS ANGELES COUNTY.

claims in California. The board organized in Los Angeles of that year, and was composed of Hiland Hall, afterward Governor of Vermont, Harry I. Thornton and Thompson Campbell. This board was in existence several years, and heard and decided a great many contests. The State Surveyor General reports as follows the grants of Los Angeles County as determined by the commission and the conrts:

NAME OF GRANT.

CONFIRMEE.

ACRES. DATE OF PAT.

Aguaje de Is Centinella

B. Abila

2,219.26 Aug. 23, 1872

Los Alamitos

A. Stearns

28,027.17

Aug. 29, 1874

Azuas

A. Duarte

6,595.62

June 6, 1878

Aznea

Henry Dalton

4,431.47

May 29, 1876

La Ballona Boca de Santa Monica

Ysidro reys, et al. 6,656.93

July 21, 1842

Boca de Playa La Brea

E. Vejar

6,607.37

Mar. 1, 1879

Cabuega

D. W. Alexan- der, et al.

La Cañada

J. R. Scott, et al.

5,832.10

Aug. 1, 1866

Cañada de los Alisoe

J. Serrano

10,668.81

June 27, 1871

Cañada de los Nogales

J. M. Aguilar

1,199.56

May 4, 1882

Los Cerritos

Juan Temple

27,054.36

Dec. 7, 1867

l'ienega 6 Paso de la Tijera T. Sanchez, et al.

4,219.34

May 22, 1873

Las Cienegas

J. Abila, et al.

4,439.05

June 15, 1871

El Conejo

J. de la G. y Nor- iega

48,571.56 Jan. 8, 1873

1.08 Coyotes

Andres Pico, et al. 48,806.17

El Encino

V. de la Osa, et al.

4,460.73

Jan. 8, 1876

El Escorpion

Urbano, et al.

1,109.65

Dec. 11, 1873

Loa Feliz

M. Y. Berdugo

6,647.46

April 18, 1871

La Habra

Andres Pico, et al

6,698.57

.Dec. 4, 1872

Huerta de Cuati

V. Reid

128.26

June 30, 1859

Isl. of 8. Catalina

J. M. Covarrubias 45,820.43

J. M. Flores

48,799 59

June 21, 1879

Los Angeles City Landa

City of Loa An- geles

17,173.37 7 Aug. 9, 1866

Mission San Gabriel, lot near

Bp. J. S. Alemany

55.23 Dec. 4, 1875

Mission San Fernando

Bp. J. S. Alemany

76.94

May 31, 1964

Mission San Gabriel

Bp. J. S. Alcmany

190.69 Nov. 19, 1859

Ex-Mission San Fernando E. de Celis

116,858 46

Jan. 8, 1873

Loa Nogales

Maria de J. Gar-

cia, et al.

1,003.67 June 29, 1882

Los Palos Verdes

J. L. Sepúlveda, et al.

31,629.43

June 23, 1880

Passo de Bartolo, part of Passo de Bartolo, part of

B. Guirado

875.99

Sept. 27, 1867

Passo de Bartolo, part of

Pio Pico, et al.

8,991.22

Aug 5,1881

Morilla & Romero

2,042.81

June 15, 1871

J. M. Sanchez

4,431.95 July 19, 1859

Prospero Tract

R. Valanzuela, et al.

23.63

Dec. 4, 1875

Providentia

D. W. Alexander, et al.

4,064.33

Aug. 6, 1872

Rincon de la Brea

G. Ybarra

4,452.59

Nov. 14, 1864

Rincon de los Beyea

F. Higuera, et al.

3,1:27.89

Aug 27,1822

San Antonio

A. M. Lugo

29,513.35

July 20, 1866

San Antonio, or Bodeo de las Aguaa

M. R. Valdez

4,449.31 June 27, 1871

Jacoba Feliz,et al. 48,611.88

Feb. 12, 1875

Juan Silva

50.00

H. P. Dorsey

50.41

Michael White

José Ledesma

22.21

June 20, 1871

Tracts near San Gabriel

J. P. de JJ. Conrt- ney

49.29 June 20, 1871

Francisco Sales

19.43

June 20, 1871

Daniel Sexton

227.78

May 10, 1871

José Domingo

22.34

Ang. 23, 1871

Henry Dalton

8,893.62

May .30, 1867

José Sepúlveda

48,803.16

Sept 19, 1867

& Vejar

22,340.41

Jan. 20, 1875

San José, addition to

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Author: Lewis Publishing Company. cn Publication date: 1889 Publisher: Chicago, Lewis Pub. Co. Number of Pages: 1092

Author: Lewis Publishing Company. cn
Publication date: 1889
Publisher: Chicago, Lewis Pub. Co.
Number of Pages: 1092