USA > California > Los Angeles County > Pasadena > History of Pasadena, comprising an account of the native Indian, the early Spanish, the Mexican, the American, the colony, and the incorporated city, occupancies of the Rancho San Pasqual, and its adjacent mountains, canyons, waterfalls and other objects of interest: being a complete and comprehensive histo-cyclopedia of all matters pertaining to this region > Part 46
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helplessly down the steep, rocky declivity 800 feet to the bottom - of course being killed, his pack torn into tatters, and the provisions scattered all along the slope, as food for mountain animals and insects. Fortunately, the young men themselves managed to get safely across the danger-stretch, and hastened on down to their comrades. Four of the party returned to try and reach the horse to see if he was killed, and to recover what they could of the lost baggage and supplies. It was a climb for life, perilous at every step. The horse was dead. They recovered a few things, and returned to camp very sad and very tired. They stayed in camp all next day to rest ; then the whole company went to Barley Flats, these being the first women who had ever climbed to that long-famed mountain hunting ground. They all returned home by way of Switzer's trail, the girls having walked the entire round - about sixty miles in all.
HARVARD TELESCOPE POINT, or " Signal Peak."-Directly back from Mount Harvard, and a little westward, at the summit of the range, there is a slight elevation above the main ridge line, and here is where the Harvard 23-inch photographing telescope stood from May 1, 1889, until late in 1890: hence the name. The instrument was in constant use both night and day, when there was no obscuring clouds, taking photographic views one foot square, which, when properly placed together, formed a complete and accu- rate map of all planets, satellites, stars or nebulae visible from that point during one entire year. And some objects in the star-world were there brought to view and recorded which had never been seen by mortal eye before. This work was conducted by Prof. - King. Up to January I, 1890, there had been taken 1155 of these photographs. The same instru-
PROFFESSOR
JACK .
OBSERVATORY CASINO- 1894.
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ment is now, 1894, doing a similar work at Arequipa, Peru, at a station 8,050 feet above sea level-over 2,000 feet higher than Mount Wilson. [See article "Wilson's Trail" for account of how the instrument was trundled up to Mount Wilson.] This point was often spoken of as Wilson's Peak ; but the highest part of Mount Wilson lies about a mile farther east, toward a crag called Echo Rock, which looks down a tremendous precipice into a branch of Santa Anita canyon. The telescope site was formerly called "Signal Peak," as I find it described in the Pasadena Valley Union of May 21, 1886, which says :
"The high point or peak of mountain visible from Pasadena which forms the summit at the head of the old Wilson trail is known as 'Signal Peak,' from its long use by parties who had climed that trail making a fire there in the evening to signal their friends below that they had arrived safely at the top."
The Mount Wilson Toll Road Company has converted the observatory building into a series of guest rooms called "Observatory Casino," which forms an Annex to their Mount Wilson Camp resort for invalids and tourists.
PRECIPICIO PEAK .- From the summit of Mount Wilson, or Harvard Point, there extends westward a long, narrow stretch of mountain crest, including what is called "Knife-Blade Ridge," and terminating at Precipicio Peak, from whose top the visitor looks down southwardly into a gulf of steep, precipitous and terrifying depth called "Eaton Canyon," although its official or recorded name is Precipicio Canyon, which was its old Spanish name. On the north side he looks down a more gradual and wooded slope, though quite as deep, into the west fork of the great San Gabriel canyon and its historic river. And on the west side he looks down into a heavily wooded deep valley or mountain gap which forms a sort of pass from Eaton canyon through to West San Gabriel canyon, and is the great gulf of separation between the Mount Wilson and the Mount Lowe systems of adjunct peaks, ridges, spurs, etc. The Precipicio peak and the sharp ridge leading to it are plainly seen from Pasadena, and have a little historic asso- ciation which I quote from a document of the time, October, 1891 :
"Dr. and Mrs. Reid clambered all day over craggy peaks, and along spaces thickly strewn with sharp, angular fragments of rocks, and through thorny chapparal, and through a small but grand pine grove, and for several rods along the crest of a dividing ridge [the "Knife-Blade," as John Muir called it] so narrow that they could stand erect and from either hand on op- posite sides drop a stone that would plunge down 2,000 feet before it could strike anything which might stop its downward course. Mrs. Reid [then over 65 years old] went nearly two miles farther on this difficult line than any woman had ever gone before."
Since Echo Mountain and Mt. Lowe came into such pre-eminent fame, inen have crossed a few times between them and Mt. Wilson, following
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this ridge to the Eaton gap, thence by way of Grand Basin to the Mt. Lowe bridle road at Castle canyon summit .*
MUIR'S PEAK .- This is the next peak west, and is the sunrise point seen from Echo Mountain during June and July. This peak is the summit of the great sloping ridge which forms the east wall of Rubio canyon and west wall of Pine canyon. The first white man ever known to have stood on this peak was the famous John Muir, who, in August, 1875, climbed up here from below Eaton canyon falls. [See article on " John Muir's Moun- tain Climb in Pasadenaland," Chapter 20.]
ECHO MOUNTAIN, takes its name from a wonderful echo that booms and rolls and reverberates from the mountain walls that form a sort of semi- circle around and above it, westward, north, and eastward. Directly north- west from Echo Mountain, and plainly visible from Pasadena, is a bold facing of white rocks [feldspathic syenite] that extends up to the crest or summit ridge, along which pine trees are seen ; this mountain facing or wall of white rocks is semi-circular in form, and constitutes distinctively the "Echo Ampitheater."
MOUNT VESUVIUS .- A detached spur of the front range a little north and east from Echo Mountain, and perhaps 1,000 feet higher, has been given this name, because for several months in 1893 fireworks were dis- played from its summit every Saturday night at nine o'clock, and always ending with a piece that represented in miniature a volcanic eruption of Mount Vesuvius. These luminous displays were visible not only at Rubio Pa- vilion and Echo Mountain, but also at Pasadena, Los Angeles, Santa Monica, Redondo, Long Beach, etc.
MOUNT LOWE. - This is the boldest and most bulkish mountain mass seen north of Pasadena, and lies, with its three-wave outline, like some extinct monster of past ages basking lazily on the mountain top. It is the highest one of the Pasadena mountains which can be seen from Pasa- dena, and is commonly spoken of as 6,000 feet altitude; but Wm. H. Knight, president of the Science Association of Southern California, in- forms me that according to reckonings of the U. S. Geodetic survey, its highest point is 6, 100 feet above sea level. It was called "Oak Mountain " by hunters, and the early settlers of Pasadena ; but on September 24, 1892, it was for good and sufficient reasons formally christened "Mount Lowe," and has since become world-famed under that name. Full particulars of this christening will be found in the chapter on the Mount Lowe Electric Railway. On October 11, 1887, Owen and Jason Brown, assisted by Calvin Hartwell, erected a stone monument and flag pole on this summit, and left a
* As early as 1883-84 Byron O. Clark and H. C. Kellogg had crossed over, and then projected a wagon road up the entire length of Millard and Grand Canyons, thence across to Wilson's Peak. It's "awfully easy" to build mountain roads-on paper.
24
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written record claiming it as Brown's Peak .* But afterward the Browns claimed another peak west of Millard canyon for their name, and com- menced building a bridle road up to it from Las Casitas.
STRAWBERRY PEAK [?]-The top of this can be seen like a little old New England haystack peeping over the west shoulder slope of Mount Lowe. It was named by some wags at Switzer's camp in 1886, from its fancied resemblance to a strawberry standing with its blossom end up ; but one of them said, " We called it Strawberry peak because there weren't any strawberries on it." The joke took ; and that burlesque name has been commonly used by the old settlers ; but the peak is waiting some worthy oc- casion for a worthy name .; This lofty peak is really back in the third range of Pasadena Mountain summits-and in front of it is seen a smaller portion of a lower and smaller cone called
BLACK JACK PEAK .- [It was also called " Little Strawberry peak."] This is simply a spur from the foregoing, but has a distinct pinnacle of its own, very steep, rugged, sharp, and difficult of ascent, and composed en- tirely of a. porphyritic rock called "black spar" by the miners. In 1887 Owen and Jason Brown climbed to the top of this flinty, hard, barren pin- nacle, but I doubt if any other men have ever been venturously persistent and hardy enough to do it. They called it "Black Jack," as a perfectly natural and fitting name from the color and hardness of its rock substance ; but this name had likewise very vivid historic associations to them, from Black Jack in Kansas, where they with their father fought in June, 1856, what was in fact the first actual battle in our great national struggle against the lawless encroachments of the slave power. [The battle of Osawatomie occurred August 30, 1856-two months later.]
MOUNT DISAPPOINTMENT .- Next westward is a long stretch of moun- tain crest or ridge, not a peak, which obtained its name in this way : The United States surveyors were working their way eastward along the moun- tain ranges; and from San Fernando range they sighted this mountain as their next highest point on which to establish the government record -- but on coming here and testing its altitude they were "disappointed " to find that San Gabriel peak, a few miles farther east, was still higher. Accord- ingly they named it "Mount Disappointment," and went along to the higher peak to build their monument and deposit their official records. July 4, 1889, Mr. Herve Friend, the photogravure artist of Los Angeles, took views from the summit of Mount Disappointment, the first ever taken there.
SAN GABRIEL PEAK .- Called also "The Commodore; " and in the Mount Lowe literature called "Observatory Peak." Only the tip of it can be seen, as a small ridge extending eastwardly from a point low down on the
* In July, 1883, I saw this monument or cairn standing there yet ; but the written paper had long before been destroyed by wetness or insects ; and the flag-pole had gone to make some hunter's camp- fire.
t Prof. Lowe informs me that he has government authority to give names to any peaks within the itinerary of his great mountain railroad resort.
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east slope of the Mount Lowe tri-crest. Of course as seen from Pasadena it looks lower than Mount Lowe, and seems a part of the same, although being several miles farther north. But when there happens to be snow on its summit and not on the front range, then it shows its separateness very distinctly. The United States surveyors ignored the old Spanish name of " Sierra Madre " for these mountains, and called them San Gabriel moun- tains, because they are so extensively ramified with canyons and creeks tributary to the San Gabriel river ; and this peak being the highest of all- 6,723 feet- they put it on record as "San Gabriel peak," the chief of the range ; hence this is its name as given upon all official maps or documents. The name " Commodore " was given to it by some wags at Switzer's camp, 'which was a favorite resort far up in the Arroyo Seco canyon some eight or ten years ago,' in facetious honor of Mr. C. P. Switzer who had built the famous trail and tourist-resort camp which bore his name. They humor- ously dubbed him "Commodore " of the fleet of burros which navigated the intra-montane Arroyo Seco by way of Switzer's trail-and then dubbed this highest peak " The Commodore," after him ; and that burlesque name was quite commonly used for it. Big and little Strawberry peak, Walker's peak, Lucky camp, and various other points were named in this same spirit of fun and waggery, and given currency through newspaper reports. The name " Observatory Peak " was applied to it by Prof: Lowe, as being the grandest " observation " point in all these mountains. And the Mount Lowe Rail- way company promises in due time to make this peak accessible to their guests, and provide it with instruments for observing the wonderful scope of mundane things-of mountains, plains, deserts, valleys, cities, beaches, harbors, coast line, ocean expanse, dotting islands, etc., which can be seen from its lofty summit.
The first and only woman who had ever achieved the ascent of San Gabriel peak, up to January 1, 1895, was Mrs. Herve Friend of Los Angeles, whose husband, a prominent photogravure artist, made the first photo- graphic views ever taken on this loftiest point of our Pasadena mountains. This occurred on August 26, 1893. The party had to camp over night on the wooded ridge which connects Mount Markham and San Gabriel peak, in order to be able to make the ascent and then return to Echo moun- tain the same day. There was no path, trail or waymark beyond Rattle- snake spring ;* and as they had to carry their lunch and water supply, besides a heavy 8x10 photogravure camera, with its adjustable and stout tripod stand and a stock of exposure plates, and find their own way just as if no
* August 4th, 1893, Jason Brown went afoot from Echo mountain to Black Jack peak, to find for me the date when he and Owen climbed to its summit and gave it the name. He thought he could get back as far as Crystal Springs cabin the same night, but found it impossible to do so, and had to lie out all night, without food, blankets or shelter, on the northwest slope of San Gabriel peak. Early in the morn- ing he made his way to where he knew of a trickle of water from a crack in the solid rock. A large rattlesnake lay coiled right at the spring. He killed it, and I now have the rattles in my collection. And thus came the name, "Rattlesnake spring." Our party obtained water there when making this ascent, August 26. That snake had eleven rattles.
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human foot had ever been there before, it was an arduous climb-requiring over three hours of steady hard work to reach the summit. The party con- sisted of Herve Friend and wife, Dr. H. A. Reid, Jason Brown, and a young man named Mahlon. They found the monument or cairn built by the men of the U. S. Geodetic survey ; also the tin canister or safe for containing their official records, but the most important of these were missing-had been stolen away. When all had fairly reached the top, and were full of the sublimity and wonder of it, Jason Brown suddenly spoke: "Now I'm going to kiss the first woman who ever stood on the highest point of the San Gabriel mountains." And with that the grizzled old man put his bare bronzed arm around Mrs. Friend and kissed her, as gracefully as a French dancing master. She was taken by surprise, and stood in a sort of dazed amazement, blushing all over, but offered no resistance or resentment. A brisk cold shower of rain came on while the party were eating their lunch ; and being wholly unprepared for such a phenomenon in Pasadenaland in the month of August, they could only tip their heads to the wind and take the cold wetting as it came. But fortunately it soon passed over. The descent to camp where their burros had been left occupied two hours of careful, cautious and sometimes perilous clamber work .*
MOUNT MARKHAM .- This is a peak somewhat higher than Mount Lowe but not visible from Pasadena. It is connected with the main body of Mount Lowe by a narrow neck or ridge perhaps a hundred rods long, and also with San Gabriel peak by a similar but much shorter ridge-and these ridges are the divide whose east-slope waters flow into Eaton canyon and thence to the San Gabriel river, while their west-slope waters flow into the Arroyo Seco and thence to the Los Angeles river. It was named in honor of H. H. Markham, who first as congressman and then as governor, had won the highest public distinction of any Pasadenian.
SQUARE-TOP [also called Table mountain] is a lesser peak between San Gabriel and Strawberry peaks; and takes its name from the striking and peculiar flatness of its summit. It also is not visible from Pasadena.
GIDDINGS PEAK .- June 18, 1886, the Valley Union said : "Mr. E. W. Giddings [he was assisted by Calvin Hartwell .- ED.] has planted an im- mense white flag on a mountain summit next east of Millard canyon which is hereafter to be known as Giddings Peak, in honor of the famous old anti- slavery statesman of Ohio." The point referred to does not show as a distinct peak from Pasadena, but is the westernmost monticle of the Echo wall-crest that forms the northwesterly white-rock wall of Echo ampitheater.
*After this chapter was all ready for the press, I learned that a statement was published in the Weekly Star of August 5, 1891, signed by C. P. Switzer, to the effect that Mrs. J. D. Hooker of Los Angeles, and her sister Miss Bessie Putnam of San Francisco, made the climb from " Lucky camp," to the summit of Commodore [San Gabriel] peak on July 2.1, 1891, with Will H. Hibbie as guide; and that no woman had ever ascended that peak before. He also said that Mrs. Hooker had five years previously made the climb from his camp to the top of Mount Disappointment, being the first woman who ever set foot on its lofty crest. This was before any burro trail had been made there.
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It is marked "Grizzly Point " on the map of these mountains published by the Mount Lowe Railway Co. in 1893, the author of which probably did not know that this point had ever been named before. But the Giddings family had made a burro trail up to it from Millard canyon six years before the mountain railroad company's advent. However, they had not kept it open ; it was much overgrown, had lapsed into fragmentary hunting trails, and their claiming and naming of it remained only as a reminiscent scrap of history. As seen from the Giddings farın it looks like a distinct moun- tain peak.
BROWN'S PEAK .- In front of Mount Disappointment as we look from Pasadena there is a stretch of front range summit ridge, with four or five slightly elevated knobs, and one of these (perhaps the middle one) was called Brown's peak. The Valley Union of December 4, 1881, said: "Owen Brown, son of 'Old John,' arrived here Monday, November 30, from Put-in-Bay, Ohio, to join his brother Jason, and sister (Mrs. Ruth B. Thompson), already here. He is a man nearly 60 years of age." Again, June 18, 1886, the same paper said :
"Owen Brown, residing with his brother Jason on the Mountain Home tract, has made claim and mounted his flag on a mountain summit above Prieta canyon (the same that has been called "Negro canyon "). Owen Brown is the only man now living who was with John Brown, his father, at " Land of Sunshine," April, 1895. Harper's Ferry, and his mountain OWEN BROWN'S GRAVE. summit will be known as the "John [See page 322.] Brown Peak." He is building a horseback trail to carry visitors to the mountain top, and many persons will go there from historic sympathy or curiosity. Jason Brown has eighty acres of mesa land and also a timber claim in same vicinity."
And still again, January 29, 1887, the Union reported that Brown's trail was completed about half way up. But this ended it. They had no funds, were obliged to earn their daily bread, and never built their trail any farther. Owen died January 8, 1889, and lies buried on top of a foot-hill spur above Las Casitas. Jason was employed a year or two on Echo Mountain, but finally in March, 1894, he went back to his old home at Akron, Ohio.
The other mountain summits seen still farther westward in the same
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range are beyond the Arroyo Seco; and hence, not being within the borders of Pasadenaland, are not matters for record in this volume.
HODGE'S PEAK .- Looking across the Arroyo to the great hills back of Linda Vista, the most conspicuous one northward is on a 45-acre tract which Dr. J. S. Hodge purchased from J. D. Yocum in 1888, and built a wagon road twelve feet wide to its summit. This site is 1,800 feet above sea level ; there is a well on it ten feet deep which yields water not less than two feet in depth even in the dryest time of the year; the view from here lias free scope east and west, and from mountain to sea-a landscape of more sur- passing extent and grandeur than from any other point accessible by car- riage road.
LINDA VISTA PEAK .- This is the next highest point south and a little I west from Hodge's peak, and back of Linda Vista. There is a bridle road to its summit ; and it was in the east slope of this sub-mountain that some gold mining was done by J. W. Wilson and son in 1887-
JUMBO KNOB .- This is the great, bold terminal knob of the Linda Vista crescent of hills, which juts out toward the Arroyo Seco, opposite reservoir hill on Orange Grove Avenue. It was so named in 1884, from a fancied resemblance to the head of Barnum's famous and historic but ill- fated monster elephant, Jumbo-the protruded ridge in front representing his trunk reaching down for water.
BUZZARD CLIFF .- This was a jutting spur or crag of the San Rafael hills, and the Scoville road now winds across its terminal point. In the early days this was a notable roosting and nesting place for turkey buzzards; and I remember of once, in 1884, counting twenty-seven of these scavenger birds circling around and over it at one time.
CANYONS, WATERFALLS, ETC.
THE GLACIAL TERRACE CANYONS .- From Raymond Hill eastward to San Marino there is a line of bluffs, perfectly corrugated with small canyons which are perennial water courses, and all of them have historic association with the days and doings of the San Gabriel Mission regime. For reasons fully set forth in the chapters on Geology, Hydrology, and Prehistoric Man in Pasadena, I designate this line of bluffs (and also westward to Columbia Hill) as the "Glacial Terrace." The Garfias spring, Ed Baker's spring, and others on the Arroyo Seco, are parts of the same general system of glacial terrace leak-spots ; but those from Raymond to San Marino form a distinct- ive and characteristic group.
RAYMOND CANYON .- The Raymond brook from the springs near Ray- mond station on the Santa Fe railroad flows down this canyon, and finally makes a great, troublesome outwash on the line between the Raymond Im- provement Co.'s land and the Gov. Stoneman place. During the Spanish or Mexican occupancy, this stream and outwash were known as the "Ar-
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royo San Pasqual." The Pasadena, Ramona and Los Angeles railroad (now the Southern Pacific) partly cuts the course of this Raymond canyon.
LOS ROBLES CANYON .- At the foot of Los Robles Avenue, where it ends blunt against the Los Robles ranch fence [Stoneman's], which is the south line of Pasadena city, there is a body of springy land which gives rise to the east branch of the stream that forms this canyon -its first spring being on the south side of Wallis street. Then a few rods westward there is another spring brook, which is the outlet of another body of boggy or marsh land that extends northward to and above the junction of Euclid Avenue and Maine street, and thence diagonally across Los Robles Avenue northeastward nearly to California street. These two brooks come together and form Los Robles creek and canyon near the upper line of J. E. Jardine's picturesque and beautiful five-acre home place on its west bank. Below this place it turns eastward and joins
OAK KNOLL CANYON .- This takes its rise in some water-bearing land on the west side of Oak Knoll tract on line with the foot of Moline [El Molino] Avenue. Here the O. K. company has sunk wells, water trenches, and tunnels to provide pipe water for their subdivision ; but the original streamway or canyon extends down between Oak Knoll and Allendale to the head of Willowdale creek, where it is joined by Los Robles creek .* And it was near this point that the Mission Fathers started their ancient ditch which led these waters along on the side of the bluff down to their stone flouring mill. This stream has been called " Mill Spring creek," be- cause of the padres' use of it; also "Willowdale creek," from the name "Willowdale " given to his place by Capt. J. Elwood Ellis, who resided here during the early years of the Pasadena colony settlement ; also " Hutchinson's creek," from a Mr. Hutchinson, who commenced in 1858-59 to raise strawberries, vegetables, etc., on its banks ; also "Richardson's creek," from Solomon Richardson, who became a partner with Hutchinson in 1868, and resides there yet. Of course the first name has the historic preference.
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