USA > California > Los Angeles County > History of Pomona Valley, California, with biographical sketches of the leading men and women of the valley who have been identified with its growth and development from the early days to the present > Part 11
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Here also, at the Alvarado house, services were held once a month on Sunday, when the padres came out from the Mission. And there was a time when the services were held alternately here and at the Palomares house farther east on the Camino Real. And the old adobe house has witnessed a member of weddings, which among the Spaniards were great events. No money was spared to make the day as joyous as possible. However poor the family, the bride must have a fine silk dress with veil and a wreath of wax flowers in her hair, white kid gloves and slippers-all paid for by the groom. Her mother must prepare a sumptuous dinner, at whatever cost. If the money was not at hand they raffled off a cow or sold a horse, or borrowed it somewhere. Weeks beforehand the preparations began, canning fruit and chilis, pickling olives and drying meat which later would be pounded fine and served with gravy. Hogs were fattened for bacon and tamales. When at last the wedding day approached, everyone was invited. The marriage ceremony, following confession, was long and impressive, conducted by the Mission priest, and was for the most part in Latin. Arising from their knees with the benediction of the padre upon them, the gay company went to the wedding dinner. Sometimes as many as a hundred guests sat down to one of these feasts. And the Spanish housekeeper made the most of this chance to show her skill. Indians were hired to help; a large beef was killed and broiled on the coals; fried chickens and other meats were served for variety. There were steaming bowls of sopa-a Mexican dish made of boiled rice with onions and garlic and seasoned chilis, and with olives scattered through it like plums in a pudding, the whole fried to a delicious brown. Of course there was no end of sweets, like cakes, pastelles, jellies, fruits and conservas. But the most delicious dish of all, the piéce de resistance (how one's mouth waters to think of it!), was the juicy roast of young pig, stuffed with spices and brown as the crackling skin that Charles Lamb's Bobo and Hoti found so delicious. Of course there was always the dance, much as we have described it above, but with even more gallantry and fine dress. Sometimes, as in the old days, men wore, just below their knees, yards of fine ribbon with little dolls and gewgaws fastened to their flying ends.
Nearby was the scene, too, for the celebration of festival days, of which there were so many in the Catholic calendar. Above all other days one remembers San Juan Day. The favorite sport on this day was sacando el gallo. Choosing a place beside the road where it was broad and shady, they would bury a rooster in the ground, leaving only its head and neck sticking out. Then men and boys would ride far up the road, each one ready to take his turn at the play. Down the road they would gallop at full tilt, each one leaning over and trying to grab the rooster by the head. But el gallo is quick and usually dodged. Sometimes
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twenty or thirty would dash by before the rooster was caught. Sometimes a horse would shy and the rider would fall off, only to be dragged out of the way to make room for the rest. When one succeeded in catching a cock, there was great fun as he chased the others about, lambasting them with the fowl, which he still held by the head. They always rode in Mexican saddles, of course, with the big pommels, and with bridle reins of horsehair or hide or of braided leather. Other sports of San Juan Day were horse racing and trick riding, and cock fights. And then there was always a barbecue under the willows in what is now Ganesha Park. Here a fat steer was killed and a bonfire made. Then everyone got a piece of juicy meat and roasted it, holding it on a stick over the fire.
On these occasions the Burdicks, and other American families who followed them soon after, were always invited, for the generosity and hospitality of the Mexicans toward their neighbors were unlimited. Whenever one killed a hog or beef, he brought a quarter as a gift and hung it up in the cooler. And if they wanted to borrow a wagon to go to Los Angeles, it always came back in better condition than when they took it, and with something from the city to pay for the trouble. If anyone was sick, they always brought delicacies to eat and were ready to help with the work. If "Don Cy," as Mr. Burdick was familiarly called, ren- dered one some assistance, or gave some advice in a matter of business, there were sacks of grain or slabs of bacon by way of appreciation. Even when small- pox raged and whole families were wiped out, they did not desert each other, but there were plenty to care for the sick. It was doubtless this lack of precaution which accounted for the terrible toll which the disease levied upon the Mexicans. And it was even worse among the Indians, as will be noticed later.
But life at the San José Hills was not all fiesta and celebration in those days. These are the high lights in a picture full of the grey and somber colors of ordinary ranch life, when every one was hard at work. And a busy life it certainly was, when everything there was to eat, except perhaps sugar and tea and spices, was produced on the ranch, and most of the clothing was made at home.
This picture of the setting in which the Burdicks found themselves when they came to the San José would not be complete without some reference to the Indians of the Valley. Under the sycamores and willows beside the stream, just where the picnickers now eat their lunches at the tables in Ganesha Park, was an Indian "rancheria" or village. Near the Huaje, farther east on the County Road, was another, a larger encampment, which remained long after the others had disap- peared. Another was situated at the eastern edge of Indian Hill to the north of Claremont, and others still at Cucamonga and by the southern hills.
By this time the Indians were no longer a serious menace to civilization and civilized people. They lived, however, a most lazy, shiftless life, doing very little even in the way of hunting, save as they were absolutely obliged to, and drinking as much as they could get and hold. There were sometimes bad Indians among them, malditos, as Ramon Vejar calls them ; and sometimes a band of Coahuillas or "Piutes" would ride in from the mountains and bring consternation to both the Valley Indians and Mexicans alike. At one time a number of San Antonio Indians were camped on the site of Packard's place, called later the Evergreen Ranch, gathering the fruit of the cactus pear, or tuna, when a band of "Piutes" swooped down upon them and killed them all, except one girl about twelve or fourteen years old, who came running to the Vejars with an arrow hanging from her neck. At another time the Alvarados were sleeping one night in their veranda in the Huerta dle San Antonio, or Vineyard of San Antonio, as the Loop place was called, when
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a Coahuilla Indian who had been working for them attacked them with an axe. One he struck on the side of the head, severely wounding but not killing him. Another he killed outright, and then ran away. Of course a party was formed to get him. Manuel Alvarado and others hunted till they found him, and hanged him from the limb of a sycamore. While they were preparing to string him up, a certain Juan Garcia tried to persuade him to repent and pray for forgiveness, but he picked up a rock and smote his solicitous intercessor a savage blow on the side of the head. Yes, he was a maldito.
As a rule, however, the Indians of the Valley were not dangerous ; and they were available for all sorts of ordinary labor, if not too protracted or strenuous. Occasionally a fiesta was watched by the old-timers with interest, especially for the young folks, when the Indians from the tops of their jacales, or huts, would scatter strings of pinoñes, baskets and bits of silver money, which the children scampered to pick up as souvenirs. For one minded to see it, these Indian ranch- erias, with their crude jacales, their home-made pots, baskets and rugs, their open campfire, their meager nondescript clothing barely covering the dark-hued bodies, and all the other features of a semi-barbaric life, furnished a certain picturesque- ness to the scene which is now forever gone.
THE FIRST SCHOOL AND ITS TEACHER, P. C. TONNER
After the Burdicks had settled on their ranch by the San José Hills, the question of how their children were to be educated became a serious one. Their four children, except perhaps the youngest, were of school age, and there was no school in the Valley. At San Gabriel there had been schools, and there had been the Mission fathers, too, who were good instructors. Upon inquiry they found others wrestling with the same problem. At Spadra there was a considerable number of children in the Fryer, Phillips, Rubottom, and Arnett families, and no school ; and in all the haciendas about them were the children of the Palomares, Alvarado, Vejar, and Garcia families. So Mr. Burdick advised with the school trustees and with the teachers whom he had known well in San Gabriel-the Hoyts, and the Loops, and Frank Burns-and a school district was organized, called the Palomares district, with Francisco Palomares, Cyrus Burdick and Juan Garcia for its first board of trustees. A man by the name of Eskridge was chosen for the first teacher and the school was held for a time in the large room of the Alvarado house. Then a plain wooden schoolhouse was built by some sycamore trees south of the Alvarado house, much of the labor of construction being done by the trustees themselves, who drove to San Bernardino for the lumber. It was made of rough boards and cost about eighty dollars. As the school became crowded a ramada, or veranda, was built around it, covered with vines, and the roof thatched with palm leaves, for protection from the heat. The first teacher did not prove very successful, partly because he knew very little Spanish ; and the second, a Mr. McFadden, stayed but a short time on account of his health, so Mr. Burdick went to Los Angeles to find another. There he learned of a young man who seemed to be well qualified for the place. In fact, his training and qualifi- cations were far beyond the requirements of the little district school on the ranch. For he had been educated for the priesthood in the Catholic Church and could speak Latin and Greek, as well as Spanish and other modern languages. The young pedagogue with the Irish brogue and shock of red hair was P. C. Tonner. a man who was to be for twenty years the most striking character in the new
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town of. Pomona. He was looking for a position as teacher of Greek, but as such positions were not very numerous in the far west he was glad to come to the Palomares district. The children were of all ages and grades, from three-year-old infants, whom he sometimes carried to school, to big, strapping fellows of twenty or more. Some classes were held in the ramada, and Laura Burdick, oldest daughter of the trustee, assisted with the little children. Evening classes were held for a time, in which the rudiments of the Spanish language were taught.
Patrick Tonner was an original teacher, as indeed he was original in every- thing else. He taught the children much in his own way, and entertained them more, for he was fond of reading and could repeat from his well-stored memory poems and orations without end. But the responsibilities of his office rested lightly on his shoulders, and the lure of the out-of-doors, in this wonderful new country, was very attractive. And more than this, the wine of the tippler was in his veins, so that "I should" was lost in "I would." More than once Mr. Burdick, plowing in his orchard in the morning, saw Tonner go by, gun in hand, on his way from the school to the hills. "Where are you going?" Mr. Burdick would say. "Going to hunt hares," might be his reply. Or, again, he might find the schoolmaster fast asleep in a furrow of the field, and have to trundle him home in a wheelbarrow to sober off. And the next day he might recite impressively to his school Poe's "Raven"-Quoth the raven, 'Nevermore.'" This, by the way, was his favorite recitation at the Good Templars' Lodge, which later he liked to attend. So, in his way he taught the three R's, and spared not the rod, as Chileno and Juan de Dios and others may recall.
With the growth of Spadra the children from that section outnumbered those of the settlement at the San José Hills, and as they had much farther to go to school, it was decided to move the schoolhouse nearer to the village of Spadra. So it was moved to a point on the County Road some distance east of the Phillips house, "in the swag on the bank of a blind wash from San Antonio," as one recalls it, and here it was remodeled and enlarged. Then came the division of the district, and the little peregrinating schoolhouse was moved once more, this time to a point still farther east on the road, by the road crossing next west of the railway crossing. Here it stood until long after the new schoolhouse at Spadra had been built and occupied. This latter event was in the summer of 1876, the school opening in September following the dedication, which was celebrated with a big ball.
The story of the schools in Pomona, following the division of the school dis- trict and the beginning of the town, is narrated later. When the building was moved to Spadra the teacher, Mr. Tonner, gave up his teaching for the study and practice of law, and more immediately for the business of real estate.
P. C. Tonner was born in Ireland. From generations of ancestry in the Emerald Isle he inherited the keen perception and ready wit, the facile tongue, the retentive memory and the powerful intellect so characteristic of his people. He was brought to America as a boy and was placed in a Roman Catholic school at Philadelphia. When the Civil War broke out he ran away from school and cnlisted in the Federal Army. One or two others followed him, and the bishop, at the head of the school, set out to find them and bring them back. It was not an easy task, but he found them at last, and demanded their release. The officer refused to let them go; the army needed men, especially eager and husky young fellows like these ; once in, they could not be relieved. But the bishop insisted that they were under the lawful age and were bound to the parochial school. So the boys were discharged and returned to school. After this, as Tonner himself used
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to say, he was a hard case to handle, and at length he ran away again, this time making his way to California. Arriving first at San Francisco, he learned of a position which was open at the college in Monterey, where a teacher of Greek was wanted. Now Patrick was still a good Catholic, and he had received at the parochial school a large part of the training for the priesthood. With all his way- wardness he had acquired a good education and was, of course, well schooled in the classics. But when he appeared at Monterey to apply for the position they did not want him because of his youth. "We want a man, not a boy," they said. "I thought you wanted someone to teach Greek," said Tonner. "Is it a man you want, or an instructor of Greek?" "Do you know Greek?" they asked. "Try me," he replied. So they tried him, and forthwith engaged him for the place. The work was quite to his taste and he was well equipped for it; nor was he averse to following the calling for which he had been chosen. But the relations with his colleagues were not agreeable. In course of time he was obliged to discipline an unruly student, administering a severe flogging. This was the begin- ning of the end of his work in the college, and in the church, for the boy began to make trouble for him, reporting that his teaching was heretical. He was sum- moned before the authorities and questioned as to these reports. Asked if he had been teaching thus and so, he did not deny it. "Yes," he said, "that is what I think and believe to be true." "Well," they said, "you must not teach such doc- trines here." "Do you mean to say that I may not speak as I believe?" was Tonner's fierce demand, voicing the world-old cry of self-assertion and independ- ence of thought against authority. "No, you may not," was the reply. "Then I will never wear these vestments again," said Tonner, as he pulled off his priestly robe and tore it in two. So a brilliant intellect and powerful influence were lost to the church, and the man from his best estate. Turning from the life of a student and priest, he plunged into the ways of self-indulgence and masterful gain. Drinking freely, he forged the chains by which he was to be enthralled and from which he could never escape. For a time after leaving Monterey he taught at Los Nietos, and then, dismissed perhaps because of his habits, he was engaged to teach in the Palomares district, as has been narrated. The bitterness of Tonner's feeling toward the priests of the Catholic Church is expressed in his
LINES WRITTEN FOR A TILE OF THE SAN GABRIEL CHURCH
Thou vestige of an ancient race, Caught from a crumbling shrine, You recall the days when the monk's dark face Bent o'er his sacred wine. You recall the days when the Mission plain Was willow and oak and ash. E'er the Si-bag-na1 by the friar Cambor2 Was converted by lasso and leash ; You recall the days when the River Temblor3 Was a fair and lovely scene. Where the peaceful Indian dwelt content Beneath its larches green, E'er the bigot priests from cruel Spain. Salvation on their lips. Converted to Christ the Indian race With bloodhounds and with whips.
1. Si-bag-na, name of the Indian tribe living at San Gabriel.
2. Cambor, for Cambon, one of the two Franciscan monks who came to establish the Mission.
3. The San Gabriel was called El Rio de los Temblores because of the frequent earthquakes experi-
enced by those who lived near the river.
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This condemnation of the priest agrees with the arraignment by Hugo Reid, the Scotchman who married an Indian woman and lived with the Indians near San Gabriel, and he is regarded as an authority in many respects on the Indians of the Valley. Except for this opinion of Reid and a few others, we should regard this attitude of Tonner as evidently prejudiced and entirely without foundation. How small the ground was for such a judgment of the methods of the Mission fathers with the Indians may be seen from the brief account of the Missions, especially that of San Gabriel, given in an earlier chapter.
However severe his denunciation of others, there were times when Mr. Tonner was quite as bitter in self-condemnation. This was a side of his character which was little known, of course, save by his most intimate friends. Yet our estimate of the man, as we read of his strange conduct and most reprehensible acts, may be modified somewhat by the glimpses we get of a kindlier nature from some of his verses which have never been published hitherto. These finer traits, we may be sure, were known and appreciated by the young woman whom lie married, in spite of all his faults, and who stayed by him to the end-a woman of the finest character, as everyone agrees. From a poem written probably before his marriage, entitled "Penitence," these lines are significant :
But now for lack of self-control I've lost the idol of my soul For man-debasing wine, And fiercely on myself I turn, And rack my soul with pain. I've lost thy love-I know it well ; I fell from Heaven to deepest hell; It burns and racks my brain.
And there is his "Valentine to Roxy, Aetat Four":
I know a maiden fair, She's my love. In ringlets hangs her hair, She's my love. She's as sweet as sweet can be, Nothing fairer can you see, And she's all the world to me, Is my love.
(Two other verses. )
Now I'll to you confess (She's my love, And I'll never love her less, She's my love ), That this charming little queen Scarcely has four summers seen- It is my baby that I mean By "my love."
Whatever may be said of the quality of Tonner's verse, one cannot but sym- pathize with its sentiment in such a gem as this. It was a vehicle which he was fond of using whenever moved by any emotion, whether worthy or unworthy. It might be a humorous caricature of some neighbor, or a memorial ode. It might be a satirical attack on an opponent, like his "Old Nick against Loud," when he was attorney for Dr. Nichols in the great land case which he won against H. M. Loud ; or it might be a stirring patriotic call, like the "Sinking of the Maine." When the conflict was on, years later, between the liquor interests and their opponents, and men were sharply divided into two hostile camps, Tonner himself appeared to be divided, openly marshaling the forces in favor of the saloons, yet
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publishing the poem, "O Wine, Wine! Thou Most Seductive Curse of Humanity," which equals the most impassioned invectives of John B. Gough in the fierceness of its condemnation of the liquor traffic, and calls upon the voters of Pomona to drive it away. Was this hypocritical ?. No; it is quite possible that the poem may have been written while under the influence of liquor, as some of his best legal work was done in that condition, and he was fond of reciting and writing at such times. But it is just as likely that it may have been written in a moment of sin- cere revolt against the domination of the evil over himself. Those who saw the man staggering along the street or lying in the gutter, or who knew of his un- worthy acts and plans, were usually ignorant of this personal struggle for mastery and self-control, and some would doubtless be incredulous of it yet. Not only to himself and to his wife were pledges given for reform, but to intimate friends as well. One day, after the saloons had been abolished and only one or two "blind pigs" remained, a man with whom he had an important business engagement failed to find him at his office and was told that he was possibly at the Hotel. Not being a citizen of the town, he succeeded, after much persuasion, in inducing the proprietor to lead him to the bar. Through dark passageways, and through doors which were unlocked and locked again, they came to the bar, where the keeper was handing Tonner a glass of whiskey. "Have a drink," said he, and urgently insisted. "No," said his friend, "you know I don't drink, and you don't want me to. And you don't want to, either. Come, now, let us attend to that business." "All right," said Tonner, overturning the glass, "come on, little 'un." But there was a struggle later in the carriage when Tonner tried to recover a bottle which his friend had abducted from a side pocket. Yet he was not often dangerous in his cups. More often he might be seen standing by the counter, holding in one hand a full glass of wine, while for ten minutes at a time he declaimed, repeating from memory the great speeches of modern or classic orators, or perhaps some rhymes of his own, gesticulating with the free hand or with his glass, yet never tasting it until fully ready.
One might fill a volume with incidents, amusing and otherwise, of this remark - able character. One evening he wandered into a Guild social of the Episcopal Church, saying, "I like the 'Piscopalians. (hic)-they don't meddle with politics nor r'ligion." At another time, before the saloons had been closed, Constable Slanker, who had so often taken him home to sober off, saw him coming out of a saloon early in the morning after a night of drinking and poker ( for he could drink long without becoming helpless), and said to him, "Tonner, aren't you ever going to quit ?" His reply was, "I'll bet you a five-dollar hat you'll be seen in this saloon before I am." "Done," said Slanker, and from that time on Tonner was sober for a whole year, so it is claimed. Then the constable saw him again coming out of the same saloon, and began to take him to task; at which Tonner said, "You old fool, don't you ever forget? Come on over here;" and at the store across the street he said, "Give this man the best five-dollar hat in the store."
He conceived, and carried out for a time, the most audacious and far-reaching swindle on his fellow citizens, yet he was often good-hearted and generous, ready, if in the right mood, to assist in all sorts of benefits. He was especially active in canvassing subscriptions for the Catholic Church when it was built. In his chosen profession he soon became an authority. Lawyers and law students today, reading his arguments in former cases, are struck with the clearness of his reasoning and the extent and soundness of his legal knowledge.
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Young men who studied law with him-and a number who have taken high rank in the profession were thus associated with him-testify not only to his keenness but to the value of his instruction and partnership. More is said later of his real estate operations and of his connection with important movements in town.
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