USA > California > Los Angeles County > Los Angeles > Los Angeles from the mountains to the sea : with selected biography of actors and witnesses to the period of growth and achievement, Volume II > Part 37
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The second chapter in the history of the Edison Company begins with the Redlands Electric Light and Power Company, starting with the year 1892. The Redlands group had been developing hydro electric generation and long distance transmission. It comprised principally H. H. Sinclair, Henry Fisher and A. W. Decker, an electrical engineer. After organizing the company, in 1892, they set about the building of a hydro electric plant at the mouth of Mill Creek Canyon, some eight miles from the city of Redlands. Mr. Decker insisted on the installation of a three-phase system similar to one then being operated in an experimental way in Tivoli, near Rome. But much delay ensued before the plans and specifications for such a plant would be accepted by any American com- pany manufacturing electrical equipment on the ground that such a plan was "a foolish piece of business." Finally the General Electric Com- pany agreed to build two two hundred and fifty kilowatt three-phase generators. These were installed in what is now known as Mill Creek Number One Hydro Electric Plant, being the first hydro electric three- phase long distance plant in the world. These generators and the original motors connected to the transmission system, the first of the kind ever turned out by the General Electric Company, and placed in operation in 1893, are still in daily service and are operating in parallel in perfect accord with the latest creations of the art at Big Creek.
The Redlands group also organized the Southern California Power Company and acquired water rights on the Santa Ana River, and in 1899 put in operation a second station, now known as Mill Creek No. 2. Meanwhile the Los Angeles group was having trouble in keeping its power supply equal to its increasing business. It was but natural the two groups, the one having the market and the other the power, should join forces, and in June, 1898, the Southern California Power Company was taken over by the Edison Company. The Santa Ana River No. 1 plant was completed and put into operation in December, 1898, trans- mitting power at 33,000 volts to Los Angeles, sixty-eight miles away, a distance and voltage theretofore unheard of. The many difficulties and problems in this marvelous piece of electrical pioneering were solved to the lasting credit of the principal men in the organization.
In subsequent years the Edison Company rapidly expanded, acquir- ing the Pasadena Electric Light and Power Company, and entering the Pasadena field in August, 1898; purchasing the gas and electric properties of the Santa Ana Gas and Electric Company at Santa Ana in 1899, and acquiring the Redlands properties in 1901. In 1902 the Kern River projects were acquired with the purchase of the California Power Com- pany, and the same year Mountain Power Company, with Santa Ana River No. 2, was taken over.
These properties were all taken over September 1, 1902, at a
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that time the Edison Electric Company was`organized, with a capitaliza- tion of ten million dollars and an authorized bond issue of the same amount. In 1903 occurred the consolidation of the United Electric Gas and Power Company with the Edison Company, giving the latter gas and electric properties at Santa Barbara, Santa Monica and Long Beach, and electric properties at Redondo, San Pedro and Monrovia, including a steam plant at Santa Monica. In 1906 gas properties were acquired in Whittier, Pomona, Riverside, Redlands, Colton and Monrovia, but subsequently the gas properties were all sold.
The present corporation, the Southern California Edison Company, was formed in 1909, with a capitalization of thirty million dollars and an authorized bond issue of the same amount. Later the capital was in- creased to a hundred million dollars, with bond issue authorized at a hundred thirty-six million dollars. In 1909 W. A. Breckenridge came into the organization as vice president and general manager, and is now president of the company. Mr. Breckenridge is an eminent electrical engineer, and was engineer in charge of construction at the building of the hydro electric plant at Niagara Falls.
Besides the improvements and extension of existing plants and service from year to year, the next important acquisition came in 1917 with the purchase of the franchises, property and business of the Pacific Light and Power Corporation, and controlling interest in the Ventura County Power Company and several smaller companies. This purchase gave to the Edison system hydro-electric plants including the famous Big Creek plants, known all over the world, a large steam plant at Redondo, and altogether more than doubled the company's power supply. The merger was also notable because it brought into the company as its largest individual stockholder and as a member of the board of directors Henry E. Huntington, a name that speaks for itself everywhere in California.
· W. E. Dunn entered the board of directors with Mr. Huntington, bringing with him his wide knowledge of legal and practical affairs; also Howard E. Huntington, whose experience in the administrative affairs of corporations is of value to the management.
Others who came into the organization at that time were George C. Ward, now second vice president ; A. N. Kemp, comptroller, and E. R. Davis, superintendent of the Northern Division.
A few words should be added to this historical sketch to describe the status of the company at the close of 1918. The Southern California Edison Company, with its subsidiaries, most important of which are the Mt. Whitney Power and Electric Company, operating in the San Joaquin Valley, and Santa Barbara Electric Company, operating in Santa Barbara and vicinity, now has an installed capacity of 158,920 horsepower in seventeen hydro-electric plants, and 143,510 horsepower in eight steam stations, a total installation of 302,430 horsepower. All these are linked together and inter-connected by more than fifteen hundred miles of high- tension transmission lines operating at voltages ranging from 150,000 to 30,000 volts, and eight thousand miles of distributing lines, supplying electric energy to two hundred thousand consumers. This electric energy does more than light and serve transportation needs, being in fact an indispensable asset to the entire industrial work of the territory covered. The company serves with electric energy a population of more than a million people, covering an area of fifty-five thousand square miles, greater than that of New Hampshire, Vermont, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New Jersey and Delaware.
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The first steam plant operated by the company had a capacity of eighty horsepower. The capacity of the latest steam plant at Long Beach is 65,000 horsepower. The first hydro-electric plant had a capacity of 500 kilowatts; the latest, the two Big Creek plants, 32,000 kilowatts each. The first long distance transmission line was eight miles long and was operated at 2,300 volts. The latest is 240 miles long and is operated at 150,000 volts. The first company had a capitalization of five hundred thousand dollars, and the latest one hundred million dollars. These facts and figures have real significance and portray in a graphic manner some of the most important developments in Southern California during the last thirty years.
Interesting and illustrative of the growth of Southern California, as · has been the history of the company, the personal element is even more so to those who are familiar with what has been achieved. What is affectionately termed "The Edison Spirit" has dominated all of the deal- ings of officers and employees with each other and has naturally radiated to the public, giving potent force to the slogan introduced by Mr. Miller when he first took charge of its affairs: "Good service, courteous treat- ment, square dealing."
Besides Mr. Miller, Mr. Ballard and Mr. Percey, already mentioned, those prominently identified with the upbuilding of the company and in its employ over fifteen years are B. F. Pearson, general superintendent of the Southern Division, who had charge of much of the original con- struction ; S. M. Kennecy, general agent in charge of the commercial de- partment, and who has a record of developing new business for the company nearly always in advance of its generative capacity ; W. L. Frost, his assistant, who has advanced through all of the grades; John Otto, purchasing agent, who entered the service as district agent; A. W. Childs, superintendent of sales, and Dr. H. C. Stinchfield, chief surgeon.
This sketch would not be complete without tribute to the memory of the late H. H. Trowbridge, who, as general counsel for the company, solved many intricate problems, and his foresight and wisdom were sub- stantial factors in making the Southern California Edison Company a permanent institution of the Southwest.
ARTHUR GEORGE WELLS. Indelibly inscribed on the pages of rail- road history is the name of Arthur George Wells, whose strong intellect and long experience, directed in the channels of railroad business, have gained for him pre-eminence as one of the most efficient men in his line of work in the country, and for the past seventeen years he has held the responsible and dignified position of general manager of the Atchi- son, Topeka & Santa Fe Railroad. A level, cool-headed man of business may command respect because of his great capacities in managing vast enterprises and his power to change circumstances to suit his will, and may have as chosen associates others of like calibre and similar power and interests, but in order to secure the confidence and esteem of his fellowmen he must have other qualities of 'a tenderer nature to win per- sonal affection. That Arthur George Wells does possess these char- acteristics of a finer fibre his many friends in every walk of life testify, and these make him one of the best liked men in his community, as well as one of the most successful in the railroad business.
Arthur George Wells was born at Guelph, Ontario, Canada, Novem- ber 18, 1861, a son of Arthur and Georgiana Dora (Ridout) Wells. The Wells family is one of the old ones in England, and its records show that Mr. Wells' grandfather on the paternal side fought under General
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Wellington against the great Napoleon in the Spanish campaign. Until he was fifteen years old Arthur George Wells attended the public schools at Guelph, but then left school to become self-supporting, entering the railroad service, in which it was destined he was to rise rapidly. Like the majority of men in the railroad business who reach the top, he under- stands every detail of it, and his first connection with this line of en- deavor was as an apprentice machinist in the shops of the Kansas City, St. Joseph & Council Bluffs Railroad at St. Joseph, Missouri, which he entered in 1876. Having completed his apprenticeship, in 1880 Mr. Wells was made clerk of the mechanical department, leaving this road for the position of purchasing agent for the Atlantic & Pacific Railroad. It was in March, 1882, that Mr. Wells began his long career with the Atchison, Topcka & Santa Fe Railroad in a clerical position at San Marcial, New Mexico, and in June, 1882, was promoted to be chief clerk to the general superintendent of the Atlantic & Pacific Railroad at Albuquerque, New Mexico, while in 1885 he was made trainmaster of the same road, and in these connections he was able to gain an insight into the management which served to prepare him for duties involving larger responsibilities. By 1886 the ability of this alert young man brought him to the notice of those in authority, and he was made assist- ant to the general manager of the Ohio & Mississippi Railroad, and in January, 1890, he was offered and accepted the position of superintendent of the Ohio, Indiana & Western Railroad, which was merged into the Cleveland, Cincinnati, Chicago & St. Louis Railway, in the service of which road Mr. Wells remained until 1893, being superintendent suc- cessively of the Peoria, Indianapolis and St. Louis divisions. He was then made assistant to the first vice president of the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe Railroad, and was then given a general superintendency of the Atlantic & Pacific Railroad, and later was made general superintendent of the Southern California Railroad, the San Francisco Railroad and the Jan Joaquin Railroad, all branches of the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe Railroad, and in 1901 was made general manager of the Coast Lines of the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe Railroad, with headquarters at Los An- geles, California.
On October 15, 1884, Mr. Wells was married at St. Joseph, Missouri, to Gertrude Alice Barnard, a daughter of John F. Barnard. Mr. and Mrs. Wells have two daughters, namely Helen Audley, who married H. Norton Johnson and lives at Salt Lake City, Utah, and Louise. Since he cast his vote, Mr. Wells has been a stanch republican, but aside from exercising the right of suffrage, he does not participate in politics. Social by nature, he finds relaxation and congenial companionship in the Los Angeles Country, California, Pacific, Union and San Francisco Clubs and the Automobile Club of Southern California. The sound judgment and singleness of purpose which have characterized Mr. Wells' handling of the various problems which were presented to him for solution in the different positions he has held have been valuable assets to him and his roads, and he has developed with his knowledge of railroad experience a keen interest in life, an open mind and quick understanding. He is a man of personal charm, culture and widely diversified interests, and is one of the constructive citizens of his part of the country.
WILFORD E. DEMING is a veteran real estate man of Los Angeles, has been familiar with the changes and developments in real estate values for a quarter of a century, and has been one of the city's most successful operators and business men.
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He was born at Marysville in Marshall County, Kansas, July 17, 1860, a son of Dr. J. C. and Ulrica C. (Erickson) Deming. A few years after his birth his parents moved to Indiana, where his father practiced his profession as a physician in different parts of the state. Mr. Deming at- tended public school and graduated from high school at the age of sev- enteen, after which he spent one year in Purdue University. He became a successful stock raiser and farmer in Jasper County, Indiana, and re- inained there until 1892, when he sold out. A visit to Southern California soon afterward led him to make his home here permanently, and in 1894 he settled at Los Angeles. He has ever since been an independent real estate operator, handling his own properties almost entirely. One of his transactions has a special interest. In 1901 he bought from [. W. Hell- inan a piece of property on South Grand avenue between Seventh and Eighth streets, a frontage of 112 feet, at seventy dollars per front foot. Recently he was offered three thousand dollars a front foot for the same ground.
Mr. Deming is a republican. In Los Angeles January 23, 1901, he married Ruth Benedict. They have two children: Wilford E., Jr., born in 1904, attending the Los Angeles High School; and Rita, who is a student in the Intermediate High School.
ISAAC O. LEVY, secretary of the prominent general insurance agency of Behrendt & Levy Company, is a native son of Los Angeles, and has had an active business career here for over twenty years.
He was born on Fort Street, now Broadway, between Fifth and Sixth streets, where Clunes Theater stands, October 7, 1879, a son of Michel and Rebecca (Lewin) Levy. His father was born in Alsace- Lorraine, France, February 18, 1834, and came to this country in 1851, making his way to California the same year. He had varied business experiences at San Francisco, Placerville, Diamond Springs, in Somona county, also in Nevada for five years, and in 1868 moved to Los Angeles and established himself in the wholesale liquor business. After various changes the firm became M. Levy & Company, and long before the death of Michel Levy on March 27, 1905, his was recognized as the oldest house of its kind in Southern California. He also established the Los Angeles Vintage Company. His dominent characteristic was integrity and a degree of fidelity which made him the personification of good faith in business and personal life. All who knew him admired this splendid trait. It is said that he was never asked to put anything in writing when transacting a business deal. He was very liberal in behalf of all Jewish activities and charities, was a York Rite Mason, and was identified with many important phases of the growing city of Los Angeles for nearly forty years. In 1870 he married Rebecca Lewin, a native of Germany. She came to Los Angeles in 1867 and died Sep- tember 11, 1918. They left three children: Mrs. Lemuel Goldwater, of Los Angeles; Miss Therese, of Los Angeles, and Isaac O.
Isaac O. Levy graduated from the Los Angeles High School in 1897, and during the following eight years was associated with his father in the wholesale liquor business. On leaving his business he formed a partnership with Sam Behrendt in the general insurance business and they organized the Behrendt-Levy Company. In 1908 the business was incorporated with Mr. Levy as secretary and treasurer. This is one of the largest and most successful general insurance agencies in Southern California. Mr. Levy is also a director of the Moreland Truck Company. He is affiliated with Westgate Lodge A. F. and A. M., is a member of
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the Scottish Rite and Mystic Shrine, and is past president of the B'nai B'rith and a member of Corona Parlor of the Native Sons of the Golden West, the Los Angeles Athletic Club, the Automobile Club of Southern California, and in politics is independent. At Los Angeles, July 9, 1913, he married Dora Marks. They have one son, Donald Michel, born April 11, 1916.
LUCIUS K. CHASE, who came to Los Angeles in 1897, has enjoyed an enviable position as an able civil and corporation lawyer, and has been identified with many prominent cases, especially litigation over land titles, and has represented the affairs of a number of corporations.
Mr. Chase, who is also prominent in the social and civic life of Los Angeles, was born at Madison, Wisconsin, July 29, 1871, a son of Ransom J. and Mary M. (Baker) Chase. His father was a successful lawyer and the son was given the best advantages in school and home. He attended public school at Sioux City, Iowa, the Shattuck Military Academy at Faribault, Minnesota, and took his law course in the Uni- versity of Wisconsin, where he graduated LL. B. in 1896. For one year he practiced law with his father at Sioux City, and in 1897 came to Los Angeles, and from the first has been specializing in corporation and civil law. He is counsel for the Security National Bank and a director and counsel for a number of corporations.
Mr. Chase owns several hundred acres of ranch land in the Palo Verde Valley, devoting this land to the cultivation of cotton and alfalfa. Some years ago he became interested in the law suit of California vs. United States, involving a tract of fifty thousand acres. He was em- ployed as attorney to represent the settlers of Palo Verde Valley. Cali- fornia claimed all the swamp lands of that valley, but Mr. Chase suc- ceeded in defeating the claims of the state in behalf of the actual settlers.
Mr. Chase was for five years a director of the Chamber of Com- merce and is now chairman of the Chamber of Commerce Advisory Board in the matter of the Arizona-California River regulation. He is a member of the Los Angeles City Board of Education and was chair- man of the Finance Committee therefor for the years 1917-18. He belongs to the Southern California Lodge No. 278, F. and A. M., Los Angeles Commandery No. 9, K. T., and is also a Scottish Rite Mason and Shriner, a member of the Beta Theta Pi College Fraternity, the Military Order of the Loyal Legion, and has been a member of the Cali- fornia Club since 1899, and is a member of the Los Angeles Country Club, City Club and Chamber of Commerce. Politically he is a re- publican.
At Los Angeles, January 1, 1900, Mr. Chase married Marie E. Watkins. Her father, D. F. Watkins, was a Congregational minister and went as a missionary of his church to Old Mexico in 1871. Mr. and Mrs. Chase have three children : Lucius Foster, born in 1901, a graduate of the Los Angeles High School and now a student in the Uni- versity of California ; Ransom W., born in 1904, and David P., born in 1908, students in the public schools of Los Angeles.
HYMAN SCHWARTZ is a Los Angeles lawyer, whose connections have been of steadily growing importance, and whose life record, for a man of his years, is one of great interest and inspiration.
He was born at Rene, Russia, February 12, 1887. The family crossed the ocean to New York City in 1900, lived there until 1907, and the parents have since lived in Los Angeles, where Jacob Schwartz is propri- etor of the New York Bottling Works.
yours truly
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As a boy in his native country Hyman Schwartz attended a gymna- sium, the equivalent of a college in this country. In New York City he perfected his knowledge of the English language and also took courses in chemistry and mechanical drawing. After coming to Los Angeles he pursued the study of law in the night classes of the University of South- ern California. During the day he was working as bookkeeper for Cun - ningham, Curtis & Welch, the largest stationery house in Los Angeles. He proved a valuable man to that organization, was made assistant credit man, and was outside salesman for the last two and a half years before he began active practice in 1912. Mr. Schwartz is now attorney for his old employers. He was admitted to the California bar in 1912 and has since been admitted to practice in the Federal Courts. He enjoys a good general practice, and among other interests he is secretary and partner in the Pacific Rock Salt Company of Los Angeles. In 1916 he organized what was known as the Engineering Construction Company, located on North Main Street. He was its president until he sold out his interests in 1918. This company manufactured aeroplane parts, pumps and flota- tion machines. Mr. Schwartz sold out his interest in the business pre- paratory to getting his services accepted in the army.
Mr. Schwartz, whose offices are in the Van Nuys Building, is a re- publican in politics, though he voted for Wilson at the second term. He is a member of Los Angeles Lodge No. 42 F. and A. M., the oldest Masonic Lodge in the city. He is also affiliated with Lodge No. 99 of the Elks. At Los Angeles February 12, 1912, he married Miss Esperance Silver- berg. She was born in Chicago and was educated in the grammar and high schools of that city. Her father, Dr. Henry M. Silverberg, was a practicing dentist in Chicago for about twenty years and since 1910 has lived in Los Angeles.
EDGAR E. SELLERS. There are many notable examples in southern California of the power and productiveness of an idea, and perhaps none more recent and notable than the chain of Pacific Tea and Coffee Stores, which now extend up and down the Pacific Coast to the number of half a hundred or more. The man responsible for the idea and great growth and prosperity of the Pacific Coffee Stores is E. E. Sellers, an expert coffee man. He has had a long experience in every branch of the busi- ness, from clerk to importer, and his genius consists largely in one fact, that once a good idea came to him he had the faith and the energy to carry it out and make it a success.
Edgar E. Seliers was born at Barry, Pike county, Illinois, January 19, 1865, a son of George W. and Sarah (Fletcher) Sellers. He gradu- ated from high school at nineteen, and then for two years taught, after which he moved with his family to Kansas, his father buying a ranch near Newton. After some experience on the farm Mr. Sellers became a traveling salesman for the Nave-McCord wholesale grocery house of St. Joseph, Missouri. He was with them four years and then went with William Schotten & Company of St. Louis, a wholesale coffee house. His first work there was as sample boy, and later he was with the firm as a traveling representative for eleven years. In 1894 he opened a small retail coffee store at Sedalia, Missouri, and gradually developed it until he was supplying many stores as a wholesaler. He sold out his Missouri business in 1903 and moved to Denver, Colorado, becoming coffee buyer. tester and manager of the coffee department of the Morey Mercantile Company. In that capacity he gained a knowledge of coffee that made him a real expert, a knowledge extending all the way from the coffee plantation to the point of consumption.
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Mr. Sellers resigned his position in Denver in 1913, and coming to Los Angeles in the fall of that year opened up the first exclusive coffee store at Long Beach. That was the origin of the Pacific Coffee Stores Company, his partner being O. E. Adamson. Mr. Sellers put into practice many original ideas in the building and equipment of the coffee stores. Nearly all of them are housed in neat brick and glass buildings, "some in the business districts of cities and towns and others located conveniently to the great highways of automobile traffic. One essential feature of the plan is the installation of complete roasting machinery, so that the coffee can be delivered hot from the roaster in bags and sold direct to the customer, eliminating much of the handling and additional costs imposed between the coffee plantation and the coffee store. A familiar name for the Pacific Coffee Stores is "Coffee Stations," and from a beginning of one store at Long Beach the chain has grown link by link until in the spring of 1919 there were fifty-one stores on the Pacific Coast, and also in Reno, Nevada, and Ogden, Utah. At that time a hundred and twenty people were employed, most of them being taught the full details and the roasting and blending of coffee, and to know the goods they were selling. In 1918 the chain of stores sold over two million pounds of coffee, with an aggregate value of half a million dollars. Each store is a manufacturing plant, and all the buying and selling makes an automatically checked system, so there is no guess- ing on what is being made.
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