by Paul R. Spitzzeri
Our latest “Read All About It” offering pores through the pages (all four of them) of the 3 January 1875 edition of the Los Angeles Herald, which has plenty of interesting content relating to the Angel City during the peak of its first growth and development boom, which began about seven years prior. As has been noted here on several occasions, F.P.F. Temple was one of the leading business figures in the emerging city during that period and his name features rather prominently in the issue.
Under the “Local Brevities” section, with short bursts of news, we find that “Rain! Rain!! Rain!!! is the prayer of the farmers” and, while official records for rainfall begin in 1877, there were unofficial sources prior to that, including two residents of Los Angeles, these being farmer Oliver H. Bliss, who recorded 16.25 inches for the winter of 1874-1875, and merchant Charles Ducommun, who measured 21.67 inches, and someone only identified as Bennett, possibly William J., who was an orange grower in the 1880 census, with this Pasadena resident determining that 15.10 inches fell during the season.
It was also recorded that “the wine production of Los Angeles, for the past season, was about 2,000,000 gallons,” presumably this meant the county, including the operation at William Workman’s ranch at La Puente, where his grandson, Francis, supervised the 100-acre vineyard of about 100,000 vines and the three brick wineries that stood directly south of the Workman House.
Another item of note was that Los Angeles City Treasurer James J. Mellus, whose parents were early Angel City merchant Francis Mellus and Adelaida Johnson (whose second husband was David W. Alexander, a former store owner with Mellus and a close friend of the Workman and Temple family), “has made his official deposits with Temple & Workman,” this referring to the safekeeping of city funds, totaling some $23,000, with the bank on the promise of a princely 7% rate of interest.
It is rare to find much mention in the city’s press of people of color, but this section quickly noted that “the colored troops may not fight well, but they certainly dance well,” as the recently formed Temple Guards, whose captain was Lewis G. Green, who’d served in the Mexican-American War, “had a dance last night.” Why the militia, formed in August 1874, was deemed not of martial readiness is not known, but Green also told the Los Angeles Express on the 4th that the event at Leck’s Hall was to celebrate Emancipation Day for President Abraham Lincoln’s epochal Emancipation Proclamation, freeing all African-American slaves, issued on New Year’s Day 1863.
In the real estate transactions listing, there was reference to “Biddie,” or Biddy, Mason selling, for $1,500, half of a lot on the west side of Spring Street between Third and Fourth streets to John H. Jones, a stable and hay yard owner, and others. Today, the Broadway Spring Center is on this spot and the Biddy Mason Memorial Park, honoring this remarkable Black woman, is at the rear of the building.
Speaking of property, it was observed that the state and county tax list for 1874 amounted to a quarter-million dollars, of which $200,000 was paid up and the delinquent amount, with names of owners and property descriptions, as well as amounts owned, published in the press, subject to a 5% penalty. County Recorder Jeffrey W. Gillette told the Herald that “real estate is lively.”
Another of the eight transactions listed was the purchase by United States Senator John P. Jones of Nevada from Robert S. Baker of 75% of the Rancho San Vicente (a.k.a., San Vicente y Santa Monica) and three-quarters of Baker’s interest in the adjacent Rancho Boca de Santa Monica for $162,500. Jones, a mining magnate, was in the process of developing the new seaside resort town of Santa Monica at the time.
Baker was married to Arcadia Bandini Stearns, whose late husband, the prominent merchant Abel Stearns (who died in 1871), held enormous quantities of real estate and left her very wealthy—the Baker Block, completed a few years later, was built on the east side of Main Street where Stearns’ El Palacio adobe residence was situated. The impressive Baker structure was razed in 1942 and U.S. 101 runs through the site now. Another recorded transaction was Benjamin D. Wilson transferring ten acres at Wilmington to a group for a “M.E. Church South College.” Known as Wilson College, the institution later moved north to a tract adjacent to Agricultural Park and, in 1880, became the University of Southern California, which was Methodist affiliated until early in the 20th century.
Other news items on the third page included “The Racing Outlook,” specifically the leasing of Agricultural Park’s horse racing track to Major W.J. Welch, who’d recently returned from San Francisco with commitments of owners there to bring their steeds south so that “excellent speed contests are promised the people of Los Angeles in the immediate future.” It was added that “the new lessee is erecting a fine club house” and the first races under the new operation were to be held on the 15th. Agricultural Park later became Exposition Park.
In advance of the races and all of wagering that would be associated with it, the Evangelical Alliance was holding its Week of Prayer in the Fort Street Methodist Episcopal Church, completed in 1870 at Fort (renamed Broadway two decades later) and Third Street. Reporting that “the various branches of the Protestant church [were] uniting in the services,” these were held at 7 p.m. from Monday the 4th through Saturday the 9th and “all Christians and others are cordially invited.
Each day had a focus: Thanksgiving and confession; National objects for Prayer (civil government, as well “the increase of intelligence, the purification of public opinion, and the spread of free institutions throughout the world”; Home objects for Prayer, including members of families, but also schools, the ministry, the Y.M.C.A., and Sunday schools; Foreign objects for Prayer, including “the extension of religious liberty throughout the world,” world peace, and “the subordination of international intercourse, commerce and science, to the spread of Christ’s kingdom;” Missionary objects for Prayer, such as “the conversion of the Jews,” “the deliverance of the nation from superstition,” and “the conversion of the world for Christ;” and, lastly, Prayer for Religious Revival, including the “increase in zeal, spirituality, and devotedness” for churches and “a clearer witness for the truth among them.”
Beyond the purported evils of horse racing and gambling, the “Court Reports” section, in addition to civil suits such as Temple and Juan Matias Sánchez suing Charles Dameron over presumed squatting on their lands near El Monte, and probate hearings like that for the wife of future Inglewood founder (and current Centinela tract developer with Temple) Daniel Freeman, there were a trio of criminal cases against baker John Rump, blacksmith John Wilson and Frank Rivers with these proceedings said to “have been dragging their length along for years” as “the defendants are charged with leasing property to bawds,” meaning prostitutes or proprietors of “houses of ill fame.”
Another article, called “Our Mineral Wealth,” continued reporting of the Herald concerning “discoveries of mineral wealth made in the mountains surrounding San Fernando” and quoted former state senator Charles Maclay, founder in 1874 of the new town of that name, “that the discoveries are ten fold more valuable than reported.” The piece continued that,
Prospectors are out in all directions, and the excitement at San Fernando is red hot, and daily increasing . . . Senator Maclay himself has been out on a prospecting tour, and a few days ago he discovered a tin mine, some twelve miles north of the town . . . At least twenty discoveries of tin, just as rich, have been made in the past few weeks.
Also claimed were deposits of coal and cinnabar, while “at least half a dozen gold leads have been discovered within the past few weeks, and the assays are most flattering.” At San Francisquito Canyon at the west edge of the San Gabriel Mountains, Francisco López stumbled upon gold in March 1842 that led to a brief rush and F.P.F. Temple (along with Stearns and others) sent dust back east to a brother for sale to the national mint at Philadelphia.
Five miles north of San Fernando, a prospector known only as Slater, “has just discovered a silver mine that yields almost pure silver” and this was deemed “the best hit yet made by prospectors in the San Fernando region.” Lastly, brief mention was made of the fact that “the petroleum wells are yielding finely, and fresh flows are daily being discovered, on both sides of the mountains that encompass San Fernando.” In what is now Santa Clarita, on the west side of Interstate 5 at the eastern extremity of the Santa Susana range, Temple was pouring large sums into oil prospecting through his Los Angeles Petroleum Refining Company.
The second page mentioned that a patent was recently issued to Dr. Albert E. Merrill, a recent arrival from near Cleveland, Ohio, and Elijah H. Workman, nephew of William Workman, a member of the Los Angeles Common (City) Council, planter of landscape at the Plaza and Sixth Street (Central) Park, now Pershing Square, and whose farm south of town was well-known for his agricultural experiments, for a “family fruit dryer.” The paper asserted that such a device, another was part of the Alden system, supported by F.P.F. Temple and his son, Thomas, already in commercial operation, “is something that every family must and will have.”
The Herald added that “it is the best thing we have ever seen for family use” and “while it is cheap and easy to operate, it will preserve twenty-five to sixty bushels of fruit or vegetables a day.” Its ease of use was because the infusion or stopping of hot air for the drying process was handled via a simple turning of a screw so that “the women and children on the farm can operate it.” Moreover, the device was so constructed that its platform could be expanded to commercial use and “thus companies can be formed and a factory put up on a large scale,” as with the Alden works. It was claimed that, not only was the dried fruit superior to sun-dried articles, but “when placed in a basin of water, [it] will reassume all its fresh qualities, so that no one can tell but it was just from the tree or garden.”
There was heavy advertising and a display of a model machine at Elijah’s house and samples of dried project at the Main Street saddlery Elijah ran with his younger brother, William H., in successive months, during which Merrill apparently ended his medical practice. Despite the paper’s gushing that the machine “is a God send to the farmers and just in time” and that “two or three acres judiciously planted in vegetables, will make the farmer more clear money than fifty acres in grain,” the enterprise soon ended in failure. Merrill returned to Ohio, became a lawyer and probate judge and then, in his sixties, came back to Los Angeles in the early 1900s and died in the Angel City in 1931 at age 88.
Also mentioned were the prospects for shipping of silver from the Panamint mines of the desert regions of San Bernardino County, courtesy of mine owner and president of the Panama Railroad, Trenor W. Park, formerly a member of the federal land commission and a lawyer in San Francisco before returning to his native Vermont. He mentioned the possibility of building to Panamint “a railroad, broad gauge, from Truxton,” a proposed town named for the son of Edward F. Beale, the former Indian agent and owner of Rancho El Tejón who was associated with Baker at that massive ranch and in the Santa Monica-area ranchos before Senator Jones acquired those interests. In 1872, Baker and Beale bought 5,000 acres of Rancho La Puente, in its eastern sections where Walnut is now, from William Workman. Such a railroad, argued Park, “would make it the best-paying road in the United States.”
Lastly, there were several references to the Los Angeles and Independence Railroad, formed in spring 1874 with the intention to build a narrow-gauge line between the Angel City and the Inyo County seat in proximity to silver boom towns like Cerro Gordo. F.P.F. Temple was the inaugural president and former governor John G. Downey, president of rival The Farmers’ and Merchants’ Bank, was treasurer, but difficult was encountered in securing enough local capital to get the project where it needed to be for construction.
This led to outside investment by Senator Jones (who, the paper reported, was married on New Year’s Day), Park and others and the addition of a branch line to Santa Monica, while Downey quietly exited, and Temple yielded the presidency to Jones, the main stockholder, and assumed the treasurer role. With money from the likes of Jones and Park and the latter’s connections to manufacturers of rail engines and cars, the L.A. & I. moved, by the onset of 1875, into a much better position, even with talk to run the line to Utah and a link with the transcontinental railroad, to the consternation of the Southern Pacific, which controlled local railroading to that date.
In an article headlined “Important Facts,” the Herald, owned by a company which counted Temple as one of its stockholders and its treasurer, told readers,
Mr. F.P.F. Temple and Engineer [Joseph U.] Crawford were called to San Francisco last week by a telegram from Senator Jones on business connected with the Los Angeles and Independence Railroad. Mr. Temple returned on Sunday morning [the 3rd], and from him we obtain the following information: Senator Jones and other capitalists agree to take three hundred thousand dollars of stock in the road provided the people of Los Angeles and San Bernardino counties will subscribe to an equal amount. [Noting it was to be of regular gauge, connect with no other line—meaning the SP—and go to Santa Monica,] These are the terms and conditions on which we may build a railroad that will make Los Angeles the second city in the State and Los Angeles valley the richest and most desirable spot on the Pacific Coast. It behooves the people of this city and valley to think earnestly and act promptly on the proposition above set forth.
The piece continued that “Los Angeles city will be greatly benefited by this road, and she must aid in its construction,” noting that the region needed $200,000 in additional subscriptions to meet the demands of Jones and his partners. The paper predicted that, once construction on the line commenced, the stock price would jump by a third.
Adding that the route was not yet determined, the Herald warned that the L.A. & I could choose to bypass Los Angeles as the intent was to go from Independence to Santa Monica and a wharf constructed to ship precious metal ores out to places like England (via Park’s Panama Railroad, of which he acquired a controlling interest in 1874.) It was noted that Crawford calculated the length of the line at 220 miles and the cost at $600,000 for the grading of the roadbed and acquisition of wood ties, while bonds could be used for the rest.
Separately it was reported that the chief engineer “will arrive in a couple of days and immediately take the field with a corps of assistants” with work including “several preliminary lines . . . through the valley and between this city and Cajon Pass.” That vital opening near San Bernardino was used by the Workman family as they took the Old Spanish Trail from New Mexico to Los Angeles nearly 35 years prior and was the subject of a fall 1874 map, a copy of which is in the Museum’s collection and which was the topic of a prior post here, while a receipt for Crawford’s preliminary survey in August 1874 is also in our holdings and covered in a post on this blog.
The Herald also observed that
One hundred Chinamen will leave San Francisco to-morrow for this city for the purpose of commencing work on the Los Angeles and Independence Railroad. They will be dispensed on the different sections of road where the heaviest grading [and most difficult labor] is required.
For both the L.A. & I and the Southern Pacific work in this area, including the latter’s construction of the main line from the north and branch lines from Florence (South Los Angeles) to Anaheim and from Los Angeles east through the San Gabriel Valley, including along Valley Boulevard on the Rancho La Puente, Chinese laborers engaged in the grueling work of grading, tunneling and other elements of road construction. As was almost always the case, these men were largely invisible, being hardly mentioned in news accounts or other sources.
One trace of their endeavors, however, is still with us in the form of the existing path of the L.A. & I that now forms the E (formerly the “Expo”) line to Santa Monica, this being the same route completed by the L.A. & I later in 1875. The collapse of the state economy in late August, from which occurred the failure of the Temple and Workman bank, also meant that the L.A. & I. could not only expand beyond that branch to the sea, but that it was sold to the Southern Pacific in 1877.
The Homestead is fortunate to have a bevy of mid-1870s Los Angeles newspapers in its collection to help us better understand regional and Workman and Temple family history, so look for more posts in the “Read All About It” series using these valuable sources.