by Paul R. Spitzzeri
It’s an innocuous little document, but it is a window into some notable early history of Los Angeles far beyond its modest purpose. The featured object from the Museum’s collection for this post is a 11 October 1864 receipt issued to the estate of the late Isidro Reyes acknowledging payment of $120 on account to one of the Hellman family, several of whose members were merchants in the Angel City.
The pair of signatures are a little tough to read, but these and the document are in the same hand and the fact that there is a main recipient and an agent leads to the assumption that the receipt was for Isaiah Moses Hellman (1831-1890) but that it was written by his cousin Isaias Wolf Hellman (1842-1920).
I.M., as he was commonly known, migrated with brother Samuel from Reckendorf, Bavaria (which became part of a unified Germany in 1870) and settled in Los Angeles in 1855. This was about the time that Gold Rush-era prosperity in the Angel City, largely due to the cattle trade for fresh beef in the gold fields as well as merchants outfitting and supplying miners who took the southern route to California,
While the siblings sold some general merchandise, their niche among the mercantile class in town was their emphasis on books and stationery. The business was located in the Bell Block, later Mellus’ Row, at the southeast corner of Aliso and Los Angeles streets where the Federal Building is situated now. When, in 1857, Jonathan Temple completed the first of several buildings in the Temple Block, this at the southern end, the Hellmans moved their store there.
In spring 1859, two cousins, Herman and Isaias, left Reckendorf and following a typical chain migration pattern of hearing about opportunity in a new land from those from the same family and town, came to Los Angeles. The former going to Wilmington, Phineas Banning’s port town, south of the city and the latter joining the employ of what was called “Hellman and Brother.”
When the federal census was taken a little over a year later, Isaiah, aged 29, and identified as a merchant, and Isaias, 17 years old, and listed as a clerk, resided in the same household with other Jews, including merchants and clerks Henry Wartenberg, Wolf Kalisher, Morris and Jacob Schlesinger, Barron Marks, Jacob Weil and Samuel Meyer adjacent to them.
A dispute broke out between Isaiah and Samuel, leading them to found their own establishments, with no small amount of rancor and rivalry between them. Notably, Herman became a partner of Sam, though that ended with a formal dissolution in 1866, while Isaias continued his association with I.M. This would make sense as to why the signatures on the Reyes estate are, if read properly, the way they are.
In other words, prior to his death in 1863, Reyes had credit with the I.M. Hellman store and, as part of the probate proceedings, the merchant, as a creditor of the estate, would have filed for payment of the outstanding amount on the account. As the clerk, Isaias would have had the responsibility for writing out the receipt and, almost certainly, the claim for payment to the Reyes estate.
Within months of the issuance of the receipt, another major change took place for the Hellmans. While Isaiah continued his store for another several years, though he retired in the 1870s while still relatively young, Isaias, who was just 22 years of age, struck out on his own. The day that President Abraham Lincoln died in the assassination committed by John Wilkes Booth after the conclusion of the Civil War, Hellman purchased, for $525, the store of Adolph Portugal (who later opened another store, situated in the Temple Block adjacent to the Temple and Workman bank) at Main and Commercial streets.
Quickly, Hellman demonstrated his considerable talent and acumen and built his enterprise into an unqualified success, with an advertisement from February 1867 noting that shipments from San Francisco of clothing, shoes and boots, accessories, carpets, oil cloth, matting and more were offered at from 30-50% under “the present market rates,” while he added that “my facilities to do [sic] a regular Wholesale Jobbing business,” beyond his retail enterprise, “not excelled by any business house South of San Francisco.”
At the beginning of summer 1868, Hellman advertised an “Enlargement of Premises” to double the floor space and which allowed for an “Extension of Business” following another big buy in the northern metropolis “at such prices as will give him command of the trade of this city and county.” Not only was the new merchandise “the best selected stock . . . ever presented to this community,” but most was acquired “since the late decline of goods” so that the merchant was “enabled to sell cheaper than any house south of San Francisco.”
Shortly afterwards, however, Hellman closed his store to enter the business that made him one of the wealthiest and most powerful of the citizens of Los Angeles, California and the West Coast. In what seemed like an ideal combination, the young entrepreneur, not quite 26 years old, joined forces with William Workman and his son-in-law F.P.F. Temple, to open Los Angeles’ second bank, Hellman, Temple and Company.
As a previous post here discussed, the dissolved after about 2 1/2 years, due to differing philosophies among Temple and Hellman about how to run the bank. While his former partners went on their own, but failed in 1876, Hellman, with ex-Governor John G. Downey as partner, formed The Farmers’ and Merchants’ Bank of Los Angeles and went on to stunning success, including running the Nevada Bank, which merged in 1905 with Wells Fargo. As a landowner and financier, Hellman was without peer in this area for decades.
With regard to his cousin, I.M., retirement meant investment as a major stockholder in Isaias’ important enterprise at Rancho Cucamonga, which he acquired in 1870, involving grape growing and wine-making and of The Farmers’ and Merchants’ Bank, service as Los Angeles City Treasurer for one term in 1877 upon which he declined to run again, and as trustee of the important Jewish organization, the Order of B’nai B’rith.
The other main figure in the receipt was Ysidro (spelled Isidro on the document) Reyes (1813-1863), whose family history in California dates to the earliest European incursion by land with the Portolá Expedition of 1769-1770. His grandfather, Francisco, was one of the soldados de cuero or “soldiers of leather” who took part in the campaign which went as far as the Bay Area and then was posted at Monterey, Mission San Luis Obispo and Mission San Antonio.
In 1784, Francisco Reyes received a land grant to the Rancho Los Encinos, though he soon returned the tract when the Mission San Fernando was being planned, and he received a grant to property near Rancho La Purisima in northern Santa Barbara County. Residing in Los Angeles, Francisco served as an alcalde during two periods in the 1790s and one of his sons, Jacinto, was the father of Ysidro.
Born in Los Angeles in April 1813, Ysidro Reyes was the grantee, with Francisco Márquez, in 1839 of the Rancho Boca de Santa Monica from Governor Juan Bautista Alvarado. The property, comprising just over 6,600 acres included Santa Monica Canyon, Pacific Palisades and portions of Topanga Canyon and Reyes built an adobe house, the approximate location of which is marked by a plaque at the junction of Sunset, Chautauqua and Pampas Ricas boulevards in Pacific Palisades. At times, he also sold tar from the famous pits on the Rancho La Brea to Los Angeles residents for covering their adobe house roofs.
As with most ranchos in the region, the value of Boca de Santa Monica early on was for cattle raising and, presumably, Reyes benefited to some degree from the prosperous days of the Gold Rush beef trade, though he did have a vineyard with 75,000 pounds of grapes with small amounts of corn, beans and peas as shown on the 1860 federal census agricultural sheets. As noted above, however, that ended by the mid-1850s and the local industry was further affected by competition from imported breeds like the longhorns from Texas. A national depression in 1857 also had an effect on the regional economy.
The biggest blows, however, came in the early Sixties with massive flooding in late December 1861 and most of January 1862, during which an estimated 50 inches of rain fell in California and locally, following by two years of devastating drought, with estimates of four inches each year in 1863 and 1864. Grasshopper invasions and epidemics of smallpox also swept through greater Los Angeles during this period, wreaking further havoc.
Highly contagious, smallpox raged through the region at the end of 1862 and into the following year, being particularly devastating to the already rapidly declining indigenous population, but also affecting Latinos and poorer people, generally. The Los Angeles News of 21 November 1862 briefly observed that the town’s public schools were closed because of the outbreak adding that “it is a humane idea.”
A couple of weeks later, the 5 December edition of the paper reported that at San Juan Capistrano, in the furthest southern reaches of Los Angeles County, “some fifty Indians have already died from the small-pox, and it is thought that the disease was brought into this place [that is, Los Angeles] by an Indian from San Juan.” If this was true, it did not take long for the virulent disease to race through the Angel City.
The 12 January 1863 issue of the News informed readers that “this disease, if we may judge from reports, has been and is still committing fearful ravages among the Indian and low Mexican population” and added that “we have heard it stated that no less than 14 cases died in one day last week.” A dozen days later, the Common (City) Council enacted an ordinance creating a Board of Health of five persons, one supervising a district within city limits, and stating,
It shall be the duty of said Board of Health . . . without respect to age or color, who are now sick with the smallpox, and not convalescent, and have not the means of paying therefor, to be provided by the city with medicine, food, and medical attention. Provided, That in all such cases such persons shall immediately be removed to the city hospital, provided such hospital has sufficient capacity for such persons . . .
It shall further be the duty of each Commissioner of said Board of Health . . . to see that every person, without distinction of age, sex or color, who has not had the kine pox or small pox, be properly vaccinated.
Moreover, those who refused to be vaccinated when called upon to do so were subject to arrest and conviction in the Mayor’s Court of a misdemeanor subject to fines of $10-50, imprisonment of 5-10 days or both at the discretion of that official.
The News of 5 February reported that more than 500 cases were reported in the city and about 150 persons dead from the disease, while double that likely succumbed countywide, while it added that “more precautions are being adopted by the native population,” this likely meaning Latinos, “who in the outset were too careless, and it is hoped the disease has reached its climax, and will gradually disappear.”
On the 9th, El Monte established a Board of Health and banned the hauling of corpses through town to Mission San Gabriel and its cemetery, suggestive that these persons were Latino and native Americans much less stopping anyone from going through the community who had the disease. It was also mentioned that schools could be closed, if needed, while officials were empowered “to use any measure in regard to straggling Indians that may become necessary.”
On the 16th, Ysidro Reyes fell victim to the dread disease and, horrifically, six of the children he had with Antonia Villa, who he married thirty years before, died, as well, during the scourge. While the exact number of deaths is not known, it seems highly unlikely that few families suffered so terribly from the epidemic as the Reyes’.
On that day, the Board of Health reported to the Common Council that in four of the five districts, there were 243 cases, with 62% taking place in the fourth district, which, not surprisingly, comprised the Sonoratown section north of the Plaza and which included most of the poorest residents of the Angel City.
Health Officer Dr. Robert (a.k.a, Russell) T. Hayes reported having vaccinated 219 persons, while the hospital had 41 patients, with 27 recently discharged and eight having died lately. It was added, though, that (and this may sound familiar to readers):
The commissioners complain of want of attention on the part of the police officials, the apathy of the people, and the many annoyances and obstacles they have to encounter. They recommend the passage of an ordinance, insisting upon the cleansing and purifying of infected premises, burning of clothing, &c., and other obvious measures, tending to arrest of the progress of the disease.
The 28 March edition of the Los Angeles Star cited Hayes as reporting that “there are but few cases of smallpox now in our community” while “straggling cases of varioloid,” a mild form experienced by those who’d had the disease before or were recently vaccinated, “is about the extent of the malady now.” The paper did conclude that “occasionally an Indian turns up with a case of genuine smallpox.”
A report in the 2 May issue of the Star observed that of the City’s Cash Fund of $7,000, 45%, of $3,000, was “expended in treatment of the smallpox—a necessary outlay, and one which no one will declaim against.” Notably, it was stated that, in 1862, $4,800 was spent on a dam and waterwheel for the city water delivery system, but that was washed away in the January deluge, while $3,000 was spent in 1861 and 1862 on remodeling the Market House built by Jonathan Temple in 1859 for use as the courthouse. Debt and loans came out to something on the order of $35,000 during that period, as well.
To wrap up, while I.W. Hellman went on to great success and wealth in subsequent years, Antonia Villa de Reyes continued residing on her half of the Rancho Boca de Santa Monica, but as greater Los Angeles embarked on its first significant and sustained boom, she decided to sell in 1872 to Robert S. Baker, who soon founded, with U.S. Senator from Nevada John P. Jones, the town of Santa Monica.
As stated at the outset, this document is very modest, but it does have some remarkable associations of our regional history through the stories of the Hellmans, the Reyes family and that smallpox epidemic that caused such terrible loss of life during an already challenging period in greater Los Angeles.
It’s remarkable that in the 1860s, people were already using vaccinations (cowpox) to combat the deadly smallpox that was spreading through greater Los Angeles. Paul’s hint in his post is especially thought-provoking, which encourages us to reflect on the recent pandemic in comparison to the smallpox outbreak in 1864. Sadly, after more than 150 years, our handling of COVID was not much better than how Angelenos dealt with smallpox. Unreliable information, overcrowded hospitals, scrambling for disinfectants and essentials, and the urgent rush for life-saving vaccines all mirrored past struggles and chaos. Although vaccines were rolled out in a hurry, their effects were disappointedly limited and short-lived. It felt like big pharmaceutical companies were using us as experiments, while governments generously funneled money their way also in a hurry .
Now, looking back over the past four years, I seriously question whether the pandemic was truly managed and controlled by healthcare authorities, epidemic experts, and vaccinations. Instead, I believe the major contributing factor in overcoming it was the widespread development of collective immunity. In other words, this century’s disaster was left largely to the mercy of natural forces – much like how we face wildfires today. While wildfire rages, we are still like a century ago watching and waiting for them to weaken and burn out on their own.