by Paul R. Spitzzeri
We return again to the donation by John and Barbara Clonts of hundreds of documents pertaining to the early history of North Whittier (Hacienda) Heights, preserved by its on-site sales agent, Grover T. Russell, who left the papers to the Clontses when he sold them his 1916 house six decades ago. Several prior posts have mined the collection to share some of the notable aspects of this community, established in 1913 on land sold by the estate of Elias J. “Lucky” Baldwin, who died four years earlier and who took ownership of a large section of Rancho La Puente by foreclosure on William Workman’s portion after the collapse of the Temple and Workman bank and his loan to it.
Two letters, dated 22 January 1915, are the highlighted objects from the Clonts donation for this post, with the first sent to Edwin G. Hart, a key member of the team that developed North Whittier Heights and who went on to establish the adjacent La Habra Heights community. The writer of this missive was William M. Campbell, a resident of the tiny hamlet of Table Grove, Illinois, located northwest of the state capital of Springfield.
The letter was fairly typical in that it was a request for information about the tract, though it did go on at some length with questions after Campbell asked “would you kindly send me your literature as to what you have at North Whittier Heights and what same is like?” He continued with multiple inquiries:
How about your walnut land, and what are your walnut orchards that are now growing worth per acre? How old are the trees, and are they the soft shell, or budded, or are the two the same kind of walnut? Have you any walnut orchards that are now bearing, that are for sale, and what price are such orchards, and about how much would such an orchard net one a year?
The correspondent understood that prices would vary based on the age of trees planted, but he also wishes to know “what a walnut orchard would net one each year” taking into account “cost of water, taxes and gathering walnuts.” This was because Campbell “would then know better as to cutting lose [sic] from here as I feel [I] would rather live out in Calif, but I wish to find out all I can about the walnut industry, and if walnuts orchards are sure crops, and good property to have.” With that, he hoped to receive a reply soon.
Notably, there was a William Monroe Campbell, who hailed from the same Illinois county and who, during the Teens, moved to Eureka, in the northwestern part of California. By 1920, he was in Oakland, but, soon after, migrated south and purchased a walnut grove on Santa Anita Avenue in Arcadia. He lived there for about a quarter-century before his death in 1949 at the age of 86 and it seems very likely this was the curious correspondent.
The other letter-writer directed his missive to Russell, but he was an existing owner at North Whittier Heights, though not a contented one. Ludwig Gossmann began by stating that he’d received a letter from the sales agent and another man and observed that he noted that,
your own statement that this walnut grove does not even bring in 3% after all the hard labor that is connected with it, and I do not wish to have such property after all.
According to your statement wich [sic] I have made out on the back [of this letter], I consider the property $11,000 too high.
Such a trade would mean that Mr. Cheney [who offered the switch of land] would receive my property for nothing.
Gossmans’s figures represented that the income of the last walnut crop was $6,440, but that with interest on the $36,000 loan to buy the property, labor and the horse-drawn team hired for the year and water, the expenses totaled $4,760, leaving a purported surplus of $1,680. He continued, however, that “even from this amount comes taxes, picking & handling nuts, which will be at least 520.00,” when those expenditures were paid out, so the actual profit was $1,160.
Gossmann’s experience with his North Whittier Heights grove may well have reflected the question of whether the advertising by Russell, Hart and the Whittier Extension Company, the development firm, promised better yields of agricultural product and the resulting revenue and profit than buyers and growers would actually realize. There were, however, likely other factors, such as the owners’ management of their property, to take into consideration, as well.
For example, while it appears that Campbell, who hailed from a rural farming area in the Land of Lincoln, had enough experience to be a walnut grower for quite a number of years at Arcadia, it does not seem that Gossmann possessed a background in agriculture. Instead, the native of what became a united Germany when he was a child, was a doctor, though more of a homeopath based on what was discerned about his years in greater Los Angeles.
Census records provide different years (1886, 1887 and 1889) for Gossmann’s migration to America and he very quickly settled in Los Angeles, perhaps as early as 1887 during the great Boom of the Eighties. An early reference to him and his work is from the 13 October 1891 edition of the Los Angeles Times in which he advertised “secure health through my massage treatment in connection with my famous baths” and which he assured would successfully treat neuralgia, paralysis and rheumatism, among others, and that his work was “by the latest improved method as practiced in Germany and recommended by the best physicians.”
Notably, he styled himself a masseur, not a physician, working with, as another early ad put it, “superior steam baths, with fresh air,” adding that “this healthful luxury can only be had” at his massage rooms on Spring Street, just south of 3rd Street. By spring 1893, however, he was on Broadway between 6th and 7th streets and operating what he called the “Los Angeles Cure, Bath and Massage Institute” and the “practitioner of natural therapeutics” with the appellation of “doctor” offered a
New science of healing, steam baths of various kinds with fresh air, head and abdominal steam baths, hip and friction sitting baths, scientific manual massage, [and the] system of the world-renowned Dr. Metzger of Amsterdam.
Johann Georg Metzger (1838-1909) is generally acknowledged as a key figure in massage therapy and achieved his fame from about 1870 onwards. In an October 1893 ad, Gossmann expanded his description so that the “institute” included “a vegetarian and diet dining-room . . . where the best of diet is furnished to patients,” while he was “prepared to give vapor baths at residences,” his version of a house call. Gossmann became the founding president of the Vegetarian Society of Southern California in 1894, as well.
By summer 1896, there was another change, as Gossmann and his wife, Helene Wibbels, who he married four years prior, opened their “Hygienic Home” at Broadway and 3rd Street, across from the landmark Bradbury Building. Food was mentioned first with the note that “the best method of curing is through the stomach by means of proper and wholesome food,” with this area run by Helene Gossmann and the result advertised as “Nature’s work of healing in Nature’s own way, not interfered with by drugs and nostrums.” Prices were 25 cents for breakfast and supper (lunch) and 35 cents for dinner or $5 weekly.
A solarium, or sun bath, was said to be the only one in Los Angeles and it was asserted that “the cleansing effect of the sun’s rays” were “scientifically utilized” with alternating days by gender and by appointment on Sundays. Costs were 75 cents for individual treatments and a dozen offered for $7.50.
Otherwise, the facility offered some of the treatments mentioned above along with packs and steam compresses, while “female complaints [are] treated by the Thure Brand Massage System” and the Gossmanns added that “we are specialists in all Chronic Female Complaints, obstructions and irregularities, and for all physical derangements of the human system.” Also mentioned was the use of “Father Kneipp’s water-cure method,” this being Bavarian priest Sebastian Kneipp and his spa near Munich, and “Louis Kuhne’s new science of healing” involving vegetarianism as key.
An October 1896 ad cautioned that people needed to get their health in order before addressing how “to settle the money question is the proper thing to do for the proper adjustment of the social system” and this was done through “proper hygienic and hydropathic treatment” so that the body was cleansed and channels “clogged up with alien matter.” Baths were essential “if you would have your body thrilled with electric fire and your face aglow and eyes sparkling” and it was water and heat, not drugs, that were vital, with the latter “the great life-giver” and the former “the universal purifier and beautifier.”
A notable Gossmann article on massage appeared in the “Care of the Human Body” section of the Sunday Times of 9 April 1899 and he began by celebrating the triumph of science over mysticism including the development of anatomical study and knowledge. Mentioned were Peter Henrik Ling and his work with calisthenics and what became known as Swedish massage and his student and successor, Lars Gabriel Branting, with the author stating that he studied under the latter in Stockholm, though the year 1855 was undoubtedly 1885.
What followed was a good deal of detail about massage therapy and its asserted role in increasing blood flow, improving the nervous system, and reducing chronic and acute pain. While it was obvious that ailments to be treated were those that responded to touch, Gossmann averred that massage was also important for working with dislocated and fractured parts of the body and was “of inestimable value in digestive trouble caused by prolonged inactivity,” though its most important work was with muscles and nerves.
By spring 1900, Gossmann’s “Hygienic Institute” was opened on Hill Street just north of Central (Sixth Street) Park, later renamed Pershing Square, and an ad briefly noted that “this popular institute has lately removed to more commodious and airy quarters, [and] fitted up nicely.” This included sections for the sexes and the usual offerings of massage and hip, steam and sun baths. Recently, the masseur offered “a class for teaching scientific massage,” this being deemed “a good opportunity for healers, nurses and parents.”
As he 20th century dawned, Gossmann was mentioned in a short article in the Los Angeles Express of 20 September 1901 concerning the expected arrival of a German colony of vegetarians. It was reported that an unnamed scout from the northern port city of Hamburg was given Gossmann’s address and “one of the foremost advocates in California of a vegetarian diet” told the paper that it seemed that the man was more interested in a home for himself than for a group. Sites, however, were discussed with another local including in Redlands, San Diego and Santa Barbara and it should be noted that the early part of the century was particularly noted for utopia and other colonies in our region.
After this, however, Gossmann, who once registered to vote as a Socialist, largely disappears from media accounts, except for a reference in 1912 to him as a director of a mining company. Much of this might be explained by his relocation, by 1910, to what is now the Chevy Chase section of east Glendale, where the more rural atmosphere may have been considered more desirable for the two sons, Ludwig and Angelo, that he and Helene had.
It was during their residence in that area, also when the doctor started referring to himself as a “drugless physician,” that the acquisition of the North Whittier Heights walnut grove took place. He remained a resident of Glendale until his death in December 1935, with a very brief obituary stating he’d had a medical practice in Los Angeles for 48 years.
Presumably, Gossmann unloaded his Hacienda Heights walnut grove shortly after this letter to Russell was written, but whatever transpired, his missive is a notable one regarding his complaint concerning low profitability, while Campbell’s is interesting for his various inquiries about walnut raising on the tract, especially if this is the same man who ended up raising the crop in nearby Arcadia.
I am unclear how many acres of walnut grove William Campbell purchased in Arcadia, California, in 1915. What I am curious about, however, is whether his descendants became wealthy over generations due to his early property investment.
Let’s assume the acreage he purchased was priced at $300 per acre (the average land price in California during the 1910s ranged from $100 to $500 per acre) and that he owned no less than 200 acres (the typical size of a walnut grove being between 200 and 500 acres). This would align with his loan amount of $36,000, as noted in the post.
Arcadia was a typical agricultural area in the early 20th century. However, by the mid-20th century, it had transformed into a popular residential city, soon becoming a prestigious area. Today, it remains a highly sought-after location. If Campbell’s property had remained within his family, there is little doubt that his descendants would have become millionaires.
His story serves as an excellent reference to a wealth-building model based on property investment that spans generations. By investing in property with the intention of the high returns being enjoyed by your grandchildren not your children, and encouraging them to invest in property with the same plan for future generations. A positive cycle is thus created within the family. The goal is not immediate profit but rather a substantial return over three or four decades. By adopting this long-term approach, each generation is highly likely to achieve significant wealth.
Hi Larry, nothing was located for this post about Campbell’s walnut grove in terms of when it was bought and sold and its size, but you make the excellent point that acquiring farm, grove or orchard property and then being able to sell it for commercial or residential development could be a significant financial windfall for its owners. Perhaps this happened with Campbell and heirs, especially because of the post-World War II suburban boom?