by Paul R. Spitzzeri
As greater Los Angeles underwent, from the late 1860s through the middle part of the next decade, its first boom, small as it was compared to the many, much larger ones that followed, one of our best sources for understanding what was at hand during this period is through newspapers. The Homestead has a collection of these, mainly in the years from 1872 to 1876, which is when the boom reached its peak and then went bust and, because the Workman and Temple family was among the most active of the boomers and then experienced the worse financial failure in the bust, the “Read All About It” series frequently refers to them and the context of that era.
This post’s highlighted artifact from the Museum’s holdings is the 18 July 1874 issue of the Los Angeles Express, which launched three years before from the ashes of the News (which debuted nearly fifteen years before) and became one of the trio of principal English-language dailies, along with the Herald (which began publication in October 1873) and the Star, the city’s first paper when it debuted in May 1851, went dormant in September 1864 and then returned four years later.
One of the most important elements of the growth of the region during this era was its increasing agricultural might, whereas the cattle industry was the backbone of the local economy until the Civil War years, when floods and drought wrought havoc on it. Grape growing, for wine and brandy, was important during the cattle years and continued to be so even as areas like Napa and Sonoma counties became more prominent because of better conditions leading to higher quality product. Grain was also a major element of our area’s economy, especially wheat, with William Workman, for example, having about 5,000 acres of his portion of Rancho La Puente devoted to it and a mill operated to process the flour.
Citrus, too, started to become a crucial crop by the Seventies, starting with William Wolfskill’s grove on Alameda Street from about 4th to 7th streets and which was California’s first commercial grove when planted in 1841. In the areas around the Mission San Gabriel, a district by that name was established with such growers as Benjamin D. Wilson, James B. Winston, General George Stoneman and many others. In Riverside, Eliza Tibbets in 1873 introduced the Washington navel that became vital for an industry that covered huge swaths of the Southland.
In early June 1874, the Co-operative Nursery and Fruit Company of Los Angeles County was incorporated after a meeting in F.P.F. Temple’s Temple Block by such noted horticulturists as Ozro W. Childs, former governor John G. Downey and Thomas A. Garey, along with Garey’s associated Milton Thomas and Luther M. Holt. This trio became president, vice-president and secretary, respectively, of the organization, while Downey assumed the office of treasurer.
During the first part of July, the organization, which had its stock of a quarter million dollars quickly subscribed, purchased over 140 acres from Salisbury Haley and John Quincy Adams Stanley along about a mile of San Pedro Street just outside the southern city limits and near where Garey had nearly 40 acres for his nursery since 1866. This was in what became the Historic South-Central neighborhood and the 12 July edition of the Herald reported that Garey intended to transfer his land to the Company when it was ready. Haley’s land was formerly owned by Michel Lachenais, who was lynched in December 1870 after murdering his neighbor Jacob Bell.
The Express quoted from the San Francisco Bulletin as that paper, perhaps having read the Herald‘s aforementioned piece, observed that “the establishment of this enterprise not only intimates the faith that is exhibited in the present and prospective profits of orange culture, but it also testifies to the growth of the southern part of the State.” Remarking that, “there is no doubt that the whole of the southern counties have grown wonderfully within the last few years,” the northern sheet added that “much of his growth is to be attributed to the progress made in the culture of semi-tropical fruit.”
Further noting that the principals in the firm were those who were financially successful in the orange industry, the Bulletin continued that, when the company was up and running, “young trees will be supplied at about half the current rates.” There were no fears of overplanting and prospects were excellent as “the sales of those possessing orange orchards are increasing each year,” so the idea of offering trees at half the cost was sure to mean that “thousands more acres [will be] brought into cultivation with them.”
For its part, the Express commented,
It will be remembered that the company have entered into a contract with Mr. [Henry, or Harry, J. Crow, who was a founder of Glendale] for the supply of 500,000 orange trees, 100,00 lime trees, and 79,000 lemon trees to be delivered to the company between the 1st of March and the 1st of July next year. The horticulturist who has entered into this contract has already sown the seed from 150 barrels of oranges and is to plant more. Although these orange seeds were so recently planted, the young plants are above ground with a healthy looking appearance.
Despite the large-scale effort (much like that of the Forest Grove Association, headed by Robert M. Widney and with F.P.F. Temple as treasurer, and its attempts to establish a eucalyptus nursery near modern Downey), the resulting bust meant that the Company’s lands were transferred to banker John M. Elliott, who, decades later, established a large orange grove at North Whittier (Hacienda) Heights, just south of the Homestead.
Another article of interest was titled “Ice Manufacture” and concerned a visit by an Express reporter to the facility, which began operation in April 1871 out of the quarters of the privately owned Los Angeles Water Company off the northeast corner of the Plaza at Marchessault and Alameda streets. The tour was with Charles E. Miles, a surveyor and captain of the city’s volunteer fire company, the 38s, who recently was reported to be one of the victims of the recently apprehended bandit Tiburcio Vásquez.
After robbing rancher Alessandro Repetto in modern Monterey Park and being pursued by Sheriff William R. Rowland (whose late father was co-owner with William Workman of Rancho La Puente, which is where William later made a fortune in oil), Vásquez encountered Miles doing survey work for the San Gabriel Orange Growers Association’s Indiana Colony, soon to be called Pasadena, and nabbed his watch before eluding his pursuers in the rugged Sierra Madre (San Gabriel) Mountains.
Miles was in charge of the works while its manager, George Milliken (1832-1910), a native of Maine who was convalescing from recently having his leg broken while delivering ice. Miles did this while awaiting the arrival of a San Francisco ice expert to take over operations. The report noted,
We found the works in operating in producing a seven-ton batch, which would be completely frozen by this morning. We entered the great tank where the ice is made, and found it as cool as Siberia. On lifting a plank we could see the ice in the course of formation. The congellation [congealing] was progressing from each compartment outward and upward, and was then almost five inches thick. Another inch would make it its full size, when it would be taken out in large square cakes. The process of ice manufacture by the action of ammonia has been so often described that we shall not repeat the method here. Suffice it to say that this apparatus is capable of turning out seven tons at a run, and that it requires three days to complete the freezing process. The invention is owned by a San Francisco company, and all the ice used in this State is distributed by that company. They have a complete monopoly of the business, and must be coining money.
In the “Local Items” column, it was noted that the San Francisco Circus opened the previous night to a significant crowd at the corner of Temple and New High streets, likely in the old lumber yard that was used for the lynching of Lachenais and several Chinese males killed in the Chinese Massacre of October 1871, but then razed into an open field. Joe Murphy and his acting troupe were the new lessees of the German-owned Turnverein Hall and were preparing for their first comedic performances. Meanwhile, a new German-language newspaper, the Sud Californische Post, was soon to be launched.
The 38s volunteer fire company was to take place in ten days as noticed in an advertisement. A visit by two men from the Utah Mining Gazette was also mentioned and one of the visitors was Fred T. Perris (1837-1916), a native of England who went to Australia with his family at age 12. With his mother and sisters, he settled in 1853 in the Mormon colony of San Bernardino and then joined most of those settlers when they were recalled four years later to Utah by Brigham Young under the apprehension that war with the United States was likely.
Perris’ father, meanwhile, having refused to join the LDS Church, returned to England where he died and the young man went there to settle the estate, which took two years during which time he learned photography. Trying that trade unsuccessfully on returning to Salt Lake City, Perris became a surveyor, including for the transcontinental railroad, though a clash with Young led to the loss of that job, so he turned to selling hats. After a brief period running the still-existing Salt Lake Tribune, Perris came to Los Angeles as noted by the Express and then went again to live in San Bernardino.
Perris returned to surveying, including as San Bernardino city and county surveyor, in which positions he did vital work with subdivisions, water projects, and railroads. This led him to become the chief engineer of the California Southern Railroad, which built a line from Barstow to San Diego, followed by the same role with the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe, as it completed a transcontinental line to the region, including through the Cajon Pass. The Riverside County city of Perris is named for him.
Another item concerned a new cutter and rollers for bookbinder Moses W. Perry, who was in the regiment of New York volunteers led by Jonathan D. Stevenson that came to Los Angeles during the Mexican-American War. Perry went to the gold fields and then long resided in the Santa Barbara area before settling in the Angel City in 1870 and taking up his trade, as well as printing some of the city’s newspapers, such as the Star. The Express pointed out that, with his new machinery, Perry “has now the most complete bindery in the State, outside of San Francisco, and ought to keep all our work in this line at home.”
While the rudimentary harbor at San Pedro and Wilmington was where almost all trade with ships was conducted during this period, there were efforts at other locations during the Seventies and afterward, including where Ballona Creek empties into the Pacific at Playa del Rey, the new town of Santa Monica (formed months after this issue), the area of New Port in what became Newport Beach and Anaheim Landing, in which William Workman had a financial stake because of sending products from his portion of Rancho La Puente there, where Seal Beach and Long Beach meet at the outflow of the San Gabriel River.
Then there was Bolsa Chica in modern Huntington Beach, where the paper stated that “the contract for erecting the Bolsa Chico [sic] Wharf, near Anaheim, has been let to Mr. E. Gay, of San Francisco, for $30,000, and that “this wharf will bring ship and wagon together for the entire valley of the Santa Ana, and will prove an inestimable convenience and source of economy to the people in the southern end of the county.”
Moreover, the Southern Pacific railroad branch from Florence (South Los Angeles) to Anaheim was mentioned as also important for the development of what, in 1889, became Orange County, though the wharf project soon petered out. Meanwhile, a report from the Anaheim Californian included news of a protest from 35 settlers in that Bolsa Chica area and the Rancho Las Bolsas, where Westminster was founded in 1874, regarding any attempt from the Los Angeles and San Bernardino Land Company, established to manage the late Abel Stearns’ massive estate, to assert its claims there.
Speaking of Wilmington, a report from that town’s Enterprise mentioned the conclusion of the school year at Wilson College, founded by Benjamin D. Wilson and which soon closed, though the 1880 founding of the University of Southern California may be seen as a descendant, and it also observed that Wilson and Norman C. Jones took over Phineas Banning’s planing mill and machine shop with the intention of taking up furniture making and other enterprises.
Another example of the manifestation of the boom was a brief report on construction contracts for buildings designed by Los Angeles’ first trained architect, Ezra Kysor, for jeweler Charles Ducommun on the east side of Main Street at Commercial Street and a quartet of cottages by banker Isaias W. Hellman (former partner of F.P.F. Temple and William Workman and, with Downey, their competitor with his Farmers’ and Merchants’ Bank). Dr. Frank P. Howard also hired a contractor to build a pair of residences on Spring Street at its southern terminus with Main, a short distance from the suburban property of Elijah H. Workman.
Lastly, the Express reported on the trial of Jaime Fernández, tried for murder in the killing of Gabriel Mendioroz in an adobe house in which both men lived “on Oliveras street, a small thoroughfare running out of the Plaza from Marchessault street.” This was formerly known as Wine Street, because of the manufacturing of that beverage there, but it was renamed for Agustín Olvera, a prominent attorney and judge for many years in Los Angeles. In the late 1920s, it was recast into the Olvera Street that has, ever since, been a major tourist attraction.
While two of Mendioroz’ daughters, teens who were “very intelligent and gentle-looking young ladies,” testified that Fernández attacked their father after a confrontation about the former’s treatment of the Mendioroz family, the defense offered two men who said that they saw a quarrel and that the deceased attacked with a knife before Fernández fired in self-defense. Yet, the girls stated the incident happened in the evening and the defense witnesses said it was about noon.
In an editorial, “Our Palladium,” the Express decried the actions of the jury, claiming,
The acquital [sic] of Fernandez is perhaps the most astonishing instance on record of a man going entirely scot free, by the verdict of a jury, notwithstanding all the flagrant circumstances of the case. The public mind, (and all who had familiarized themselves with the facts in the case,) was prepared for a verdict reducing the crime of murder in the first degree [perhaps to second degree murder or manslaughter]; but when it is met with an absolute acquittal, it is severely shocked.
The defense was credited for its effort, but the paper added “we doubt whether society is any the safer” while it continued that “we doubt whether our system of jurisprudence is raised higher in the estimation of anybody.” Moreover, it believed that the acquittal of Fernández would lead to the view that “another and ponderous argument has been placed in the mouths of men who favor the summary punishment of crime,” meaning lynching.
Just six or so weeks prior, Jesús Romo was lynched near the Workman Mill after an attack on the miller, William Turner, and his wife Rebecca, with her miscarriage of their child the result, but the Express opined that,
And yet it would be wrong and illogical for the advocates of lynch law to say that the law is lax, or that the courts protect criminals, or that our prosecutions are not able and earnest. For Fernandez owes his freedom and safety entirely to the jury who acquitted him.
We will continue to mine the contents of the newspaper in the Museum’s holdings for the “Read All About It” series, so keep a look our for those.