Read All About It in the Los Angeles Herald, 25 February 1875

by Paul R. Spitzzeri

Returning again to the Museum’s inventory of historic Los Angeles newspapers for this latest installment of the “Read All About It” series of posts, we peruse the four pages of the 25 February 1875 edition of the Los Angeles Herald with a contextual observation that the Angel City was, though few, if any, could have realized it, in the final months of its first growth boom, which began some seven years prior.

Even though the rest of the nation was mired in what has been called the Long Depression because it stretched from 1873 until the end of the decade, California seemed immune because of the phenomenon of a silver boom in Virginia City, Nevada and nearby areas which fed the coffers of San Francisco banks like the Bank of California.

One of that city’s capitalists heavily invested in stocks in some of these mines was Elias J. Baldwin, who, however, sold out, to the tune of a few million dollars and earned his nickname of “Lucky” because of his windfall. In spring 1875, Baldwin came to Los Angeles to invest some of his bonanza in local real estate and bought the Rancho Santa Anita from merchant Harris Newmark for $200,000, a then-record.

Another mining mogul, Nevada Senator John P. Jones was heavily invested in a new seaside resort town called Santa Monica and, at the start of 1875, became president of the locally established Los Angeles and Independence Railroad, formed to build a line to another silver boom area, this in Inyo County in eastern California. Jones replaced F.P.F. Temple who, befitting his role as the head of his private Temple and Workman bank, moved to the treasurer’s seat, while also insisting that, for his significant stock ownership, a branch line be constructed first to his new burg.

The Southern Pacific Railroad was working on a line from the north that would, when finished in September 1876, link the Angel City to San Francisco, while it also continued efforts on the main line heading east (including through William Workman’s portion of Rancho La Puente) to eventually connect to Yuma, Arizona and further points eastward. The SP, by virtue of a Congressional mandate to build through our area and a subsequent subsidy deal approved in November 1872 by Los Angeles County voters, also owned the local Los Angeles and San Pedro Railroad, linking the city to the rudimentary port at Wilmington, though some early federal investment, including dredging and a breakwater, was recently inaugurated.

These are just a few examples of how the boom manifested in early 1875 in greater Los Angeles and, in its editorials on page two, the Herald addressed the good times, under the simple title of “Progressing.” The paper observed that “an average of three steamers per week land at Wilmington,” which was founded by the “Port Admiral” Phineas Banning, a settler more than two decades before and a native of Delaware’s capital and principal city, on the down trip from San Francisco.”

It was added that each of the craft carried some 150 passengers and the Herald asserted that 75% or more “are people who come into the valley to remain” while querying “what becomes of them?” On the surface, came the answer to the rhetorical question, “we are apt to be impressed with the notion that our population is not increasing as rapidly as these figures would seem to warrant,” although some estimates pegged the city’s population as high as 15,000, when the 1870 census recorded under 6,000. It continued that “on reflection and investigation we reach a different conclusion,” which was:

A carefully taken census would show a very large increase in the number of residents in this city and valley over that of two or even one year ago. This is a large valley and its almost universal fertility makes it an abiding place for a vast number of people without an apparent density of population . . . There are not perhaps to exceed thirty thousand people in this county to-day [the 1870 tally was 15,309]; yet Los Angeles valley is capable of supporting a million people [the county now has about 9.8 million residents], and the day will come when her population will equal that number.

With respect to growth, considered “steady and regular” as well as “rapidly increasing,” the editorial remarked that “when we look over the valley in detail we find towns, villages and settlements where a year ago the sheep were grazing.” One example was San Fernando (though obviously in its own valley of large size, though only very sparsely inhabited), which “is the creation of less than a year,” being founded by former state senator Charles Maclay and situated along that SP line coming from the north and “where now we find quite a little town, one year ago there was not a house.”

In another valley, generally called the Santa Ana and, about 15 years later part of a new Orange County, it was noted that “Anaheim has almost doubled in population and more than doubled her wealth within that period.” The 1870 census enumerated 565 persons in the colony founded by Germans in 1857, while in 1876 (when it became Los Angeles County’s second incorporated city) it was said to be 881.

While there was a Los Nietos township that, in 1860, had two dozen Anglos, but, a decade later, had nearly 1,200, it was stated that it “did not exist one year ago; now we speak of it as a town,” this really being the formation of Downey in October 1873. Beyond that settlement, it was commented that “around it for miles the farming population has more than doubled and the agricultural industries more than trebled.”

Other communities, like El Monte and Spadra (now in southwestern Pomona) were considered similar, while “the same increase and wealth is noticeable among the railroad from this city to Wilmington, where, for instance, Temple and Fielding W. Gibson (an El Monte farmer and broom maker) developed, a decade before, the northern end of Rancho San Pedro into what, by 1870, became Compton. Having discussed these several areas of the county, the Herald concluded,

Los Angeles has moved forward with rapid strides. She has built many fine business houses and private dwellings, and it seems to us that here are one-fourth more people here now than ten months ago. But it is in the agricultural interests that we have made the greatest advances. The number of new farms that have been made in this valley within a year, could they be immediately known, would astonish the old settlers. The process of cutting large tracts [from Spanish and Mexican-era ranchos] into small farms has been going on steadily, and this alone has added many hundred families to our farming population. It is a fact that cannot be denied that Los Angeles valley is improving more rapidly than any other portion of the State.

Under the heading of “Going Ahead” another item of note on that editorial page recorded that “yesterday grading commenced on the Los Angeles and Independence Railroad, between this city and Truxton,” a city planned at Santa Monica before Jones came onto the scene, the name being that of a son of its promoter Edward F. Beale of Rancho El Tejon renown.

The railroad’s Chief Engineer James U. Crawford told the paper that “the road bed will be completed and ready for ties and iron from the water [meaning shipped by sea] to within four miles of this city within a month or six weeks.” Meanwhile, another crew was “blasting out the road bed through Cajon Pass,” which Crawford and surveyors claimed just before SP workers could do it, “and the number of men employed on that part of the road will be increased to the utmost number that can be used in a short time.”

Also key to the work on the project was that, “another party of one hundred Chinamen has been ordered from San Francisco and will be on hand in a few days.” It may well be that some of these laborers came from such railroad projects as the Central Pacific portion of the transcontinental railroad, completed a half-dozen years before, as well as other California rail projects, though the growing anti-Chinese movement galvanized by the Workingmen and codified by the second state constitution, ratified in 1879, and the federal Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882 was, in part, motivated by anger over Chinese labor in such work as railroad building.

The piece continued that “the contract for the lumber and piles to build the wharf at Truxton has been closed with a San Francisco firm and the first cargoes will arrive in a short time.” Again, the Beale project of that name would soon give way to Jones’ Santa Monica project, but the Herald ended with the statement that “these evidences of progress in the work,” like those in the aforementioned editorial, “are gratifying to the citizens of this valley.”

Another new community, not mentioned in the “Progressing” article, was Artesia, established by a cooperative association of agriculturists, including Thomas Garey, Milton Thomas, Luther Holt and others whose names would be cemented with their creation, later in 1875, with Pomona. The nascent burg’s name derived from the abundance of artesian wells that tapped large pools of water in the area and the city now has about 16,400 residents on what was from the 1920s to the 1960s a major dairy section.

The Herald reported that “the Anaheim train,” this being a branch of the SP from Florence, south of Los Angeles in what is now the Florence-Graham area, “with an extra coach attached, was crowded to its full carrying capacity yesterday morning with visitors to the Artesia land sale.” The paper remarked that,

Some went down, perhaps, to satisfy their curiosity or to take advantage of the free ride, but great body of the passengers, comprising many of the monied men of the city. The number of attendants at the sale was larger than that of the preceding day [the first of three], and there was a noticeable increase of spirit in the bidding.

Sales totaled a little north of $26,000 and some of the better known names from the Angel City included John W. Potts, Thomas D. Mott, Edward A. Preuss, and E.W. Noyes and a table shows purchases of 40-acre, 10-acre and 5-acre lots and tracts, as well as fractional and town lots. Dr. Thomas S. Stanway, who acquired 5-acre lots for around $40 an acre, sold these the following day to “outside parties,” presumably meaning those not living in the area, for $60 an acre. Potts who picked up 160 acres on the first day was offered a $5 per acre advance, but chose not to sell.

The article ended with the remark that,

The sale will be closed to-day, and the prospect is that there will be a larger crowd in attendance than at either of the preceding sales. About 700 acres of the finest farming land in the tract will be offered and sold without reserve . . . [in addition to free train tickets] A lunch will be spread on the grounds sufficient for all.

At El Monte, a benefit concert three days prior for that town’s Grange society of farmers “brought together one of the largest and most appreciative audiences ever assembled” there. It was added that “the exercises consisted of a lecture illustrative of the elevating powers of music, and a variety of select songs, Scotch and national airs; embracing the lively and gay, the soothing and thrilling.” The day being George Washington’s birthday, “a short and happy speech to the memory” of the nation’s first president was also delivered.

Another entertainment, at the Turn-Verein Hall on Spring Street operated by the German organization of that name, was for the benefit of singer and actor Jennie Reiffarth, who recently performed in Los Angeles venue with Charles Vivian and his company. Reiffarth was praised for her “grand, superb, magnificent” stage work that led the Herald to assert that “she will yet take the front rank as an actress” and it was added that “her audience appreciated her efforts.”

In the “LOCAL BREVITIES” column, a tidbit observed that “a portion of Gospel Swamp is to be known hereafter as Fountain valley,” the former name referring to an area in what is now south Santa Ana and not far from today’s South Coast Plaza,” with the late Orange County historian Phil Brigandi noting that the area’s high population of preachers were responsible for the moniker, while Fountain Valley drew its name as did Artesia, from those subterranean water sources.

With reference to the Los Angeles and Independence Railroad, it was recorded that “two car loads of Chinamen were dispatched to Spadra yesterday,” via the SP line, “to be employed on the grading” in that area. Separately, it was stated that “all Chinatown,” this centered on the Calle de los Negros, now part of Los Angeles Street southeast of the Plaza, “is exercised over the shooting affair” five days prior and involving conflicts between two tongs, or companies.

Another railroad reference was that “the contract for building the wharf of the Los Angeles and Independence has been let to Mr. Thos. R. Bard, of Ventura county,” who later became prominent with Union Oil Company, the development of Port Hueneme and five years of service in the United States Senate.

More pithy items included the shipment of 500 boxes of oranges from the Los Angeles and San Pedro depot to the harbor, most of these likely from the San Gabriel Valley, which was the main growing area for the fruit; the moving of the office of Mayor Prudent Beaudry to a new location; and Beaudry’s placement of benches on his hill lands at the west side of town, including Bunker Hill and Bellevue Terrace, “for the convenience of sight-seers” enjoying “a view of our beautiful valley.” It is worth observing that Beaudry was president of the corporation that ran the Herald, while Temple was its treasurer.

Lastly, another effort to develop the real estate resources of the Angel City was through the fall 1874 formation of The Real Estate Associates of Los Angeles, modeled after one in San Francisco, and which sold stock for the purchase of land in the southwest section of the city, south of Beaudry’s holdings, acquired from former mayor John G. Nichols. The center of the tract, advertised in the Herald, was Orange Street (now the east end of Wilshire Boulevard) and the section between 7th and 8th streets.

This look back 150 years ago to greater Los Angeles’ first boom provides some excellent examples of the developments taking place in the Angel City, but which, however, soon gave way to the inevitable bust, precipitated by a panic in late August that later included the failure of the Temple and Workman bank and the financial ruin of that family. We’ll be sure to offer more posts looking at newspapers in our collection, so keep an eye out for those!