by Paul R. Spitzzeri
Alfred Beck Chapman, after service in the United States Army and close to two decades as a prominent attorney, as well as being a founder of the city of Orange, dedicated himself, from about 1880, to his large ranch in the San Gabriel Valley at the foothills of the mountains of that name. Over the next decade, he built a reputation as a grower of high quality oranges, while raising lemons and other crops, and looked to innovative ways to improve his groves through fertilization and pest control.
The years covering the Boom of the 1880s, including 1887 and 1888 when William H. Workman, nephew of Homestead founders William Workman and Nicolasa Urioste, was mayor of Los Angeles, included many examples of Chapman’s rise to prominence among the orchardists of the region, as noted in part five. Now, we turn to the post-boom years and the remainder of the 19th century and then the first 15 years of the 20th century to conclude this post.
Among Chapman’s other interests in the 1890s were his continued involvement with the Arrowhead Springs Hotel, located beneath a natural feature on the side of the San Bernardino Mountains which gave the hostelry its name. The first iteration was opened in 1864, at which David Smith, who gave himself the title of doctor, opened his “infirmary” or “sanitarium” to use hot mineral water to treat patients with tuberculosis and other illnesses.
Smith’s enterprise was not economically viable and leased the place to two Los Angeles men, Robert Darby and Sylvester Lyman, who made some improvements, but the financial picture did not improve. A few days after Smith died, the hotel burned with the situation obviously suspicious. This is when Chapman joined Darby, Lyman and others to form a new company and build a new hotel costing $150,000.
The edifice was enlarged with two wings, bringing the total number of rooms to 120, making it the largest in San Bernardino and vicinity, but on Independence Day 1895, smoke was discerned along the roof’s western-facing gable and, because of strong west winds, the fire spread rapidly, so that, within a half-hour, reported the Los Angeles Express of the next day, “the whole building was wrapped in flames” and “presented quite a spectacle as seen burning from San Bernardino.”
By this time, Chapman was president of the Arrowhead Hotel Company with Los Angeles merchant Benjamin F. Coulter and his son Franklin being the other officers and the latter’s wife was a guest at the time the inferno consumed the structure, said to have cost $40,000 and accommodating between 100 and 125 guests during the busy winter season when folks from elsewhere in the country flocked to the region during the balmier weather or sought relief from whatever ailed them in the hot springs. A third hotel was built a decade later, but was also consumed by fire, the blaze happening in 1938. In 1909, Arrowhead springs water was offered to the public and remains a popular product today, though it sources from springs in Colorado and Canada, as well.
In the Angel City, the Los Angeles Cable Railway was, along with the Second Street Cable Railway, at the forefront of that technology, replacing horse-drawn systems, in street railroads, though it proved to be a costly one and was soon outstripped by the development of electric car lines. The LACR, not long after completing a line to Boyle Heights, foundered financially and Chicago interests, led by Charles B. Holmes, who ran a cable car line in the Windy City, took over and renamed it the Pacific Railway.
The 4 March 1891 edition of the Los Angeles Times reported that Holmes and a brother were the officers of the Pacific and that, in September and October 1889, issued renewed LACR stock in the name of the new firm. Among those holdings large shares were former LACR owners James F. Crank and Isaias W. Hellman (former bank partner of William Workman and F.P.F. Temple), as well as Bank of California president William Alvord (in whose name the foreclosed properties of Workman and Temple, after their bank failed in 1876, was sold, though “Lucky” Baldwin was the creditor) and Chapman, who took $50,000 worth. In fall 1893, the year a major depression hit the country, the Pacific collapsed and ruined Holmes and others invested in it.
Not long after the Los Angeles Oil Field was opened by Charles Canfield and Edward Doheny and instigated intense interest in petroleum prospecting, in March 1894, Chapman joined Hiram Barton, his partner in developing a town on the Barton Ranch near San Bernardino (as mentioned in part five of this post), map mogul Andrew McNally (whose Altadena house was consumed by the Eaton Fire of January 2025) and others in founding the Natural Gas and Oil Company, though it does not appear the company was particularly active.
Regarding another natural resource, Chapman and members of his family faced a successful condemnation suit in 1894 from the City of Monrovia, which wanted five-and-a-half acres of his ranch as it “desires its use for municipal purposes in supplying water to its inhabitants.” This example of eminent domain came during a decade in which there were several years of drought and before imported water came to the region, so it is an interesting item regarding issues of supply.
At the end of the Nineties, Pasadena’s water committee explored options for improving its municipal stocks, including annexing territory that was served by various water companies, while also pursuing a plan for a municipally-owned system—his happened in 1912 four years after electricity was supplied to residents by the city. The Times of 16 April 1899 reported that Chapman offered the Crown City three proposals for selling tracts from his ranch that had artesian wells. The amounts were 750 acres for $450,000, 600 acres for $400,000 and 350 acres for $325,000 and, if either of the latter two were chosen, he would forego taking any water, but it does not appear that any deal was made.
With respect to his orange-growing pursuits, Chapman was further complimented on his five-acre experiment, mentioned in part five, in using bone meal as fertilizer, working to keep pests from the trees and used the best methods of irrigation. The financial reporting was that he realized a handsome net profit of $500 an acre, which was noted before here, but the Herald of 2 February 1890 reiterated the value of smaller groves over larger orchards, so that someone properly working 20 or 30 acres “will in a few years have a competency” and this meant that “there is the opportunity for thousands of heads of families to place themselves in this advantageous position in this county.”
The 26 March 1891 number of the paper rejoiced that “orange growers are in luck and no mistake” as “the market is booming at flood tide, and looks as if it might be a tidal wave.” Prices were good, yields high and “the country is swarming with buyers, all grabbing for everything in sight.” Chapman was cited as a preeminent example of the current climate and was praised for his patience in not selling fruit too early and it was remarked:
He began shipping on his own account [independently], and is reported to have shipped off about 6000 boxes. This week he closed out the crop on the trees for a lump sum of $25,000, excepting his Tangerine oranges, and all his lemons . . . [an informant for the paper] estimates that the Chapman crop will net a total of nearly $40,000. Three years ago his orchard was almost given over as destroyed by the white scale bug, which now turns off $40,000 worth of fruit. The sum is a very handsome one for any farmer to bank for his crop.
In its 12 July issue, the Herald discussed the introduction of what it called the “Joppa” orange, but what is best known as the Jaffa, one of the main varieties in the Middle East (the orange’s antecedents recently were reported to be from the Indian subcontinent but developed into the citrus species in south-central China). Jaffa is now part of the Tel Aviv-Yafo metropolitan area of Israel.
The paper paraphrased Chapman’s son, A. Scott, as stating that the Jaffa was “the best of all the varieties he and his father had grown, and they have tried nearly every variety that has been introduced from abroad and all the ones of home origin.” It was also observed that it was seedless, the tree lacking thorns and the color said to be a deep red.
John R. Dobbins, mentioned in this post a couple of times, owned the original trees brought to the San Gabriel district and remarked, “I am highly pleased with the growth and fruit” and added “I regard it as one of the very best varieties of recent introduction, and as a money-maker it will be very hard to beat.” How they got to this area was explained:
In 1877, Mr. A.B. Chapman of San Gabriel, was connected with the law firm of Glassell, Chapman & Smith, of Los Angeles, who were then the attorneys of the Southern Pacific railroad company, and in conversation with the late Charles Crocker and other officers of the road on their return from the Mediterranean, they praised an orange they had seen at Joppa, Palestine, above all other which came under their observation. Mr. Chapman then sent for some seeds from the American consulate at that point. The consul sent him some seeds of that orange, which were planted that same year. Several plants were thus obtained, and when large enough the best of them were set in his orchard.
In its 20 August number, the Times cited data for a new pamphlet from the Los Angeles Chamber of Commerce, established three years prior but well on its way to becoming a paramount promotional entity for the Angel City and environs, which, the paper observed, “gives some idea of the magnitude of some of our productions on a large scale.”
Adding that “the statistics are given from small ranchers and in favorable localities,” the Times reported that “Lucky” Baldwin, a neighbor of Chapman, sold 80,000 boxes of oranges from 75 acres of trees for a net profit of just shy of $103,000 (as well as alfalfa, barley, hay and wheat from more than 3,200 acres, much of which was on the Rancho La Puente, which he obtained by foreclosure from William Workman a dozen years prior. Chapman’s 130 acres yielded a net of $29,000, a vast improvement over the $6,000 loss realized the prior season. The Herald in its first issue of 1892 added that his cultivating and irrigating costs were $1,000 and that the loss from 1890 was due to the orchard being “badly infested with scale, and poorly managed.”
The grower’s fertilization regime was again cited by the Herald in its 18 November issue with respect to that five-acre experiment, which produced results far superior to the rest of his domain and it was remarked that, “Mr. Chapman says it pays to fertilize, and to put labor on the cultivation of the orange.” Some $2,500 was expended on “the most approved composts” for the current season so that his crop “from present appearances, will exceed by 5000 boxes the yield of last season,” which was considered a good showing.” This led the paper to advise, “here is an object lesson which should not be lost on orange-growers.”
Problems with the orange crop in 1892 were discussed in the Herald of 19 November, as it remarked that “the failure of many of the navel orchards . . . to produce fruit after a heavy blossom in the spring . . . has puzzled our foremost fruit growers.” Reflecting his stature among regional orchardists, Chapman was quoted as to his views on the subject and he remarked,
Imagine a navel orange orchard thoroughly fertilized with horse manure and heavily in bloom. Manifestly the tree is putting forth its greatest efforts, both growing and blooming. We are taught that the orange . . . is dependent upon a supply of nitrate in the soil for its existence . . . Our springs [of water] are cold and the nitrates do not form in the soil sufficiently rapidly for the needs of the tree; and a tree that has not the proper of nitrogen at its control is forced to turn yellow and drop its fruit. The remedy consists in applying nitrate ready formed, as nitrate of soda . . . the three essentials for the growth of nitrate are: shade, moisture and heat.
In fall 1893, a California fruit growers convention was held at the Grand Opera House in Los Angeles and it is not surprising, given his past concerns with the topic, that Chapman was appointed to a committee on transportation and freight rates, joining a quartet of others from various parts of the Golden State, while his son Scott was added to committee on the convention’s resolutions.
From about the mid-Nineties onward, Chapman’s public presence was significantly diminished, at least as reflected in media coverage. He occasionally was mentioned in terms of real estate transactions, such as the Los Angeles Express reporting his September 1905 purchase from James B. Lankershim of 40 acres near Western Avenue and 4th Street, said to involve in the vicinity of $120,000 and it presumed that the acquisition was for subdivision.
A month prior, the paper noted that Chapman and the Coulters leased the Arrowhead Springs property about a year before and that a new cement and stone hotel was being constructed on the 1,120-acre property and was to be ready for an October opening. Moreover, the entity leasing the tract, it being reported that transportation and real estate tycoon Henry E. Huntington was involved, “has the option to purchase the entire property for $115,000, and it is reported that it has availed itself of the option.”
The citrus growing operation at the Chapman place, however, continued with his son Scott, who took on greater responsibility for its management. The role the father-and-son played in dealing with scale infestation, alluded to here in a few places, involved their advocacy in the obtaining of the Vedalia beetle from Australia.
At the end of the 1880s, this effort “marked the start in the United States of biological control” with 500 of the insects imported, though it took some subterfuge, and placed in the groves of John W. Wolfskill, John R. Dobbins and the Chapmans. In subsequent years, the beetles went to work and eradicated the cottony cushion scale that so long plagued regional groves.
In its 6 April 1904 number, the Times provided some detail on the Chapman Ranch, noting that “A.B. Chapman of San Gabriel has been growing oranges since 1878 or earlier” and “has groves amounting to eighty acres and the crop is usually a carload per acre” with about 100 for the current season. Moreover, it was remarked that Chapman “has not been an exchange man,” meaning that he operated independently of associations such as that which marketed its fruit under the widely known Sunkist brand.
The article also related challenged Chapman had with railroad shipping rates and the spoliation of fruit, as well as the slowness in packing oranges with this last said to involve three boxes per day per laborer, but in 1904 it was 40-50 boxes. With respect to current freighting charges, the paper observed that Chapman “thinks it robbery, and a violation of the constitution” that he paid about $326 an acre for his 80 acre grove. The piece ended with,
The trouble about farmers getting their rights, as Mr. Chapman views it, is that there are no farmers in Congress. If the farmers would combine and send men from their own ranks to Congress laws could be passed which would restrain railroad companies from making exorbitant charges.
On 16 January 1915, Chapman died at his home at age 85 and it was reported by the next day’s Times that he “was in excellent health until a short time before his death,” attributed to heart failure after he contracted a severe cold. He was survived by his second wife, Mary Louisa Stephens (whose brother Albert Lee was a prominent lawyer and judge) and five children aside from Scott, including two sons who were doctors and three daughters.
The relentless expansion of suburbia east from Pasadena meant that the days of the Chapman Ranch were numbered by the time the boom of the early 1920s came. Scott Chapman continued agricultural operations until about then, but in June 1923, about nine months before his death, came the sale of land for the Chapman Villa tract, which was marketed and sold by the firm of Marsh and Coughran, who were also the agents for Walter P. Temple’s newly established Town of Temple.
In May 1927, Chapman Woods was opened for sale and the Pasadena Star-News of the 14th featured a lengthy article, illustrated with several photographs, and a large ad, which pronounced that “the unsurpassed beauty of this wonderful estate is known to but few people, as it has been maintained as a private estate for seventy-five years,” though the Chapmans had it for not far under sixty.
In any case, it was notable that the sale of tracts was by acre, and none under this amount, with prices from $7,000 to $10,000, but “unlike the usual methods of property subdivision—no definite boundaries for estates have been established” and “each buyer may personally select the location and boundaries of his own estate.” Those getting in early had “the greatest freedom of selection.” Also highlighted were natural oak, sycamore and walnut trees as well as planted varieties like avocado, eucalyptus, magnolia, palm, pine and, of course, orange.
Agents C.M. Northrup & Son pronounced,
The great estates established by the pioneers of Southern California gradually have been cut up into city lots during the past ten years, until today there are only a very few such estates remaining close to the great cities. Among these famous estates is that of A.B. Chapman . . . The heirs of Mr. Chapman finally have been prevailed on to permit others to own and enjoy these productive and picturesque acres.
With its centennial next year, Chapman Woods, along with the Chapman Avenue of Orange and Garden Grove (though not the Chapman Avenue of Fullerton and Placentia, that being named for Charles C. Chapman, who has no known connection to Alfred) is one of the few visual reminders of one of the more prominent figures in Greater Los Angeles legal and agricultural circles in the last four decades of the 19th and into the 20th centuries.