Dr. Truman H. Rose
The reader may already have noted that more than one important move in my life has been decided upon with but little previous deliberation. During August, 1866, while on the way to a family picnic at La Ballona, my brother suggested the advisability of opening an office for H. Newmark & Company in New York; and so quickly had I expressed my willingness to remove there that, when we reached the rancho, I announced to my wife that we would leave for the East as soon as we could get ready. Circumstances, however, delayed our going a few months.
My family at this time consisted of my wife and four children; and together on January 29th, 1867, we left San Pedro for New York, by way of San Francisco and Panamá, experiencing frightfully hot weather. Stopping at Acapulco, during Maximilian's revolution, we were summarily warned to keep away from the fort on the hill; while at Panamá yellow fever, spread by travelers recently arrived from South America, caused the Captain to beat a hasty retreat. Sailing on the steamer Henry Chancey from Aspinwall, we arrived at New York on the sixth of March; and having domiciled my family comfortably, my next care was to establish an office on the third floor at 31 and 33 Broadway, placing it in charge of M. J. Newmark, who had preceded me to the metropolis a year before. In a short time, I bought a home on Forty-ninth Street, between Sixth and Seventh avenues, then an agreeable residence district. An intense longing to see my old home next induced me to return to Europe, and I sailed on May 16th for Havre on the steam-propeller Union; the band playing The Highland Fling as the vessel left the pier. In mid-ocean, the ship's propeller broke, and she completed the voyage under sail. Three months later, I returned on the Russia. The recollection of this journey gives me real satisfaction; for had I not taken it then, I should never again have seen my father. On the twenty-first of the following November, or a few months after I last bade him good-bye, he died at Loebau, in the seventy-fifth year of his age. My mother had died in the summer of 1859.
It was during this visit that, tarrying for a week in the brilliant French capital, I saw the Paris Exposition, housed to a large extent in one immense building in the Champ de Mars. I was wonderfully impressed with both the city and the fair, as well as with the enterprising and artistic French people who had created it, although I was somewhat disappointed that, of the fifty thousand or more exhibitors represented, but seven hundred were Americans.
One little incident may be worth relating. While I was standing in the midst of the machinery one day, the gendarmes suddenly began to force the crowd back, and on retreating with the rest, I saw a group of ladies and gentlemen approaching. It was soon whispered that they were the Empress Eugénie and her suite, and that we had been commanded to retire in order to permit her Majesty to get a better view of a new railroad coach that she desired to inspect.
Not long ago I was reading of a trying ordeal in the life of Elihu B. Washburne, American Minister to France, who, having unluckily removed his shoe at a Court dinner, was compelled to rise with the company on the sudden appearance of royalty, and to step back with a stockinged foot! The incident recalled an experience of my own in London. I had ordered from a certain shoemaker in Berlin a pair of patent-leather gaiters which I wore for the first time when I went to Covent Garden with an old friend and his wife. It was a very warm evening and the performance had not progressed far before it became evident that the shoes were too small. I was, in fact, nearly overcome with pain, and in my desperation removed the gaiters (when the lights were low), quietly shoved them under the seat and sat out the rest of the performance with a fair degree of comfort and composure. Imagine my consternation, however, when I sought to put the shoes on again and found the operation almost impossible! The curtain fell while I was explaining and apologizing to my friends; and nearly every light was extinguished before I was ready to emerge from the famous opera house and limp to a waiting carriage.
A trifling event also lingers among the memories of this revisit to my native place. While journeying towards Loebau in a stage, I happened to mention that I had married since settling in America; whereupon one of my fellow-passengers inquired whether my wife was white, brown or black?
Major Ben C. Truman was President Johnson's private secretary until he was appointed, in 1866, special agent for the Post Office department on the Pacific Coast. He came to Los Angeles in February, 1867, to look after postal matters in Southern California and Arizona, but more particularly to reëstablish, between Los Angeles and points in New Mexico, the old Butterfield Route which had been discontinued on account of the War. Truman opened post offices at a number of places in Los Angeles County. On December 8th, 1869, the Major married Miss Augusta Mallard, daughter of Judge J. S. Mallard. From July, 1873, until the late summer of 1877, he controlled the Los Angeles Star, contributing to its columns many excellent sketches of early life in Southern California, some of which were incorporated in one or more substantial volumes; and of all the pioneer journalists here, it is probable that none have surpassed this affable gentleman in brilliancy and genial, kindly touch. Among Truman's books is an illustrated work entitled Semi-Tropical California, dedicated, with a Dominus vobiscum, to Phineas Banning and published in San Francisco, 1874; while another volume, issued seven years later, is devoted to Occidental Sketches.
A fire, starting in Bell's Block on Los Angeles Street, on July 13th, during my absence from the city, destroyed property to the value of sixty-four thousand dollars; and the same season, S. Lazard & Company moved their dry goods store from Bell's Row to Wolfskill's building on Main Street, opposite the Bella Union hotel.
Germain Pellissier, a Frenchman from the Hautes-Alpes, came to Los Angeles in August, and for twenty-eight years lived at what is now the corner of Seventh and Olive streets. Then the land was in the country; but by 1888, Pellissier had built the block that bears his name. On settling here, Pellissier went into sheep-raising, scattering stock in Kern and Ventura counties, and importing sheep from France and Australia in order to improve his breed; and from one ram alone in a year, as he demonstrated to some doubting challengers, he clipped sixty-two and a half pounds of wool.
P. Beaudry began to invest in hill property in 1867, at once improving the steep hillside of New High Street, near Sonora Town, which he bought in, at sheriff's sale, for fifty-five dollars. Afterward, Beaudry purchased some twenty acres between Second, Fourth, Charity and Hill streets, for which he paid five hundred and seventeen dollars; and when he had subdivided this into eighty lots, he cleared about thirty thousand dollars. Thirty-nine acres, between Fourth and Sixth, and Pearl and Charity streets, he finally disposed of at a profit, it is said, of over fifty thousand dollars.
John G. Downey having subdivided Nieto's rancho, Santa Gertrudis, the little town of Downey, which he named, soon enjoyed such a boom that sleepy Los Angeles began to sit up and take notice. Among the early residents was E. M. Sanford, a son-in-law of General John W. Gordon, of Georgia. A short time before the founding of Downey, a small place named Galatin had been started near by, but the flood of 1868 caused our otherwise dry rivers to change their courses, and Galatin was washed away. This subdividing at once stimulated the coming of land and home-seekers, increased the spirit of enterprise and brought money into circulation.
Soon afterward, Phineas Banning renewed the agitation to connect Los Angeles with Wilmington by rail. He petitioned the County to assist the enterprise, but the larger taxpayers, backed by the over-conservative farmers, still opposed the scheme, tooth and nail, until it finally took all of Banning's influence to carry the project through to a successful termination.
George S. Patton, whose father, Colonel Patton of the Confederate Army, was killed at Winchester, September 19th, 1864, is a nephew of Andrew Glassell and the oldest of four children who came to Los Angeles with their mother and her father, Andrew Glassell, Sr., in 1867. Educated in the public schools of Los Angeles, Patton afterward attended the Virginia Military Institute, where Stonewall Jackson had been a professor, returning to Los Angeles in September, 1877, when he entered the law firm of Glassell, Smith & Patton. In 1884, he married Miss Ruth, youngest daughter of B. D. Wilson, after which he retired to private life. One of Patton's sisters married Tom Brown; another sister became the wife of the popular physician, Dr. W. Le Moyne Wills. In 1871, his mother, relict of Colonel George S. Patton, married her kinsman, Colonel George H. Smith.
John Moran, Sr., conducted a vineyard on San Pedro Street near the present Ninth, in addition to which he initiated the soda-water business here, selling his product at twenty-five cents a bottle. Soda water, however, was too "soft" a drink to find much favor and little was done to establish the trade on a firm basis until 1867, when H. W. Stoll, a German, drove from Colorado to California and organized the Los Angeles Soda Water Works. As soon as he began to manufacture the aerated beverages, Stevens & Wood set up the first soda-water fountain in Los Angeles, on North Spring Street near the Post Office. After that, bubbling water and strangely-colored syrups gained in popularity until, in 1876, quite an expensive fountain was purchased by Preuss & Pironi's drug store, on Spring Street opposite Court. And what is more, they brought in hogsheads from Saratoga what would be difficult to find in all Los Angeles to-day: Congress, Vichy and Kissingen waters. Stoll, by the way, in 1873, married Fräulein Louisa Behn, daughter of John Behn.
An important industry of the late sixties and early seventies was the harvesting of castor beans, then growing wild along the zanjas. They were shipped to San Francisco for manufacturing purposes, the oil factories there both supplying the ranchmen with seed and pledging themselves to take the harvest when gathered. In 1867, a small castor-oil mill was set up here.
The chilicothe—derived, according to Charles F. Lummis, from the Aztec, chilacayote, the wild cucumber, or echinocystes fabacea—is the name of a plaything supplied by diversified nature, which grew on large vines, especially along the slope leading down to the river on what is now Elysian Park, and in the neighborhood of the hills adjacent to the Mallard and Nichols places. Four or five of these chilicothes, each shaped much like an irregular marble, came in a small burr or gourd; and to secure them for games, the youngsters risked limb, if not life, among the trees and rocks. Small circular holes were sometimes cut into the nuts; and after the meat, which was not edible, had been extracted, the empty shells were strung together like beads and presented, as necklaces and bracelets, to sisters and sweethearts.
Just about the time when I first gazed upon the scattered houses of our little pueblo, the Pacific Railway Expedition, sent out from Washington, prepared and published a tinted lithograph sketch of Los Angeles, now rather rare. In 1867, Stephen A. Rendall, an Englishman of Angora goat fame, who had been here, off and on, as a photographer, devised one of the first large panoramas of Los Angeles, which he sold by advance subscription. It was made in sections; and as the only view of that year extant, it also has become notable as an historical souvenir.
Surrounded by his somewhat pretentious gallery and his mysterious darkroom on the top floor of Temple's new block, V. Wolfenstein also took good, bad and indifferent photographs, having arrived here, perhaps, in the late sixties, and remaining a decade or more, until his return to his native Stockholm where I again met him. He operated with slow wet-plates, and pioneers will remember the inconvenience, almost tantamount to torture, to which the patron was subjected in sitting out an exposure. The children of pioneers, too, will recall his magic, revolving stereoscope, filled with fascinating views at which one peeped through magnifying glasses.
Louis Lewin must have arrived here in the late sixties. Subsequently, he bought out the stationery business of W. J. Brodrick, and P. Lazarus, upon his arrival from Tucson in 1874, entered into partnership with him; Samuel Hellman, as was not generally known at the time, also having an interest in the firm which was styled Louis Lewin & Company. When the Centennial of the United States was celebrated here in 1876, a committee wrote a short historical sketch of Los Angeles; and this was published by Lewin & Company. Now the firm is known as the Lazarus Stationery Company, P. Lazarus[28] being President. Lewin and Lazarus married into families of pioneers: Mrs. Lewin is a daughter of S. Lazard, while Mrs. Lazarus is a daughter of M. Kremer. Lewin died at Manilla on April 5th, 1905.
On November 18th, the Common Council contracted with Jean Louis Sainsevain to lay some five thousand feet of two- and three-inch iron pipe at a cost of about six thousand dollars in scrip; but the great flood of that winter caused Sainsevain so many failures and losses that he transferred his lease, in the spring or summer of 1868, to Dr. J. S. Griffin, Prudent Beaudry, and Solomon Lazard, who completed Sainsevain's contract with the City.
Dr. Griffin and his associates then proposed to lease the water-works from the City for a term of fifty years, but soon changed this to an offer to buy. When the matter came up before the Council for adoption, there was a tie vote, whereupon Murray Morrison, just before resigning as President of the Council, voted in the affirmative, his last official act being to sign the franchise. Mayor Aguilar, however, vetoed the ordinance, and then Dr. Griffin and his colleagues came forward with a new proposition. This was to lease the works for a period of thirty years, and to pay fifteen hundred dollars a year in addition to performing certain things promised in the preceding proposition.
At this stage of the negotiations, John Jones made a rival offer, and P. McFadden, who had been an unsuccessful bidder for the Sainsevain lease, tried with Juan Bernard to enter into a twenty-year contract. Notwithstanding these other offers, however, the City authorities thought it best, on July 22d, 1868, to vote the franchise to Dr. Griffin, S. Lazard and P. Beaudry, who soon transferred their thirty-year privileges to a corporation known as the Los Angeles City Water Company, in which they became trustees. Others associated in this enterprise were Eugene Meyer, I. W. Hellman, J. G. Downey, A. J. King, Stephen Hathaway Mott—Tom's brother—W. H. Perry and Charles Lafoon. A spirited fight followed the granting of the thirty-year lease, but the water company came out victorious.
In the late sixties, when the only communities of much consequence in Los Angeles County were Los Angeles, Anaheim and Wilmington, the latter place and Anaheim Landing were the shipping ports of Los Angeles, San Bernardino and Arizona. At that time, or during some of the especially prosperous days of Anaheim, the slough at Anaheim Landing (since filled up by flood) was so formed, and of such depth, that heavily-loaded vessels ran past the warehouse to a considerable distance inland, and there unloaded their cargoes. At the same time the leading Coast steamers began to stop there. Not many miles away was the corn-producing settlement, Gospel Swamp.
I have pointed out the recurring weakness in the wooden pipes laid by Sainsevain and Marchessault. This distressing difficulty, causing, as it did, repeated losses and sharp criticism by the public, has always been regarded as the motive for ex-Mayor Marchessault's death on January 20th, when he committed suicide in the old City Council room.
Jacob Loew arrived in America in 1865 and spent three years in New York before he came to California in 1868. Clerking for a while in San Francisco, he went to the Old Town of San Diego, then to Galatin, and in 1872 settled in Downey; and there, in conjunction with Jacob Baruch, afterward of Haas, Baruch & Company, he conducted for years the principal general merchandise business of that section. On coming to Los Angeles in 1883, he bought, as I have said, the Deming Mill now known as the Capitol Mills. Two years later, on the second of August, he was married to my daughter Emily.
Dr. Joseph Kurtz, once a student at Giessen, arrived in Los Angeles on February 3d, with a record for hospital service at Baltimore during the Civil War, having been induced to come here by the druggist, Adolf Junge, with whom for a while he had some association. Still later he joined Dr. Rudolph Eichler in conducting a pharmacy. For some time prior to his graduation in medicine, in 1872, Dr. Kurtz had an office in the Lanfranco Building. For many years, he was surgeon to the Southern Pacific Railroad Company and consulting physician to the Santa Fé Railroad Company, and he also served as President of the Los Angeles College Clinical Association. I shall have further occasion to refer to this good friend. Dr. Carl Kurtz is distinguishing himself in the profession of his father.
Hale fellow well met and always in favor with a large circle, was my Teutonic friend, Lewis Ebinger, who, after coming to Los Angeles in 1868, turned clay into bricks. Perhaps this also recalled the days of his childhood when he made pies of the same material; but be that as it may, Lewis in the early seventies made his first venture in the bakery business, opening shop on North Spring Street. In the bustling Boom days when real estate men saw naught but the sugar-coating, Ebinger, who had moved to elaborate quarters in a building at the southwest corner of Spring and Third streets, was dispensing cream puffs and other baked delicacies to an enthusiastic and unusually large clientele. But since everybody then had money, or thought that he had, one such place was not enough to satisfy the ravenous speculators; with the result that John Koster was soon conducting a similar establishment on Spring Street near Second, while farther north, on Spring Street near First, the Vienna Bakery ran both Lewis and John a merry race.
Dr. L. W. French, one of the organizers of the Odontological Society of Southern California, also came to Los Angeles in 1868—so early that he found but a couple of itinerant dentists, who made their headquarters here for a part of the year and then hung out their shingles in other towns or at remote ranches.
One day in the spring of 1868, while I was residing in New York City, I received a letter from Phineas Banning, accompanied by a sealed communication, and reading about as follows:
Dear Harris:
Herewith I enclose to you a letter of the greatest importance, addressed to Miss Mary Hollister (daughter, as you know, of Colonel John H. Hollister), who will soon be on her way to New York, and who may be expected to arrive there by the next steamer.
This letter I beg you to deliver to Miss Hollister personally, immediately upon her arrival in New York, thereby obliging
Yours obediently,
(Signed) Phineas Banning.
The steamer referred to had not yet arrived, and I lost no time in arranging that I should be informed, by the company's agents, of the vessel's approach, as soon as it was sighted. This notification came, by the by, through a telegram received before daylight one bitterly cold morning, when I was told that the ship would soon be at the dock; and as quickly as I could, I procured a carriage, hastened to the wharf and, before any passengers had landed, boarded the vessel. There I sought out Miss Hollister, a charming lady, and gave her the mysterious missive.
I thought no more of this matter until I returned to Los Angeles when, welcoming me back, Banning told me that the letter I had had the honor to deliver aboard ship in New York contained nothing less than a proposal of marriage, his solicitation of Miss Hollister's heart and hand!
One reason why the Bella Union played such an important rôle in the early days of Los Angeles, was because there was no such thing as a high-class restaurant; indeed, the first recollection I have of anything like a satisfactory place is that of Louis Vielle, known by some as French Louis and nicknamed by others Louis Gordo, or Louis the Fat. Vielle came to Los Angeles from Mexico, a fat, jolly little French caterer, not much over five feet in height and weighing, I should judge, two hundred and fifty pounds; and this great bulk, supported as it was by two peg-like legs, rendered his appearance truly comical. His blue eyes, light hair and very rosy cheeks accentuated his ludicrous figure. Louis, who must have been about fifty-four years of age when I first met him, then conducted his establishment in John Lanfranco's building on Main Street, between Commercial and Requena; from which fact the place was known as the Lanfranco, although it subsequently received the more suggestive title, the What Cheer House. Louis was an acknowledged expert in his art, but he did not always choose to exert himself. Nevertheless his lunches, for which he charged fifty or seventy-five cents, according to the number of dishes served, were well thought of, and it is certain that Los Angeles had never had so good a restaurant before. At one time, our caterer's partner was a man named Frederico Guiol, whom he later bought out. Louis could never master the English language, and to his last day spoke with a strong French accent. His florid cheeks were due to the enormous quantity of claret consumed both at and between meals. He would mix it with soup, dip his bread into it and otherwise absorb it in large quantities. Indeed, at the time of his fatal illness, while he was living with the family of Don Louis Sainsevain, it was assumed that over-indulgence in wine was the cause. Be that as it may, he sickened and died, passing away at the Lanfranco home in 1872. Vielle had prospered, but during his sickness he spent largely of his means. After his death, it was discovered that he had been in the habit of hiding his coin in little niches in the wall of his room and in other secret places; and only a small amount of the money was found. A few of the real pioneers recollect Louis Gordo as one who added somewhat to the comfort of those who then patronized restaurants; while others will associate him with the introduction here of the first French dolls, to take the place of rag-babies.
Both Judge Robert Maclay Widney and Dr. Joseph P. Widney, the surgeon, took up their residence in Los Angeles in 1868. R. M. Widney set out from Ohio about 1855 and, having spent two years in exploring the Rockies, worked for a while in the Sacramento Valley, where he chopped wood for a living, and finally reached Los Angeles with a small trunk and about a hundred dollars in cash. Here he opened a law and real-estate office and started printing the Real Estate Advertiser. Dr. Widney crossed the Continent in 1862, spent two years as surgeon in the United States Army in Arizona, after which he proceeded to Los Angeles and soon became one of the charter members of the Los Angeles Medical Society, exerting himself in particular to extend Southern California's climatic fame.
I have spoken of the ice procured from the San Bernardino mountains in rather early days, but I have not said that in summer, when we most needed the cooling commodity, there was none to be had. The enterprising firm of Queen & Gard, the first to arrange for regular shipments of Truckee River ice in large quantities by steamer from the North, announced their purpose late in March, 1868, of building an ice house on Main Street; and about the first of April they began delivering daily, in a large and substantial wagon especially constructed for that purpose and which, for the time being, was an object of much curiosity. Liberal support was given the enterprise; and perhaps it is no wonder that the perspiring editor of the News, going into ecstasies because of a cooling sample or two deposited in his office, said, in the next issue of his paper:
The founding of an ice depot is another step forward in the progress that is to make us a great City. We have Water and Gas, and now we are to have the additional luxury of Ice!
Banning's fight for the Los Angeles & San Pedro Railroad has been touched upon more than once. Tomlinson, his rival, opposed the project; but his sudden death, about two weeks before the election in 1868, removed one of the serious obstacles. When the vote was taken, on March 24th, as to whether the City and County should bond themselves to encourage the building of the railroad, seven hundred votes were cast in favor of, and six hundred and seventy-two votes against, the undertaking, leaving Banning and his associates ready to go ahead. By the way, as a reminder of the quondam vogue of Spanish here, it may be noted that the proclamation regarding the railroad, published in 1868, was printed in both English and Spanish.
On May 16th, Henry Hamilton, whose newspaper, the Star, during part of the War period had been suspended through the censorship of the National Government, again made his bow to the Los Angeles public, this time in a half-facetious leader in which he referred to the "late unpleasantness" in the family circle. Hamilton's old-time vigor was immediately recognized, but not his former disposition to attack and criticize.
Dr. H. S. Orme, once President of the State Board of Health of California, arrived in Los Angeles on July 4th and soon became as prominent in Masonic as in medical circles. Dr. Harmon, an early successor to Drs. Griffin and Den, first settled here in 1868, although he had previously visited California in 1853.
Carl Felix Heinzeman, at one time a well-known chemist and druggist, emigrated from Germany in 1868 and came direct to Los Angeles, where after succeeding J. B. Saunders & Company, he continued, in the Lanfranco Building, what grew to be the largest drug store south of San Francisco. Heinzeman died on April 29th, 1903. About the same period, a popular apothecary shop on Main Street, near the Plaza, was known as Chevalier's. In the seventies, when hygiene and sanitation were given more attention, a Welshman named Hughes conducted a steam-bath establishment on Main Street, almost opposite the Baker Block, and the first place of its kind in the city.
Charles F. Harper[29] of Mississippi, and the father of ex-Mayor Harper, in 1868 opened with R. H. Dalton a hardware store in the Allen Block, corner of Spring and Temple streets, thus forerunning Coulter & Harper, Harper & Moore, Harper, Reynolds & Company and the Harper-Reynolds Company.
Michel Lèvy, an Alsatian, arrived in San Francisco when but seventeen years of age, and after various experiences in California and Nevada towns, he came to Los Angeles in 1868, soon establishing, with Joe Coblentz, the wholesale liquor house of Lèvy & Coblentz. The latter left here in 1879, and Lèvy continued under the firm name of M. Lèvy & Company until his death in 1905.
Anastácio Cárdenas, a dwarf who weighed but one and a half pounds when born, came to Los Angeles in 1867 and soon appeared before the public as a singer and dancer. He carried a sword and was popularly dubbed "General." A brother, Ruperto, long lived here.
When the Canal & Reservoir Company was organized with George Hansen as President and J. J. Warner as Secretary, P. Beaudry contributed heavily to construct a twenty-foot dam across the cañon, below the present site of Echo Park, and a ditch leading down to Pearl Street. This first turned attention to the possibilities in the hill-lands to the West; and in return, the City gave to the company a large amount of land, popularly designated as canal and reservoir property.
In 1868, when there was still not a three-story house in Los Angeles, James Alvinza Hayward, a San Franciscan, joined John G. Downey in providing one hundred thousand dollars with which to open, in the old Downey Block on the site of the Temple adobe, the first bank in Los Angeles, under the firm name of Hayward & Company. The lack of business afforded this enterprise short shrift and they soon retired. In July of the same year, I. W. Hellman, William Workman, F. P. F. Temple and James R. Toberman started a bank, with a capital of one hundred and twenty-five thousand dollars, under the title of Hellman, Temple & Company, Hellman becoming manager.
I do not remember when postal lock-boxes were first brought into use, but I do recollect that in the late sixties Postmaster Clarke had a great deal of trouble collecting quarterly rents, and that he finally gave notice that boxes held by delinquents would thereafter be nailed up.
A year or two after the Burtons had established themselves here, came another pedagogue in the person of W. B. Lawlor, a thick-set, bearded man with a flushed complexion, who opened a day-school called the Lawlor Institute; and after the Burtons left here to settle at Portland, Oregon, where Burton became headmaster of an academy for advanced students, many of his former pupils attended Lawlor's school. The two institutions proved quite different in type: the Burton training had tended strongly to languages and literature, while Lawlor, who was an adept at short-cut methods of calculation, placed more stress on arithmetic and commercial education. Burton, who returned to Los Angeles, has been for years a leading member of the Times editorial staff, and Burton's Book on California and its Sunlit Skies is one of this author's contributions to Pacific Coast literature; his wife, however, died many years ago. Lawlor, who was President of the Common Council in 1880, is also dead.
The most popular piano-teacher of about that time was Professor Van Gilpin.
William Pridham came to Los Angeles in August, having been transferred from the San Francisco office of Wells Fargo & Company, in whose service as pony rider, clerk at Austin, Nevada, and at Sacramento, and cashier in the Northern metropolis he had been for some ten years. Here he succeeded Major J. R. Toberman, when the latter, after long service, resigned; and with a single office-boy, at one time little Joe Binford, he handled all the business committed to the company's charge. John Osborn was the outside expressman. Then most of the heavy express matter from San Francisco was carried by steamers, but letters and limited packages of moment were sent by stage. With the advent of railroads, Pridham was appointed by Wells Fargo & Company Superintendent of the Los Angeles district. On June 12th, 1880, he married Miss Mary Esther, daughter of Colonel John O. Wheeler, and later moved to Alameda. Now, after fifty-one years of association with the express business, Pridham still continues to be officially connected with the Wells Fargo company.
Speaking of that great organization, reminds me that it conducted for years a mail-carrying business. Three-cent stamped envelopes, imprinted with Wells Fargo & Company's name, were sold to their patrons for ten cents each; and to compensate for this bonus, the Company delivered the letters entrusted to them perhaps one to two hours sooner than did the Government.
This recalls to me a familiar experience on the arrival of the mail from the North. Before the inauguration of a stage-line, the best time in the transmission of mail matter between San Francisco and Los Angeles was made by water, and Wells Fargo messengers sailed with the steamers. Immediately upon the arrival of the boat at San Pedro, the messenger boarded the stage, and as soon as he reached Los Angeles, pressed on to the office of the Company, near the Bella Union, where he delivered his bagful of letters. The steamer generally got in by five o'clock in the morning; and many a time, about seven, have I climbed Signal or Pound Cake Hill—higher in those days than now, and affording in clear weather a view of both ocean and the smoke of the steamer—upon whose summit stood a house, used as a signal station, and there watched for the rival stages, the approach of which was indicated by clouds of dust. I would then hurry with many others to the Express Company's office where, as soon as the bag was emptied, we would all help ourselves unceremoniously to the mail.
In August, General Edward Bouton, a Northern Army officer, came to Los Angeles and soon had a sheep ranch on Boyle Heights—a section then containing but two houses; and two years later he camped where Whittier now lies. In 1874, he bought land for pasture in the San Jacinto Valley, and for years owned the ocean front at Alamitos Bay from Devil's Gate to the Inlet, boring artesian wells there north of Long Beach.
Louis Robidoux, who had continued to prosper as a ranchero, died in 1868 at the age of seventy-seven years.
With the usual flourish of spades, if not of trumpets, ground was broken for the Los Angeles & San Pedro Railroad at Wilmington on September 19th, and toward the end of November, the rails had been laid about a mile out from Wilmington.
The last contract for carrying the Overland Mail was given to Wells Fargo & Company on October 1st and pledged a round remuneration of one million, seven hundred and fifty thousand dollars per annum, while it also permitted passengers and freight to be transported; but the Company came to have a great deal of competition. Phineas Banning, for example, had a stage-line between Los Angeles and Yuma, in addition to which mail and passengers were carried in buckboards, large wagons and jerkies. Moreover there was another stage-line between Tucson and El Paso, and rival stage-lines between El Paso and St. Louis; and in consequence, the Butterfield service was finally abandoned.
This American vehicle, by the by, the jerky, was so named for the very good reason that, as the wagon was built without springs, it jerked the rider around unmercifully. Boards were laid across the wagon-box or bed for seats, accommodating four passengers; and some space was provided in the back for baggage. To maintain one's position in the bumping, squeaking vehicle at all, was difficult; while to keep one's place on the seat approached the impossible.
Of the various Los Angeles roadways in 1868, West Sixth Street was most important in its relation to travel. Along this highway the daily Overland stages entered and departed from the city; and by this route came all the Havilah, Lone Pine, Soledad and Owens River trade, as well as that of the Ballona and Ciénega districts. Sixth Street also led to the Fair Grounds, and over its none too even surface dashed most of the sports and gallants on their way to the race course.
I have said that I returned to New York, in 1867, presumably for permanent residence. Soon after I left Los Angeles, however, Samuel Cohn became desperately ill, and the sole management of H. Newmark & Company suddenly devolved on Sam's brother Kaspare. This condition of affairs grew so bad that my return to Los Angeles became imperative. Accordingly, leaving my family, I took passage on October 31st, 1868, for San Francisco, and returned to Los Angeles without delay. Then I wired my wife to start with the children for the Coast, and to have the furniture, including a Chickering grand piano, just purchased, shipped after them; and when they arrived, we once more took possession of the good old adobe on Main Street, where we lived contentedly until 1874. This piano, by the way, which came by freight around Cape Horn, was one of the first instruments of the kind seen here, John Schumacher having previously bought one. While we were living in New York, Edward J. Newmark, my wife's brother, died here on February 17th, 1868.
Before I left for New York, hardly anything had been done, in subdividing property, save perhaps by the Lugos and Downey, and at Anaheim and Wilmington. During the time that I was away, however, newspapers and letters from home indicated the changes going on here; and I recall what an impression all this made upon me. On my way down from San Francisco on Captain Johnson's Orizaba in December—about the same time that the now familiar locomotive San Gabriel reached Wilmington—land-agents were active and people were talking a great deal about these subdivisions; and by the time I reached Los Angeles I, too, was considerably stirred up over the innovations and as soon as possible after my return hastened out to see the change. The improvements were quite noticeable, and among other alterations surprising me were the houses people had begun to build on the approaches to the western hills. I was also to learn that there was a general demand for property all over the city, Colonel Charles H. Larrabee, City Attorney in 1868, especially having bought several hundred feet on Spring and Fort streets. Later, I heard of the experiences of other Angeleños aboard ship who were deluged with circulars advertising prospective towns.
To show the provincial character of Los Angeles fifty years ago, I will add an anecdote or two. While I was in New York, members of my family reported by letter, as a matter of extraordinary interest, the novelty of a silver name-plate on a neighboring front door; and when I was taken to inspect it, a year later, I saw the legend, still novel:
Mr. and Mrs. Eugene Meyer
In the metropolis I had found finger-bowls in common use, and having brought back with me such a supply as my family would be likely to need, I discovered that it had actually fallen to my lot to introduce these desirable conveniences into Los Angeles.
William Ferguson was an arrival of 1868, having come to settle up the business of a brother and remaining to open a livery stable on North Main Street near the Plaza, which he conducted for ten years. Investing in water company stock, Ferguson abandoned his stable to make water-pipes, a couple of years later, perhaps, than J. F. Holbrook had entered the same field. Success enabled Ferguson to build a home at 303 South Hill Street, where he found himself the only resident south of Third.
This manufacture here of water pipe recalls a cordial acquaintance with William Lacy, Sr., an Englishman, who was interested with William Rowland in developing the Puente oil fields. His sons, William, Jr., and Richard H., originators of the Lacy Manufacturing Company, began making pipe and tanks a quarter of a century ago.
C. R. Rinaldi started a furniture business here in 1868, opening his store almost opposite the Stearns's home on North Main Street. Before long he disposed of an interest to Charles Dotter, and then, I think, sold out to I. W. Lord and moved to the neighborhood of the San Fernando Mission. About the same time, Sidney Lacey, who arrived in 1870 and was a popular clerk with the pioneer carpet and wall-paper house of Smith & Walter, commenced what was to be a long association with this establishment. In 1876, C. H. Bradley bought out Lord, and the firm of Dotter & Bradley, so well known to householders of forty years ago, came into existence. In 1884, H. H. Markham (soon to be Congressman and then Governor of the State), with General E. P. Johnson bought this concern and organized the Los Angeles Furniture Company, whose affairs since 1910, (when her husband died), have been conducted by the President, Mrs. Katherine Fredericks.
Conrad Hafen, a German-Swiss, reached Los Angeles in December, 1868, driving a six-horse team and battered wagon with which he had braved the privations of Death Valley; and soon he rented a little vineyard, two years later buying for the same purpose considerable acreage on what is now Central Avenue. Rewarded for his husbandry with some affluence, Hafen built both the old Hafen House and the new on South Hill Street, once a favorite resort for German arrivals. He retired in 1905.
It was early in 1869 that I was walking down Spring Street one day and saw a crowd at the City Hall. On a large box stood Mayor Joel H. Turner, and just as I arrived a man leaning against the adobe wall called out, "Seven dollars!" The Mayor then announced the bid—for an auction was in progress—"Seven dollars once, seven dollars twice, seven dollars three times!" and as he raised his hand to conclude the sale, I called out, "A half!" This I did in a spirit of fun; in fact, I did not even know what was being offered! "Seven dollars fifty once, seven dollars fifty twice, seven dollars fifty three times, and sold—to Harris Newmark!" called the Mayor. I then inquired what I had bought, and was shown the location of about twenty acres, a part of nine hundred being sold by the City at prices ranging from five to ten dollars an acre.
The piece purchased was west of the city limits, and I kept it until 1886 when I had almost forgotten that I was the owner. Then George Williamson, one of the first salesmen of H. Newmark & Company, who became a boomer of the period, bought it from me for ten thousand dollars and resold it within two weeks for fourteen thousand, the Sunset Oil Company starting there, as the land was within what was known as the oil district. Since the opening of streets in all directions, I have lost trace of this land, but incline to the belief that it lies in the immediate vicinity of the Wilshire district.
My experience reminds me of Colonel John O. Wheeler's investment in fifty or sixty acres at what is now Figueroa and Adams streets. Later, going to San Francisco as a Customs officer, he forgot about his purchase until one day he received a somewhat surprising offer.
On January 1st, A. J. King and R. H. Offutt began to publish a daily edition of the News, hitherto a semi-weekly, making it strongly Democratic. There was no Sunday issue and twelve dollars was the subscription. On October 16th, Offutt sold his interest to Alonzo Waite, and the firm became King & Waite. In another year King had retired.
How modest was the status of the Post Office in 1869 may be gathered from the fact that the Postmaster had only one assistant, a boy, both together receiving fourteen hundred dollars in greenbacks, worth but a thousand dollars in gold.
Henry Hammel, for years connected with the Bella Union, and a partner named Bremerman leased the United States Hotel on February 1st from Louis Mesmer; and in March, John King succeeded Winston & King as manager of the Bella Union. King died in December, 1871.
In the winter of 1868-69, when heavy rains seriously interfered with bringing in the small supply of lumber at San Pedro, a coöperative society was proposed, to insure the importation each summer of enough supplies to tide the community over during the wintry weather. Over one hundred persons, it was then estimated, had abandoned building, and many others were waiting for material to complete fences and repairs.
Thanks to Contractor H. B. Tichenor's vigor in constructing the Los Angeles & San Pedro Railroad, public interest in the venture, by the beginning of 1869, had materially increased. In January, a vessel arrived with a locomotive and a steam pile-driver; and a few days later a schooner sailed into San Pedro with ties, sleepers and rails enough for three miles of the track. Soon, also, the locomotive was running part of the way. The wet winter made muddy roads, and this led to the proposal to lay the tracks some eight or ten miles in the direction of Los Angeles, and there to transfer the freight to wagons.
Stearns Hall and the Plaza were amusement places in 1869. At the latter, in January, the so-called Paris Exposition Circus held forth; while Joe Murphy and Maggie Moore, who had just favored the passengers on the Orizaba, on coming south from San Francisco, with a show, trod the hall's more classic boards.
Ice a quarter of an inch thick was formed here for several days during the third week in January, and butchers found it so difficult to secure fat cattle that good beef advanced to sixteen and a quarter cents a pound.
On January 20th, I purchased from Eugene Meyer the southern half of lots three and four in block five, fronting on Fort Street between Second and Third, formerly owned by William Buffum and J. F. Burns. Meyer had paid one thousand dollars for one hundred and twenty feet front and three hundred and thirty feet depth; and when I bought half of this piece for one thousand dollars, it was generally admitted that I had paid all that it was worth.
Isaac Lankershim—father of J. B. Lankershim and Mrs. I. N. Van Nuys—who first visited California in 1854, came from San Francisco in 1869 and bought, for one hundred and fifteen thousand dollars, part of Andrés Pico's San Fernando rancho, which he stocked with sheep. Levi Strauss & Company, Scholle Brothers, L. and M. Sachs & Company of San Francisco and others, were interested in this partnership, then known as the San Fernando Farm Association; but Lankershim was in control until about one year later, when Isaac Newton Van Nuys arrived from Monticello, where he had been merchandising, and was put permanently in charge of the ranch. At this period Lankershim lived there, for he had not yet undertaken milling in Los Angeles. A little later, Lankershim and Van Nuys successfully engaged in the raising of wheat, cultivating nearly sixty thousand acres, and consigning some of their harvests to Liverpool. This fact recalls a heavy loss in the spring of 1881, when the Parisian, which left Wilmington under Captain Reaume, foundered at sea with nearly two hundred and fifty tons of wheat and about seventy-five tons of flour belonging to them.
J. B. Lankershim, owner of the well-known hotel bearing his name, after the death of his father made some very important investments in Los Angeles real estate, including the northwest corner of Broadway and Seventh Street, now occupied by the building devoted to Bullock's department store.
M. N. Newmark, a nephew of mine and President of the Newmark Grain Company, arrived in 1869, and clerked for H. Newmark & Company until 1871, in which year he established a partnership with S. Grand in Compton, selling general merchandise. This partnership lasted until 1878, when Newmark bought out Grand. He finally disposed of the business in 1889 and, with D. K. Edwards, organized the firm of Newmark & Edwards. In 1895 Edwards sold out his interest.
Victor Ponet, a native of Belgium, and once Belgian Consul here, while traveling around the world, landed in California in 1867 and two years later came to Los Angeles. Attracted by the climate and Southern California's possible future, Ponet settled here, engaging first in the pioneer manufacture and importation of mirrors and picture frames; and before his retirement to live in Sherman, he had had experience both as undertaker and banker.[30]
In 1869, General W. S. Rosecrans came south in the interest of the proposed San Diego & Gila Railroad, never constructed. The General, as a result, took up land around Sausal Redondo, and there by the summer of 1869 so many people (who insisted that Rosecrans had appropriated public land) had squatted, that he was put to no end of trouble in ejecting them.
Though I have witnessed most of the progress in Southern California, it is still difficult to realize that so much could have been accomplished within the life-time of one man. During 1868-69 only twenty-two hundred boxes of oranges were shipped from Los Angeles, while the Southern counties' crop of oranges and lemons for 1913-14 is estimated, I am told, at about twelve million boxes!
Due to the eight-day shindy marking the celebration of the Chinese New Year, demand for a more concentrated rumpus was voiced in February, 1869, threatening an agitation against John Chinaman.
The same month, residents, wishing a school in which German should be taught, and a gymnasium, petitioned the Common Council to acquire a lot in New High Street for the purpose.
About 1869, the Los Angeles Social Club which, to the best of my recollection, was the first of its kind in the city, was organized, with headquarters in the earliest building erected by I. W. Hellman, at the northwest corner of Los Angeles and Commercial streets. Among other pioneer members were Captain Cameron E. Thom, Tom Mott, Eugene Meyer, Sam and Charles Prager, Tom Rowan, I. W. and H. W. Hellman, S. Lazard, W. J. Brodrick, John Jones, Kaspare Cohn, A. C. Chauvin, M. and J. L. Morris, Leon Loeb, Sam Meyer, Dr. F. A. McDougal, B. Cohn and myself. Somewhat later, the Club moved to the east side of Los Angeles Street, between Commercial and Aliso. Still later, it dissolved; and although it did not become the direct ancestor of any of the several well-known social organizations in the Los Angeles of to-day, I feel that it should be mentioned as having had the honor of being their precursor and model.
Speaking of social organizations, I may say that several Los Angeles clubs were organized in the early era of sympathy, tolerance and good feeling, when the individual was appreciated at his true worth and before the advent of men whose bigotry has sown intolerance and discord, and has made a mockery of both religion and professed ideals.
It must have been early in the sixties that Alexander Bell sold the southern end of his property to H. Heinsch, the saddler. On February 23d, 1869, the directors of the San Pedro Railroad selected the Mike Madigan lot on Alameda Street, on a part of which the owner was conducting a livery-stable, as the site for the depot in Los Angeles; and Heinsch having allowed the authorities to cut through his property, the extension of Commercial and Requena streets eastward from Los Angeles to Alameda was hastened.
Late on February 14th, the news was circulated of a shocking tragedy in the billiard saloon of the Lafayette Hotel, and at once aroused intense regret, affecting, as the affair did, the standing and happiness of two well-known Los Angeles families. About eight o'clock, Charles Howard, a young lawyer of prominence and a son of Volney E. Howard, met Daniel B. Nichols, son of the ex-Mayor; and some dispute between them having reached its climax, both parties drew weapons and fired. Howard was killed and Nichols wounded, though not fatally, as was at first thought. The tragedy—the cause of which was never generally known—made a profound impression.
The work of extending water mains along Fort, Spring and other streets progressed steadily until the Los Angeles Water Company struck a snag which again demonstrated the city's dependence. Difficulty in coupling pipes called a halt, and the management had to send all the way to San Francisco for a complete set of plumbers' tools!
In the spring, Tileston, Emery & Company, a Los Angeles and San Gabriel firm, brought south the first steam separator seen here and took contracts to thrash the farmers' grain. On June 3d they started the machine, and many persons went out to see it work. Among features pointed out were precautions against fire from the engine, which the contractors declared made "everything perfectly safe."
From its inception, Wilmington sought, in one way or another, to rival Los Angeles, and in April threw down the gauntlet. A. A. Polhamus, a workshop engineer of the Los Angeles & San Pedro Railroad, (in 1887, a manufacturer of straw wrapping paper somewhere between here and Wilmington,) had built a velocipede; and no sooner was it noised about than John Goller set to work to eclipse the achievement. About one o'clock, therefore, on April 25th one of Goller's apprentices suddenly appeared ready to make the first experiment. The streets were soon crowded and interest was at fever heat. The young fellow straddled the wheels, moved about half a block, and then, at the junction of Main and Spring streets, executed a first-class somersault! Immediately, however, other intrepid ones tried their skill, and the velocipede was voted a successful institution of our young and progressive city.
