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Half a year before my coming to Los Angeles, or in April, 1853, nearly twenty-five thousand square miles had been lopped off from Los Angeles County, to create the County of San Bernardino; and yet in that short time the Mormons, who had established themselves there in 1851 as a colony on a tract of land purchased from Diego Sepúlveda and the three Lugos—José del Carmen, José María and Vicente—and consisting of about thirty-five thousand acres, had quite succeeded in their agricultural and other ventures. Copying somewhat the plan of Salt Lake City, they laid out a town a mile square, with right-angled blocks of eight acres and irrigating zanjas parallel with the streets. In a short time, they were raising corn, wheat (some of it commanding five dollars a bushel), barley and vegetables; and along their route of travel, by way of the Mormon metropolis, were coming to the Southland many substantial pioneers. From San Bernardino, Los Angeles drew her supply of butter, eggs and poultry; and as three days were ordinarily required for their transportation across what was then known as the desert, these products arrived in poor condition, particularly during the summer heat. The butter would melt, and the eggs would become stale. This disadvantage, however, was in part compensated for by the economical advantage of the industry and thrift of the Mormons, and their favorable situation in an open, fertile country; for they could afford to sell us their produce very reasonably—fifteen cents a dozen for eggs, and three dollars a dozen for chickens well satisfying them! San Bernardino also supplied all of our wants in the lumber line. A lumber yard was then a prospect—seven or eight years elapsing before the first yard and planing-mill were established; and this necessary building material was peddled around town by the Mormon teamsters who, after disposing of all they could in this manner, bartered the balance to storekeepers to be later put on sale somewhere near their stores.
But two towns broke the monotony of a trip between Los Angeles and San Bernardino, and they were San Gabriel Mission and El Monte. I need not remind my readers that the former place, the oldest and quaintest settlement in the county, was founded by Father Junípero Serra and his associates in 1771, and that thence radiated all of their operations in this neighborhood; nor that, in spite of all the sacrifice and human effort, matters with this beautifully-situated Mission were in a precarious condition for several decades. It may be less known, however, that the Mission Fathers excelled in the cultivation of citrus fruits, and that their chief competitors, in 1853, were William Wolfskill and Louis Vignes, who were also raising seedling oranges of a very good quality. The population of San Gabriel was then principally Indian and Mexican, although there were a few whites dwelling some distance away. Among these, J. S. Mallard, afterward Justice of the Peace and father of the present City Assessor, Walter Mallard, carried on a small business; and Mrs. Laura Cecelia Evertsen—mother-in-law of an old pioneer, Andrew J. King, whose wife is the talented daughter, Mrs. Laura Evertsen King—also had a store there. Still another early storekeeper at the quaint settlement was Max Lazard, nephew of Solomon Lazard, who later went back to France. Another pioneer to settle near the San Gabriel River was Louis Phillips, a native of Germany who reached California in 1850, by way of Louisiana, and for a while did business in a little store on the Long Wharf at San Francisco. Then he came to Los Angeles, where he engaged in trade; in 1853, he bought land on which, for ten years or until he removed to Spadra (where Mrs. Phillips still survives him), he tilled the soil and raised stock. The previous year, Hugo Reid, of whom I often heard my neighbors speak in a complimentary way, had died at San Gabriel where he had lived and worked. Reid was a cultured Scotchman who, though born in the British Isles, had a part, as a member of the convention, in making the first Constitution for California. He married an Indian woman and, in his leisure hours, studied the Indians on the mainland and Catalina, contributing to the Los Angeles Star a series of articles on the aborigines still regarded as the valuable testimony of an eyewitness.
This Indian wife of the scholarly Reid reminds me of Nathan Tuch, who came here in 1853, having formerly lived in Cleveland where he lost his first wife. He was thoroughly honest, very quiet and genteel, and of an affectionate disposition. Coming to California and San Gabriel, he opened a little store; and there he soon married a full-blooded squaw. Notwithstanding, however, the difference in their stations and the fact that she was uneducated, Tuch always remained faithful to her, and treated her with every mark of respect. When I last visited Tuch and his shop, I saw there a home-made sign, reading about as follows:
THIS STORE BELONGS TO NATHAN TUCH,
NOW 73 YEARS OLD.
When he died, his wife permitted his burial in the Jewish Cemetery.
Michael White was another pioneer, who divided his time between San Gabriel and the neighborhood that came to be known as San Bernardino, near which he had the rancho Muscupiabe. Although drifting hither as long ago as 1828, he died, in the late eighties, without farm, home or friends.
Cyrus Burdick was still another settler who, after leaving Iowa with his father and other relatives in December, 1853, stopped for a while at San Gabriel. Soon young Burdick went to Oregon; but, being dissatisfied, he returned to the Mission and engaged in farming. In 1855, he was elected Constable; a year later, he opened a store at San Gabriel, which he conducted for eight or nine years. Subsequently, the Burdicks lived in Los Angeles, at the corner of First and Fort streets on the site of the present Tajo Building. They also owned the northeast corner of Second and Spring streets. This property became the possession of Fred Eaton, through his marriage to Miss Helen L. Burdick.
Fielding W. Gibson came early in the fifties. He had bought at Sonora, Mexico, some five hundred and fifty head of cattle, but his vaqueros kept up such a regular system of side-tracking and thieving that, by the time he reached the San Gabriel Valley, he had only about one-seventh of his animals left. Fancying that neighborhood, he purchased two hundred and fifty acres of land from Henry Dalton and located west of El Monte, where he raised stock and broom corn.
El Monte—a name by some thought to refer to the adjacent mountains, but actually alluding to the dense willow forests then surrounding the hamlet—the oldest American settlement in the county, was inhabited by a party of mixed emigrants, largely Texans and including Ira W. Thompson who opened the first tavern there and was the Postmaster when its Post Office was officially designated Monte. Others were Dr. Obed Macy and his son Oscar, of whom I speak elsewhere, Samuel M. Heath and Charlotte Gray, who became John Rowland's second wife; the party having taken possession, in the summer of 1851, of the rich farming tract along the San Gabriel River some eleven or twelve miles east of Los Angeles. The summer before I came, forty or fifty more families arrived there, and among them were A. J. King, afterward a citizen of Los Angeles; Dr. T. A. Hayes, William and Ezekiel Rubottom, Samuel King—A. J. King's father—J. A. Johnson, Jacob Weil, A. Madox, A. J. Horn, Thomas A. Garey, who acquired quite a reputation as a horticulturist, and Jonathan Tibbets, spoken of in another chapter. While tilling the soil, these farmer folks made it their particular business to keep Whigs and, later, Republicans out of office; and slim were the chances of those parties in El Monte and vicinity, but correspondingly enthusiastic were the receptions given Democratic candidates and their followers visiting there. Another important function that engaged these worthy people was their part in the lynchings which were necessary in Los Angeles. As soon as they received the cue, the Monte boys galloped into town; and being by temperament and training, through frontier life, used to dealing with the rougher side of human nature, they were recognized disciplinarians. The fact is that such was the peculiar public spirit animating these early settlers that no one could live and prosper at the Monte who was not extremely virile and ready for any dare-devil emergency.
David Lewis, a Supervisor of 1855, crossed the continent to the San Gabriel Valley in 1851, marrying there, in the following year, a daughter of the innkeeper Ira Thompson, just referred to. Thompson was a typical Vermonter and a good, popular fellow, who long kept the Overland Stage station. Sometime in the late fifties, Lewis was a pioneer in the growing of hops. Jonathan Tibbets, who settled at El Monte the year that I came to Los Angeles, had so prospered by 1871 that he left for the mines in Mohave County, Arizona, to inaugurate a new enterprise, and took with him some twenty thousand pounds of cured pork and a large quantity of lard, which had been prepared at El Monte. Samuel M. Heath was another El Monte pioneer of 1851; he died in 1876, kindly remembered by many poor immigrants. H. L., J. S. and S. D. Thurman were farmers at El Monte, who came here in 1852. E. C. Parish, who arrived