LOS ANGELES IN 1881
{Times, Dec. 4, 1891, p. 1}
What Los Angeles Looked Like in the Year 1881
A quiet, slow-moving, half-way frontier town was Los Angeles early in
1881. The census of the previous year had given it a population of 11,311, and
it had certainly not increased since then, for there was quite an exodus to
Arizona, which territory had been brought into prominence by the discovery of
the Tombstone mines and the extension eastward of the Southern Pacific
railroad, then fast approaching a junction with the eastern lines. Tucson, the
other old pueblo on the Santa Cruz, had a population of 6994, and was booming,
while Los Angeles was decidedly dull. Hundreds were endeavoring to dispose of
their property here at any price in order to go and make their fortunes in the
mining country. Arizona was largely settled up at that time with Los Angeles
people. The fortunate ones were those who were unable to sell their property
here, although they did not see it in that light. You could have exchanged
property in Los Angeles for property in Tucson on even terms then, while today
fifty feet on Congress street, Tucson, would scarcely bring enough to pay one
year's taxes on fifty feet of Spring street property, for Los Angeles now has a
population of over 55,000, while Tucson has only about 5500. Most of the
wanderers have come back home, like the Prodigal Son, convinced that irrigation
ditches are safer to base estimates of wealth upon than are holes in the
ground.
As the year wore on the Southern Pacific effected a junction at Deming,
giving Los Angeles a direct through line to the East, shorter and with much
easier grades than that from San Francisco. The mining business in Arizona
also brought many thousands of dollars to Los Angeles, whence most of the
supplies for that Territory were drawn, as they are to a great extent now.
This instilled a little life into the drowsy pueblo, and by the beginning of
December, when the first number of The Times appeared, there was a perceptible
improvement in business. In its second issue The Times noticed that rooms and
houses were all taken, and that stores were engaged as soon as the corner-stone
was built, and old settlers were expressing the belief that "Los Angeles never
had a brighter future before it than now." On the 24th of that month a leading
editorial was published on "The Need of Manufactories," in the course of which
the rapid development of business resources of the city was referred to. The
article continued:
General business has been so prosperous, the demand for
our produce in Arizona and New Mexico has been so active, the
opportunities for successful speculation in land have offered
so many inducements to the capitalist, and money has
commanded such a high premium for safe investments on real
estate and personal securities that but few of our citizens
have given thought to the more important considerations of
inaugurating manufacturing ventures in Los Angeles. It
cannot be denied but that the City of Angels is now enjoying
a season of business prosperity almost without parallel in
her history. Every merchant and commercial enterprise of any
importance is accomplishing wonders in the way of business
success. The city is increasing rapidly in the way of
population and influence, and is speedily assuming all the
attributes of metropolitan existence. Still, in the minds of
certain people, there is a doubt as to the permanency of this
prosperity. Some people naturally regard it as only a boom,
and with a decline in the demand for our produce, or with the
evil of a dry season to curtail our harvests, they reasonably
expect a corresponding falling off in the volume of our
business, in the number of new buildings, in the amount of
real estate transactions and in the immigration to our city
and county. While we are sanguine enough to doubt that
either of the causes enumerated would produce general
disaster in business and financial circles, as some think,
still we believe that Los Angeles should begin to consider
measures that would tend to avert any such direct calamities.
There should be some balance wheel that will prevent seasons
of booms and depressions, and will create a steady and
certain condition of business prosperity. That balance wheel
is undoubtedly manufactures.
In the light of events that have transpired it is amusing to read of the
dire forebodings as to the effect of a reaction from the "boom" then
prevailing. What an innocent little boomlet it was! The croaker was evidently
here in 1881, with his mouldy maunderings about dry seasons and overproduction.
He is here yet, although irrigation has made us to a great extent independent
of dry seasons, and the markets of the world yet clamor for our products. The
remarks about factories are, however, still pertinent, although we have
established scores of manufacturing enterprises during the past ten years.
It must not be supposed, from the reference to the wonderful business
done, that stores were carrying on a business then that bore any sort of
comparison to that of today. In December, 1881, a peddler went into one of the
leading dry goods stores of the city and selected seven pieces of prints which
he wanted to buy. The proprietors complained that this would deplete their
stock of those goods, and persuaded him to take only half a piece of each! The
Los Angeles retail merchant princes of today were yet in embryo in 1881.
The change in the appearance of Los Angeles during the past ten years has
been so remarkable that persons who visited then and who return now can
scarcely recognize it as the same city. In 1881 the Spanish quarter, with its
low, one-story adobe houses, was still an important part of the city, and adobe
houses and stores were numerous elsewhere. The residences were nearly all of
the cottage order, and few business buildings rose above two stories. The only
blocks of importance were those named after Baker, Temple and Downey, the first
named being really the only building in the city of any architectural
pretensions. In the last-named was located the office of this paper.
Much business yet clustered about the Plaza, around the little park in the
center of which was a handsome row of well-trimmed cypress trees. The business
center was then at the Temple Block, the business quarter being bounded on the
north by the Plaza and on the south by First street. Where the Nadeau Hotel
now stands was a German butcher shop, in an adobe building back of which was a
horse corral and hay yard. Adjoining on Spring street on the south was a
planing mill. Spring street, south of First, had more bare lots than
residences and no stores, for business had not then begun to move so far south.
Property on Spring street, between First and Second, was sold at $150 a foot,
which was considered a very high price. At two other corners of First and
Spring were a saloon and a coal-yard. The Wilcox Block on North Spring, where
Jevne's grocery now is, was the only good business building on Spring street.
Where the Phillips Block now stands was an old one-story adobe building used as
a city jail.
On First street there was no business east of Los Angeles street, the road
being very bad. Los Angeles street was then, as now, the principal wholesale
business street. Main street was then the leading residence street. I. W.
Hellman, Gov. Downey and John Jones had fair residences there. On
Broadway--then Fort street--were a few cottages. There were a few scattering
residences out to the west as far as Pearl street. Even at that time Figueroa
was considered a fine residence street, there being residences here and there
as far south as Adams street, and on the latter street a number of houses had
been built around the Longstreet tract, of a character that was then considered
superior. The houses on other streets in the neighborhood were mostly
shanties. Below Eighth street most of the town was planted in barley. Acreage
in the Morris Vineyard tract, between Pico and Washington, near Main, was
offered at $900.
Up Temple street, near Bunker Hill avenue, was a deep cut. Here an old
frame and muslin building, called the Pavilion, stood almost alone. There were
scarcely any buildings on the hills west of Bunker Hill avenue. Lots were
offered this side of the hill at $100 apiece, without finding many buyers.
Second street, west of Hill, was nothing but a wagon track. Beaudry was trying
to supply the hills with water, which he succeeded in doing after a time.
East of Main, both north and south at First street, there was quite a
settlement of small buildings. Mrs. Woodworth's residence, at the corner of
San Pedro and Second, was then a stylish place. Orchards and vineyards, on
patches of from two to ten acres, covered much of this section.
The only bridge in the city in December, 1881, was that at Aliso street
{Aliso Road - Ed.}, the Downey avenue bridge having been built very shortly
afterward. East Los Angeles was a small settlement, consisting chiefly of
Downey avenue, then recently laid out. Lots on the avenue were valued at about
$100 apiece, and one groceryman was slowly starving to death. On Boyle Heights
there were half a dozen houses, chief among which were the residences of
Cummings, Hollenbeck and W. H. Workman. Where the Cummings Hotel now stands a
Spaniard kept a little flour and plenty of whisky. Teams stopped there as the
"last chance" this side of Downey.
The Pico House and St. Elmo--then called the Lafayette House--were the
principal hotels. There were no paved streets in the city, which during the
rainy season, were in a horrible condition, horses and vehicles often sinking
knee-deep into the foul-smelling mixture of black mud and offal, which was
churned by the vehicles and hoofs into the consistency of a sticky paste. The
"sidewalks" were little better in most places, consisting mostly of gravel,
which after a long rain got so mixed with the soil that you could not tell one
from the other. This state of affairs continued to prevail, even on Main and
First streets, until 1887, when a serious attempt was begun to pave the city.
The show places of those days were the home of O. W. Childs on Main street
and the Wolfskill orange orchard. The street-car system was confined to a
single horse railroad, running every twenty minutes from the San Fernando depot
to Washington Gardens. {Other records indicate several lines operated in 1881
- Ed.} The railroads were the Southern Pacific to San Francisco, and its lines
to Santa Monica, San Pedro and Santa Ana.
The leading agricultural industry was the raising of sheep and cattle.
Immense bands of sheep kept the hills bare of herbage. The great complaint
throughout the country was that there was "no water." Since then bountiful
streams have been connected on the plains from mountain canons and tunnels, and
more is constantly being developed, yet some people complain that this is a
waterless region. Los Angeles was the center of what orange-growing business
there was. The Times of that year claimed that there were 256,135 orange trees
growing within a few miles of the city. The Wolfskill orange orchard, where
the Arcade depot now stands, was famous all over the country. Some of the
orange trees, forty years old, are still standing in the home place of Mrs.
Wolfskill near the depot.
The climatic and other attractions of Southern California had been made
widely known in 1872 by Charles Nordhoff, and quite a number of Easterners
began to visit and winter here. The stream was, however, a tiny one compared
with that at present. There were no special arrangements made for the comfort
of visitors. The Nadeau, the Westminster, the Raymond, the Arcadia and the
Coronado hotels had not then been thought of.
They were crying for a Federal building in December, 1881. The cry still
goes up. State division was talked of a little even then and "Los Angeles"
was suggested as a good name for the baby, which had not yet been born. The
City Council was urged to have the houses numbered. A reduction in fruit rates
to the East had just been secured. Several more reductions have since been
given and the end is not yet. The city library boasted of from seventy-five to
eighty visitors every evening, and that 900 books had been given out during the
previous month. As many as that are sometimes issued in a day now. The
Chamber of Commerce was considering the obtaining of an appropriation of
$200,000 from Congress for the improvement of Wilmington harbor. This and a
good deal more has since been secured, but the appetite of Wilmington harbor
grows with the getting, and it now asks for millions where it then wanted
hundreds of thousands. But then, its business has increased in the same
proportion. There were 1924 pupils enrolled in the public schools of the city
in 1881. The city assessments amounted to $7,627,632, and the tax levy to
$75,749. It takes a good deal more to make the municipal mare go now-a-days.
The Times was saying it "would like to see" a first-class theater, a fire-alarm
system, streets and sidewalks repaired, and a paper with larger circulation
than The Times. We have two first-class theaters, a fire-alarm system and
excellent streets and sidewalks, but the paper with a larger circulation than
The Times is not yet here.
Pasadena--then still generally known as the "Indiana Colony"--consisted at
that time of four corners and a post office. Five acres on what is now the
city of Pasadena were sold in December, 1881, for $40 an acre. Santa Monica
was already quite a promising little place. In one respect it was ahead of the
present time, for it had a wharf and steamship communication. A hotel was
there, known as the "Jones and Baker."
As to prices of real estate in 1881, a glance through The Times will give
the best idea of that. One of the largest sales of the year was that of the
Cordona building, a large two-story brick block standing on a lot 81 feet front
on Main street, running back to Los Angeles. It was sold by James Stephens to
Louis Phillips for $46,500. A house of five rooms on Charity street, now Grand
avenue, close in, was offered for $1200. A transfer of the south east corner
of Temple and Olive was recorded for $1800, another of a lot on the west side
of Main street, between Second and Third, for $2700, and one of a 60-foot lot
on Wilmington street for $1300.
A nice little home on the hill near Temple street was offered for $475.
Rowan and Dobinson offered a small house and lot on Bunker Hill avenue for
$350.
On the lst of January, 1882, The Times published a list of building
improvements made in Los Angeles during 1881, and congratulated its readers on
the great progress. In this article it is stated that "during the past year
Los Angeles has had a building boom seldom heard of in an agricultural
country." The total value of the improvements foot up something less than
$200,000. In further proof of the existence of a boom, the annual report of
the city and county officers is given. There was a boom even in deaths, the
health officer reporting the number for 1881 at 254. The fire department had
been called out 33 times during the year, of which 15 were false alarms. The
losses paid by insurance companies amounted to $920, and the expenses of the
department, of which Jacob Khurts was the chief, were $6648. The number of
arrests by the police was 948. D. M. Adams, as City Justice, had received
$3345. The number of books in the library was 2800, expenses $1946 and
receipts $494. The zanjero had received $9346 for water and expended $10,586.
J. C. Kays, City Treasurer, had $41,688 in his hands on November 1. The
delinquent tax list was $4496, of which $1449 had since been paid. This is
referred to as the smallest delinquent list ever known in the city.
Los Angeles was at that time lighted by gas, but the new electric tower at
San Jose was attracting much attention, and there was already talk of securing
an electric light system for Los Angeles.