RAILROADS
No event in the late 19th century had a greater impact on the development
of Los Angeles than the railroad. Without it, agriculture would have had a
limited market, the number of health seekers arriving in the Southland would
have been lessened, and the population growth that sparked the real estate boom
of the 1880s would have been impossible. While other factors - the drought of
the 'sixties, the breakup of the ranchos, the introduction of the navel orange
- were important, it can be argued that nothing was more instrumental in the
transformation of Los Angeles than the coming of the steam locomotive.
Located miles from the nearest harbor, the old pueblo depended upon stage
lines and teamsters for its link to the sea until Phineas Banning opened his
rail line - the Los Angeles and San Pedro - in 1869. That facilitated movement
of both freight and passenger traffic between harbor and town, an important
point as evidenced by the efforts of various financial interests to develop
ports, with railroad connections to the emerging city, at Redondo, Ballona and
Santa Monica. Still, as long as the Southland's tie to the outside world
depended on a steamer or horses pulling coaches or wagons the full potential of
Los Angeles remained undeveloped. That would change with the arrival of the
Southern Pacific.
Incorporated in 1865, the Southern Pacific Railroad had been organized by
Northern California investors who were not a part of the Central Pacific. The
railroad, headquartered in San Francisco, obtained authorization from Congress
in 1866 to build a transcontinental south from that city through Los Angeles
County to San Diego, then turning east to connect with the Atlantic and Pacific
R.R. at Needles on the Colorado River. Before significant construction had
begun, the S.P. fell under the control of the "Big Four" - Charles Crocker,
Mark Hopkins, Collis Huntington and Leland Stanford - owners of the Central
Pacific. In 1871 they received from Congress the right to construct yet
another transcontinental, this one along a route from Tehachapi Pass to Los
Angeles, connecting with the Texas Pacific at Yuma.
Since the legislation required only that the routes go through Los Angeles
County, there was fear on the part of some Angelenos that the city would be
by-passed or that San Diego would become the Pacific terminus of the lines.
Negotiations with the "Big Four" culminated in a demand by the railroad that an
amount equal to 5 percent of the assessed valuation of the county be donated to
the Southern Pacific in return for construction of the line into the city.
Despite objection from residents who considered this to be extortion, voters
approved the arrangement in 1872. In excess of $600,000 was given to the S.P.,
including ownership of Banning's railroad to the harbor.
In September, 1876, the S.P. completed its line from the San Joaquin Valley
south to Los Angeles. The route crossed the Tehachapis to Mojave and made its
way into San Fernando through what was then the world's longest tunnel. Los
Angeles finally had a rail connection to the east although it required a trip
north to Sacramento in order to join the Central Pacific route across the
Sierra Nevada.
By virtue of its land grant arrangement with Congress, the S.P. was still
required to build east to the California border. The line to Yuma from Los
Angeles was finished in 1877, but the Texas Pacific, building west, had not
even reached New Mexico. The S.P. continued laying track through Arizona and
New Mexico, connecting with the Santa Fe at Deming in 1881 to open the first
southerly transcontinental route east. In 1883 the S.P. tracks connected at
the Pecos River east of El Paso with west-bound construction crews, creating
the "Sunset Route" to New Orleans. That facilitated participation by
California's citrus growers in the New Orleans Exposition of 1884, where they
won major awards.
To complete its other transcontinental route the S.P. built east from
Mojave to Needles where it met up with the Atlantic and Pacific, in reality a
subsidiary of the Santa Fe. That line also became operational in 1883 but the
S.P. preferred to route eastbound traffic over the Sunset line or the Central
Pacific line via Ogden.
In 1884 the S.P. leased its Needles-to-Mojave track to the Santa Fe.
Late the next year Santa Fe trains utilized a newly constructed line through
Cajon Pass between Barstow and San Bernardino, and through another lease with
the S.P. connected with Los Angeles over the existing S.P. tracks from
Colton. Passenger service began in November, 1885. The competition between
the S.P. and the Santa Fe for passenger traffic led to deep cuts in fares from
the East and Midwest, particularly in 1886, stimulating the rush to Southern
California that sparked the real estate frenzy of that decade. By 1887 Santa
Fe had acquired the S.P. track from Needles to Mojave and had purchased the
Los Angeles and San Gabriel Valley R.R., giving Santa Fe its own tracks into
Los Angeles.
While recognizing the benefits derived from rail transportation, many
Angelenos were skeptical about the management of both the S.P. and the Santa
Fe. Dissatisfaction with S.P.'s freight rates in the late 1870s brought
Charles Crocker to town as the principal speaker at a public meeting called by
the city council. Discourteously subjected to what one member of the audience,
Harris Newmark, thought was a lack of consideration and made the butt of
stinging criticism, Crocker is reputed to have said:
If this be the spirit in which Los Angeles proposes to
deal with the railroad upon which the town's very vitality
must depend, I will make grass to grow in the streets of your
city.
Crocker's remark was not an idle threat, for his railroad had bypassed
cities that failed to respond to its demands for subsidies and its monopolistic
rate practices were already well known. Newspaper readers had utilized the
letters columns of the city's press in the early 1870s to warn against any
subsidy to the S.P. Historian James Guinn cited "Taxpayer" and "Pro Bono
Publico," two pen names that would appear frequently in the Times in the
'eighties, as examples of letters protesting the 1872 subsidy.
Citizens criticizing the S.P. would also use the letters column of the
Times. In phrases and charges that foreshadowed the writing of Frank Norris,
who depicted the railroad as a monster, a soulless force with tentacles of
steel reaching across the state of California, readers of the Times denounced
"the octopus" and the unethical practices that came to be so closely associated
with it: the public be damned, discriminatory freight rates and the issuance of
free passes to influence political decisions. These letters, written by
"Sufferer" in 1887 and by Blanton Duncan in 1889, bring to mind the passages in
Norris' Octopus, published a decade later, where Magnus and Harran Derrick
came face to face with the discriminatory short haul policy of the Southern
Pacific and where engineer-turned-farmer Dyke discovered to his dismay the
formula by which the railroad determined freight rates. While there is no
direct evidence to demonstrate that "Sufferer" was actually Blanton Duncan, the
content of the two letters suggests that as a possibility. The letter by
Duncan is but one of a series on railroad malpractices he published in the
Times in Feb., 1889.
{Times, Mar. 13, 1887, p. 3}
Contrasting Railroad Policies.
Los Angeles, March 11.--[To the Editor of The Times.]
Too much cannot be said in commendation of the policy of the
Atchison and Santa Fe Railroad Company. It has been the
making of Southern California. Had Los Angeles remained
under the iron heel of the Southern Pacific she would have
been far behind where she is today. The policy of that
company is utterly selfish. They have never yet comprehended
the idea of mutuality in prosperity. "Live and let live" is
not in their code of ethics at all. Their cardinal doctrine
has undeniably been, "Charge all that the traffic will bear,"
and the practice, quite uniformly, has been to exact more
than the traffic would bear. In scores of instances have
they illustrated the fable of the goose that laid the eggs,
over and over again killing the goose in their greed to get
at the eggs. Many a promising enterprise has been choked to
death by the extortions of that company, which, under like
circumstances, would have been fostered and built up by the
Santa Fe Company. It is really strange that the Southern
Pacific people have not heretofore seen the error of their
policy. It is as plain as a pikestaff to other people, and
it is beginning to dawn on the Southern Pacific Railroad
managers that what is good for the public is good also for a
railroad. The Southern Pacific has long sought to prosper,
and has, perhaps, for the hour prospered by choking,
strangling and crushing out this, that and the other locality
which has refused or failed to come up to its requirements.
Every approach of theirs to a town, city or county has been
preceded by a demand for tribute. The appeal of the Arab for
backsheesh was not more persistent, and woe to the community
that failed to respond. How many years ago is it that they
threatened to make the grass grow in the streets of Los
Angeles if she failed to comply with their extortionate
demands for money and bonds? How long is it since the good
people of San Bernardino committed the indiscretion of
denying them tribute, and suffered, in consequence, the
mortification of seeing the new town of Colton started up
expressly for their ruin? The audacity of the Southern
Pacific people when they had the field all to themselves was
fairly sublime. It has no parallel in this or any other
country.
A question may well be raised at this time as to the
extent to which their extortions are still binding upon a
community. They were made upon Los Angeles when she was
powerless to help herself; it was "your money or your life,"
and we stood and delivered. How far has the railroad company
performed its part? Has it lived up to the obligations in
all particulars, so as to render a compliance on our part
obligatory? This is worth looking into. It may be possible
yet, in a measure, to free ourselves from the clutch of the
tyrant. At all events, it is practicable to require of that
railroad company a much more faithful compliance with its
duty than has been shown up to this time.
In most flagrant disregard of the interests of this
city, it has established depot arrangements which would
disgrace any half-civilized place on the face of the earth.
There is no other town in America where locomotives, railroad
trains, street cars, hacks, express wagons, farm wagons,
drays, trucks, freight trams, private carriages, buggies,
cattle, mules, horses, swine, sheep, men, women and children
are mingled together confusedly in a public street. Arriving
in this town by rail from the East or North is an ordeal
which no one passes through a second time without fear and
trembling. The timid are subjected to great fright, and the
feeble--yes, everybody--in great danger.
Isn't it time the Southern Pacific magnates were given
to understand that some other people have interests in this
world as well as themselves? The present depot arrangements
are not only disgraceful to the last degree, but they are
extremely detrimental to the prosperity of this city, and
ought not to be endured.
SUFFERER.
{Times, Feb. 23, 1889, p. 3}
Cheating the Law.
Los Angeles, Feb. 17.--[To the Editor of The Times.]
The startling charge is made before the Legislature that the
boldness of crime has extended to a falsification of judicial
records, and that cases before the Supreme Court of the
United States have been gained by fraud and perjury against
the State. It is easy for vast moneyed interests to procure
corrupt instruments whenever the persons in control are
unscrupulous enough to carry into effect their wishes in that
line. If such scoundrelism has really been perpetrated, it
is time to institute proceedings which will punish all
concerned in the successful falsification of records. The
United States has power enough to do this, even against the
vast influence which the Southern Pacific may wield in this
State. The charge is a grave one and made publicly on
authority of the Controller. It must be proved or disproved.
It is bad enough that corporations for years contest the
payment of taxes, which should be equally borne by all
classes of a community. Whether State or United States
officials are the allies of corporations in fraud or evasion
of just debts, there should be no leniency in the prosecution
and punishment of all offenders. A telegraphic dispatch to
The Times says:
"Attorney Lezinski, representing Controller Dunn, said
that the records were false, and that the Circuit Court and
Supreme Court of the United States had been imposed upon, and
that the latter tribunal had finally decided against the
State of California upon these findings. The records were
examined, and taking up case No. 85, he alleged that the
United States Supreme Court had been led to believe that the
railroad company was assessed for four miles of water between
the foot of Market street and Oakland Mole at the same rate
as the regular roadbed, when such was not the case. Lezinski
said that these findings had been prepared in the railroad
company's office, and there had been criminal negligence or
something wrong on the part of the State's legal
representative in signing the stipulation upon which the
findings had been based, and this fact would be established
before the investigation closed."
The Southern Pacific is good at preparing reports and
papers. It is currently stated that all the evidence against
the syndicate when Congress was examining how they got away
with such a vast sum to invest in new enterprises and left
the United States to hold the bag, was prepared by the
Southern Pacific and sent out to the public. So it seems
that the corporation, in cases against itself, was permitted
to prepare the records.
"Lezinski said that these findings had been prepared in
the railroad company's office."
It is a good thing for a defendant to let him prepare
the evidence for both sides! With such a man as Gov.
Patterson of Pennsylvania to represent the prosecution, and
his assertions as to the fraudulent misappropriation of
$142,000,000 of Government property, it would have been
difficult to shape the State pleadings in the interest of the
octopus defendant.
There has been a growing disposition on the part of
corporations to assert greater powers and rights than
individuals. Nothing has been granted to them, which confers
any privilege over the humblest citizen. Anything assumed by
the corporation outside of the clearly defined powers of its
charter is ultra vires, and before a properly constituted
judiciary there will be full and speedy reckoning for all
usurpations and wrongs. The misfortune has been that shrewd,
unprincipled and daring men have allied themselves with those
who controlled the actions of officials and courts; and for
years the unpunished audacity and spoliation by these
syndicates has given them a quasi right by prescription or
custom, submitted to by those communities which could not
successfully for the time defeat their exactions and
oppressions. The time is coming, however, when there will be
a wakening up, and a better knowledge and enforcement of
rights and justice and law against the arrogant and the rich,
who dominate everything on the Pacific Coast, as a privileged
and superior race. It would be far better to have a good,
kindhearted, intelligent despot to rule the Pacific, than to
permit the worst of all obligarchies - a plutocracy - to have
its own way, with but one object, the increase of their own
wealth and power by the impoverishment and degradation of the
masses, and by open and derisive violations of law made by
the mockery of a so-called Republic. The Legislature has had
its attention called to the violation of laws, and it is
probable that some legislation will yet be enacted to keep
corporations in their proper sphere. The Congress intended,
by its long and short-haul clause, to make citizens of all
States equal in the carrying of freights to their respective
place of business. It was provided that the rates should be
reasonable and just. But the railroads, being soulless and
without conscience, always set to work the most astute tools
- for large pay - to devise some scheme against the spirit of
the laws for the protection of all. So they single out San
Francisco, of course, as one of the terminal points. The
Santa Fe compels the selection of Los Angeles and San Diego.
But for the Santa Fe having its line here, the Southern
Pacific would have but one terminal point - San Francisco -
and the whole of Southern California would be under its heel,
to pay just such exactions as might be piratically enforced,
and every pound of freight for all the local stations -
inside the State, and to California citizens - would be
hauled to San Francisco, with the additional delay, and then
the compulsory payment of freight at the local rate from San
Francisco back to the station through which the freight had
passed a week before. There are now three terminal points.
But to San Bernardino, Colton or any other point within
California west of Yuma, the business of each community is
virtually under the control of the octopus, and every pound
of freight is brought to Los Angeles from the East and sent
back at $60 to $100 per car additional freight, besides the
delay and damage to the goods. Congress has had its
attention called to this matter, so has the {state railroad -
Ed.} commission, and also members of the Legislature.
Merchants in various places have made subscriptions to test
the matter before the courts or the commission. The latter
is the speediest, for with the influence of the syndicate
with officials and courts, technicalities and red tape would
keep off a decision until they had drained the life-blood out
of all local commerce, manufactures, and even agriculture.
The people have been convinced in many places that law is
being made for the benefit of the thief, the scoundrel and
the swindler, and not for the due administration of justice
and equity. Not the more common felon who robs and steals by
brute force, but the subtle villain, who, knowing precisely
what the law says, can by his scheming brain evolve complete
evasion of the letter of the law, and find an able ally on
the bench to construe it as he has planned, and thus robs
whole communities at will. The Southern Pacific, by its
power, has compelled the Santa Fe and other lines to evade
the law in a similar manner. It is the duty of honest
citizens and States and communities to resist all these
encroachments, by which freedom will be eventually crushed,
and despotism will reign. The changes are decidedly in favor
of the latter, because history repeats itself, and the
current events indicate the subversion of republican
government everywhere. It would be idle to state to those
who simply worship mammon, and have no other guide than their
own creed and selfishness, what has been clearly written, and
is on the eve of fulfillment. And even with a knowledge that
resistance will not avail, it would be a prouder fate to die
in the defense of liberty than to live as a slave to a bloody
autocracy of wealth, without refinement, education or soul.
I have some suggestions to make as to what you and many
others now living will yet see before the century ends. Very
truly,
BLANTON DUNCAN.
Other writers may have been less eloquent but were just as irritated with
questionable railroad policies.
{Times, April 20, 1887, p. 9}
A Conundrum.
"Long and Short Howls."
Los Angeles, April 16.--[To the Editor of The Times.] I
want some one to tell me why the railroad company charges
more than double the rate on a box of oranges shipped to
Kansas City than on one shipped to San Jose. I sent one to
each place on the same day; one costing 40 cents, the other
$4. Now we all know it is not even five times the distance
to Kansas City that it is to San Jose. At the same rate they
ought to haul the one sent to Kansas City 4820 miles. Can
you in some way give me a reason?
ANDREW ADKISSON.
[We give it up.--Ed.]
{Times, June 29, 1882, p. 3}
Gen. Stoneman's Pass.
Editor Times: The letter of the Constitution forbids
the Governor of the State to accept a pass from a railroad
corporation; does not the spirit of the Constitution forbid a
candidate for Governor to stump the State traveling on a
pass? In canvassing the State a decent regard to the
opinions of mankind and an eye to the vote of the law-abiding
Democracy of Los Nietos will induce Gen. Stoneman to refrain
from electioneering on Sunday. Returning home to rest every
Sunday in the bosom of his family he will necessarily do a
good deal of railroad riding, and if we call the trip from
Los Angeles to some central point, like Sacramento, the
average ride, his eighteen or twenty outgoings and incomings
will be worth at customary rates, about a thousand dollars.
That is, he will be under obligations to Stanford, Crocker &
Co. to that amount.
Now, wherein is it better for the people that a Governor
should be inaugurated under fresh obligations to the railroad
corporations for favors worth a thousand dollars, than that
he should receive those favors six months after election? It
may be, however, that General Stoneman in stumping the State
will not use his pass as Railroad Commissioner, and that when
he went to San Jose to give Stanford "a black eye" he paid
full fare at the ticket office.
PENSEE.
{Times, Nov. 8, 1888, p. 6}
Free Passes.
Los Angeles, Nov. 3.--[To the Editor of The Times.]
Permit me to emphatically second the suggestion in today's
Times as to public officials riding on free passes. Such a
thing is certainly not proper in anyone owing a duty to the
whole public, and the acceptance of particular favors from
individuals at least lays the recipient open to the
reasonable suspicion of partiality to the donor in any matter
that may thereafter arise. Any public servant is able to pay
his fare; if not, it will be more dignified and respectable
to walk.
TAXPAYER.
Letter writers also complained about the inconsiderate treatment of
passengers. That complaint, however, was not reserved exclusively for the
Southern Pacific. Long before Metrolink or the "Big Red Cars" of the Pacific
Electric, residents of the San Gabriel Valley relied on steam trains for their
commute to downtown Los Angeles. Elias Longley and "Tenderfoot" found the
service offered by the Santa Fe and the Los Angeles and San Gabriel Valley
Railroad wanting. "Arizonan" penned a similar complaint about the Southern
Pacific's interstate service.
{Times, Feb. 24, 1888, p. 6}
Protest Against the Santa Fe Change of Time.
Los Angeles, Feb. 23.--[To the Editor of The Times.] It
is announced this morning that "the Santa Fe time-card has
been perfected." A large number of the daily patrons of the
road take exceptions to the word "perfected," and wish to
appeal, through your columns, to the management of the road
for one other change. The reduction of the number of trains
going out between 7 and 8:05 in the morning it is hoped will
enable the Duarte accommodation to reach Los Angeles on time,
viz., 8:25 a.m. Heretofore, on account of having to meet
these outgoing trains, it has had to switch off on side-
tracks and be delayed until 9 or 9:30, which was too late for
business men to reach the city.
But now comes another serious derangement: The 5:30 p.m.
train is taken off, leaving only the 5 p.m. train on which
business men can return to their suburban homes. There are a
good many lawyers, court reporters, book-keepers, clerks,
etc., who cannot leave their places of business until 5
o'clock or later, and of course they cannot reach the 5 p.m.
train. What are they to do? Many of them who have bought
homes in the beautiful towns along this road have for months
been rooming in the city, temporarily, in the hope that "the
great," "the enterprising," "the accommodating" Santa Fe,
would rise equal to the necessities of the people, and
furnish such local accommodations as would enable the
business men to live in their country homes, and get to and
from the city at such reasonable hours as all first-class
roads furnish cities of the size of Los Angeles. But it
seems the great railroad manager and "First Vice-President"
Smith is not equal to the task. And now we will have to sell
our country homes, abandon the Santa Fe, and move to the
city, until such time as the people of Pasadena find
themselves able to build a rapid transit road of their own-
unless the 5 p.m. train is changed to 5:30.
ELIAS LONGLEY
On behalf of 50 others.
{Times, Dec. 3, 1886, p. 4}
KICK AT A RAILROAD.
Sierra Madre, Dec. 1.--[To the Editor of The Times.] It
is an old and true saying that "competition is the life of
trade," and in some cases with individuals and corporations
it seems to be the only way to compel them to use their
customers in a gentlemanly or business-like way. The case I
have in mind now is the Los Angeles and San Gabriel Valley
Railroad, or the employes of this road. It seems to me (and
I find I am but one of many who hold the same opinion) that a
more ungentlemanly or disobliging set of men, from the
brakemen up to the highest officials, would be hard to find
east or west, and the writer hereof has traveled some.
It is hardly worth while to go into details, but any
person who has been obliged to ride over this road, or have
freight sent over it, knows only too well what these
annoyances are. Grocers and others along the line, who have
had freighting done, are seriously considering whether it
would not be cheaper to go back to first principles and do
their freighting by horse power as of old. If only a small
bill of merchandise is shipped from their depot to Los
Angeles, before it has passed many stations it is all
detached, side-tracked and broken up generally, and, instead
of reaching its destination all together, as shipped, it
comes creeping along for several days, a little at a time.
And if time and patience are worth $3 per day, and corner
lots are selling for $50 per front foot, how much cheaper is
it to have goods shipped on this road than to freight them by
mule or horse power? If any of The Times readers are good in
"figgers,' will they please solve the mathematics problem for
us. There has been, and still is, strong talk of the
Southern Pacific Railroad running a line from Shorb's winery
east through the San Gabriel valley, and that or any other
competing line would be hailed by the people of the valley
with genuine satisfaction. We wish to give the devil his
due, and the railroad company as well. Their road has
increased the value of property adjacent to it, and without
railroads our Golden State would not be the great sanitarium
of the world, as it is to-day. But courtesy and kindness do
not cost much, and sometimes they are worth a great deal in
dividends.
Probably this letter will remind your readers of the
fable of the "mouse and the lion," but you know the mouse got
into the lion's ear and gave him a horrible earache before he
got through with him.
TENDERFOOT.
{Times, July 30, 1889, p. 3}
Treatment of Passengers on the Southern Pacific of Arizona.
Los Angeles, July 29.--[To the Editor of The Times.] I
would like a few lines of your space to protest against the
disgraceful manner in which passengers on the Southern
Pacific line, through Arizona, are treated. If my experience
has not been exceptional, which, I have no reason to suppose,
I wonder that nobody yet has made complaint on the subject.
Early this month, I, with two friends, bought three
first-class tickets for Tucson. At Colton we stopped over
for a week or so. On leaving Colton we found there was no
ordinary first-class car on the train--only a Pullman sleeper
and an emigrant car. The emigrant car was divided in the
center, having ordinary seats in front and emigrant berths
behind. Leaving Colton in the evening, we took sleeping
berths in the Pullman, at $3 a berth, being compelled to do
this or ride in the emigrant car.
On the return trip, a couple of days ago, we found that
the ordinary first-class car is dropped at Maricopa, Ariz.,
and from Maricopa to Colton, where the ride is in the
daytime, there is no ordinary first-class car, and first-
class passengers are obliged to ride in the emigrant car,
being prohibited from entering the Pullman car. Leaving
Tucson at 1 a.m., and arriving at Los Angeles at 9:31 p.m.,
it is practically an all-day ride, where one has little use
for a sleeping car.
Again: from Tucson to Yuma is nearly 300 miles.
Breakfast is served at Yuma at 11 a.m. From the previous
evening until that time, there is nothing to eat all the way.
The cook in the Pullman car supplies meals in that car at the
moderate rate of $1.25 for a mere apology for a breakfast,
and I was obliged to pay 25 cents extra for the privilege of
sitting in a Pullman car to eat it.
The emigrant car was filthy in the extreme. Men, women
and children had to use the same retreat, and await one
another's convenience. All classes were mixed together.
Chinamen, emigrants, Mexicans, laborers and people smoking
tobacco. The air was foul, unwholesome and disgusting.
There were no conveniences for washing, and only one place
for drinking water, which was in an abominable condition, as
women and children were continually running there to take
water for washing and drinking purposes, spilling it all over
the floor. Besides this, the water ran short between
stations.
This state of affairs is an absolute public disgrace,
and a very great injury to Arizona travel.
ARIZONAN.
While Charles Crocker and his colleagues at the top were the principal
target of complaints, not even the Southern Pacific's janitors escaped
criticism.
{Times, Sept. 4, 1886, p. 2}
How is This?
To the Editor of the Times--Sir: Will you please tell
me, through the columns of your paper, if it is the custom of
the employes of the Southern Pacific R. R. to appropriate all
packages found in the cars, or to take them to the offices of
the company for identification by the owner?
The reason I ask is, the other day, having occasion to
remain in the cars of the train just in from Santa Monica for
a few minutes after the janitor came in to clean up, I saw
him take a lady's hand-satchel from the seat (where it had
been left), open it, take out a handkerchief and drop it to
the floor. He then took some money from a small purse inside
the satchel--a few dollars, I think--and counted it, and then
put it back, and put everything in his pocket, and went on
cleaning the car.
Why did he throw that handkerchief away?
PASSENGER.
Until the Santa Fe made it clear that Los Angeles, not San Diego, was to be
the major West Coast terminus of its line, a fierce rivalry between the two
cities marked the 1870s and 1880s. San Diego had by far the better harbor and
for a time seemed destined to be the metropolis of the southwestern part of
California. That rivalry may have inspired the vandalism that E. S. Turner
reported.
{Times, Oct. 5, 1887, p. 6}
BAD WORK.
What Became of Our Immigration Literature.
Los Angeles, Oct. 3--[To the Editor of The Times.] On
my return from Kansas City to Los Angeles, I saw a large pile
of books dumped off the cars at a small station west of the
Kansas State line, on the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe line.
I got off the train and found that they were copies of
"Resources of Los Angeles County," {probably a later edition
of the Board of Trade pamphlet referred to in the previous
chapter - Ed.} the boxes burst open and the books scattered
all about. I have been informed that they were shipped for
St. Louis, Mo. It was about the 25th of September that they
were thrown overboard. I found a number of San Diego agents
on the train who abused passengers who said they were going
to Los Angeles, and twitted them of not having good sense. I
could not help thinking that the whole thing was an outrage
on Los Angeles county and city. Yours, in the interest of
Southern California, Los Angeles city and county included.
E. S. TURNER.
When the S.P. and the Santa Fe cut passenger fares in 1886 the intent was
to encourage interstate traffic, not to reduce local fares. Thus, when the
Santa Fe fare from Los Angeles to Chicago fell to $15, the passenger paid the
full fare but received a rebate of $20 at the other end of the line. The S.P.,
however, did not bother with rebates and sold tickets to Kansas City for as low as
$1 for a short period in 1886. Most of those tickets were reportedly purchased
by local travelers, who would otherwise have had to pay $2.30 to go to Colton.
Not only did the S.P. lose $1.30 in fare, but it also had to reimburse the
Missouri Pacific, with whom the S.P. had an agreement, 51 cents on the dollar.
Other passengers bought $1 tickets to the Midwest and rode only to San
Francisco, causing the S.P. to lose $24 of the regular $25 fare.
Such inspired and imaginative planning on the part of railroad passengers
was not new. Enterprising ticket scalpers were already at work, as revealed in
this 1882 exchange between "J. F. McA." and Edward Nittinger, operator of a
real estate/employment office. In 1886 one railway attempted to stem ticket
scalping by printing a description of the passenger on the ticket but soon
abandoned that ploy when other lines refused to adopt it.
{Times, Sept. 22, 1882, p. 1}
TICKET SCALPING.
An Old Offender at his Favorite Vocation.
To the Editor of The Times:
I write this article hoping that the experience of some
unfortunates may prove a lesson to others. For some time
past it has been the custom of a certain employment office to
advertise on the dead walls and other places, "railroad
tickets for sale." To the unexperienced it would seem a
novel way of buying railroad tickets. On presenting himself
at the place advertised, he will be told that he can buy a
ticket to San Francisco, or some other point, for almost
one-half the regular rate for a first-class ticket. The
manager of that employment office is too well versed in legal
technicalities to lay himself liable, so he tells the
unsophisticated that he does not sell the ticket but for the
sum of one dollar he will convey the information where the
said tickets are for sale. If the party should prove to be
more than usually inquisitive he is promptly told that he can
find no more information, but must pay his dollar and he will
be referred to where he can buy the ticket. In most cases
the dollar is paid and a receipt is given telling the bearer
where the tickets can be found, and for which information he
had to pay his dollar. Going to the place referred,
sometimes it being a regular professional scalper of tickets,
and in some instances being parties who had bought their own
tickets at contract rates, and which is only good to the
party sold to, they affixing their signature to the same.
After paying the money to the second party and congratulating
himself on buying a first-class ticket at almost half the
usual rates, he prepares himself and starts off on the train.
All is right till the conductor (whose experiences in that
direction have led him to be more than usually sharp) quickly
detects an old contract ticket with the party's signature
attached, or to be more sure he generally has the party to
write their name underneath, which quickly shows he is not
the original purchaser. The train is stopped and the victim
is put off minus what he had paid, or if he decides to
purchase a ticket again paying as much as if he had bought it
at the original starting point. If this shall save some who
have ever contemplated buying such tickets and saving them
their money and much trouble, this article shall not have
been written in vain.
J. F. McA.
{Times, Sept. 23, 1882, p. 4}
Ticket Scalping.
To the Editor of The Times:
Please publish this answer to an article in your issue
of Sept. 22d, 1882, signed J. F. McA.
I keep an employment office and a bureau of information,
where one can be informed that they can buy a horse or wagon,
find a boarding house, and where parties can be found that
have for sale first-class unlimited railroad tickets, which
they have purchased without signing a contract at the time of
purchase. I do not give any information or take the address
of any party that has for sale an emigrant or a limited
contract ticket. A notice of my system of doing business is
posted in my office, and I make a charge for information and
receipt for the same, but if parties do not negotiate after a
careful inspection, then on return of the receipt, signed, I
return fee charged for services rendered.
E. NITTINGER.
Los Angeles, Sept. 22, 1882.
During the railroad construction craze of the mid-1880s, "G" offered this
uncannily prophetic view of railroad development in the coming years. His
prediction should be compared with a map of Southern California rail lines
existing in 1900. "G's" only major miscalculation, related to the erroneous
conviction that rails, once laid, would never be abandoned, was his belief that
the California Southern's Temecula Canyon line was a permanent route. After
the tracks were again destroyed by an even greater flood in 1892 the canyon
route was abandoned in favor of a coastal line to San Diego. Ysidora, a
California Southern station, was on the Santa Margarita River near Oceanside.
In 1885 the Atlantic and Pacific acquired the California Southern, which
eventually became part of the Santa Fe.
{Times, June 22, 1886, p. 2}
Local Railroad Building.
To the Editor of the Times--Sir: It seems to be the
fashion now for editors and other people to hazard guesses on
whether a certain movement of railroad surveyors means this
or means the other, and I want to take my turn.
My guess is (and I want to file it for record) that the
California Southern Railroad is going to do everything I have
seen guessed in Southern California papers, except abandon
any part of any line now built.
Take your map of these three companies and see if you do
not agree with me. If you were the rich and powerful
Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railroad Company wouldn't you
buy and complete the San Gabriel Valley Railroad to the main
line near San Bernardino? have the most direct entrance to
Los Angeles, the metropolis of the southern coast, and tap
the great foot hill fruit belt? I have never been a rich
railroad company, but the above would be my move.
Then wouldn't you build another branch from the main
line near Riverside down that great and rich valley parallel
with the Santa Ana river and into another equally good for
other purposes, cross the river near Anaheim, take that place
and perhaps Garden Grove and Long Beach on the way and reach
tide water in the biennially improving harbor at Wilmington?
I would.
Then I would build from Los Angeles, by something near
the old stage route, through a rich country, to my main line
at either Ysidora or Oceanside, and thus connect the
metropolis with Wilmington harbor and also the great harbor
and future great commercial city of San Diego, by the more
direct route. Then I would build a crosscut. I would tie my
three lines together by a line (now being re-surveyed)
running from Elsinore station, on the main line, past the
village, the lake and the coal mine, down the Temescal creek,
crossing the Riverside and Los Angeles branch and the river
near Temescal wash, developing the rich Rincon and princely
Chino ranches, tapping my competitor at Pomona and my San
Bernardino and Los Angeles line a few miles further north.
I would want some short branches--one from Los Angeles
to Santa Monica; one from Perris to the thriving four-year-
old colony and town of San Jacinto; one to Escondido, and one
to El Cajon.
Then I would say, "this southern country is mine, and
the fullness thereof." And following the traditional record
of the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe of faithful service to
my patrons along established lines, I would use their every
mile to increase the demand for transportation over them. If
anybody should say anything about abandoning the Temecula
Canyon road, I would only laugh; because I would remember
that when only two years ago that road abandoned me, I took
some months to consider, settled it for all time and spent a
quarter of a million dollars making that road so good that it
carried me through similar floods last winter, and will,
without doubt, continue to serve me as well in future. Why,
I never heard a case of abandoning a railroad; did you?
Now, I hope none of your readers will think I am in the
secrets of the company because I have so fully outlined the
very policy they are going to pursue. I want to have the
credit of my guess.
G.