Shadows of the Past : The Ghost Towns of L.A. County

By CECILIA RASMUSSEN BDTIMES RESEARCHER

May 29, 1990 12 AM PT

During the 1887 real estate boom, developers hoped to lure homesteaders to 60 new towns in Los Angeles County. Today, many of these locales are just a shadow--or ghost--of their former selves , reduced to mere street names or merged with larger cities nearby. One became part of the failed Socialist colony of Llano; others merely vanished. Promoters employed many schemes to attract buyers: brass bands, street processions, free lunches and excursions , and advertisements rich in description with promises that were never intended to be fulfilled.

Here are a few of these such towns. Llano

Crumbling chimneys and walls are lingering monuments to almost a thousand people who once labored in this water-scarce community, officially known as the Llano del Rio Cooperative Colony. Located in the Antelope Valley not far from the site of present-day Llano, the first Llano settlement was established in about 1888, possibly by Quakers. A post office was established in 1890. That settlement’s peak year was 1895, when 100 people lived in or near the community. But the settlement experienced more of a population bust than boom; school enrollment plunged from 33 pupils in 1894 to only five in 1900. Drought and the failure of an irrigation project dried up the first Llano.

The town experienced something of a rebirth in 1914 when it was resettled by Los Angeles Socialists under the guidance of attorney and former mayoral candidate Job Harriman. Harriman acquired the land and its water rights for practically no down payment and established the community to prove the socialist theory of cooperative living. Between 1915 and 1917, Llano was the largest town in the Antelope Valley, and at its high point had a population of about 1,000. Townsfolk bought shares in the colony with cash or by trading goods. One individual who was cash-poor but rich in rowboats used his boat supply to ante up. Each person was “paid” $4 per day--not in cash, but on paper.

The 1917 Llano Viewbook--sort of a town yearbook--painted a bright picture of the community enthusiastically working to “solve the problems of unemployment by providing steady employment for the workers; to assure safety and comfort for the future and for old age; to guarantee education for the children in the best schools, and to provide a social life amid surroundings better than can be found in the competitive world.”

But less than a year after the yearbook came out, the bright picture had turned bleak.

It was said that the cooperative colony failed in part because some people would not cooperate. Fourteen people would be assigned a job, but only four would do the work. A second problem was the recurring water shortage.

One December day in 1917, most of the cooperators left this desert town for the timbered country of Louisiana, where Harriman purchased 20,000 acres to start another cooperative that he named Newllano.

The Llano they left behind eventually went bankrupt, even though a few hearty souls remained. Today, Llano has a population of about 350 with a golf course, post office, gas station and grocery store.

Chicago Park

By mid-March of 1888, the push was on to turn this San Gabriel Valley hamlet into a boom town. Advertisements distributed in the East and Midwest showed a white steamer on its way up the rippling waters of the San Gabriel River, taking on freight and passengers at Chicago Park. Its nearness to Monrovia made it popular and about 2,289 lots, 25 by 133 feet, sold fast. This rectangular-shaped town was about 2 1/2 blocks long by five blocks wide, south of what is now Live Oak Avenue and just east of present-day Peck Road in Arcadia. Its streets were named for roadways in the other Chicago--Dearborn, La Salle, Michigan, Monroe. Clark Street is the only street name that still remains. It has been said that promoter Will Beach envisioned a busy inland shipping center.

But some say Beach stretched the truth a bit in his promotional campaign to swell the ranks of his community. For one thing, the San Gabriel River was more gurgle than gush. In fact, some lots were actually in the San Gabriel River bed. The irony of the ad was not lost on the locals, but the out-of-towners failed to see the humor.

Eventually the buyers learned that they had been tricked and abandoned their purchases. The only person who ever lived in Chicago Park was the hotel caretaker.

Arcadia annexed this property in 1957, mainly to secure water rights on the river. Gladstone

At the intersection of present-day Gladstone Street and Citrus Avenue in what is now Azusa, in the early 1880s, lay a sleepy little town called Centro. Nineteen properties totaling about 500 acres were purchased for the unheard-of price of $372,661 by Henry H. Boyce, part owner of the Los Angeles Tribune. Boyce renamed the town after British Prime Minister William Ewart Gladstone, who at the time was enjoying a period of popularity in the United States. The prime minister was supposedly presented with the title deed to a lot, but no record exists.

On April 23, 1887, the day lots went on sale, the town consisted of a schoolhouse, church, store, livery stable and the Centro Hotel, locally known as the Pull Tight Hotel (so called because the sheets on the beds were pulled excessively tight).

Advertisements for the town boasted of a mammoth hotel--but it never materialized. Boyce and his associates bought an interest in the Victor Marble Co. and said they would be able to lay down marble that was cheaper than brick. But lime was the company’s only product.

Power from a nearby waterfall was declared to be abundant--enough to supply the juice for the town’s electric lights and run its streetcars. But no waterfall was ever found.

The Tribune quoted developers who boasted of $100,000 in land sales on opening day, but only two deeds amounting to $2,862.50 were recorded, casting doubt on the $100,000 figure. The highest price paid for an acre lot was $13,000, which meant a handsome profit for the lucky seller who had paid only $150 for it in 1882.

The Times, a competitor to Boyce’s Tribune, began running stories about the fraudulent claims of the developers, which helped squash the land sales.

Besides the false promises and The Times’ stories, Gladstone never survived because railway lines ran too far north of the town--a whopping two miles. Also, $10,000 for a few small lots was too high, even in the boom days.

Some of the buildings remained in Gladstone until 1903, then were moved to Azusa. Boyce’s Gladstone Improvement Co. went out of business in December, 1905, when it forfeited its charter for failure to pay its taxes.

Lordsburg

Spread over 800 acres and roughly bordered by present-day Foothill Boulevard, Fulton Road, Arrow Highway and Damien Avenue in what is now La Verne, Lordsburg was once little more than a hotel. The inn cost at least $80,000 to build and was put up by Pasadena realtor Isaac W. Lord. Back in the 1800s, a good hotel was half a town. In this case, it was the whole town. But Lord had something bigger in mind--a town to rival Pomona.

“Eden-like homes” were envisioned for land around the hotel sold at a May 25, 1887, auction. Individual lots ran from $400 to $800. Lord told of $200,000 in sales but reportedly only 100 lots were sold.

Lordsburg, nearly a day’s ride from Los Angeles, never really attracted a crowd--to the land or the hotel. In fact, one unlucky hotel guest was reportedly charged $75 for a one-night stay. When he queried the innkeeper about the cost, the proprietor reportedly explained that he had spent a bundle building that hotel, that the stranger was the first and only guest and, therefore, had to pay his part of the interest on the investment.

By March, 1891, Lordsburg had slumped and Lord sold his hotel to a colony of German Baptists known as Dunkers. They established Lordsburg College, which opened its doors in September, 1891, with a student body of 135. The original college building was torn down in 1926.

Today, on the same site, between B and D streets on Bonita Avenue, stands the University of La Verne.

Eldoradoville

In 1859, a tough miner’s town known as Prospect Bar was situated off what is now California 39, four miles up the East Fork of the San Gabriel River in Azusa Canyon. Hundreds of people poured into this canyon settlement to make $2 to $10 a day working the gold mines. Then, on March 10, 1860, the Eldoradoville Mining District was formed. A rowdy successor to Prospect Bar, this rudimentary settlement contained a half dozen saloons, a boarding house, three stores, a blacksmith shop and a butcher shop. Just two miles south, in Follows Camp, was the general store of Henry Roberts, which was built in 1861 and is the only remaining building from the gold-rush era in the San Gabriel Mountains. Roberts and a partner whose last name was Williams (his first name was lost to time) inaugurated a stage coach line that made biweekly trips from Los Angeles to the canyon.

Eldoradoville died a violent death in a flood on Jan. 17, 1862. The shantytown was washed away, lock, stock and barrel.

R.I.P: The Afterlives of 14 Towns

According to the July, 1889, county Board of Equalization report, about 79,350 lots in 60 towns were laid out as of Jan . 1, 1887. The population on paper was 3,350, but some towns had only one resident. Here’s what became of some others: Alosta became Glendora.

Bethune and Raymond merged with South Pasadena.

Clearwater became part of Long Beach.

Ivanhoe rests on the northern edge of Silver Lake near the Ivanhoe Reservoir.

Monte Vista was swallowed by Tujunga.

Palomares is now part of Pomona.

Ramona became part of Alhambra.

Rosecoe became Sunland.

Seabright can be found in Long Beach.

Sunset became Westwood.

Tropico merged with Glendale.

Walteria, Meadow Park became Rancho Palos Verdes.

West Duarte moved its buildings to Monrovia.