Trio Laid Foundation for Modern Suburbia

When considering the San Fernando Valley’s evolution from ranch-dotted agricultural tract to dense grid of subdivisions, one often imagines the turning point to be the 1950s heyday of suburbia.

But decades prior to that postwar boom, the true groundwork had been laid by Isaac Van Nuys, Hobart J. Whitley and William Paul Whitsett. At the turn of the century, the three were all key players in the purchase of the southern half of the Valley by the Los Angeles Suburban Homes Co.

Van Nuys, son-in-law of Isaac Lankershim, another Valley pioneer, helped run the Los Angeles Farm & Milling Co. Using dry-farming techniques popular in the western plains, he turned about 47,000 acres into a vast grainfield.

But when the world wheat supply exceeded demand by the mid-1890s, farming rapidly lost its appeal. As historian Lawrence Jorgensen noted, “The original Isaac Newton theorized a universe composed of ‘building blocks’ of matter. Mr. Isaac Newton Van Nuys . . . saw ‘building blocks’ on subdivided land where once was desert wilderness.”

Van Nuys sold his acreage to the Suburban Homes Co., which envisioned the community of Van Nuys as the centerpiece of an unprecedented land deal. In all, 30 investors put up an initial $25,000 apiece but quickly earned it back with 50-foot lots soon selling for $1,000 each.

Whitsett, once described by Van Nuys Chamber of Commerce director Bruce Ackerman as “the original P.T. Barnum,” grew up in Pennsylvania and arrived in the Valley by way of Chicago. He bought a half interest in Van Nuys and soon became the community’s sales manager, hawking lots all over town and pioneering the planned community concept by drawing up specific maps with major and secondary streets.

Whitley brought crucial railroad expertise to the group, having marketed tracks of Rock Island and Northern Pacific railroads as tie-ins with land development. As general manager of Suburban Homes, he specialized in linking transportation with Valley growth.

His wife, Margaret Virginia Whitley, would later write that during years of negotiations that forever changed the Valley landscape, Whitley remained fond of “driving out from his home in Hollywood every Sunday after dinner with his family, knowing of the possibilities of that location.”