The Heritage Junction Dispatch a Publication of the Santa Clarita Valley Historical Society

The Heritage Junction Dispatch A Publication of the Santa Clarita Valley Historical Society Volume 41, Issue 2 March-April 2015 Calendar President’s Message by Alan Pollack Saturday, March 14 mere 6 months “Instantly the hotel became a roaring mass Lecture and tour on the St A after the of flames”. Sleeping in the hotel that morning Francis Dam Disaster greatest disaster in was the night operator, McReynolds. He 11:00 AM Saugus Station See page 7 California history barely escaped with his life, still in his white decimated San robe. According to the Los Angeles Times, Monday, March 23 Francisco with “Other inmates were eating breakfast. The Board of Directors Meeting earthquake and fire, house seemed to explode with fire, so dry 6:30 PM Saugus Station a huge conflagration was the structure, and these people were Saturday, March 28 in the fall of 1906 forced to abandon it without saving any of its Symposium on the St Francis almost dealt the contents. C. H. Clayton of Los Angeles owned Dam disaster same fate to the Santa Clarita Valley. It all the hotel.” 10:30 AM-12:30 PM Saugus Station started in the hotel at Lang Station, in Soledad 2:00 PM Newhall Library FROM LANG STATION TO See page 5 Canyon along the tracks of the Southern Pacific Railroad. Much like the fire which PLACERITA CANYON Wednesday, April 1 destroyed the elegant Southern Hotel in Driven by a strong north wind, the flames Deadline for the May-June Dispatch Newhall in 1888, it was believed to have been from the hotel leaped over the tracks and Friday, April17 through caused by a defective flue or a spark from the quickly consumed the new train depot. The Sunday, April 19 chimney. Across the tracks from the hotel, flames then spread along the railroad tracks Cowboy Festival, See page 9 a new train depot had recently been built. westward down Soledad Canyon. Three miles Monday, April 27 At 8:00 AM on the morning of October 5, down the canyon, they reached the ranch of 1906, station agent Slayton noticed smoke Board of Directors Meeting Deputy Constable Youngblood. The constable 6:30 PM Saugus Station curling up from the roof of the large frame lost five buildings and an olive orchard. The hotel and sent out an alarm. Slayton stated, Continued on Page 2 OutWest Concert Series at The Repertory East, 24266 Main St in Newhall. 8:00 PM Thursday, March 26: Midnight Radio with Katy Moffatt; $17.00 for Lang as it appeared at the SCVHS members time of the 1906 fire. The Wednesday, April 15: Kristyn Harris station dated from 1888, and Jim Jones; $22.00 for SCVHS after the second depot members burned. Note the water tank and standpipe for locomotives on the right. Check www.scvhistory.org for other upcoming events. Source: Bancroft Library, as shown in Serpico 2000:66. See above. Articles and inquiries regarding The Dispatch may be made to 661 254-1275 PAGE 2 THE HERITAGE JUNCTION DISPATCH VOLUME 41, ISSUE 2 President’s Message Continued from page 1 fire advanced past the mouth of Soledad Canyon toward started from the gas in one of the wells. The place at once Humphrey. It jumped across Whitney Canyon, destroying became a torch-light brigade as oil derrick after oil derrick the houses and barn on the Nettleton & Kellner Ranch. As leaped skyward in flame until twenty-four of them had been it proceeded into Placerita Canyon, the fire roared toward consumed. The residences of Will Hitchcock and Will Biscailuz the Standard Oil Company’s boiler house and pumping plant. were licked up along with a lot of employees’ shacks, barns Near the plant, residents of the canyon were eating lunch, and outhouses. When the tank containing 60,000 barrels of including Dr. S. L. Wellington, who was visiting the canyon with oil tried to build a fiery ladder to heaven, we all thought that his wife and granddaughter: “Our lives were spared by the our fight to save the Standard Oil Company buildings was narrow margin of five breathless minutes. When I saw those hopeless. In fact for a while it looked as if we would mount flames tear through the twenty foot growth of underbrush that ladder along with everything else. The heat was terrible, like spray dashing high over rocks, and consume great oak but we stuck it out and the flame, through God’s will, stood trees like the flash of lightning reaching into the sky, fear straight. We saved the boiler house, the office building and the came into my heart. Fear for the women and children, who machine shop, and the residence of Superintendent Walton had been playing by the brook but a few moments before. Young. .Finally the fire flattened out and died a natural death Most of the men who live in this canyon were away on in the hills about midnight, and we lay down in our clothes business. A man named Gibbs, A.M. Park, and I, alone had to under the sky and slept until morning.” drag the women to safety. It was terrible. .We had no time In the mountains between Rice Canyon and Chatsworth in to save anything. We were lucky to get out with the clothes the San Fernando Valley were roaming six thousand range on our backs. We ran along the road until the fire raced cattle. Their lives were endangered as the flames leaped over ahead of us and blocked our way. We crawled through the the mountains between the two valleys. Cattle that had been underbrush and struggled up the hillside, only to be driven evacuated from the burned district were taken over Beale’s back to the bed of the stream, where we threw water upon Cut in Fremont Pass down to the town of San Fernando. our scorched faces and cupped it up in our hands to moisten During the night, Martin Mahey and his wife rode up from our parched throats. I saw the hair of Mrs. Reynolds [the Newhall into the dark canyons of the mountains to the south wife of the superintendent of the Standard Oil Plant] singed searching for their 150 head of cattle endangered by the until I thought it would be burned entirely from her head. flames. They found many of their cattle in clusters of two, The clothes of the women smoked. Had a skirt caught the threes, and fours. The frightened animals were herded through flame, I fear that nothing could have saved the threatened smoke and falling cinders into the lowlands near Newhall. life.” Constable Ed Pardee saved the day when he rushed up the canyon road to the fleeing residents with horse and buggy. Section men and other gangs of the Southern Pacific Railroad The women and children were packed into the buggy, with were taken by special train into the fire district where, Mrs. Reynolds taking the reins to drive them out of harm’s through their heroic efforts, several railroad bridges were way. The men were able to escape the canyon on foot. saved between the San Fernando railroad tunnel and Lang Station. A section house at Lang managed to escape the All of the buildings on the grounds of the Standard Oil flames. Here a crew of linemen worked to reestablish the pumping plant were destroyed, except for the residence telegraph connection. Late in the afternoon, Southern Pacific’s of Superintendent Clay Reynolds. The loss of the pumping Owl train crossed Fremont Pass through a dense cloud of plant cut off the water supply to the town of Newhall. From smoke and flames as it approached the San Fernando tunnel. Placerita Canyon, the fire raced into Elsmere Canyon and then The train entered the tunnel’s mouth through “walls of red headed towards Newhall. The flames passed just southwest flame. The heat smote passengers, and the pungent fumes of of the town and turned towards Fremont Pass (now the deep-brown smoke filled their nostrils” (Los Angeles Times, Newhall Pass). There a stubborn group of firefighters led by October 6, 1906). the Superintendent of the Newhall Ranch managed to save the homes of Duarte, E. Humas, C. Price, and K. Rivera. INTO THE SAN FERNANDO VALLEY THE PICO CANYON FIRE Around 2:00 AM on October 6, the fire was eating its way along the western slope of the Santa Susana Mountains A second fire that day wreaked havoc in Pico Canyon. As told toward Chatsworth. Two hundred fire fighters fought by eyewitness Ernie Moore, “The fire is supposed to have heroically through the night to try to bring the fire under Continued on Page 6 PAGE 3 THE HERITAGE JUNCTION DISPATCH VOLUME 41, ISSUE 2 Train-ing Days by Maria Christopher n April 25 or 26, if you are driving on Highway 126 agriculture interests. When the tracks arrived at Camulos, Onear Fillmore, don’t be alarmed if you see a vintage several railroad-related buildings were put up. Two are still train rolling through the valley. You are not having visions; in use but not open to the public. Although the depot was this is part of RailFest 2015. RailFest is organized by the torn down, you can still see pictures and the depot sign Santa Clara River Valley Railroad Historical Society to when you visit the Rancho Camulos Museum. The railroad celebrate the history of the railroad in our area and is a entrepreneurs promoted Rancho Camulos as the Home free event for all ages. It is located at 250 Central Avenue of Ramona and thousands flocked to visit the home of the in Fillmore and runs from 9:00 to 5:00 each day.

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