Site of Early Los Angeles Author(s): Ruth E. Baugh Source: Economic Geography, Vol. 18, No. 1, (Jan., 1942), pp. 87-96 Published by: Clark University Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/141411 Accessed: 02/06/2008 14:16

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http://www.jstor.org SITE OF EARLY LOS ANGELES

Ruth E. Baugh

WO maps of early Los Angeles were concluded for the founding of the help interpret conditions that second colony, although the location influenced selection of site for of the southern settlement had been its original settlement: first, the plan chosen by Felipe de Neve, governor of of the pueblo as sketched by Jose Alta California. Argiiello in 1786-five years after the The site of the southern pueblo, the founding-on the occasion of the assign- broad terrace of the Rio Porciuncula, ment to the colonists of town lots and was located only nine miles west of the planting fields; second, the plan of the Mission San Gabriel. Here, in 1769, city in 1849, as surveyed by Lieutenant Don Gaspar Portola, on his northward Ord of the United States Army. journey in search of Monterey Bay, had Argiiello's sketch demonstrates the halted "to reconnoiter the country, and simple plan of the customary Spanish above all else to celebrate the jubilee colony adapted, obviously, to the par- of Our Lady of the Angels of Porciun- ticular conditions of the Los Angeles cula." ("Porciuncula was the name site; Ord's map, strikingly similar, of a town and parish near Assissi which shows functions of the city sixty-eight became the abode of Saint Francis years after establishment of the pueblo. after the Benedictine monks had pre- Of great interest today is the fact sented him, about 1211, with a little that the area of parent settlement, the chapel which he called in a jocular way, subject of these two early maps, is still La Porciuncula [the small portion]" nucleus of twentieth-century Los An- Nellie Van de Grift Sanchez, Spanish geles. The Civic Center now under and Indian Place Names of California, development contains the parent core, p. 51, San Francisco, 1914.) The notwithstanding a tremendous enlarge- diarist of the expedition, Padre Crespi, ment of the city's area in recent years. noted in his journal, the charms of this The pueblo of Los Angeles was one locality: "We entered a very spacious of three civilian settlements founded in valley, well grown with cottonwoods Alta California, to provide agricultural and alders, among which ran a beautiful produce for presidios which were being river from the north-northwest, and established along with missions for the then doubling the point of a steep hill, it control of Spain's important north- went on afterwards to the south. western frontier. Of the two colonies Toward the north-northeast; there is surviving the vicissitudes of early in- another river bed which forms a spacious fancy, San Jose, the first to be organ- water-course, but we found it dry. ized, was planted in the fertile Santa This bed unites with that of the river, Clara Valley south of San Francisco giving a clear indication of great floods Bay, and received its settlers in Novem- in the rainy season, for we saw that it ber, 1777. A third civic community, had many trunks of trees on the banks. Branciforte, was founded in 1797 near We halted not very far from the river the site of the present city of Santa which we named Porciuncula. Here Cruz, but soon passed out of existence. we felt three consecutive earthquakes Four years elapsed before arrangements in the afternoon and night. This plain 88 ECONOMICGEOGRAPHY where the river runs is very extensive. with grass." (Fray Juan Crespi, Mis- It has good land for planting all kinds sionary Explorer of the Pacific Coast, of grain and seeds, and is the most 1769-1774. Translation of diary by suitable site of all that we have seen H. E. Bolton, pp. 147-149. University for a mission, for it has all the requisites of California Press, 1927.) for a large settlement. . . . After cross- Padre Crespi's account doubtless in- ing the river we entered a large vineyard fluenced Governor de Neve's choice of of wild grapes and an infinity of rose site for the southern pueblo. For bushes in full bloom. All the soil is twelve years the place had borne the black and loamy, and is capable of name "Our Lady of the Angels of producing every kind of grain and fruit Porciuncula," and this name which which may be planted. We went west, was later applied to the pueblo was, in continually over good land well covered its abbreviated form, inherited by the

FIGURE 1.-Topography of central Los Angeles showing river, terrace, and hills of the site of the early settlement. The entire area included in this map is today the nucleus of the city of Los Angeles. (Adapted from U. S. topographic map, Los Angeles quadrangle, edition of 1900.) SITE OF EARLY LOS ANGELES 89

FIGURE 2.-Plan of the Pueblo of Los Angeles. Copy of the original sketch executed in 1786 by Jose Argiiello on the occasion of the assignment to the colonists of the town lots and planting fields in accordance with Governor de Neve's Reglamento of 1781. The propios or municipal lands, the rents of which were used to defray pueblo expenses, lay between the Rio de Porciuncula (Los Angeles River) on the right, and the azequia madre (mother ditch) in the center of the sketch. Fronting the plaza (P) were the house-lots and spaces reserved for municipal buildings. The King's Highway connecting the San Gabriel Mission enters the plaza at 0. The names of the nine heads of families to whom lands were granted are here listed. The scale used in mapping the pueblo proper is four times larger than that used for the fields. (From the Provincial State Papers, Archives of California. Tom. III-IV, p. 55. Bancroft Library, University of California.) 90 ECONOMICGEOGRAPHY city of Los Angeles. With this location agricultural practices, particularly that in mind, the governor prescribed the of irrigation, utilized in the European conditions for the settlement: homeland to overcome the handicap "For the establishment of the Pueblo of a long, dry summer. Thus water of Los Angeles, near the river Porciun- was the critical factor in agricultural cula, and on the land designated for production on this Pacific Mediterranean this purpose, there shall be included littoral, for without it even this fertile all the lands that may be benefited by soil would yield but a niggardly return. irrigation. There shall be marked out The determining element, therefore, the best place to construct the dam in in the pueblo's location, was the presence order that the water may be distributed of a small stream. to the largest extent of land. The Rio Porciuncula (Los Angeles "The site where the Pueblo is to be River) enters the plain a few miles established shall be marked out, on above the town site, discharging a clear land slightly elevated, exposed to the rivulet from the saturated gravels which north and south winds. Measures shall underlie the San Fernando Valley. The be taken to avoid the dangers of floods; stream constitutes the overflow from the most immediate vicinity to the a subterranean reservoir; hence its river, or vicinity to the principal zanja volume, though meager, was fairly shall be preferred; taking care that constant as far down as the pueblo. from the Pueblo the whole or greatest Below that point it diminished in part of the planting lands shall be volume and finally was lost in the sands seen." (Order of Governor Felipe de of the deep gulch in which it is en- Neve for founding of Los Angeles. trenched. Occasionally, however, Translation by Phil Townsend Hanna swollen by torrential winter rains, it in the Publications of the Historical became a turbulent river and occupied Society of Southern California. Vol. its arroyo from bank to bank. XV, Pt. I, pp. 154-155. 1931.) To To escape the winter floods and to this site, two leagues west of San facilitate the distribution of irrigating Gabriel, a small group of Spanish water, the pueblo was laid out on the soldiers escorted the forty-six settlers broad terrace about half a mile west who had been recruited in northern of the arroyo's edge. A simple dam Mexico, and with fitting ceremony was constructed two miles upstream formally founded on September 4, 1781 where the river rounded the steep bluff El Pueblo de Nuestra Senora La Reina of the Elysian Park Hills, and from de los Angeles. this point water was diverted into The area chosen was eminently satis- zanjas, thence on to the high level of factory for an agricultural colony. If the terrace and to the pueblo and plant- at first the land yielded poor returns, ing fields beyond. Here the ground was the cause lay in unskilful cultivation level, but with sufficient slope to insure and not in adverse natural conditions. good drainage. (Figure 1.) Rainfall was far from adequate, it is The intermediate location of the true, but the pobladores were accus- terrace between the entrenched river tomed to an even scantier precipitation on the east, and an irregular line of in the Sonoran desert. Spanish officials hills rising abruptly on the west, hemmed and Franciscan friars were familiar with in the little settlement and created an the moisture deficiencies of the Mediter- easily defensible site, an advantage ranean climate and knew the requisite which fortunately was not put to the SITE OF EARLY LOS ANGELES 91

FIGURE 3.-The plan of the city of Los Angeles in 1849, as surveyed and drawn by Lieutenant E. O. C. Ord of the United States Army. Ord's map includes a part of the area shown on Argiiello's sketch. The point of intersection of the two coordinate lines of the Ord map is the parish church which fronted the plaza in 1849, as it does today. This location, however, is not identical with that of the original plaza because the pueblo in the early years of its history was forced to move back from the river to escape destructive winter floods. Vineyards and gardens occupied the entire area of the level terrace between the river and the main irrigation ditch, whereas the newly plotted business and residential district was laid out near the base of the hills. The piedmont road in the left center of the map is the Spanish trail which Portola followed in 1769 on his march northward in search of Monterey Bay. test during pueblo days, for the natives indeed, this range is no less a mother encamped in the rancheria of Yang-na, to groves and gardens which today lie located "among the woods on the at her feet. river's bank" appear to have received The pueblo plan, adopted for Los hospitably Spanish conquistadores as Angeles, was utilized by Spain in her well as Mexican immigrants. colonies throughout North and South The general situation of the pueblo America. It comprised a village in was no less favorable than its site. which house lots faced a common square Grass covered plains stretched con- or plaza, with planting fields and pas- tinuously to the ocean, twenty miles tures beyond the residential precincts. to south and west; they were to become According to the governor's instruction, within a few decades the grazing grounds the pueblo should contain four square of thousands of cattle, horses, and sheep. leagues (28 square miles). In the geo- Beyond the knolls and ridges east of graphical center of this area "a plaza the river lay the fertile valley lands 200 by 300 feet was to be laid out with tributary to the Mission San Gabriel, its corners facing the cardinal points the outpost which provided physical and with streets running perpendicularly and spiritual sustenance to the infant from each of its four sides." (H. H. colony. Twelve miles to the north, Bancroft, History of California, Vol. I, there rose from the plain a mountain p. 345.) Lands were apportioned so wall, the Sierra Madre, nurturer of that each settler received a house lot mountain streams, and truly a mother as well as a share in the suertes or sowing to the infant settlements planted in the fields. The west side of the plaza was valleys of semi-arid southern California; set aside for the church and government 92 ECONOMIC GEOGRAPHY buildings, while east of the river were pueblo to the rank of a city resulted in the realengas or royal lands. an ever-growing demand for house lots. The first community task of the But imperfect titles and lack of maps pobladores was the construction of the and records made the transfer of land mother ditch, which conveyed domestic difficult. Judging by the minutes of and irrigating water to the pueblo and its its meetings, one is led to believe that fields. The settlers doubtless attempted the granting of lots and the confirma- some cultivation during the first year tion of titles was the major business of of the colony's existence, but records the local ajuntamiento, or town council, of production are lacking. By 1786 the throughout the decade preceding the colony was apparently self-supporting, American conquest. (Proceedings of for in that year government aid was the Ajuntamiento in Los Angeles City withdrawn. Jose Argiiello, under the Archives.) Governor's direction, executed the final This confused state of affairs per- distribution of property, guaranteeing sisted until the territorial governor in the title of each settler to a house lot 1849 requested a map of the city and and four fields-two suertes of irrigable information pertaining to the granting land and two of dry. The accompanying of lots. (Guinn, James M., History of sketch of the pueblo (Figure 2) included Los Angeles, Vol. I, p. 266.) Lieutenant in the territorial records of Alta Cal- E. O. C. Ord of the United States Army ifornia shows the location of residence was commissioned to survey the city plots fronting the plaza, and of the and, in addition, was instructed by the suertes in the area between the main local council to sketch "all lands actually ditch and the river. El camino real under cultivation from the principal which ran out to Mission San Gabriel, water-dam down to the last cultivated crossed the Rio Porciuncula and zanja field below. As to the lots that should madre just north of the planted fields. be shown on the map, they should begin (Archives of California, Provincial State at the cemetery and end with the house Papers, Tom. III-IV, p. 55. Bancroft of Bottiler. As to the commonalty Library, University of California. The lands of this city the surveyor should map of the pueblo is on a scale four determine the four points of the compass times larger than that of the fields.) and taking the parish church for a But to the close of the century, the center, measure two leagues in each accomplishments of the pueblo hardly cardinal direction. These lines will justified the establishment of the colony. bisect the four sides of a square within By 1800 the population numbered only which the lands of this municipality 315. In 1822, Mexico threw off the will be contained, the area of the same yoke of Spain and became a republic; being sixteen square leagues, and each thereupon for more than two decades side of the square measuring four California's affairs were administered leagues." (Los Angeles City Archives. by Mexican governors. By the arrival Vol. IV, pp. 590-594, 1849.) of traders and trappers from Santa Fe The results of Lieutenant Ord's survey and of foreigners who reached the west are embodied in the "Plan de la Ciudad coast in American and English ships, de Los Angeles," completed August 29, the population slowly increased. The 1849, today a highly prized record in designation of Los Angeles as capital the city's archives as it is the first of Alta California-a temporary arrange- authentic map of the city of Los Angeles ment only-and the promotion of the (Figure 3). Although Ord's map records SITE OF EARLY Los ANGELES 93

FIGURE4.-The pueblo of Los Angeles as sketched by H. M. T. Powell, March 17, 1850. This view of the settlement was made seven mnonths after the completion of the Ord map (Figure 3). (From " The Santa Fe Trail to California, 1849-1852," the Journal and Drawings of H. M. T. Powell. Edited by D. S. Watson, San Francisco, 1931. Sketch used by permission of the Book Club of California and the Grabhorn Press.) conditions in 1849, it enables us in the dential section occupied the higher light of historical facts to reconstruct ground west of the zanja madre and the physical aspect of the original Calle Principal, whereas the cultivated pueblo, and to interpret the role played fields lay east of, and slightly lower by the three dominant geographical than, the mother ditch. features: river, terrace, hills. The zanja madre had to tap the river The map shows that the Los Angeles far enough above the pueblo to allow of 1849, like the pueblo of 1781, centered the diverted water to flow by gravity round the plaza. On the west, the town to the terrace, which is elevated above was sharply delimited by hills which the stream level at the town. Originally presented a steep front to the settlement, a crude dam of brush and poles was while on the east, the utilized area thrown across the river two miles stopped abruptly at the brink of the upstream. (The original intake was dry wash in which flowed the inter- located in the vicinity of the present nlittent Los Angeles River. The resi- North Broadway bridge, according to 94 ECONOMICGEOGRAPHY

the late Charles J. Prudhomme, who yards are very extensive and are said came to Los Angeles in 1855, and who to contain from 25,000 to 30,000 and was for many years an engineer in the even 40,000 vines, the stock of which Los Angeles Water Department.) From was brought by the padres from Spain this point the main conduit ran south- and France." (Parke, Lieut. John G., ward, following the base of a low scarp Reports of explorations and surveys to (probably Alameda Street) to a point ascertain a railroad route from the above the plaza where it bifurcated into Mississippi River to the Pacific Ocean two major ditches, one of which carried [1853-1856]. Ex. Document 91, Vol. the domestic water supply to the pueblo, VII, pp. 80-81. House of Representa- the other, the irrigating water to the tives, Washington, D. C., 1857.) fields. As population increased and the Grapes and wine were much in cultivated area was extended, the ditches demand, and constituted the cash crop were lengthened until a general zanja of pueblo farmers. For the year ending system served the pueblo. This system, June 1850, Los Angeles County pro- improved and enlarged, was utilized duced 57,355 gallons of wine, valued at for more than a century. $6,550 according to the Federal Census. On the sunny terrace sloping gently (Seventh Census of the United States, to the river lay the cultivated fields. 1850. Washington, D. C. 1853.) Dur- Ord's map indicates that grapes were ing the period of the gold rush, grapes the dominant crop and were given from the southern districts found a preference of location: they were planted ready market in San Francisco and the nearest the zanja madre for adequate mining towns adjacent to Sacramento. water, and removed far enough from Even as late as 1859, grapes were the river to escape the ravages of winter shipped to northern markets. The floods. Major Emory, who passed report of coastwise shipments of domestic through Los Angeles the year of the produce from the port of San Pedro for Ord survey, noted that "of the many the year ending October 31, 1859 lists fruits capable of being produced with grapes and wine as the exports of great- success (in Los Angeles), by culture and est value. During that period, 22,974 irrigation the grape is perhaps that boxes of grapes, valued at $67,484, and which is brought nearest to perfection." 183,500 gallons of wine with a value of (Emory, W. H., Notes of Travel in $138,625, were exported, the bulk of California from the official reports of the shipment going to San Francisco. Colonel Fremont and Major Emory, (Los Angeles Star. September 24, 1859.) p. 275. Dublin, 1849.) Lieutenant Beyond the limits of Ord's Los Parke, enroute through southern Cal- Angeles, intensive cultivation was re- ifornia in 1854, was impressed by the stricted. Powell's sketch of the city irrigation facilities found at the settle- (Figure 4), made only seven months ment of Los Angeles. "Most of the after Ord's survey, depicts the cultivated fine graperies," he observed, "extend land west of the river, but indicates no along the river-side. In the vineyard cultivation east of the gulch. (The of Don Luis Vignes the vines are watered Santa Fe Trail to California, 1849-1852. by open drains from the river, which The Journal and Drawings of H. M. T. run down one side of an allotment with Powell. Edited by D. S. Watson. The side sluices for allowing small streams Book Club of California, Grabhorn to flow in between the rows and irrigate Press, San Francisco, 1931.) However, the ground. . . . Many of these vine- with the extension of the zanja system, SITE OF EARLY LOS ANGELES 95 grape plantings became numerous on which bisects the cultivated area be- the east terrace. In this district (luring tween Calle Principal and the river, the 1859-1860, H. D. Barrows watered a present Alameda Street. The original vineyard of 29,000 vines. (Barrows, Spanish trail which skirted the base of H. D., Water for domestic purposes the hills-Portola's path in 1769- versus water for irrigation. Publications persists on Ord's map. And only in of the Historical Society of Southern the newly plotted section of the city of California, Vol. VIII, pp. 208-209.) 1849 does a conventional net of streets But the vast area out of reach of the appear. fructifying waters of the river was There is no historical evidence that devoted exclusively to grazing. the hills immediately west of the settle- On the Ord map the confused mosaic ment played a military r6le during the of holdings and the haphazard arrange- early days of the pueblo. Not until the ment of roads in the district of the time of the American conquest was the original planting fields reflect the irreg- elevation, Fort Hill, fortified. Here, ular methods of land acquisition during after the first conquest of the territory the thirties and forties. The roads- in 1846, Captain Gillespie of the United mere lanes-followed farm boundaries. States Army stood siege during an An exception is noted in the main road uprising of the Californians. Following

FIGURE 5.-The civic center of modern Los Angeles embraces the site of the original settlement, notwithstanding a tremendous areal expansion of the city during the present century. The course of Los Angeles River roughly traces the upper margin of the photograph; a portion of the hills that confined the early pueblo on the west are seen in the lower left-hand corner. (Spence Air Photos, Los Angeles.) 96 ECONOMICGEOGRAPHY the recapture of Los Angeles by Com- The rural aspect of the city persisted modore Stockton and General Kearny until the late seventies. Urbs in horto, the next year, a redoubt, Fort Moore, a city within a garden, aptly described was constructed on Fort Hill, but was Los Angeles at that time.' Business and abandoned shortly thereafter. (Guinn, social life centered round the plaza. James M., Publications of the Historical North of the plaza lay Sonoratown, "as Society of Southern California. Vol. Mexican as though transported bodily IV, pp. 141-147.) from Old Mexico." (Workman, Boyle. It is interesting to follow up the part The City That Grew. P. 114. Los played by the terrace, river, and hills Angeles, 1935.) of the original site in the later decades The event that ushered in the trans- of Los Angeles' development. The hills formation from rural town to metropolis to this day present a barrier. They was the completion of transcontinental barred expansion for many years, setting railroads to Los Angeles. The Southern a limit to the occupancy of lands on the Pacific Railroad reached Southern Cal- west. With the eventual spread of the ifornia in 1876, and the Santa Fe nine city in that direction, several tunnels years later. A rate war ensued which were cut to connect the newer residential was a contributing factor in drawing and business districts on the west with thousands of new residents to California. the old center, but this improvement Population grew rapidly, business in- came late. The first tunnel was com- creased and the city began an areal pleted as recently as 1901. expansion which has carried its bound- In the eighties, following construction aries miles in all directions from the of streets, the hills overlooking the plain parent core. and river became a high-class residential Vineyards and orchards on the terrace district for a short time. Then retrogres- gave way to factories, wholesale blocks sion set in. Today, the flamboyant and business houses. Railroads and architecture of these run-down houses electric transportation lines criss-crossed dates the period of their heyday. the area recently under cultivation. The hills, however, may come into a The zanjas that had served the early more positive utilization as befits their farmlands disappeared. Bridges spanned prominence. According to W. H. Schu- the river. And the river itself, raison chardt of the Los Angeles City Planning d'etre of the original settlement, con- Commission, the hills adjacent to the tinued to serve the enlarged city. Even terrace "supply excellent sites for supe- today this small and almost invisible rior types of multiple dwellings," close stream contributes an appreciable per to the new Civic Center. They make cent of the total water supply. Easily possible "an unusual architectural cre- recovered as it emerges from the San scendo leading to a grand climax a Fernando Valley, through infiltration hundred feet above the lower land," and galleries it is diverted into municipal thus offer opportunities in the projected reservoirs. Civic Center for "a truly great modern The location of the Civic Center of acropolis." (Schuchardt, W. H., The modern Los Angeles in close proximity' Civic Center, in "Los Angeles, preface to the old plaza ties the present to the to a master plan." Publication XIX, past in utilizing the parent center, heart p. 240, The Pacific Southwest Academy. of the settlement from the days of the Los Angeles, 1941.) city's founding.