Los Angeles herald., 1905-06-04

There has been no era in the history
| Of the United States in which sucf
miracles Of town growth and develop.
ment have been recorded as that which
has characterized this extreme south
western section of the United states.
The American tendency to brag and
to draw rosy pictures has been known
as a national foible at all stages of
our career, but as a matter of fact
the reality of accomplishment has sur
passed anything prefigured In our
dreams. During the first quarter OF
the last century Francis Jeffrey I'm one
Edinburgh Review and Kit North in
the other were wont to write amusing
diatribes at American hopefulness,
presumption and bounce" and tenfold
the utmost vagaries of our widest
dreams ever hoped for has been accom-
plished in the nation as n whole. AS
to what has been achieved in Southern
California in the past generation exag-
geration or hyperbole is simply impos-
sible.
When the Central and Union Pacific
railways had been completed the south
ern counties were practically a terra
incognita. Santa Barbara. Los Ange-
les CVentura county had not then been
created out of Santa Barbara) San
Bernardino and San Diego counties
We're large territories thought to be
only At to he depastured by cattle and
G., I'm Of ctp
running from San Francisco TO San
Diego and calling at intermediate
ports of which San Pedro was one,
with a line of stage coaches running
through the interior counties, was
thought ample to do all the business
of this section The most striking
thing to he noted along this most pleas
ant of sea trips when I first made
it in the summer of 1872 was a small
wharf at Santa Barbara surmounted
by an enormous sign on which one
read Blood, Undertaken" showing
that the business of taking care of
eastern invalids was not overlooked
in often ultimate results. The lovely
old mission stood too far back to de-
light the voyager.
The magnates of the Central Pacific
railway were wise in their day and
generation. About 1872 the news
papers of the east began to be full of
accounts of the many pleasant things
which We're to be seen out here. In
the spring of that year Charles Nord-
hoff appeared and began to write highly
interesting articles to his paper, the
New York Herald. about California
and practically Southern California.
Those letters brought me out here,
and, I have no doubt, brought thous-
ands of others. 1 may mention, in
Passing, that there is a right smart
town up In Ventura county named
after this versatile newspaper man.
Nordhoff afterward published his let
ters In book form.
Our Two Famous Colonies
When Nordhoff came to Southern
California he took a great interest in
Anaheim as we'll he might. 1t was
settlement of beautiful vineyards with
a townsite, drawing water from the
Santa Ana river for irrigation pur-
poses The colonists had no knowledge
of farming or as vineyardists. They
just learned these things like Squeers'
boys at Dotheboys hall, "by going and
doing of 'em." OF course there were a
few practical vineyardists, like Koenig
and Theodore Reiser, who leavened the
lump and showed the others how to go
to work. The experiment was decided
success, though the visitation of the
phylloxera made and ravages in an
eventful year.
The Anaheim colony demonstrated
the fact that men who never had hoe,
plow or pruning knife in their hands
could go out in Los Angeles county
(Ananeim was then in this county,,
GYeate beautiful homes and acquire
completeness for thelselVes.
Pasadena also started out as a col
ony. About thirty-three years ago a
number of Indiana people sent out D.
Nj. Berry, a reputable and accom-
plished citizen of that state, to South