page_title: Mount San Antonio
section_title: Exploitation of resources
hierarchical_section_title: Mount San Antonio / History / Exploitation of resources
caption_attribution_description: English: Group of hunters at the summit of Mount San Antonio—Mount Baldy, ca. 1890. In the San Gabriel Mountains, Angeles National Forest, Southern California.
context_page_description: Mount San Antonio, colloquially referred to as Mount Baldy or Old Baldy, is a 10,066 ft peak in the San Gabriel Mountains in Los Angeles County, California. Lying within the San Gabriel Mountains National Monument and Angeles National Forest, it is the high point of the range, the county, and the Los Angeles metropolitan area. Mount San Antonio's sometimes snow-capped peaks are visible on clear days and dominate the view of the Los Angeles Basin skyline. The peak is pyramid shaped, with a steep south face and a shallower north face. The summit is accessible via a number of connecting ridges along hiking trails from the north, east, south and southwest.
context_section_description: The Tongva tribe call the mountain Yoát or Joat, which means snow, and the Mohave call it Avii Kwatiinyam.
  The name Mount San Antonio was probably bestowed by Antonio Maria Lugo, owner of a rancho near present-day Compton, ca. 1840, in honor of his patron saint Anthony of Padua.
  The first development in the area came in the Civil War era, and was focused on exploitation of the area's resources both by independent homesteaders and for use by the populated lowland areas. Some of the first people to live permanently in the area were Mormon settlers in Lytle Creek Canyon (1851), orange farmer Madison Kincaid (1865) and fruit farmer and beekeeper A.A. Dexter (ca. 1875). A sawmill was built in 1870 upstream from today's Mt. Baldy Village, but it either burned down or was destroyed in the flood of 1884.
  Ever since 1882, the San Antonio Water Company has controlled the water rights in San Antonio Canyon, including its three hydroelectric plants.
  A tributary of San Antonio Creek flows through what is now known as Icehouse Canyon. Because the canyon is deep, its north-facing slope retains snow late into the spring, and in 1859 Victor Beaudry and Damien Marchessault built an icehouse there. The ice was brought down from the mountains to Los Angeles by mule and wagon and sold door to door, as well as being used at Beaudry and Marchessault's ice cream saloon, the only one in the city. (Marchesseault was later mayor of Los Angeles.)
  Gold mining did not begin in the area until decades after the California Gold Rush, with the earliest historical record being of the death of miner Jacob Skinner in 1879 in his mine at the Hog Back slide. Placer mining gave way to hydraulic mining in the 1880s and continued through the 90's. The Banks (Hocumac) Mine was built in 1893 near the Baldy Notch. It was supplied with water by a mile-long pipeline, remnants of which can still be seen, running all the way from San Antonio Creek. The remains of the Gold Ridge Diggings (a.k.a. Agamemnon mine) (1897-ca. 1904) are found near the headwaters of San Antonio Canyon, in the canyon below the Ski Hut. The miners were kept supplied by sheep hunter turned merchant Fred Dell, who built Dell's Camp near the present Mt. Baldy Village, and by mule driver Fletcher Manker, who built a store at what is now known as Manker Flat. Gold mining began in Icehouse Canyon in 1892. The Hocumac and Gold Ridge mines were unsuccessful due to the uncertain water supply, the low amount of gold in the ore, and a water-pollution lawsuit filed by downslope farmers.
caption: A group of hunters at the summit of Mt. Baldy, ca. 1890
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