Twenty-Mile Shore Line of the Rancho Topanga Malibu Sequit
Ranchos Los Cerritos and Los Alamitos
The lives of two persons seldom parallel themselves more strangely than did the lives of two great California ranchos, the Rancho Los Cerritos and the Rancho Los Alamitos. Both were part of the Manuel Nieto grant made in 1784 by the King of Spain, each was partitioned to a Nieto heir, each became the property of a New Englander and each owner naturalized as a citizen of Mexico. They rivaled each other for the honor of the finest sheep, the fattest cattle, the fastest horses. Together they became the property of the Bixbys, jointly they shared the growth of Long Beach and finally they divided the honor of Signal Hill—Los Cerritos the northwesterly slopes, Los Alamitos the southeasterly slopes.
Juan Temple was one of the New Englanders who early settled in Los Angeles when California was a part of Mexico. At one time Temple ran the mint for the government of Mexico. Later he opened the first general merchandise store in Los Angeles, advanced the City of Los Angeles funds for Ord’s Survey, built the first theater, the County’s first Court House and the Temple Block, recently wrecked to make way for Los Angeles’ new City Hall. Temple Street is named for him.
Not only did Temple naturalize as a citizen of Mexico, but he married a Spanish girl of a prominent family. Dona Rafaela Cota became his bride and by this marriage Temple acquired one-twelfth of the Rancho Los Cerritos, then owned by Rafaela and her eleven brothers and sisters, heirs of Manuela Nieto de Cota. The remaining eleven-twelfths was not so easily acquired and it cost Don Juan “$3025 in silver coin and an equal amount in merchandise at market prices” to complete his ownership of the 27,000 acre rancho.
In 1844 the large hacienda, yet standing on the Virginia Country Club grounds, was built and occupied by the new owners. Until a short time before his death Juan Temple divided his time between his big Rancho and his many interests in the Pueblo of Los Angeles. In 1866 he sold the hacienda, the cattle, the sheep, the horses and the 27,000 acres for $20,000 and removed to San Francisco where he died. Benjamin and Thomas Flint and Llewellyn Bixby were the fortunate purchasers.
Meanwhile, adjoining Los Cerritos on the East, Rancho Los Alamitos had had a similar career. Another heir of Manuel Nieto to whom this 28,000 acre Rancho was partitioned, sold it in 1834 for $500 to Brigadier-General Jose Figueroa for whom Figueroa Street in Los Angeles is named, and at one time Governor of California under Mexico.
In 1840 the Estate of Figueroa sold the Rancho, composed of “six sites of grown up cattle” to Don Abel Stearns for $5500 to be paid in hides and tallow to be laid down at San Pedro or at Mazatlan. Don Abel Stearns was the other New Englander who became famous as a Mexican citizen. Like Temple he, too, married into a Spanish family and was equally prominent in affairs of the Pueblo of Los Angeles.
The same drought that caused a terrific loss of stock and forced Juan Temple to sell Los Cerritos for $20,000 proved fatal to Don Abel’s ownership of the Los Alamitos and eight months after the Flints and Bixby bought Los Cerritos the Sheriff sold Los Alamitos to Michael Reese for $31,000, approximately $1.10 an acre. In 1881 the Estate of Michael Reese sold the rancho to John W. Bixby, who in turn conveyed a one-third interest each to I. W. Hellman and Jotham Bixby. Under the Bixbys both ranchos flourished.