In 1882, 4,071 acres were purchased by Colonel Griffith Jenkins Griffith and in 1884 Colonel Griffith sold back to the City of Los Angeles for $25,000 the valuable water rights donated 43 years previously.
In the western and southern parts of the rancho development followed rapidly. The Lick Tract, now part of Hollywood, was platted, then Ivanhoe and the Edendale district. But most of the mountain and slope land of the Los Felis Rancho was undeveloped except by hand of nature until 1898 when Colonel Griffith deeded 3,015 acres of unsurpassed land to the City of Los Angeles, one of the finest gifts ever presented to a city—Griffith Park.
Rancho San Pedro
Within the boundaries of Rancho San Pedro was Nigger Slough, Rattlesnake Island and the Salt Flats, and its own name was none too beautiful. But the Rancho San Pedro overcame all such handicaps and developed into a favorite child in the family of the Spanish Ranchos.
This rancho, containing 43,119 acres, was one of the tremendously big Spanish grants made by a Spanish King, who believed the limit of population which Southern California could ever care for was represented in the ten Missions, four Pueblos (San Diego, Los Angeles, Santa Barbara and San Luis Obispo) and the comparatively few Ranchos.
The grant was made to Juan Jose Dominguez of an illustrious family quite different from the average Spanish family living in California in its early days. The Dominguez heirs have each in succession adapted themselves to every change and kept a large part of their rancho intact to the present day. But much of the land was so strategically located on the sea, around the harbor and on main lines of boulevards and railroads between Los Angeles and San Pedro, that it was inevitable that intensive development should take place on these parts.
On December 22, 1854, the Dominguez heirs sold 2,400 acres at the harbor to Phineas Banning, B. D. Wilson, John G. Downey and associates for $20,000, or nearly $10.00 an acre, and on this and adjoining land Banning founded the town of Wilmington, originally called New San Pedro. During the Civil War Phineas Banning and B. D. Wilson in a burst of patriotic enthusiasm donated a large parcel of land in their new town to the United States government for Drum Barracks, and as such it served a useful and vital purpose, not only as a supply station and barracks, but, as well, to hold down anti-Union sentiment. It was easy to donate the land but it took eight years and a special act of Congress for Banning and Wilson to get the land back after the close of the War.
Nine miles north of Wilmington but within the same rancho was platted Comptonville, now Compton, originally planned as a temperance colony. Ten miles westerly and also in the same rancho, Redondo Reach, platted in 1889, became a famous pleasure resort. Between these far distant points have been laid out the towns of Gardena, Moneta, and Torrance. In addition to these there are now many hundreds of small farms, and probably the world’s largest aggregation of oil tank farms, two or three airports, an excellent and productive oil field, and there is plenty of land left in the rancho.
Such is the story of a gift from a King—a Rancho of success.
