Twenty-four hundred voters registered in Los Angeles this year.
In the fall, William H. Spurgeon founded Santa Ana some five miles beyond Anaheim on a tract of about fifty acres, where a number of the first settlers experimented in growing flax.
It is not clear to me just when the rocky Arroyo Seco began to be popular as a resort, but I remember going there on picnics as early as 1857. By the late sixties, when Santa Monica Cañon also appealed to the lovers of sylvan life, the Arroyo had become known as Sycamore Grove—a name doubtless suggested by the numerous sycamores there—and Clois F. Henrickson had opened an establishment including a little "hotel," a dancing-pavilion, a saloon and a shooting-alley. Free lunch and free beer were provided for the first day, and each Sunday thereafter in the summer season an omnibus ran every two hours from Los Angeles to the Sycamores. After some years, John Rumph and wife succeeded to the management, Frau Rumph being a popular Wirtin; and then the Los Angeles Turnverein used the grove for its public performances, including gymnastics, singing and the old-time sack-racing and target-shooting.
James Miller Guinn, who had come to California in November, 1863 and had spent several years in various counties of the State digging for gold and teaching school, drifted down to Los Angeles in October and was soon engaged as Principal of the public school at the new town of Anaheim, remaining there in that capacity for twelve years, during part of which time he also did good work on the County School Board.
Under the auspices of the French Benevolent Society and toward the end of October, the corner-stone of the French Hospital built on City donation lots, and for many years and even now one of the most efficient institutions of our city, was laid with the usual ceremonies.
On October 9th, the first of the new locomotives arrived at Wilmington and a week later made the first trial trip, with a baggage and passenger car. Just before departure a painter was employed to label the engine and decorate it with a few scrolls; when it was discovered, too late, that the artist had spelled the name: LOS ANGELOS. On October 23d, two lodges of Odd Fellows used the railway to visit Bohen Lodge at Wilmington, returning on the first train, up to that time, run into Los Angeles at midnight.
October 26th was a memorable day, for on that date the Los Angeles & San Pedro Railroad Company opened the line to the public and invited everybody to enjoy a free excursion to the harbor. Two trains were dispatched each way, the second consisting of ten cars; and not less than fifteen hundred persons made the round trip. Unfortunately, it was very warm and dusty, but such discomforts were soon forgotten in the novelty of the experience. On the last trip back came the musicians; and the new Los Angeles depot having been cleared, cleaned up and decorated for a dedicatory ball, there was a stampede to the little structure, filling it in a jiffy.
Judge H. K. S. O'Melveny, who first crossed the Plains from Illinois on horseback in 1849, came to Los Angeles with his family in November, having already served four years as a Circuit Judge, following his practice of law in Sacramento. He was a brother-in-law of L. J. Rose, having married, in 1850, Miss Annie Wilhelmina Rose. Upon his arrival, he purchased the southwest corner of Second and Fort streets, a lot one hundred and twenty by one hundred and sixty-five feet in size, and there he subsequently constructed one of the fine houses of the period; which was bought, some years later, by Jotham Bixby for about forty-five hundred dollars, after it had passed through various hands. Bixby lived in it for a number of years and then resold it. In 1872, O'Melveny was elected Judge of Los Angeles County; and in 1887, he was appointed Superior Judge. H. W. O'Melveny, his second son, came from the East with his parents, graduating in time from the Los Angeles High School and the State University. Now he is a distinguished attorney and occupies a leading position as a public-spirited citizen, and a patron of the arts and sciences.
In his very readable work, From East Prussia to the Golden Gate, Frank Lecouvreur credits me with having served the commonwealth as Supervisor. This is a slight mistake: I was an unwilling candidate, but never assumed the responsibilities of office. In 1869, various friends waited upon me and requested me to stand as their candidate for the supervisorship; to which I answered that I would be glad to serve my district, but that I would not lift a finger toward securing my election. H. Ábila was chosen with six hundred and thirty-one votes, E. M. Sanford being a close second with six hundred and sixteen; while five hundred and thirty-seven votes were cast in my favor.
Trains on the new railway began to run regularly on November 1st; and there still exists one of the first time-tables, bearing at the head, "Los Angeles & San Pedro Railroad" and a little picture of a locomotive and train. At first, the train scheduled for two stated round trips a day (except on steamer days, when the time was conditioned by the arrival and departure of vessels) left Wilmington at eight o'clock in the morning and at one o'clock in the afternoon, returning at ten in the morning and four in the afternoon. The fare between Los Angeles and Wilmington was one dollar and fifty cents, with an additional charge of one dollar to the Anchorage; while on freight from the Anchorage to Los Angeles, the tariff was: dry goods, sixteen dollars per ton; groceries and other merchandise, five dollars; and lumber, seven dollars per thousand feet.