Early start of Bell Gardens

Historical Site

The Early Years

The early start of Bell Gardens

The City of Bell Gardens has a rich native Indian history dating back thousands of years. In the late 1700’s, when the area was associated with a large amount of land situated along the lower basin of the Rio Hondo area in Los Angeles County, Bell Gardens was once a bustling agricultural center for Californios during the Spanish Empire, 1509 - 1823, the Mexican government, 1823 - 1848, and the United States, after the Mexican-American war concluded in 1848. Among those early Spanish settlers was one of California’s first families, the Lugos.

In 1771 Antonio Lugo was a 35-year-old corporal in the Spanish army and was given a land grant of more than 29,514 acres, which today is known as the cities of Bell Gardens Maywood, Vernon, Huntington Park, Walnut Park, Cudahy, South Gate, Lynwood and Commerce. The land grant was given as reward for his military service during the establishment of the Franciscan Missions in California while being the attendant of colonization for the area.

While stationed at San Antonio de Padua Mission near Salinas, California, Antonio Lugo’s son Don Antonio Maria Lugo was born in 1783. Later as a young man, Don Antonio, using this large amount of undeveloped territory given to his father, Lugo built one of the largest ranches in the history of the state of California. Don Antonio then built an adobe home on the ranch, which he named Rancho San Antonio. There, Lugo raised cattle and became one of the most respected members of the community, so much that he was given a term as Mayor of Los Angeles. He built several adobe homes within the boundaries of the grant. One of the adobe houses, built in 1795, is the oldest house in Los Angeles County and is still standing at 7000 Gage Ave.

By the time Don Antonio was in his sixties, he had amassed thousands of acres of property. Although he sold some of the land, the majority of it was lost when California became a part of the union in 1850.

One of his nine children, Vicente, married and built a two-story adobe home in 1850, located at 6360 Gage Ave. A daughter of Don Antonio Maria married Stephen C. Foster, Mayor of Los Angeles in 1854 and lived in an adobe house just east of 6820 Foster Bridge Road, now marked by a parking lot. A granddaughter of Antonio Maria Lugo married Wallace Woodworth, an early-day merchant and civic leader in Los Angeles. Their eldest son, Joseph, built a two-story colonial style house at 6820 Foster Bridge Road in 1924.

The land’s original adobe dwelling was built in 1795 and named Casa de Rancho San Antonio by Lugo. When Gage occupied the residence, he added two wings and redwood siding, installed bronze fireplaces, and imported expensive fabric wallpaper from France to serve as background for the Gage coat of arms, which enjoys a place of prominence in every room.

The Bell Garden’s school system began in 1867 when the San Antonio School was built where Bell Gardens Elementary stands today. Area farmers sent their children to the San Antonio School, which was one of the earliest educational institutions in the County of Los Angeles.

Henry Tift Gage Acquired the Hacienda and 27 acres of what was left of "El Rancho San Antonio." He courteed and and married Francisca Victoria Lugo. He began restoration and preservation of the Lugo Adobe house in 1888. THe walls were plastered hard and smooth inside and outside. Sturdy Redwood siding was applied to the exterior. It then came to be called "The Gage Mansion".

The original Adobe brick walls

can still be seen where a section of the plaster wall has fallen away.

Japanese agriculturalists developed and subdivided local vegetable gardens and the area was nicknamed "Gardens of Bell" after the nearby City of Bell. The city was also derisively known as "Billy Goat Acres" after the "Okies" who settled in the area during the Great Depression.

Today, only a 2.4 square mile city, Bell Gardens maintains only a small portion of the original Lugo land grant, which is located at the site of the Casa Mobile home Park at 7000 Gage Ave. In 1991 the park’s tenants, who own the land as well as Lugo’s original dwelling, were successful in their efforts to have Casa de San Antonio named State Historical Monument No. 984. Their effort ensures that Don Antonio Maria Lugo’s name and his historic home will be preserved for future generations of Bell Gardens residents and Californians.

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The Gage Mansion

A Historically recognized Landmark

If you ever drive down Gage Blvd. passing Garfield chances are that you will miss the Historical California Landmark sign that is posted outside of the motor park. On 7000 E. Gage Ave Bell Gardens, CA is where the Gage Mansion is located.

It is in this location within the walls of the Gage Mansion that you will find

the oldest standing building in Los Angeles County,

“El Rancho San Antonio” Francisco Salvador Lugo (map, escudo Lugo), began building the Adobe Walls in 1771. His son Antonio Maria Lugo was granted 29, 514 acres of land in 1780 by King Carlos V of Spain.

They build the Hacienda together and created “El Rancho San Antonio”.

Henry Taft Gage Acquired the Hacienda and 27 acres of what was left of “El Rancho San Antonio”.

He courted and married Francisca Victoria Lugo. He began restoration and preservation of the Lugo Adobe house in 1888.

The walls were plastered hard and smooth inside and outside. Sturdy Redwood siding was applied to the exterior. The original Adobe brick wall can be seen where a section of the plaster wall has fallen away.

Henry Gage

20th Governor, Republican
(1899-1903)

Henry Gage was born on Christmas Day, 1852 in Geneva, New York. Relocating with his family to East Saginaw, Michigan, Gage spent his teenage years in Michigan, studying law with his lawyer father. In 1873 at the age of twenty-one, Gage was admitted to the Michigan Bar, working for his father's law practice in East Saginaw for over a year. Over a year later, Gage relocated to California, settling in Los Angeles. Between 1874 to 1877, Gage was a successful sheep dealer, selling sheep to various farms around Los Angeles County.^[1] In 1877, Gage returned to law, opening his own practice. Largely successful in court, his practice quickly began to attract a number of prominent corporate clients in Southern California, including the Southern Pacific Railroad, who would enjoy a decades-long relationship with Gage. Three years later, Gage married Francesca V. Rains, a great granddaughter to a California family.^[2] The Gages settled in Bell Gardens at his wife's family home.

Running as a Republican, Gage was elected as Los Angeles City Attorney in 1881, beginning a slow rise within party ranks. At the 1888 Republican National Convention in Chicago, Gage was chosen as a delegate-at-large during the proceedings. In a speech to the convention, Gage seconded the motion to nominate Levi P. Morton as the party's nomination for the vice presidency.^[3]

In 1891, President Benjamin Harrison appointed Gage as a federal prosecutor to prosecute the crew of the Chilean steamer Itata due to the Itata Incident. The U.S. federal government charged the crew with knowingly assisting an illegal arms purchase. Its cargo had consisted of weapons purchased for National Congressional insurgent forces fighting in the Chilean Civil War against President José Manuel Balmaceda. Upon review of the federal government's case, Gage dropped all charges against the Itata's crew, claimining that the government had mistaken the arms purchase as illegal.^[4]

By 1898, Gage had become a prominent corporate lawyer within Los Angeles business circles, as well as a successful owner of real estate, particularly the Red Rover gold mine in Acton in the Santa Clarita Valley. At the state Republican convention that year, Gage was nominated in the first round of voting as the party's nomination for the governorship. His nomination was largely orchestrated by the Southern Pacific Railroad, who had worked with Gage since the 1870s, and saw him as supportive of their interests.

In the 1898 state general elections, Gage defeated his Democratic rival, House Representative James G. Maguire by a modest 6.7%.^[5] Other minor candidates in the election included Job Harriman of the Socialist Labor Party of America and Prohibitionist J. E. McComas, a former State Senator.

Gage was inaugurated as the 20th Governor of California on January 4, 1899. In his inauguration speech, Gage spoke lengthy over foreign policy, favoring the recent results of the Spanish-American War and their effect on California's economy. "The peaceful acquisition of the Hawaiian Islands, extending our empire beyond our Pacific shore, should be followed as a political necessity by the annexation of the Philippines," Gage spoke. "The center of commerce must move westward. California, favorably situated, will, among other advantages, reap the harvest of trade with these new territories, developing our many varied and growing resources, creating a western merchant marine for the carriage of our imports and exports, and luring to our markets the nations of the world."^[6]^[6]

After leaving Sacramento,Gage returned to Los Angeles to resume his law practice. In 1909, President William Howard Taft appointed Gage as U.S. Minister to Portugal. Gage served in Lisbon for a little more than five months until November 1910. Political instability in Portugal, due to the Revolution of 1910 that deposed King Manuel II, as well as his wife's deteriorating health, forced Gage to submit his resignation to the U.S. Department of State and President Taft. He returned to California shortly afterwards.

Gage died in Los Angeles on August 28, 1924 at the age of 71.

He is buried at 4201 Whittier Blvd., Los Angeles, Los Angeles County California, USA

Gage Avenue in Los Angeles was named after him on October 28, 1929. Henry T. Gage Middle School, also located on Gage Avenue, is named after the governor. The Gage Mansion located in Bell Gardens Los Angeles County and is a registered California State Historical Site.^[20] is now oldest remaining home in

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The Peterson Farm House

Back in the early 1900s

In 2007 after restoration

Visit The Official website

The historical Peterson Farm House is a symbol of early life in Bell Gardens. A century ago, in 1906, there was a traumatic earthquake in San Francisco. It was in this same year that George Peterson, having made the journey to America earlier, in 1887, and his wife Anna Marie (Mary), like George, a Danish immigrant, moved their two sons, Walter, age nine, and five year old Clarence, into a new two story home on a 32 acre farm which stretched from what is now 7535 Perry Road to Jaboneria Road.

The house remains sturdy with its extra wide and thick lumber for its outside walls, rough saw marks of the original log mill slicing, are still visible.

George had been a miller in Denmark where he lived near the German border. Arriving here fluent in German and Danish, he would not speak English for some time. Nevertheless, George would later become one of the trustees of his local school board.

Earning and saving from 12 hour night shifts at a flour mill, in 1900 , George was able to lease 310 acres of farm land, as part of the Bandini Spanish Land Grant, from Arcadia B. de Baker. He was to cultivate, according to the lease, "said premises in a good, farm-like manner" and sow and harvest corn, wheat, oats or barley." He would grow these and later, alfalfa, to feed the local transportation animals.

With their earnings from the leased land, George and Mary bought a 32 acre farm from Maggie Rya, moving their home from Jaboneria Road (just north of John Barbarena's) to a location just behind that where the two story house was to be built at the current Perry Road address. The smaller house, no longer there, would eventually be used as a bunk house for hired farm workers for whom the sleight Mary Peterson would provide hardy meals during harvest times.

Those were the days. There were but a handful of families scattered about the area. The joys of the land and simple living were many. But life was never easy. Frequent devastating floods from the Los Angeles and Rio Hondo rivers were a constant threat. Whether it was to school or to relatives in 'town, " travel was slow, and distances were great.

Foster Bridge Boulevard used to be called San Diego Road. It was a main "thoroughfare" that crossed the bridge. Over the Rio Hondo river, winding through Downey, going down to the coast, along the ocean, and then, on to San Diego.

The Bell Gardens population grew slowly, staying below six hundred people into the 1930s, as they say, the rest is history.

The house has been preserved in good condition by the Peterson Foundation The El Rancho San Antonio Historical Society of Bell Gardens.

Originally incorporated in Bell Gardens in 1960 by a group of concerned citizens, the society today is proud to receive the donation of the Peterson farm House. The goals of the society are to preserve and share and educate on the rich and interesting history of Bell Gardens life.

Info Courtesy of: Bell Gardens Chamber of Commerce

Perry Road

Perry rd

Picture compliments of Mr. and Ms. Petterson

Historical information under construction.

Woodworth House

The Woodworth House

woodworth house

A Historically Recognized Landmark

A granddaughter of Antonio Maria Lugo married Wallace Woodworth, an early-day merchant and civic leader in Los Angeles. Their eldest son, Joseph, built a two-story colonial style house at 6820 Foster Bridge Road in 1924. This is considered a state historical site.

This is what we now know as the Woodworth House.

Additionally one of his nine children, Vicente, married and built a two-story adobe home in 1850, located at 6360 Gage Ave. A daughter of Don Antonio Maria married Stephen C. Foster, Mayor of Los Angeles in 1854 and lived in an adobe house just east of 6820 Foster Bridge Road, now marked by a parking lot sadly.

County of Los Angeles Board of Supervisors

SUPERVISOR WALLACE WOODWORTH

Term: 1868 - 1871

District: Not Applicable

Born: July 28, 1832

Died: September 13, 1882

Wallace Woodworth served as county supervisor for one term. He was elected to office in 1868 to a two-year term. On September 1, 1869 elections were held for the County's newly devided four district supervisorial seats. Woodworth was not re-elected , but all the incumbents remained in office through 1871.

Woodworth was born July 28, 1832, in Johnstown, Ohio, where he grew up and attended public schools.

In 1853 when he was 21, Woodworth moved to Los Angeles County and became manager of his uncle's ranch. Woodworth got involved in the cattle business, making money buying and selling on a large scale.

In 1858 he left the ranch and formed a partnership with W.H. Perry. The firm of Perry & Woodworth made and sold cabinets and furniture on Main Street. In 1867 the firm organized a natural gas company, and established the first working gas jet lines in Los Angeles.

Woodworth's business success and prominence in political circles led to his election to the county supervisorial seat. After leaving County service, Woodworth later became a member and president of the Los Angeles City Council.

In 1872 his company deversified into the lumber and millling business. Woodworth amassed a larger fortune, and was considered one of the wealthiest men and landwoners in the County.

During this time, Woodworth continued his involvement in politics. He was staunched Democrat, and in 1180 was a delegate to the county convention in Los Angeles, the state convention in San Francisco, and the national convention in Cincinnati.

In the last few years of his life, Woodworth took up framing and specialized in the growing of grapes, oranges, and olives.

His credits included membership in the Masonic Temple, donating to the local orphanages and being considered one of the early pioneer businessmen of Los Angeles.

On September 13, 1882, Woodworth died. He was 50, and was survived by his wife Carrie, and two daughters: Hazel and Juanita.

Source: Bell Gardens Library.

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