Did I remind all you saddlepals last week to set your clocks back an hour?
If you didn’t, with the extra week, you may now set them back two hours.
Go ahead.
We’re grown-ups.
What’s anybody going to do to us?
You know how, over the years, before we set out on these amazingly interesting treks in Santa Clarita history and folklore, how I give you a little tease as to what awaits us on our trailrides? Have I ever steered you wrong? C’mon and gid-yup. All I can promise is that there might be pizza ahead and there might not. Happiness, indeed, is being free of expectations …
WAY, WAY BACK WHEN
SORRY, BOYS. YOU’VE GOT ANOTHER 400 MILES TO HIKE! — On Nov. 4, William Manly and John Rogers set out on foot from Death Valley to search for rescuers for the Bennett-Arcane Party. Manly and Rogers headed toward what they thought was San Francisco. Instead, they walked all the way to the Santa Clarita Valley where Ignacio del Valle sent a rescue team back with the men. Interestingly, del Valle’s ranch was named: Rancho San Francisco.
NO. I DON’T HAVE TO TAKE IT. YOU TAKE IT. — With the simple words, “Here it is. Take it,” William Mulholland opened a spigot, sending water from Northern California into Southern California for the first time. That ceremony was held right over the hill at the base of Newhall Pass. It’s that big waterfall thing many of you drive by daily and that date would be Nov. 5, 1913.
WONDER IF HE HAD A BROTHER NAMED, ‘PLUG’ — Back on Nov. 2, 1891, Mr. Nickel founded the Acton Water Works, the first water company in the valley. Nickel was also the founder of The Acton Rooster, the second newspaper in the SCV. (The first was a lost newspaper, only a few copies literally printed by hand, that briefly circulated in the mid 1800s in Newhall.)
NOVEMBER 7, 1926
HOW THE SIGNAL BUILT THE HART MANSION — Dozens of workers were toiling in the prep work for building the new, epic William S. Hart mansion land castle atop the Hill of Winds smack dab in Downtown Newhall. A Mr. H.J. Heinrichs was in charge of grading and paving the winding road to the top of the castle. Interestingly, Hart mapped out the road himself, using several copies of The Mighty Signal. Hart walked the route and would stop every few feet to tear off a page of The Signal and plop it down, held down by a rock. Estimates on the Spanish-style hacienda, with garages, swimming pool, landscaping AND house was nearing the $100,000 mark.
IS ANTI-APATHY ENTHUSIASM OR JUST CIVIC DUTY? — Today, we suffer with voter apathy and there are elections where we might have 15% of the registered voters turn out. This particular November 1926 election was quite the opposite. It brought out about 66% of the SCV voters. Of interest, the local Newhall measure to allow a pool hall to be built passed 109-49. We also had an initiative to form a high school district. Yup. A full 20 years before even groundbreaking began on what would later be called The William S. Hart Union High School District. It passed 113-47.
NOVEMBER 7, 1936
DEAD EYE MYSTERY SHOOTER — Guess you wouldn’t want to bump into this guy at high noon in front of the saloon. A state highway worker brought in an old bull’s eye target he found near the construction of Highway 99. Six old bullets had fused together into one lump of metal smack dab center of the target.
THAT WORKS OUT TO A BUCK FOR — TWO — TURKEYS — Not only would it be grand to take Depression-era prices back to the future with us, it’d be great to take the turkeys. The Newhall Bakery, for just a half-a-buck, would present you with a fully cooked bird for Thanksgiving.
NOVEMBER 7, 1946
A HART INDIAN QUARTERBACK IN HEAVEN — Here’s some major league sports trivia for you. Our first-ever high school night football game was played on Friday night, Nov. 1, 1946. The Indians walloped the Ridgewood Military Academy, 25-6, on the old rodeo field at Bonelli Stadium (later, the Saugus Speedway). My dear buddy who went on to the big Indian Stadium In The Sky, Tommy Gibson, QB-ed that first Hart squad. Not only that, he threw the first-ever Hart High touchdown against RMA. That darn Tommy — such a lovable rascal.
FLYING ON VAPORS — Courtney Garrett probably had that same sickly feeling in the tummies of all pilots when they look at the fuel gauge and it reads: “A pint, maybe less.” Garrett force-landed his plane in the middle of Highway 99. He filled up, took off with a smidge of drama (he first narrowly missed some high-tension wires then narrowly missed crashing into a mountain) then flew safely back to Fresno.
WINDY CHICKEN. GOOD BLUEGRASS BAND NAME. — From the I Hate That When That Happens Dept., several local farmers took their prize poultry to the first annual San Fernando Valley fair. The event was marred by megalomaniac winds that destroyed the chicken tent and sent dozens of birds into the ionosphere.
NOVEMBER 7, 1956
HEY. PIPE DOWN — There’s probably enough metal under Newhall to help build a Navy and an Army. On this date, a huge work crew began laying a gigantic 30-inch gas main through downtown Newhall into Railroad Canyon. The pipeline was a long one, hooking up from the Colorado River.
DORN IT ALL!! (get it!?!?!) — Former Placerita Canyon boy Warren Dorn took over the vacated 5th District supervisor’s seat, long held by Roger Jessup. Warren was known as the Unofficial Mayor of the Soledad Township. And, the Soledad Township was what the SCV was called back then. It included our valley boundaries, plus another 900-or-so square miles.
YET MORE HART HIGH QUARTERBACKS? — Two former Hart football stars were doing well in college ball. Joe Kapp was wowing fans up at Berkeley, calling signals for the Golden Bears. Years later, he’d lead the Minnesota Vikings to the Super Bowl. Down south, Gary Yurosek was playing offensive line at UCLA. Yurosek would later become a famous Hollywood actor. His stage name? Gary Lockwood.
NOVEMBER 7, 1966
THE ALL-DEVOURING YUPPIE CONCENTRATION CAMP EMPIRE — The great hungry god, Progress, continued to eat away at the Santa Clarita and California landscape. Numbers released showed that 70 acres per day of the state were being filled with, as one Signal writer called it: “… a sea of rooftops punctuated only by gashes of roadways and flood-control channels.” Not that I don’t enjoy the company, but, today, when the beginning of the Time Ranger posse turns around to head home, it bumps into the end of the Time Ranger posse …
FIRE UP THEM NUCLEAR BOMBS — Ten brave firefighters from the El Cariso Hot Shots in San Diego County lost their lives and another 16 were terribly scarred by flames, battling a brush fire that endangered the Nike missile base at Bear Divide. The men were trapped against the base of a cliff when the wind changed and engulfed them. Army personnel worked with county and national forest firefighters to save the post. Reports were that the base housed nuclear weapons. A Freedom of Information document indicated there were nukes in Newhall, but a friend of mine, in Army intelligence, said there weren’t.
DEATH OF A VILLAGE — With the birth of Valencia just around the corner, some locals were lamenting the death of a tradition: the town. Several national reports showed that suburbia was killing a cherished part of America — one of community. Funny thing? As a junior at Hart then, I wrote a school play about zombie yuppies, wearing black socks, sandals, Bermuda shorts and Hawaiian shirts invading the SCV. They were all pushing barbecues. And so it came to pass …
NOVEMBER 7, 1976
I DON’T KNOW. HOW DOES ONE MEASURE AN ‘F?’ — Measure F, the initiative that would have formed the old Soledad Township boundaries (from Gorman to Palmdale city limits to Chatsworth and including all the SCV, about 1,000 square miles) would go down in defeat. What few remember is that there were 31 supervisor candidates for California’s newest county, had the measure passed. What struck most of the candidates was the entrenched union money against it and the ignorance and apathy of the voters.
MORE CANYON COUNTY TRIVIA — HAD the formation of the SCV’s Canyon County passed, five of the top vote-getters here would have been CC’s first Board of Supervisors. The five supes without a job were, in order of districts: Gil Callowhill; John Marlette; Carl Boyer; Don Jennings and George Wells. Darn stuck-up voters. Except for my sole write-in, my best pal Phil Lanier didn’t get a single vote …
APATHY REIGNS — Sadly, things went back to normal after the defeat of Canyon County. Numerous calls to Supervisor Baxter Ward’s office for various business matters went un-returned.
PAUL & THE HORSE HE RODE OUT ON — While locals were concerned with government and political boundaries, Paul Kraatz couldn’t care less. The Sand Canyon resident, the day of the election, took off on horseback and led a supply mule for a four-month trapping expedition in the mountains. The San Gabriels? Nope. The Sierras? Nope. Kraatz, packing a pistol and ammo, rode his horse down Soledad Canyon to pick up the Pacific Crest trail. He was going to winter in Idaho.
BELOVED NIMBYS — Not every project gets rubber-stamped. A developer tried to put in a 3,000-unit housing project in Placerita Canyon, in the Saxonia Park area. It met with stern opposition by the neighborhood.
FUN WITH REAL ESTATE NUMBERS — This’ll make you laugh. The median price of a used home in California declined a half of a percent, or, about $240. The median selling price 50 years ago was $49,158. As a friend once noted, “I’ve got a $1.2 million three-bedroom house that’s worth $70,000 …”
HALLOWEEN, 1980
I SHOULDA PUT THIS IN LAST WEEK’S HALLOWEEN TRAIL RIDE — An engineer from the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power went to visit San Francisquito Canyon to study the topography as to why the St. Francis Dam failed in 1928, killing around 500 people. Reportedly, the engineer also visited the old Ruiz Cemetery, also known as The Chinese Graveyard, where several flood victims were buried. On Halloween day, 1980, the DWP worker reportedly vanished without a trace.
NOVEMBER 7, 1986
HOUSES, HOUSES & MORE YET MORE HOUSES — The Regional Planning Commission rubber-stamped an additional 7,500 residences to be built in the valley.
M&M’s? — Inventor of the “Moral Majority,” the Rev. Jerry Falwell, was the guest speaker at The Master’s College 40 years ago. I seem to recall waving at Jerry. He didn’t wave back.
HOW ’BOUT THEM COWBOYS?!?!?! — Those galloping Canyon Cowboys tied a CIF record of 46 straight wins by opening a 128-ounce jar of whip-a-double-asterisks on Quartz Hill.
BLANKETY-BLANK CROOKS IN OFFICE — After thousands of years of proof, I’m still stunned by dirty politics. Some dirty tricksters dumped hundreds of fake voter instruction pamphlets around SCV polls, instructing them to vote a certain way on bond measures and candidates.
IF IT DIDN’T LEAK, I’D POUR 5 GALLONS IN MY HAT — This almost makes me weep. Prices at the pump fell a smidge. Gasoline was about 85 cents a gallon.
YET, IT’S STILL OVERPOPULATED — A government report predicted that the population of Castaic would increase about 15-fold from its 1986 total of 3,800 residents to about 60,000 souls by the year 2010. Hmmm. According to California-demographics.com, the population today of Castaic is 17,479, making it the 374th most-populated city in the state.
• • •
That was just pert near interesting, wasn’t it? Well. Back we are, to the here and now. I’m going to hop down and check the cinch. I’ve got to tie tens of thousands of horses to my saddlehorn and want to make sure the support is there. Truly appreciate the company on these Santa Clarita mornings, friends, saddlepals and neighbors. See you in seven with another exciting Time Ranger adventure, and, until then — ¡vayan con Dios, amigos!
Local historian and the world’s most prolific satirist/humorist John Boston has launched his new eclectic bookstore — johnboston-books.com. His hilarious adventure/family/supernatural sequel to the national bestseller, “Naked Came the Sasquatch” — “Naked Came the Novelist” — is on sale now. Ditto with his two-volume “Monsters” series about the supernatural in the SCV.
