Santa Monica Finds Its Way to the Beach

‘We didn’t go down to the beach,’ Ysidro Reyes (1910-2007) revealed in an early oral history. ‘There was sand and waves,’ he added, as if the whole idea was preposterous.   The namesake of Santa Monica Canyon co-grantee Ysidro Reyes, the younger Reyes lived in Santa Monica Canyon and was a prominent member of the Santa Monica community.   It’s hard to believe that the men and women who settled what became our local beach communities’Santa Monica, Pacific Palisades, Malibu’were drawn more by the climate and the acres of open land, than by the sand and surf that has transformed 72 miles of coastline into some of the most precious real estate in the country. Author Jan Loomis explains how the weather and the perpetual resort environment determined the look and feel of the area in her new book, ‘Westside Chronicles: Historic Stories of West Los Angeles’ (The History Press, $20).   The Marquez and Reyes families raised cattle and sheep on the original Rancho Boca de Santa Monica, 6,656 acres extending along the beach from Topanga Canyon to where Montana Avenue reaches the bluff, and east to Sullivan Canyon.   As the land-grant holdings were whittled down as a result of financial adversity, businessmen/speculators, who had made it rich in the Sierra Nevada gold fields, eyed the scenic terrain and moderate climate as ideal for their development plans.   Colonel Robert Baker, an Easterner who came West to capitalize on the Gold Rush, bought 2,000 acres of the Rancho Boca de Santa Monica and 30,000 acres of the Rancho San Vicente y Santa Monica and with his partner John Percival Jones, the Nevada senator who struck it big on the Comstock, planned to build a railroad to connect Santa Monica to Jones’ newly opened mines in Death Valley. Their venture, the Los Angeles Independence Railroad, which began service in 1875, ferried passengers and freight to and from Shoo Fly Landing (located at present-day Colorado Avenue) until the operation succumbed to financial reversals and competition with the Southern Pacific Railroad in 1877.   In spite of the frenetic land boom of the 1870s, the Santa Monica coastline and plateau remained a grass-covered range where sheep and cattle still grazed. Members of the Marquez family continued to work on their approximately 4,500 remaining acres and carried on the family traditions, including opening up a portion of the property in Santa Monica Canyon for organized groups to enjoy the benign climate. Picnicking and camping under the sycamores in the canyon drew many visitors and attracted families, some staying in tents for the summer.   Baker and Jones envisioned Santa Monica Canyon as an extension of the town and promoted it as a summertime destination for campers and businesses. By the end of the 1870s, there was a cluster of tents under the trees, a bathhouse, general store, saloons and dance hall.   Despite the interruptions caused by successive booms and busts, development nevertheless proceeded along the coast. By 1890, Santa Monica had become a desirable destination with hotels and restaurants filling the open land. Pascual Marquez built a new bathhouse at the northwest end of the beach, but it would be decades later before a vacationing population dared to put a toe in the water.   ’People didn’t like bathing in the ocean, so they put together plunges filled with saltwater,’ Loomis said in a talk at La Se’ora last week.   Even Santa Monica’s beach frontage was more of an unwanted stepchild in the early days of the area.   ’The Santa Monica Land & Water Co. owned most of the beachfront from the municipal pier to Santa Monica Canyon,’ Loomis writes.   ’Lots had been subdivided above the beach on the hills near the mouth of Santa Monica Canyon in 1899, but the strip of land between the bluff and the high-tide line was considered too narrow to develop. R.C. Gillis, who by 1902 held the controlling interest in SML&W Co., offered the strip to the City of Santa Monica for $25 a foot. The city turned it down. At that point, the SML&W Co. decided to install groins or jetties along the beach to build up the sand and widen the beach, and refreshed the offer, this time for $75 a foot; the city wasn’t interested. At that point, the company subdivided the area into lots and sold the land to private owners for summer homes. Perhaps another impediment to enjoying the beach was the difficulty of climbing down from the Santa Monica bluffs to the sand. At first, a dirt path was cut from the bluffs to the beach for horses and pedestrians. The Sunset Trail, as it was called, began at the foot of Montana Avenue. In addition, there was a wooden staircase from Palisades Park to the beach called the Ninety-Nine Steps. Built in 1875 at the foot of Arizona Avenue, the steps allowed pedestrians to cross above the Southern Pacific tracks and eventually over Pacific Coast Highway. The stairs and bridge, now concrete, still exist today. A number of funiculars were located at strategic points along the bluffs, including one at the Arcadia Hotel (now the Loews Hotel) and Inspiration Point at the end of Palisades Park. Staircases were incorporated in the development of the area, including a set from Vance Street in Pacific Palisades off Chautauqua and the steps that connect Castellemmare to the beach, built as part of the original tract in 1927. By the early 1920s, the beach as a destination took off, particularly for the elite. Sixteen members-only clubs were built along Santa Monica Beach, some of which exist to this day, like The Beach Club, Bel-Air Bay Club and the Jonathan Club. The Saltair Club, nicknamed the Dirty Thirties, and the Palisades Beach Club, called the Filthy Fifties, are still open. As Angelenos took to the popular Pacific Electric Railway, the beaches of Santa Monica became increasingly crowded. Beach clubs fearing drownings in front of their premises hired lifeguards, and the City of Santa Monica paid these guards a few extra dollars a day to help watch over the city beaches as well.   Certainly a major influence on popularizing the sand and surf was Duke Kahanamoku, whom the Beach Club hired as the athletic director and lifeguard in 1925. The five-time Olympic medalist in swimming introduced the members to both surfing and a more athletic form of beach volleyball. We can be grateful to two of our favorite sons, Will Rogers and Leo Carrillo, who made fortunes in show business and who were more comfortable on horseback than on a surfboard, but to whom we owe vast stretches of state beach. ‘It is a fitting tribute to these two friends that the beaches named for them are at opposite ends of the same beach,’ Loomis says.   Former Palisades resident Jan Loomis is the author of ‘Images of America: Brentwood’ and ‘Images of America: Pacific Palisades.’ The photographs in this book are part of the records of the Santa Monica Land & Water Company, which was responsible for creating many of the communities that make up West Los Angeles. Contact: smlwco.co