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This story tells the saga of scenic and historic Malibu with its 23 miles of beautiful coastline, rugged mountains, wooded canyons, and sheltered coves. Here you will find an exciting portion of California history from the time of Malibu's first residents, the Chumash Indians, to the present day.
The story unfolds on remote beaches featuring rocky points where Chumash Indians lived and into dark caves where smugglers and pirates stayed in early California days. You will be taken to isolated ranch land in the days of the Spanish Dons and on to the highest courts of the United States as Malibu became the last of the great Spanish Land Grants to give way to the pressure of the miraculous growth of Southern California.
Published by the Malibu Lagoon Museum, this book is part of the continuing research by the volunteer staff who are proud to be a part of the restoration of the historic Adamson home and grounds and the establishment of a museum dedicated to preserving Malibu's unique history.
Frederick C. May, Founding President, MALIBU LAGOON MUSEUM
The red planked canoes swung right and proceeded up the lagoon expertly beaching on the white sandy landfall at the mouth of a beautiful canyon. A few minutes earlier the rhythmic splashings of their double-ended paddles had been flashes on the horizon alerting the villagers that their brown-skinned braves were returning from the distant channel islands. Villagers gathered at the beach to greet the returning paddlers and excitedly inventoried the contents of the large canoes.
These unique planked canoes or tomols as the Chumash called them, were often filled with swordfish, dozens of smaller fish, baskets of abalone and clams, and chunks of steatite from Catalina quarries to be made into bowls and carvings. The canoes were quickly unloaded and moved to the higher ground where the well-built, dome-shaped grass huts of the village were located. Several lean, coyote-type dogs barked and pranced about knowing there would soon be scraps on which to scavenge.
Wisps of smoke eased out of openings in the roof of each hut and circled toward the lavender purple hills. The ocean now lazily lapped the shore. Gulls and pelicans soared into the sunset and headed for their nocturnal roosting places. A group of women with pestles in hand were seated on the ground pounding and grinding acorn mush in stone bowls. A brave examined an up-ended tomol damaged on a channel island reef. High up in the canyon, the village shaman (medicine man) was putting the finishing touches on another colorful and mysterious cave painting.
This was the end of another peaceful day in Humaliwo, a Chumash Indian settlement at the foot of Malibu Canyon. The Chumash named this spot of sandy land Humaliwo-where " the surf sounds loudly." The surf still sounds loudly and perhaps more angrily today in modern Humaliwo now known as Malibu. However, time and the tides of an ever-encroaching civilization have all but erased traces of the ancient Chumash.
The Chumash lived along the coast from Malibu to San Luis Obispo. They also lived in the interior valleys, such as Santa Ynez, Cuyama, Santa Clara and Simi. The names of their most important villages are still on maps and are an interesting part of the local culture of this area, Saticoy, Somis, Sinil, Tapo, Sespe, Calleguas, Camulos, Piru, Mugu, Zuma, Cuyama, Cachuma, Ojai, and Matilija were all Chumash villages.
There is no contemporary drawing in existence of the Chumash Indians in their native state. Fortunately, however, the Spanish diarists thought the Chumash superior to any other California tribes and happily wrote many vivid descriptions of them.
Juan Paez of the Cabrillo Expedition, wrote on October 10, 1542 after observing the Chumash:
"They were dressed in skins and wore their hair very long and tied up with long strings inter-woven with the hair, there being attached to the strings many gewgaws of flint, bone, and wood."
Father Pedro Font, diarist of the second expedition of Captain Juan Bautista de Anza, noted in 1776 the absence of clothing:
"The dress of the men is total nakedness. For adornment they are in the habit of wearing around the waist a string or other gewgaw which covers nothing. Some of them have the cartilage of the nose pierced, and all have the ears perforated with two large holes in which they wear little canes like two horns as thick as the little finger, in which they are accustomed to carry powder made of their wild tobacco. These Indians are well formed and of good TD although not very corpulent on account of their sweating, I judge. The women are fairly good looking."
The Chumash villages on the channel coast were usually built on high ground where a creek ran into the ocean. Thus, they had fresh water and a quick launching spot for their canoes. Friar Crespi with the Portola expedition in 1769 describes his first look at a village:
"We arrived at the shore where we saw a regular town, the most populous and best laid out of all we had seen on the journey up to the present time. It is situated on a tongue or point of land running out of the same beach."
This very well could be a description of Humaliwo, the Chumash village, located at the present day site of The Malibu Lagoon Museum.
"The houses are well constructed, round like an oven, spacious and fairly comfortable ; light enters through a hole in the roof.
Their beds are on frames and they cover themselves with skins and shawls. In the middle of the floor they make a fire for cooking seeds, fish, and other foods-for they eat everything boiled or roasted."
The finest technological achievement of the Chumash was the splendid tomol or planked canoe. It was unique in the new world. Father Font in 1775 described the tomol:
"They are very carefully made of several planks which they work with no other tools but their shells and flints. They join them at the seams by sewing them with very strong thread which they have and fit the joints with pitch. Some of the launches are decorated with little shells and all are painted red with hematite."
The Chumash were excellent craftsmen and artists, and the goods and tools which they made were always well-fashioned. Particularly attractive were the bowls and carvings of killer whales and other forms of sea life and effigies made from steatite. Sometimes the bowls were inlaid with colorful abalone shells and were beautifully made. The steatite quarries nearest to Malibu were on Santa Catalina Island. The Island Chumash traded with the Coastal Chumash supplying the latter with chunks of steatite.
Other implements were made of sandstone, a material available everywhere. Stone grinding bowls up to six or seven quart capacity and a variety of mortars- and pestles were common.
Baskets were the main household utensils and were indispensable in the gathering of seeds, bulbs, and roots. Water was stored and carried in basketry bottles ingeniously waterproofed on the inside with asphaltum. The baskets made by the Chumash were outstanding in workmanship and design. They were prized highly by the Spaniards and collected as curios to be sent home to relatives.
Asphaltum was so indispensable to the Chumash that one might say that they had an asphaltum culture. They used it in every phase of their life. With it they caulked their canoes, sealed the water baskets, attached the shell inlay to the bowls, and fastened arrow and spear points to shafts. Asphaltum was used to plug the holes in abalone shells which then could be used as dishes.
Fish hooks were made of abalone shell. The major use for the shell, however, was for decoration. It was lavishly inlaid on stone, bone, and wood. The surface to be decorated received a coating of asphalt onto which was pressed the shell inlay. Giant Pismo clams were used for beads and money.
Bone was used by the Chumash for many of their artifacts. It was extensively used in the making of necklaces, especially as long tubular beads. Flutes and whistles were made of bone, usually of deer tibia. Whalebone was used for many things: wedges to split wooden planks, bars to pry loose abalone, and sweat sticks (tools for scraping the TD to remove the perspiration).
The Chumash made excellent string and rope from a variety of raw materials. Yucca fiber, which made a coarse but very strong cord, was plentiful and widely used. For a more pliable string, Indian hemp, nettle, or milkweed were employed. Flint, chert, and obsidian were used by the Chumash to make very fine projectile points, drills, scrapers, choppers, and knives. The countless thousands of tiny drilled shell beads that have been found, show the efficiency of the drills.
The Chumash were one of the most advanced Indian groups in California and compare favorably with non-literate peoples anywhere in the world. In spite of this, the average person knows little about them and no monuments have been erected to their memory.
So today, when you walk barefoot on the beach sands of Malibu, you might reflect back in time to simple, peaceful Humaliwo. Imagine what a paradise they had. . . "where the mountains meet the sea and the surf sounds loudly."
JOSE BARTOLOME TAPIA
The end of the prehistoric era in California was marked by the explorations of Juan Cabrillo, who set sail from Navidad, Mexico in June 1542 with his two ships, the Victoria and the San Salvador.
On September 28, 1542, Cabrillo sailed into the bay of what is now known as San Diego. Sailing northward, he anchored on October 10th in the small bay of Malibu Lagoon, claiming this landfall for the King of Spain. He stayed until October 13th, filling his water casks and naming this tranquil lagoon and beach in his log the "Pueblo de las Canoas" (Town of the Canoes), because of the many well-crafted canoes which came to his ships to greet him.
After this, over 200 years were to pass in relative quiet along the Malibu coast. The Chumash Indians could perhaps occasionally sight the sail of a distant ship as the Manila Galleons passed south to Acapulco and San Blas on their return voyage from the Far East.
King Charles III of Spain, feeling the pressure of the explorations of the English and the Russians, which might threaten his claims on the California coast, sent expeditions northward from Mexico to settle strategic areas in California and secure the Spanish interests.
The first of these overland expeditions was headed in 1775 by Juan Bautista de Anza who had the task of gathering and shepherding some 250 men, women, and children across the uncharted deserts and mountains of Mexico to settle in California. Included in the expedition were 695 horses and mules plus some 355 head of cattle for food en route and for future herds.
One of the members of the group was young Jose Bartolome Tapia, eldest of nine children of a soldier's family. This was the person destined many years later to become the first historical owner of the Rancho Malibu.
From the de Anza expedition diaries, it has been determined that on February 22, 1776, they made camp on a fine stream under the oak trees in the canyon now known as Malibu Creek. It is said that the young Jose Tapia rode his horse Is along an old Indian trail through a beautiful canyon in the late afternoon and looked down upon a lagoon and beach.
The Tapia family settled in Northern California. Later, Jose Tapia moved to the San Luis Obispo Mission Rancho where he became Major domo.
In 1800, Tapia and his family moved south and began farming near what is now San Gabriel. At that time he made application to the Commander of the military garrison at Santa Barbara for the area lie had seen as a youth on de Anza's expedition and known as Rancho Topanga Malibu Sequit. Because of his fine previous service in the army, Tapia was given the land as a place to graze his cattle and raise his family.
Under the law during this Spanish period, absolute ownership of land was unknown. Concessions of land, however, could be granted by the governors in the name of the king for farming and cattle grazing. This was the status of Tapia's title. It was not a land grant, but a "use" concession.
Tapia lived with his wife and family on Vaquero Flats in Rancho Malibu raising cattle and living the life of the early California Dons. He died on April 18, 1824. In his will he stated:
"I declare that it has been my will that there remain to my wife for her maintenance, the vineyard with the planting ground. To carry on the vineyard, let her have the still, the kettle, two pipes and three barrels. All the saints are for my old woman, the mill and the house, and the ranch and all the cattle belong to said wife."
After the Mexican-Spanish revolution in 1822, Mexico established her independence from Spain. Between 1822 and 1846 the Mexican government confirmed many Spanish Concessions with Mexican Land Grants. The application and petition process was rather complicated. No documents were ever found indicating that the Tapia family had followed the prescribed procedure. Their title was in Jeopardy.
LEON VICTOR PRUDHOMME
In 1844, a 22-year old Frenchman, named Leon Victor Prudhomme arrived in Los Angeles. He went to work with prosperous merchant Tiburcio Tapia, son of the now deceased Jose Bartolome Tapia. Prudhomme became a trusted friend of the Tapia family and a Mexican citizen. In 1847 Tiburcio Tapia died. He had been mayor of the Los Angeles Pueblo three times. His only daughter, 16-year old Maria, married Leon Prudhomme.
In the following year, the grandmother of Maria and widow of Jose Bartolome Tapia, sold the Rancho Malibu to Prudhomme and his new wife (her granddaughter). The Rancho was described as follows:
"Said land is bounded on the North by the Sierra Mayor; on the South by the Pacific Ocean; on the East by the Rancho Santa Monica, where it joins the Canada de Topanga; and on the West by the mouth of the San Buenaventura River."
It was on January 24, 1848-the day gold was discovered in California-that the Tapirs and the Prudhommes gathered at the adobe office of Stephen Foster, alcalde of the Pueblo, to conclude the transfer and sign the deeds. The purchase price was 400 pesos, 200 pesos in cash and 200 pesos in merchandise consisting of groceries and wine.
Prudhomme had acquired the property during the transition period between the end of the Mexican rule and before the United States government had been organized in California. When the U.S. Land Commission began its hearings in 1852 to segregate private land from public domain, Prudhomme put in his claim for the Rancho Malibu. No documents could be produced actually proving the early-day grant of Malibu to Tapia. A search of the Surveyor General's office in San Francisco proved futile. Friends came forward to testify to the long occupancy of Rancho Malibu by the family, to no avail. In 1854 the Commissioners turned down Prudhomme's claim. He remained, however, on the land although he did not have good and clear title.
From the time gold was discovered in 1848 until 1855, it was a time of great wealth for Rancho Malibu. Cattle were driven north to the gold fields where each animal brought fabulous prices, pa id for in gold. By 1857, however, the prosperous days were gone. The real estate boom was over and the panic was on. Prudhomme was discouraged and now sought a buyer for his rancho.
DON MATEO KELLER
Don Mateo Keller, born Matthew Keller in Ireland in 181 1, was well educated, had studied for the priesthood, and spoke perfect French and Spanish. He left Ireland and went to Mexico to seek his fortune. Some years later he came north to California. Keller heard about the Rancho Malibu being for sale. He also knew that Prudhomme had been denied legal title to the property by the U.S. Land Commission. Despite this problem, in 1857 he accepted a quit claim deed paying the Prudhommes $1400 or about 10 cents for each acre of the entire rancho. Seven years later, in an attempt to clear the title, Keller had his name substituted for Prudhomme's name in Case No. 147 and filed a Bill of Review. With new evidence, better attorneys, and more sympathetic judges, a decree confirming Keller's claim was rendered. The Honorable Fletcher M. Haight, judge of the U.S. District Court on October 24, 1864, made the confirmation. The original boundaries of Tapia's Rancho Malibu were described as:
"Extending from a place called 'Topanga,' the dividing line between these lands and the Ranch of 'Santa Monica,' on the southeast, along the Pacific to a point called Mugu on the northwest, and bounded on the northeast by a ledge of rocks on the top of and extending the whole length of a range of mountains; and adjoining the lines of the ranchos of 'Las Virgines,' 'Triunfo,' 'Santa Ysabel,' and 'Conejo."'
Judge Haight's confirmation to Keller was made to the extent of three square leagues within the above mentioned boundaries (about 13,330 acres).
There were more than ten square leagues within the exterior boundaries of the original Rancho Malibu described in the decree. The remainder of the tract was surveyed as government land and later homesteaded. An appeal by the U.S. Land Commission to the U.S. Supreme Court to overturn judge Haight's decision was heard and dismissed by the Hon. Salmon P. Chase Chief justice, March 10, 1865.
In 1870 a survey of the land was made by the United States Surveyor General. The map was approved and on August 29, 1872, President Ulysses S. Grant did "give and grant" the Rancho Topanga Malibu Sequit to Keller. Henceforward, all deeds to Malibu real estate are traceable to "the land of Matthew Keller in the Topanga Malibu Sequit."
Matthew Keller died in 1881 and his son, Henry Keller, succeeded his father as owner of the Rancho. Henry was a financier and busy in the life of Southern California. In 1892 Keller sold his beautiful coastline property for $10 per acre to Frederick Hastings Rindge. Thirty-five years earlier Henry's father had paid 10 cents an acre for this same property.
THE RINDGE FAMILY
Frederick Hastings Rindge was the only surviving son of six children of the Rindge family of Cambridge, Massachusetts. In 1883 he inherited his father's estate which was in excess of $2 million. Four years later he married 22-year old Rhoda May Knight, and in the same year they moved to California.
In 1892 Frederick Hastings Rindge and May K. Rindge, the fourth and last owners of the entire Malibu Rancho, purchased this 13,330-acre Spanish Land Grant. They later expanded the ranch to 17,000 acres. It was the paradise Mr. Rindge had searched for in all his travels throughout the United States and Europe.
With the purchase of Rancho Malibu, Mr. Rindge realized his dream of the ideal country home: "A farm near the ocean, under the lee of the mountains, with a trout brook, wild trees , a take, good soil, and excellent climate, one not too hot in summer." He built a large ranch house in Malibu Canyon (beneath present-day Serra Retreat) to serve as a headquarters for his Malibu Rancho. It was a working cattle and grain-raising ranch which through the many years of the Rindge dynasty was to become one of the most valuable large real estate holdings in the United States.
Mr. Rindge was a philosopher, poet, writer, and man of deep spirituality who loved to ride the reaches of his ranch, dream dreams and make plans. In 1898 he wrote a book, HAPPY DAYS IN SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA, in which he recounts his interesting and spiritually satisfying d in experiences of living on his Malibu ranch, an ' which he envisioned Malibu as an "American Riviera," rivaling the seaside showplaces of Italy and France which he had visited.
The Rindge family consisted of three children: Samuel Knight Rindge, Frederick Hastings Rindge, Jr., and Rhoda Agatha Rindge. Their town residence was at 2263 Harvard Boulevard in Los Angeles and their ranch home was in Malibu Canyon which they visited on week-ends and parts of the summer when they were not vacationing in Marblehead, Massachusetts.
In 1903 their Malibu Canyon home was destroyed by a disastrous brush fire. Following the fire, the family built temporary tent houses and a cabin to provide kitchen and dining room for their Malibu accommodations.
Their idyllic days came to an abrupt stop two years later when Frederick Hastings Rindge died at the age of 48. He had accomplished much during his relatively short life. Soon after moving to California he donated land and funds to his native city of Cambridge, Massachusetts, for a public library, a city hall and an industrial school which later became known as the Rindge Technical School. In California he founded the Conservative Life Insurance Company which is now Pacific Mutual. He was a vice-president of Union Oil Company and a director of the Los Angeles Edison Electric Company (later Southern California Edison Company). His land investments included reclamation of bottom lands near Stockton and real estate holdings in the San Fernando Valley, in Los Angeles, and in the state of Sinaloa, Mexico.
As a staunch supporter of the temperance movement, Frederick Hastings Rindge was an unrelenting foe of the "Demon Rum." He agreed to reimburse the treasury of the city of Santa Monica any deficit caused by the loss of saloon license fees when Santa Monica abolished saloons. He was President of the Harvard Club of Los Angeles and a member of many historical, archaeological, patriotic, and religious organizations which mirrored his interests. He established the First Methodist Episcopal Church of Santa Monica and wrote several books which were spiritual and meditative in nature.
May Knight Rindge had been a school teacher in Trenton, Michigan with a strong religious upbringing and beliefs. Following her husband's death in 1905 she took over the management of her husband's business affairs including the Malibu Ranch. She was involved in a number of bitter battles over nearly a quarter of a century in trying to keep Malibu intact. Her indefatigable spirit in these controversies earned her the legendary title of "Queen of the Malibu" from the press.
At the beginnings of her struggles, she was a widow with three teenage children. Toward the end, when the Coast Highway finally was built through her ranch, she was a 65-year old grandmother still intent on having a self-sustaining kingdom by the sea. To this end she started construction in 1928 of a great 50-room house on "Laudamus Hill" in Malibu Canyon overlooking the sea. There were to be three wings included; one for each of her three children and their families.
The same year she constructed a dam to store the precious water from Malibu Creek for use on the ranch. A few years earlier, she started Malibu Potteries (See Chapter Five) in an attempt to bring added revenue to her dwindling estate. Tiles made at Malibu Potteries were used extensively in the Rindge Castle on "Laudamus Hill" as well as in the ocean-front beach house built on "Vaquero Hill" (present Malibu Lagoon Museum) by her only daughter, Rhoda Rindge Adamson.
Over one-half million dollars in lumber, concrete, marble, tile and hand-carved mahogany were expended between 1929 and 1932 for her hill-top citadel by the sea. Due to financial problems the mansion was never finished.
May K. Rindge died on February 8, 1941, at the age of 76. At the time of her death, her precious land was still in insolvency and she was practically without funds.
Her unfinished "castle" ai-id its 26 acres along with thousands of beautiful Malibu Potteries tiles, stored in crates, were sold in 1942 to the Franciscan Order for $50,000 to become the Serra Retreat House. In 1970 the house and most of its irreplaceable tile were destroyed by a catastrophic brush fire pushed by the dreaded "Santa Ana" winds, which Mr. Rindge described in his book as:
"... the fierce autumn wind storms, - dreaded, to be sure, but zephyrs, compared with cyclones. Three days they blow, and often precede a rain."
The Franciscan Order rebuilt and continue to operate Serra Retreat as a haven of peace in the midst of modern-day California.
Though defeated by the pressures of population and progress (See Chapter Four), May K. Rindge left a legacy of spirit and courage that marks her as one of California's history-shaping women.
THE ADAMSON FAMILY
May K. Rindge's only daughter, Rhoda, as President of the Marblehead Land Company, regained what was left of the fabulous Rindge Ranch. Marblehead Land Company was the corporation formed in 1921 to operate the Rindge Ranch.
Rhoda Agatha Rindge grew up in Los Angeles but spent many happy days at the Malibu Ranch. She attended Wellesley College (where her parents had enrolled her at birth) for a year before returning to her beloved Malibu. Four years later, in 1915, she married Merritt Huntley Adamson. They had three children: Rhoda-May Adamson (Dallas), Sylvia Rindge Adamson (Neville) and Merritt Huntley Adamson, Jr.
Merritt Huntley Adamson, Sr. had grown up in Arizona and was the son of a rancher and legislator. The northern boundary of the Adamsons' ranch touched the Havasupai Indian Reservation and Merritt was made a blood brother of that tribe. Thus, the origin of his nickname "Smoke" by which he was known for the rest of his life.
He attended the University of Southern California where he became captain of the last rugby football team on the campus. After graduating from the USC Law School and passing the Bar, he became Superintendent on the Malibu Ranch of Frederick Hastings Rindge.
Merritt's interest centered in animal husbandry and dairying and so did Rhoda's. Following their marriage, the Adamsons founded the Adohr Stock Farm as a model dairy to supply Los Angeles with the purest of milk. They reversed the spelling of "Rhoda" in christening their dairy operation, "Adohr." Their eldest daughter, Rhoda-May, was the first "Adohr-able Baby," for their advertising campaign.
By 1926 Adohr Creamery Company products were distributed throughout Los Angeles County and Adohr stock and products consistently won many top awards year after year. For many years, Mr. Adamson was a Director of the California State Board of Agriculture and a member of the National Certified Milk Producers' Association.
The Adamsons built a beach house in 1929 on land given them by Rhoda's mother. The site was Vaquero Hill-so called because a cowboy shack once stood there. (This is the site of the present Malibu Lagoon Museum.) They used the home as a beach house maintaining their permanent home in the Hancock Park area of Los Angeles from 1924 to 1936. In 1936 the beach home became their permanent residence.
Rhoda, like her mother, had a strong influence on Malibu's future. She served the family interests with the same spirit and dogged determination which earned her a place of prominence in the history of Malibu. Like her mother she too had to take over the management of the family business. After her husband's death in 1949, she became President of Adohr Milk Farms.
Since her husband had been on the Board of Directors of Marblehead Land Company, she assumed his position also. By June of 1951 all the debts had been paid following the reorganization of the company. The remaining 4,000 acres (out of the Rindges' original 17,000 acres) reverted to Marblehead Land Company of which Rhoda Adamson was president.
Until her death in 1962, she remained at the helm of both the Adohr Milk Farms and the Marblehead Land Company. She proved a capable businesswoman, coping with many family as well as business responsibilities. It was under her able direction that Malibu affairs moved out of the shadow of the depression into the light of glowing achievement. The family businesses are now operated by her three heirs under the name The Adamson Companies.
Earthly paradises are fragile things often fought for with fervor to preserve. On the heels of her husband's death May K. Rindge was immediately plunged into a struggle to keep various interests from gaining accesses across her ranch land. The conflict occurred with the railroad builders and then the highway builders. The following chapter tells how she dealt with each, changing the course of her lifestyle and ultimately the course of the development of Southern California.
THE RINDGE RAILROAD
Today southbound Amtrak passenger trains take the Oceanside route along much of the California coastline, flirting recklessly with the blue Pacific for a spectacular, foaming 113 miles from San Luis Obispo to Oxnard just above Los Angeles. There the tracks turn abruptly inland.
Why?
It is all because of a tiny railroad and the newly widowed May K. Rindge.
In the early 1900s one segment of the Southern Pacific Railroad ended at the Long Wharf just to the north of Santa Monica. The Railroad was desirous of linking this part of their line to the part that came down the California coast from San Francisco to Santa Barbara.
The shortest distance between two points is a straight line, and no one knew this better than the railroad engineers and builders as they carved out their tracks through undeveloped areas across the plains of the United States and pushed through the western mountains.
The Southern Pacific Railroad applied to the Interstate Commerce Commission in 1904 to build tracks linking the Long Wharf in Santa Monica with their northern tracks which ended in Santa Barbara. The connection proposed was a straight line right through the Rindges' Malibu ranch.
Upon hearing of the Southern Pacific's plans, Mr. Rindge decided to build a private railroad through his ranch to keep the bigger railroad company out of his domain. A little-known law prevented duplication of an existing railroad line. Before any tracks could be laid, however, Mr. Rindge died. It was left to, his widow to carry out his plans, which she did with 15 miles of standard gauge tracks called the Hueneme, Malibu and Port Los Angeles Railway. May Rindge became its president and one of the few women ever to become president of a railroad.
The line was used mainly to ship grains and hides from the ranch operations to he Rindges' private shipping wharf @now the Malibu Pier). When it was in operation, the Southern Pacific Railroad realized that two railways running through the 15-mile strip would be against the Interstate Commerce Commission regulations which prevented another railroad from condemning a right-of-way parallel to an already existing railroad.
The Rindge railroad started a short distance inside the eastern boundary of the ranch near Las Flores Canyon and ended near Yerba Buena Canyon in Ventura County. It hugged the rugged coast going on flat sandy land where possible, and also spanned canyons with immense trestle bridges. The most spectacular part of the railroad was a 115-foot high wooden trestle in the area that is today known as Paradise Cove (Ramirez Canyon). One could look down from a flat car as it crossed this trestle and, in the spring and fall at roundup time, see a large concentration of Rindge cattle nudging precariously near the wooden supports.
The Hueneme, Malibu and Port Los Angeles Railway consisted of flat cars and a small gasoline powered White engine, The line was completed in 1908 at a cost of $ 1 million and remained in use until the 1920s. After that some of the rails were used as reinforcing steel for the Malibu dam when it was constructed in 1928. Some of it was sold during the 1930s for scrap iron to Japan. Yet even today remnants of it still surface every once in a while: at Westward Beach in 1981 ... at Paradise Cove ... at the Chevron Station on Pacific Coast Highway and Old Malibu Road ... at Sea Level Drive in West Malibu in 1983. There, half buried in the sands, they seem to give mute testimony to a widow who, with her tiny railroad, dared to fight the mighty Iron Horse magnates of her day-and win.
California history is dominated by such names as the Big Four-Huntington, Hopkins, Stanford, and Crocker - and the railroads that they built. The Hueneme, Malibu and Port Los Angeles Railway was only in operation for a few years, but it did keep the biggest railroad of its time out of this part of the California coastline. Though it has remained in relative obscurity in the pages of California history, the Rindge railroad, through its brief and romantic existence, played a big role in turning the tide of development of Los Angeles inland to the San Fernando Valley. In doing so, it saved the Malibu of today from the grinds, chugs, and clatter of trains as is the fate of so many of California's beautiful oceanfront communities.
The battle of the railroad was the first encroachment fight that May K. Rindge was to win. She must have thought about that victory many times during the next 20 years as she fought valiantly through the courts against other interests all of whom wanted a passageway across her Malibu Ranch.
THE COAST HIGHWAY
Almost as soon as the railroad problem was concluded, a larger and more lengthy issue appeared. It was the battle over a public road through the Malibu and the central person again was May K. Rindge. In a study of Pacific Coast Highway (US 101A) and its historic development from a modest beginning as a path along the ocean to be used at low tide, the dominant issue was that of an individual's right versus the public's right to passage through private land. Mrs. Rindge decided to fight for her rights. The Rancho Malibu was her home, her industry, her private property, and the public wanted access.
Thus began Malibu's turbulent era steeped with years of litigation, tales of locked gates, fences, road closures, injunctions, and armed riders to keep out trespassers and surveyors. May K. Rindge spent nearly a quarter century in litigation attempting to keep her rancho intact. Four cases were fought to the California Supreme Court and two cases to the United States Supreme Court.
Before the time of the Rindges, few people had any reason to travel across the Malibu. There was so little travel over the rancho wagon road at the time of Matthew Keller's ownership that he, in November 1875, petitioned to dedicate this road to the County of Los Angeles, but his petition was not approved. There were a few homesteaders who settled when the area was used mainly for grazing cattle. They had made trails from their homes near the western and northern boundaries of the ranch across the Rancho to the beach. Once at the ocean they used the hard, wet sand of the beach at low tide to go to the Port of Los Angeles in Santa Monica or to Los Angeles to take their produce and livestock and return with supplies for their families.
Several factors changed the conditions at the ranch after the Rindges purchased it and eventually brought an end to their isolated paradise, After the Rindges improved the roads to the ranch, the number of homesteaders increased. Meanwhile, the automobile emerged, providing an increasingly popular and more mobile means of transportation. Travelers crossing the Malibu ranch going to Santa Barbara and Ventura often camped overnight as did the homesteaders, hunters, and fishermen. There were 'instances of destructive fires from campers and also loss of livestock. Moreover, many isolated coves along the Malibu were historically used by smugglers for importation of cheap Chinese labor, opium, and liquor. A growing concern for safety began to smolder.
Newspaper headlines tell the battle over the building of the road through Malibu.
STORMY HISTORY OF THE COAST ROAD
SANTA MONICA EVENING JOURNAL - October 23, 1915
Armed Ranchers Defy The Malibu Guards
SANTA MONICA OUTLOOK - March 2, 1916
Ringe Road Is Now Open-If it Has Not Been Closed
SANTA MONICA OUTLOOK - March 3, 1916
Malibu Road Is Again Fenced By Rindges
SANTA MONICA OUTLOOK - March 7, 1916
Bitter Fight In Court Over The Malibu Road
SANTA MONICA OUTLOOK - August 24, 1917
Ranchers Are Still After Road
SANTA MONICA OUTLOOK - June 12, 1923
Right Of Way Is Won
The first time gates were installed and locked on the Rancho wagon road was in 1894 by Frederick H. Rindge at Las Flores Canyon and also at Malibu Canyon. He offered keys to neighboring settlers who crossed the ranch to travel to and from Santa Monica and Los Angeles.
Succeeding years were years of road closures and injunctions or restraining orders. After her husband died, May K. Rindge installed fences across the beach road. These with the other fences necessary to run cattle, horses, and sheep on the ranch, plus natural barriers on the north and west, practically enclosed the ranch.
The beginning of an ardent and costly legal battle to preserve the Rancho Malibu intact started the day in 1907 when Mrs. Rindge walked into the law firm now known as O'Melveny & Myers. Two cases were brought against her at the same time that year. One of those was a federal case (U.S. vs May K. Rindge) brought about because of the fences and gates she had installed to preserve her safety and privacy.
The newspapers took up the cause of the homesteaders. Mrs. Rindge was depicted as: "an unneighborly woman of great wealth selfishly excluding the public from this vast area of beautiful is land with its lovely beaches. She was dubbed "Queen of the Malibu" by the Southern California press. The feelings in the community were so intense that a judge from Portland, Oregon was called in to hear this federal case. It took s' years 'x for the case to come to trial; however, it was settled in Mrs. Rindge's favor because it was decided that the people had no right to go over privately owned lands to get to public lands.
The other case was a state court case (People of the State of California vs May K. Rindge). It was mainly to determine whether the beach road was in fact a public road since it had been used by the public over the previous 30 years. In the lower courts it was determined to be a public road. Mrs. Rindge, however, appealed the ruling to the Supreme Court of California. No action was taken on this case until 1917 when it was decided in her favor; i.e., the beach road was determined to be a private road.
Subsequently, the Board of Supervisors, the governing TD of Los Angeles County, was besieged by petitions from Santa Monica, Ocean Park, Venice, the settlers, and the mountain people asking for the opening of a road through the Malibu Ranch. As a result, the County of Los Angeles brought suit against the Rindge Company to condemn a right-of-way for a road. A number of hearings by the Board of Super-visors was held-many at May K. Rindge's request. However, the final order of condemnation was decreed on April 16, 1919.
Even after the Superior Court of California gave Los Angeles County the right to condemn the right-of-way and begin construction of the road, Mrs. Rindge continued her fight. The gates at Los Flores Canyon near the present Breakers Sea Lion Restaurant were locked. When the County Surveyor and other county workers arrived to establish the lines of the road, they had to find a guard to gain admittance. Once admitted on the ranch they were not permitted to drive on it. So as the work progressed, according to a member of the survey party, each day they had to walk farther and farther until finally it took most of the workday just trudging to and from the sites.
About that time, Mrs. Rindge purchased full page ads in the LOS ANGELES TIMES and THE EXAMINER telling of the injustice which the County Supervisors threatened. In these ads she proposed an alternate route to one along the coast. It went from the Santa Monica Beach Road north behind the Malibu Beach. Previously she had offered, as a substitute, a road built by her husband along the uplands and away from the tidal land, but her proposal went unheeded.
Eventually, the County Road was completed and ready for use. Yet, even then, May K. Rindge, with dogged determination, obtained a restraining order from the U.S. District Court which merely delayed the opening. The County Road through her Malibu Ranch was finally opened for the public on November 3, 1921.
While the long string of court cases between the County of Los Angeles and Mrs. Rindge (or her operating company, The Marblehead Land Company) were being adjudicated, the state decided to construct a state highway along the coast. On June 11, 1923, Mrs. Rindge lost her case @Rindge Company et al. vs County of Los Angeles) in the highest court of our land, the United States Supreme Court, when a road easement was granted to the State of California through the Malibu Ranch. Staunchly, she claimed she was deprived of her property without due process in violation of the Fourteenth Amendment.
The state highway right-of-way followed the route of the County Road in some places and in other places it was constructed parallel to it. When state employees arrived to begin work on the State Highway, they were met at the Las Flores gate by 40 of Mrs. Rindge's armed guards on horseback. The guards kept the state work crew off the ranch for three days. The State eventually was awarded title to the right-of-way through the Malibu Ranch in 1925 by the Superior Court. The final order of condemnation was issued two years later.
The new state highway was named "Roosevelt Highway" (now called Pacific Coast Highway) and was opened for through traffic to the public between Santa Monica and Oxnard in June 1929. This was 22 tumultuous years after the first court action. There was a gala ribbon cutting on that day with the Governor presiding. Now that the highway was open, Mrs. Rindge turned her attention to other ventures, all of which were to leave their mark on Malibu's future.
Thus ended an era of California history, as the last Spanish Land Grant to have remained privately intact was now crossed by this strip of asphalt and cement which ran adjacent to the shoreline.
The opening of the Pacific Coast Highway was also the end of the isolation of Malibu ... and an end to a courageous battle of an indomitable woman, who had no thought of compromise, in keeping her rancho undivided.
In present-day Malibu the "road closed" sign is often up as rock and mud slides plague the same Coast Highway against which Mrs. Rindge fought. Even today some old-time Malibu residents say, when a road closure strikes, that it is "Rindge's Revenge."
With a highway now running through the Malibu Rancho a large labor force from Santa Monica became accessible as did the transportation to and from rail and shipping centers in Santa Monica, Los Angeles, and San Pedro.
Frederick H. Rindge had always wanted Malibu to reflect the Mediterranean architecture and flavor absorbed from his European travels. The abundance of good quality buff and red clays and the plentiful water supply, coupled with a strong demand for decorative ceramic tile needed for the Mediterranean and Spanish style homes being built in that day, contributed to the establishment of Malibu Potteries by Mrs. Rindge in 1926.
The 44,000 square foot plant was constructed along 1500 feet of beach front, ﾫ mile east of Malibu Pier and had a production capacity of 30,000 square feet of finished tile per month. Three large kilns 18 feet in diameter were fired by oil trucked in on the newly opened highway. The finished products were sent to the warehouse and display room at 119 N. Larchmont Boulevard in Los Angeles via the same highway. In 1927 the Potteries employed approximately 125 people. They were architects, chemists, ceramicists, engineers, designers, illustrators, grazers, draftsmen, artists, salesmen, and administrators. Rufus B. Keeler, the plant manager, was an expert ceramicist who formulated the secret glazes which are renowned for their color and clarity. He resided in South Gate but lived in an army tent adjacent to the pottery during the week. He is remembered as a caring manager who was concerned with the health and welfare of his employees. Swimming during lunch hour was promoted.
William E. Handley designed the cuerda seca Persian tile rugs in the loggia of Merritt and Rhoda (Rindge) Adamson's beach house (now the Mal' bu Lagoon Museum). Inez Johnson von Hake, a designer and illustrator, designed a larger cuerda seca Persian tile carpet for May K. Rindge's Mediterranean castle-like home she was building in Malibu Canyon on the site of today's Serra Retreat. She also designed a tile-top table for the entry hall of the Adamson's beach house. Margaret Curtis, also a designer and illustrator, designed the medallion-type disc for the south wall of the east patio of the Adamson home.
The tile produced at Malibu Potteries was not destined solely for the Rindge's private homes. J. Donald Prouty designed 23 large "neoclassical modern" tile panels in 1928 which still can be seen today in the Los Angeles City Hall. Kingsley Sopp was a salesman who called on architects, while carrying a 35-pound suitcase of samples, to acquaint them with Malibu tiles. He researched historical archives to assist in designing the two 6 foot by 8 foot tile murals (depicting William Henry Dana's ship, The Pilgrim, in San Pedro Bay in 1834) which were installed at the Dana junior High School in San Pedro in 1928. Simon Rodia, another employee at Malibu Potteries, reportedly often rode home in his car pool with pockets bulging with tile fragments. Later he was to become famous as the builder of the Rodia Towers (commonly called Watts Towers). So it is not surprising that Malibu Potteries tile found their way into this California landmark too.
The talented artists and craftsmen of Malibu Potteries produced an amazing variety of shapes, sizes, colors, and designs. Products in their catalog included wall tiles, floor tiles, fountains, vents, step treads, tables, fireplaces, murals and decorative panels, furniture, swimming pool tile, and many other items.
Malibu Potteries, -though only in existence for six years, distributed tile world-wide. A mural was shipped to a bank in Shanghai, but most of the tile with its Saracen, Moorish, and Spanish designs was destined for Los Angeles homes and buildings constructed in the late 1920s.
The most comprehensive collection remaining today is at the Adamson home. There one can see the many-layered terra cotta tile roofs, richly decorated exterior and interior walls, floors, and ceilings. Elegant fountains, faience jardinieres, and beautiful and rare tiled-top tables grace the gardens.
A fire which started in the clay preparation room destroyed a large area of the Potteries in 1931. Temporary repairs were made so present orders could be filled. Reportedly, Mrs. Rindge planned to rebuild. The world-wide depression, however, with an accompanying building slump greatly reduced the demand for ornamental tile. In 1932 the pottery closed never to operate again.
Malibu Potteries, under the guiding hand of Mrs. Rindge, left us with a marvelous legacy of beauty and an inspiration for present-day ceramicists. The tile-wherever it is found today with its brilliance, clarity, and lasting grace-is a testimony to the unique secret glazes, to the craftsmanship of the grazers, and to the artistic genius and versatility of the designers who worked in their idyllic factory beside the sea.
TECHNICALITIES FOR MAKING MALIBU TILE
The materials and methods used were almost the same as those used in Medieval and Renaissance times. Raw clays from the local hills were ground to flour-like texture and mixed with water to form a plastic consistency. This it was aged for six weeks.
Most of the tile was molded in plaster, molds or by hand. These lay products were dried slowly ". areas of controlled humidity to prevent warping or cracking. After five days, dry are was placed In "saggers" (a box with an open top made from fire clay and previously burned. These were placed in a kiln and heated gradually over, four days to 2300 degrees F. They ere the. cooled for two days producing a bisque or biscuit product to which glazes were applied.
Mr. Keeler's glazes were applied by three basic techniques. The cuerda seca, (dry line) technique involved tracing the outline of the design. with a manganese and oil mixture. During firing the oil burned leaving a charred black line which kept the glazes from running together.
The uenca (little valley) technique was started while the clay was d.@,p and surfaces could be sculpted or impressed so that ridges formed and provided barriers between the glaze colors.
Underglazing, the third method, was produced by stenciling designs on flat surfaces, spaces created by design were filled in with glaze and an overall glaze applied. The glazed ware was returned to the kiln. for the second, or "glost" firing. Loaded o. trays it was stacked in the kiln and fired with carefully controlled temperatures for about 42 hours. After reaching 1750-1900'F the temperature was held constant for two hours. The fire was shut off and the kiln cooled for two days. The beautiful finished product emerged.
THE MALIBU MOVIE COLONY
No history of Malibu would be complete without the story of the Malibu Movie Colony.
The development of Malibu was started with the sale of the La Costa area for $6,000,000 in 1928. To set the tone for the upcoming sales the Malibu Colony was leased to the movie stars.
This exclusive beach soon became a hideaway for the famous actors and entertainment personalities of the time. Art Jones, real estate developer, was prominent in this promotion and undertook the leasing project. Thirty-foot lots were offered on ten-year leases at $1.00 per ocean-front foot per month.
The motion picture personalities quickly responded. Anna Q. Nielson was the first to sign up. Others soon followed including: Clara Bow, Ronald Colman, Harold Lloyd, Delores del Rio, Warner Baxter, Constance Bennett, Jack Warner, Mervyn Leroy, John Gilbert, Gloria Swanson, Gary Cooper, Barbara Stanwyck and many others. Soon small beach cottages were constructed, the average cost of which was $2600. Rapidly, the area became known as the Malibu Movie Colony.
Ten years later, a portion of the Rindge's land including these leased properties, then managed under their company name, Marblehead Land Company, was offered for sale. These were quickly purchased by the celebrity occupants. From then to the present day the Malibu Movie Colony has been world famous as the playground of the movie stars, rock concert artists, writers, producers, and all types of personalities from the entertainment and business world.
Today, The Colony is a gated community with 24-hour security guards. Present residents include a veritable "who's who" of notables from the entertainment, arts, and business worlds.
Homes sell for prices from $1,600,000 to $6,000,000 and small vacant lots for as much as $1,000,000.
And so it happened, in the irony of history, that the woman who wished to lead a very private life, away from publicity on her isolated ranch by the sea, ended up selling her land to the very people whose presence and lifestyles were to make Malibu famous throughout the world.
THE SURFRIDERS
The sport of Hawaii's ancient kings was surfriding- sliding down the slope of a breaking wave. Long before Captain Cook sailed into Kealakekua Bay, Hawaiians had mastered the sport of standing erect on a speeding surfboard. In the first accounts of early island life, Cook described the exotic beauty of a princess who paddled her board through heavy surf to catch and ride the cresting waves. According to legend, King Kamehameha and his Queen Kaahumanu, surfed side by side on the great waves of Hawaiian history.
Surfing was first introduced to California at Redondo Beach by George Freeth of Hawaii in 1907; but it was another famed Hawaiian-Duke Kahanamoku-who in 1927 taught the sport to early Malibu surfers.
The Duke was a great friend of Ronald Colman and had starred with him in motion pictures. He was often seen, in the late 20s, at #16 Malibu Colony with his board heading for Malibu Point. Colman had built #16 in 1926-27, one of the first of The Colony beach cottages.
It was at the Santa Monica Swim Club that young Californians, whose names were Bob Butt, Wally Burton, Pete Peterson, Johnny McMahon, and Chauncey Granstrom, were taught the fine points of surfing by The Duke and his co-worker, Tony Guerrero. Once they passed the tough and rigorous check-out, they would head up the Pacific Coast Highway to the recently opened Rancho Malibu. The lads with their boards would crawl through a "friendly" hole in the fence at Malibu Potteries to hit the surf and paddle out to Malibu Point. They had found one of the three most notable surfing spots in the United States.
Malibu is a south facing beach with a point curved out to sea at the mouth of Malibu Creek. The waves have a very well-shaped curl, sometimes up to 10 to 12 feet, more often 2 to 4 feet. Even small waves give good rides. Where the waves peak near The Point, good surfers can get a 1/4-mile ride.
If today you should walk along the ocean's edge and ask a young surfer what he likes about the Malibu surf, he would likely say, "It's perfect; it starts as a barrel, then a wall, and then a barrel again .... It's just perfect."
"Oh, the happy vaquero! Who would be a banker when he could ride the smiling hills and hide himself and horse in the tall mustard! Who would be a slave to desk and electric light darkness in a back room, when sunshine is free to all? Aye, a liberal competence is splendid, but slavery is often it's price. But then we cannot all be vaqueros" . . .
Frederick Hastings Rindge, 1898
Frederick Hastings Rindge and May K. Rindge are gone but the essence of what they had is still here. You feel it in the sand on an early morning walk along a deserted beach ... or on a canyon horseback ride on a day that starts misty and suddenly breaks apart revealing lavender and chartreuse hillsides. Often the feeling returns when the Coast Highway quiets down and a bright magenta sun sinks slowly into a sequined sea.
The Rindge "castle" on Laudamus Hill was destroyed by a brush fire in 1970. The Malibu Potteries building burned in 1931 and was never rebuilt. The site later became the home for several years of the Malibu Yacht Club where modern catamarans and outriggers beach launched to sea as the tomols did in the days of the Chumash.
The Rindge's dam silted over and their railroad, having served its purpose, was abandoned. The corrugated iron shed, which once was the engine house for the railroad, was partitioned and remodeled many times for several stores and businesses. In 1984, it too was razed to become a modern office building site.
Soon all that remained of Malibu's poignant history was Rhoda Rindge Adamson's home on Vaquero Hill. The property was acquired by the California Department of Parks and Recreation in 1968. Then the house, too, was slated to be demolished to provide a parking lot for Surfriders Beach.
In an almost deja vu enactment, the Malibu Historical Society, through judge John J. Merrick and Ronald L. Rindge, with the tenacity reminiscent of May K. Rindge and Rhoda Rindge Adamson, fought for 14 years against the destruction of the last vestiges of a proud past. Through the sustained efforts of that society the property was placed on the National Register of Historic Places. The house, with its 13 isolated acres and irreplaceable extravagance of tile, was spared to become the Malibu Lagoon Museum.
In January 1981 the Malibu Lagoon State Beach Interpretive Association (Malibu Lagoon Museum) was formed with Frederick C. May as founding president. Today volunteer members administer this museum out of love for the Malibu-its people past and present-who have contributed to make this place "near the ocean, under the lee of the mountains, with a trout brook, wild trees, a lake, good soil, and excellent climate" such a unique community.
It is said that you cannot love your land until you know its history. In presenting this saga the Museum hopes that you, too, will come to a truer appreciation of the legendary and very special place called Malibu.
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This book was made possible by many members of the Malibu Lagoon Museum who contributed their time and effort. Luanne Pfeifer was editor. The chapters were compiled as follows: The Chumash by judge John J. Merrick, The Chain of Title by Thomas Doyle, The Rindge and Adamson Families by Juanita Ringer, The Rindge Railroad by Luanne Pfeifer, The Coast Highway by Juanita Ringer, Malibu Potteries by Charlotte Laubach and Toni Doyle, The Malibu Movie Colony by Frederick May, The Surfriders by Thomas Doyle, and Epilogue by the editor.
Appreciation is extended to the members of the Rindge-Adamson families, especially Ronald Rindge and Sylvia Rindge Adamson Neville for their kind cooperation.
All rights reserved and no reproduction of photos or text may be made without acknowledgment and written permission of the Malibu Lagoon Museum
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