Sixty Years in Southern California, 1853-1913: Containing the Reminiscences of Harris NewmarkNewmark, Harris
History
Sixty Years in Southern California, 1853-1913: Containing the Reminiscences of Harris Newmark
Newmark, Harris
California, Southern; Los Angeles (Calif.)
I should refrain from mentioning a circumstance or two in Robidoux's
life with which I am familiar but for the fact that I believe
posterity is ever curious to know the little failings as well as the
pronounced virtues of men who, through exceptional personality or
association, have become historic characters; and that some knowledge
of their foibles should not tarnish their reputation. Robidoux, as I
have remarked, came to town very frequently, and when again he found
himself amid livelier scenes and congenial fellows, as in the late
fifties, he always celebrated the occasion with a few intimates,
winding up his befuddling bouts in the arms of Chris Fluhr, who winked
at his weakness and good-naturedly tucked him away in one of the
old-fashioned beds of the Lafayette Hotel, there to remain until he
was able to transact business. After all, such celebrating was then
not at all uncommon among the best of Southern California people, nor,
if gossip may be credited, is it entirely unknown to-day. Robert
Hornbeck, of Redlands, by the way, has sought to perpetuate this
pioneer's fame in an illustrated volume, _Roubidoux's Ranch in the
70's_, published as I am closing my story.
Robidoux's name leads me to recur to early judges and to his
identification with the first Court of Sessions here, when there was
such a sparseness even of _rancherías_. Robidoux then lived on his
Jurupa domain, and not having been at the meeting of township justices
which selected himself and Judge Scott to sit on the bench, and
enjoying but infrequent communication with the more peopled districts
of Southern California, he knew nothing of the outcome of the
election until sometime after it had been called. More than this,
Judge Robidoux never actually participated in a sitting of the Court
of Sessions until four or five weeks after it had been almost daily
transacting business!
Speaking of ranches, and of the Jurupa in particular, I may here
reprint an advertisement--a miniature tree and a house heading the
following announcement in the _Southern Californian_ of June 20th,
1855:
The Subscriber, being anxious to get away from Swindlers,
offers for sale one of the very finest _ranchos_, or tracts
of land, that is to be found in California, known as the
Rancho de Jurupa, Santa Ana River, in the County of San
Bernardino.
Bernardo Yorba was another great landowner; and I am sure that, in the
day of his glory, he might have traveled fifty to sixty miles in a
straight line, touching none but his own possessions. His ranches, on
one of which Pio Pico hid from Santiago Arguello, were delightfully
located where now stand such places as Anaheim, Orange, Santa Ana,
Westminster, Garden Grove and other towns in Orange County--then a
part of Los Angeles County.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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