The Rainmaker

  

In 1889 Ernest Harnett, his wife Julia and seven of their children left England for a life in America.  Long Beach, California, is where they decided to settle.  Polly Harnett Johnson, who passed away in December 2020, had been working with family diaries, letters and a manuscript her Aunt Ivy had been preparing 50 years earlier to publish the family's history. I promised Polly I would help her with her project and am continuing to do so. Today, as the world is experiencing climate change, I thought I would share a little from Ivy's research, and my own, on how weather was so important in the early days of Long Beach and Southern California.

HarPhoto courtesy of the Harnett family. 

When the Harnett family arrived in Southern California in October 1889, they were greeted by heavy rains which flooded the area interrupting railroad service.  Fortunately, their good friends, the Gulvins, who were responsible for them deciding to settle in Long Beach, put them up a little longer than anticipated. The Gulvins, living in Florence, twenty miles from the new town of Long Beach, said if a man had a horse, wagon and cultivating implements, he could, by crop rotation and proper irrigation, produce more on ten acres of Long Beach land than on forty acres east of the Rockies. With this in mind, and the fact Long Beach was anti-liquor, Ernest Harnett bought five acres out of town, on Atlantic near Twenty-fifth Street. 

The winter of 1889-1890 was one of the worst in Southern California history. The flat area between Long Beach and Wilmington was under six feet of water. The water rushing in the rivers was so swift that the 2600-acre Nadeau vineyard, east of Florence, was devastated. Around Christmas the flooding made Long Beach a virtual island. People were stranded in Los Angeles for a week, unable to get home. One man made it back to Long Beach by swimming three stretches of flood water! On January 1, 1890, during a brief interlude when the rail line opened, the Harnetts arrived in Long Beach. Rains recommenced the following week. Long Beach was shut off from all outside communication for three more weeks until the flood waters receded. What a welcome! Ivy wrote that 34 inches of rain fell that season. 

There were times when there was little rain. A period of drought followed the torrents of rain that greeted the Harnett family in 1889-1890. Though they had an artesian well for water and irrigation, Earnest Harnett and other farmers were anxious for rain. In April 1894 they decided to bring in a rainmaker, a Mr. Baker, from Visalia. Baker used dynamite to launch his “special” ingredients into the air. Why explosives? People had noticed that heavy rains usually fell soon after a battle, and surmised the rain was caused by the explosion of cannons and gunfire.

Rainmaking 1890s. Photo: Nebraska Historical Society

Baker launched his chemicals into the air and two or three times the barometer got down low enough for the rainmaker to tell customers rain was coming. However, a week after he made this statement there was still no visible sign of precipitation. Baker claimed if he failed it would be the first time out of 16 trials that he did not produce rain.

The town decided to hire Baker for two more days because it did rain quite hard in Fullerton. Perhaps the prevailing winds from Long Beach had driven the rain clouds inland towards the foothills. Baker, who kept his formula a secret, did make it rain a little. Unfortunately, northerly winds quickly dried up the moisture from the soil.  He collected his money claiming he produced about ¼ of an inch of rain for the town. He left in disgust because he said he couldn’t do more with the winds against him.

 

Flood damage, 1908-1909

Rain was problematic. There were years of little moisture, others with too much.   In February 1909, the San Gabriel River reached flood proportions, overflowing its banks. The river didn’t flow into Alamitos Bay, like it does today.  It joined the Los Angeles River on Rancho Los Cerritos land, creating a boggy area known as the Willows. A violent cascade of water swept down Pine and Pacific Avenues between State and Willow on February 11, 1909, continuing a headlong course down State Street (now Pacific Coast Hwy.) to Anaheim Street and the inner harbor.  Streets in the northwest part of the city were impassable with water four feet deep.  The San Gabriel River became rampant about noon, when the flood waters in the foothills added to the stream.  Soon the State Street Bridge was under water and unusable.  Old timers could not remember a worst rainfall since 1889-1890, when inhabitants of North Long Beach went around in boats.   The 1908-09 winter continued to be a wet one.  By the end of March, the total rainfall for the season was over 18 inches. The previous year the rainfall  total for the entire season was 10.04 inches. After other devastating flooding in 1914 and 1916 the region decided the issue of flood control needed to be addressed, but more preventative measures were needed as disastrous floods in 1926 and 1938 revealed.

Todays Willow Street Park. Photo: City of Long Beach

The raging waters provided a good underground water level. Just north of Willow Street and west of American Avenue there was a swampy place called the Willows. Farmers along Willow Street raised apples and other fruit. Many also grew grain and Ivy remembered areas of California poppies interspersed among the fields. In times when it flooded farmers had to take row boats to save their farm animals. One enterprising real estate firm, after one or two dry years, when there had been no flood, cleared off land, laid out city lots and built houses. The next year there were floods and water reached the window sills on the houses. Buyer beware! 

 

Water was valuable commodity in Southern California, and William Penn Watson knew how to use it wisely.  Ivy Harnett wrote of the Watson family and how Mr. Watson attracted the attention of horticulturists all over the country by his successful experiments in dry farming.  He believed that to water soil that could be farmed dry was an unpardonable sin. 1n 1888 Watson and his family moved to Long Beach from Linden, Washington, settling on a ranch at the Willows at the corner of Willow and Perris Road (now Santa Fe Avenue).  Ivy remembered her siblings telling how their father even paid a special visit into town to view the 61 pound, 2-foot-long sugar beet, and the 75-pound squash Mr. Watson had grown and put on display.  

 

Weather was a challenge in the past, but even more so today. Rainmaking is again being successfully achieved in Dubai and other areas around the globe.  Mr. Watson’s dry farming techniques are being used throughout the world. The weather changes we are now facing are also being addressed by other innovations. However, halting the  extreme problem of today's climate change cannot be achieved without worldwide cooperation. Greenhouse gas emissions need to be lowered and carbon footprints reduced.  We need to realize we are a global family, all sharing Planet Earth.

Auto racing 1904 style

Professional auto racing through the streets of Long Beach has been a yearly tradition since 1975, but did you know the city's first racetrack was established in 1889 at the west end of town south of Anaheim Street? There meets were held and horses trained.  When automobiles entered the picture, Long Beach's famed seven-mile-long beach became a popular spot for car enthusiasts to test the power of this new form of transportation.  As the 2021 Acura Grand Prix of Long Beach approaches, let’s take a look at another race in 1904 that had everyone talking.

  

Barney Oldfield and his Green Dragon -  Source: Wikipedia

        In December 1904, Los Angeles/Long Beach auto fans were excited when famed auto racer Barney Oldfield told the Los Angeles Herald he would lower the mile circular track record to fifty seconds or better at Agricultural Park (now Exposition Park), and break a mile in 30 seconds on the sands of Long Beach.

          Berna Eli “Barney” Oldfield declared that the beach at Long Beach was better than any place in Florida for attempting to set a new straightaway mark. He knew other automobile enthusiasts raved about driving on the sands of Long Beach. One of them was Carl Hendrickson, an early Long Beach pioneer and the first Ford agent, who owned a specially built racing car, a four-cylinder Oldsmobile with wheels about 34 inches high.  Hendrickson loved to drive his Olds up and down the beach where other automobile owners gathered to race.  Hendrickson’s car was too fast to be allowed to race against other Long Beach autos, but Hendrickson would start the race and then pass the competitors towards "Devil's Gate” (where the Belmont Pier is today) to show the true superiority of his vehicle.  

           Though powerful, Hendrickson knew his auto was no match against Barney Oldfield’s Green Dragon but was anxious to see the racing “pro” in action. The record in 1904 for completing a mile on a straight course was 39 seconds, set by W.K. Vanderbilt Jr. on Ormond Beach, Florida, in December 1903, but Oldfield was sure his Green Dragon could drive a mile in 30 seconds.  But before he could attempt his anticipated record-breaking Long Beach run, he set out to please fans by breaking another racing record...this one on a circular track.

 

Agricultural Park (now Exposition Park)
 - Source: Wikipedia

         On December 17, 1904, several thousand fans lined up at Agricultural Park in Los Angeles to see Oldfield, who held almost all the records in auto racing since entering the sport in 1902. The start of the day didn’t live up to expectations when local racer Frank Garbutt’s Snowball proved no match for Barney Oldfield’s Green Dragon, which beat Garbutt by ¼ of a mile. Though Oldfield’s mile in 53 seconds was impressive, it did not meet Oldfield’s goal of 50 seconds.  But things were soon to change.

          Up until now the Los Angeles Times reported, it was thought automobile races were called “races” by courtesy, when in fact they were nothing more than one car trying to pass another.  But auto racing, the Times continued, indeed became “racing” that day in Agricultural Park when Charlie Burman and Frank Garbutt showed the crowd that an exciting contest could result when two cars of about the same relative ability came together.

Garbutt had hoped his gasoline powered car would do well, but autos back then were little more reliable than a racehorse, so predictions as to what a given automobile would do on a particular day were hard to make.  Garbutt hadn’t beaten Oldfield’s Green Dragon, but he hoped Snowball’s engine was warmed up enough to beat Oldfield’s other car Blue Streak, driven by Charlie Burman.

          Fans rose to their feet after Burman's Blue Streak immediately took the lead. They started to cheer when local entrepreneur Frank Garbutt’s Snowball nosed ahead.  When Burman dashed for the lead in the backstretch the crowd moaned, and then roared with excitement as Garbutt finally jaunted past Burman at the very end, winning by the narrow margin of three feet with a time of 3 minutes 12 seconds. 

          When asked about Garbutt, Barney Oldfield said Garbutt was “a splendid fellow,” who understood his automobile better than most wealthy men (Garbutt made money in the oil industry, boat and airplane building and movie industry) who followed the sport for the fun of it. Barney also went on to say that if he had Garbutt’s money, you would not see him on the track. Instead, he’d hire someone else to do the racing!

Devil's Gate - Source: Long Beach Public Library

           Though Oldfield had been three seconds short of his anticipated time at Agricultural Park, he was sure he would meet his straight course goal in Long Beach. December 18th, between 1 and 3 in the afternoon, when the tide was retreating, was the time chosen for Oldfield to race from Devil's Gate to the Pine Avenue Pier. But the race was not to be. The Los Angeles Auto Club, sponsoring the event, cancelled the demonstration after the Green Dragon blew a tire earlier in the day, plowing through weeds and brush. Disappointed fans were not to see the famed Oldfield, the first man to travel 60 miles an hour in an automobile. Prior commitments, and injuries, prevented him from rescheduling the event.

          Oldfield never made it back to Long Beach to race along the city’s sandy shore. The seven-mile-long beach that made the town famous, is no more. Auto racing, however, has returned, with portions of the track following the course Oldfield hoped to travel.  Though racing fans in 1904 did not see any records broken, perhaps fans in 2021 will.  

Lions Dragstrip Remembered

 

As the Long Beach Grand Prix approaches (September 24-26, 2021), let’s take a look at the past and another racing venue that had everyone talking.

         Many remember Lions Dragstrip in Wilmington, at 223rd and Alameda. Though in another city, it was the youth of Long Beach, especially those in the Westside, that benefited most from the drag strip. 

          Hot rods were a national passion among 1950s and 60s teenagers. Like today, there were good teens, and there were troublesome teens. It was hard to distinguish gang members from car club members. Both wore special jackets and painted names on their cars. Most car clubs had a good bunch of youngsters and were sponsored by law enforcement and civic organizations.

          In Long Beach, the Associated Car Clubs of Long Beach, the first of its kind in the nation, was formed by nine local car groups in June 1951. Members realized they needed a responsible central organization which would have the approval of police and civic groups. One of the necessary qualifications for membership was to pass the California Highway Patrol’s test for safe vehicles, which meant the association needed places where members could test their cars, conduct speed and timing tests and just enjoy drag racing. Thanks to Long Beach judge Frederick Miller, whose courtroom was overwhelmed with street racing incidents, they found a place - Lions Dragstrip.

          Judge Miller persuaded all nine Harbor Area Lions Club to take on the project. They volunteered to raise $50,000 ($566,400 today) to cover construction costs. Also, a deal was made with the Harbor Commission to buy a narrow strip of land that still sprouted a bit of alfalfa from farming days. The land, once used for storage by the railroad, was now situated among oil tanks and derricks at 223^rd and Alameda.  The Lions went to work.

          According to hot rod enthusiasts, the Lions track “officially” opened in October 1955 (9^th?), shortly after actor James Dean’s death. However, the first reference to the strip I found was in a newspaper article in December 1954 in the Long Beach Independent when the Rod and Custom Car Association asked the Lion’s Club if they could use the drag strip on specific days to educate the public on hot rods and safety programs. At that time many youths desperately wanted to be part of the “in group” of car club members, many of whom identified with James Dean and Dean’s 1955 film Rebel Without a Cause. In real life Dean was a car racing enthusiast, and many young men wanted to be just like him.  Dean’s death in a car accident in September 1955 raised his image to cult-like status. Drag racing among the clubs “a la James Dean style” became the “in” thing to do, as did clashes between rivals.

         

James Dean in his race car

       For the first 3 years attendance was low (after all would James Dean give up street racing for a drag strip), but in 1957 strip manager Mickey Thompson hit on what many felt was the salvation for the entire sport: night racing.  Fans who avoided the sport began to pour back in record numbers and within five years the mortgage was paid in full and member Lions Clubs began donating their profits to needy charities. By 1971, over $480,000 ($3.2 million today) had been donated.

          Just to give you an idea of how popular the clubs and the sport of drag racing was, it was estimated there were 1500 car clubs, with an average membership of 15 to 20 in Los Angeles/Orange counties in 1961.  Mickey Thompson, who served as Lions manager until 1962, was an inspiration to local youth, holding more than 485 world land speed records.     Thompson estimated that about 50% of the kids who raced or watched the Wednesday and Saturday grudge races were Hispanic or Black. Admission was only $2 ($18 today), something they could afford. He claimed that within two years of opening street racing incidents had been cut in half, and by 1962 they were almost non-existent.

         Lions Drag Strip continued to attract a new generation of car enthusiasts, hosting the American Hot Rod Association’s World Drag Racing Championships, and Evel Knievel, recovering from a broken back, who jumped a motorcycle over 13 cars in December 1970 before a crowd of 14,780.

         At that time, however, the port of Los Angeles was expanding and needed space for more storage, or so they said. In reality, they wanted to avoid a lawsuit by nearby residents annoyed by the noise.  Coincidently, the lawsuit was dropped when the LA Harbor Department announced it was closing the strip because they needed the area for storage. On December 2, 1972, after witnessing Don Moody break a National Hot Rod elapsed time record before a crowd of 21,000, the strip was forced to close.  The land remained vacant until the late 1970s.

        In 1979 Big Willie Robinson, head of the nonprofit Brotherhood of Street Racers, opened another drag strip on Terminal Island. It closed in 1985. Today sanctioned racing is no more.  However, those who remember Lions and the sport of drag racing may visit the Lions Automobilia Foundation & Museum, 2790 E. Del Amo Blvd., Rancho Dominguez. The museum, founded in December 2019, opened in late August 2021. Advance tickets must be purchased in advance and Covid restrictions followed.

Also, here's a You-tube link  by Long Beach film maker Danny Miguel which talks about West Long Beach and Lions Drag Strip.