bottom's at Stadra, where the roses, oleanders and orange trees had delighted the eyes and reassured the minds of some tired travelers. It was the family of E. G. Brown, his wife, little son Lyman V. W. Brown and one daughter-coming out to join him in the "desert" for so it looked as we came up from the river and swung down to the town site-just a few temporary buildings-the outlines of some tree planting-but no one minded the outlook, the husband and father was there and his faith and courage had been communicated to them.

Judge Brown was one of that first party of four men who came out from Los Angeles looking for a site for Riverside. He was living in Iowa when he saw an article by Judge North in reference to a colonization plan for citrus fruit growing in Southern California. So he arranged to join him on the train and came with him. For a time their search for a location had eluded them and Judge North was again in San Francisco when Mr. Cover brought Dr. Greves, Dr. Eastman and E. G. Brown out from Los Angeles to view the present site. They tested the soil,

looked over the water possibilities, saw oranges growing at Old San Bernardino, the trees twenty years old. So, Mr. Brown wrote to Judge North that the quest was over and a little later he approved it. Those men, with Dr. K. D. Shugart, Mr. L. C. Waite, A. J. and D. C. Twogood and others, with their families became the first settlers. The next year brought Mr. James Boyd, our Riverside historian and others.

All honor is due to the memory of those Pioneers whose vision and courage carried them through years of toil and privation. When we recall that there was no line of railway from the East nearer than San Francisco and none to Los Angeles we recognize an heroic quality that believed and labored. All lived to see their vision fulfilled. Judge Brown was fifty years old when he came to begin a new order of life, genial, public spirited, energetic. He would say "if we can grow oranges the railroads will come for them," and so they did.

He died at the age of seventy-three and saw Riverside the largest orange grove in the world-with the "Santa Fe," "Southern Pacific" and "Salt Lake" crossing his own land. Those first families found life a typically pioneer experience, but there was abundant hope and courage and they made it just as pleasant as possible. If we had to ride twelve

miles in a lumber wagon to buy bread in San Bernardino we regarded it as an "outing" and kept a keen eye for all that was new,-a horned toad, a tarantula, a road-runner and sometimes a coyote trotted along in the track. At night we have heard the cry of a wild cat, it has an almost human sound as if it must be the cry of a small child. A chicken coop had to be brought near the door to save the little ones from the swooping hawks. One day the Indian maid had brought a tiny rabbit in her waist, it hopped about and then disappeared, but next morning it was seen hopping out from under the hen's wing.

We would go over to Spanish town to see the sports on St. John's Day and watch the races. Sometimes we came upon the riders men and girls in their bright and gay trappings, stopping with laughter and evident coquetry to chat as they watered their horses in the broad, shallow river -a vivid picture in a green setting against the background of distant mountains.

A cock would be buried in the ground with only its bobbing head above, then a rider on a keen gallop would sweep down to catch that head which often saved itself by ducking and often was carried off as a prize.

Judge Brown sent for a barrel of Tahiti oranges from San Francisco and Mr. Boyd brought them out from Los Angeles. The seeds were planted and we waited nine and ten years for them to come in, but the splendid specimens of that seedling grove are still in bearing on the Anchorage Estate, yielding in some years 20 boxes to the tree at fifty years of age.

Mr. Warren, a missionary, in making a second visit to us after twelve years said, "When I first came to Riverside it had only a ditch and a future and the future was in the ditch," and so it was, our lands were taken up under the "Desert land act," and "two blades of grass graw where one grew before."

When the land values were considered high at fifty dollars per acre, father would say, "They will go to ($500.00) five hundred dollars per acre." Even that was far below the value they reached, as many have been sold at one, two and even three thousand dollars per acre for particularly choice locations.

CHAPTER XIII

A GREAT HIGHWAY

The Riverside Land and Irrigating Company started under new auspices with plenty of capital and new men. Profiting by the experience of the Southern California Colony Association, improvements were made which brightened up the aspect of things.

The water question still remained a bone of contention. Prices of land were put down and also of city lots and blocks. Mr. Rudisill, a man of education and broad ideas, married to a sister of S. C. Evans, was secretary and filled that office for several years. Mr. and Mrs. Rudisill, along with A. S. White, a mercantile man from New York, boarded with G. W. Garcelon, a newcomer from the State of Maine here for his health which he recovered, had one of the finest houses on the corner of Seventh and Main streets which house still stands as it was built except for repairs made necessary from damage by fire recently.

While the trio boarder there, their evenings were spent discussing affairs of Riverside and planning what improvements might be made. About one of the first was the improvement of Magnolia Avenue. The idea of an avenue was at first the conception of W. T. Sayward who planned to have one long avenue to be called Bloomingdale Avenue to extend from the base of Temescal Mountains to San Bernardino. This like some other of Mr. Sayward's booming was impossible of accomplishment then, although since, improvements in highways have come suggested by the introduction of bicycles, motorcycles, but mainly automobiles, aided by State funds.

The main obstacle in the way was the difficulty and cost of the necessary right-of-way. For instance, Colton Avenue, now officially named La Cadena Drive, which runs on the line of the Jurupa grant was only laid off fifty feet wide, all because one man thought his land was so valuable that he could not afford to give any more land for road purposes. Had that occurred in later years and before any roads were laid off, and experience gained by travel, there would have been wide and spacious roads laid off, ample for ordinary travel, and for future contingencies of electric cars etc.

Magnolia Avenue was a new idea in road building. Nothing was known like it in the world. About the only thing anyway like it was, so far as the writer remembers and knows, the Long Walk in England which runs from Windsor Castle into the heart of the Great Forest. It is three miles long and was laid out in the time of Charles Second and William Third. It is a wide avenue straight as a line, bordered on each side by immense beech trees and is noted on account of its length and bordering trees. A fine view of its magnificence can be seen from the top of the castle. This was built for royalty and not for the common people. Here in Riverside we have something greater and for everybody that likes to use it. There was an Alameda or road laid out between Santa Clara and San Jose which was but a narrow road, boardered with willows, planned by the Mission Fathers. It, too, had been noted but in 1870 when the writer saw it, it was in sad decay.

Probably not one in ten of the citizens of Riverside today know the correct history of Magnolia Avenue. To the few, the sketch here presented will be as a story thrice told; but to the many it will prove an interesting and informing recital, emanating as it does, from the pen of that well-known pioneer, H. J. Rudisill :

"This grand thoroughfare, both the pride and glory of Riverside, and the pioneer of the many beautiful avenues in Southern California, was laid out in 1875, and the Eastern end of it, some three miles in length, graded and planted with shade trees in 1877.

"The name first selected by Mr. W. T. Sayward, at that time President of the Company, was Bloomingdale avenue, but, at the suggestion of Mrs. E. E. Rudisill, the name Magnolia was substituted, and so recorded.

"It commences somewhat abruptly upon what was then the northern boundary of the land of the Riverside Land and Irrigating Company, and about three miles distant from the original plot of Riverside, and would have been extended in a direct line to the heart of the city if the right-ofway, which belonged to private parties, could have been obtained at moderate cost, and without litigation.

"The avenue is on a straight line running south 43 degrees west through the lands of the Riverside Land Company, and on the same course through the lands of the South Riverside Company to the Coast Range of mountains, a distance of some fifteen miles from the place of beginning. It is 132 feet wide, and is divided into sidewalks on each side. of 20 feet in width, a space of 10 feet for the central row of trees, and two roadways of 41 feet each. Streets 80 feet in width across it at right angles every half mile, and are named after the Presidents of the United States, commencing with Washington at the eastern end of the avenue. (The historical succession was not followed strictly, as Madison instead of Jefferson follows Washington, at the request of the lady already named).

"The improvement of the older portion of the avenue teaches an old but very valuable lesson, viz., that in union and co-operation there is strength and progress, whereas in the reverse there is weakness and disaster. The land having nearly all been sold by the land company to private parties for a distance of three miles, they had but little direct interest in the improvement of this avenue, though retaining considerable land on avenues parallel to Magnolia, and west of the portions sold, yet they offered to pay one-third of the expense of grading and the purchase and planting of three rows of trees, and the care of them one year, and to furnish water for irrigation free, provided the landowners on each side would pay one-third in proportion to their ownership of frontage. The proposition was at once accepted with the result so much admired and praised.

"There is no question that if the company had not made the offer, or had decided not to assist in any manner, or had two or three of the prominent owners of land along the avenue refused to do their share, the work would not have been done, and we would have had the old style of country improvement, viz., here a patch of planting and there a blank, according to the ownership, without plan or uniformity.

"The selection of the avenue trees was something of a task, to which A. S. White and the writer gave considerable time. A number of parties were corresponded with in Central and Northern California, in reference to the best trees for the purpose.

"The Lombardy poplar was in use at Anaheim, but no extensive planting of street trees had been done in Southern California. The advice from the North was to plant deciduous trees, for the reason that evergreen trees shaded the roadways too much during the rainy season, preventing evaporation, and keeping the roadways muddy. Everything indicated that we had so little rainfall at Riverside that we concluded to adopt the evergreens, the pepper for the center, and the blue gum for

the sides. It was the plan to plant the magnolia largely, but it was found that the climate was not favorable for the rapid growth desired, and they were only planted (except in a few instances) at the intersection of the Presidential streets with the avenues, where the location of the irrigation ditches gave them a greater supply of water. Subsequently the blue gum was found not to be satisfactory, whereupon many were removed, and palms and grevillas substituted. The palm as an avenue tree had not been used in California until it was adopted by Mr. White and others.

"The avenue trees were planted 16 feet apart for the purpose of securing the cheering effect of vegetations as soon as possible, for it must not to be forgotten that they were planted in the midst of a treeless waste, intending that every alternate tree should be removed as soon as the branches interlocked. This should have been done several years ago, and we note with regret that the people are hesitating to do this now (as we fear) to the permanent injury of the trees and the beauty of the

avenue.

"We saw recently a pepper tree at Wilmington in a favorable location, with a trunk 4 feet in diameter, and 18 feet to the first branches, and with a spread of top fully 60 feet in diameter. We can readily see what a magnificent improvement it would be to the avenue if such trees could be placed 64 feet apart instead of the dwarf specimens only 16 feet."

The writer, James Boyd, wishes to say that he had the contract for grading the streets and sidewalks, furnishing the trees, planting and care of them for one year, and although the terms of the contract called for a bond for the faithful performance of the work, none was ever required and at the end of the term every tree was alive. The peppers and gums cost 5 cents each in Los Angeles and the magnolias $2 each.

The water question was still an unsettled one and was the cause of considerable friction between the settlers on the Government lands and the company. No matter how willing some of them may have been, and some of them were willing enough to settle, under the law they could not pledge, bond, or encumber their lands, and therefore could not settle. Mr. and Mrs. Rudisill and Mr. White in their evening deliberations finally hit upon a plan which settled the question for all time and set an example which has been followed in all cases since. This was that the water and the land were inseparable and that every purchaser of land was to be given his proportionate share of stock in the company and that when the land was all sold so would the water and it would be in the hands of the users to manage as they saw fit. Under the management of the Southern California Colony Association the water would always remain in its hands the same as a corporation in a large city and would be a source of revenue for all time.

HENRY J. RUDISILL. H. J. Rudisill is one of the few early settlers who by reason of removing from Riverside after a few years of active and useful life has been in a great measure forgotten by the present generation and because most of his contemporaries have, like himself, passed from earthly scenes. It is, however, pleasant to know and remember that Mr. Rudisill always looked on Riverside with pleasing recollections and the knowledge that his wisdom and judgment had been instrumental in solving some of the problems that arose from time to time in a new experiment in community settlement in a far-away and isolated land where nature provided riches in the form of climate, soil and water that only wanted the hand of man to form a terrestial paradise. Mr. Rudisill in after life fully realized that such conditions on the material were also