Lordsburg Townsite

Founded by entrepreneur Isaac W. Lord in 1887 as one of a string of boom towns platted along the Santa Fe railway, Lordsburg included this site. The boom town failed, but members of the Church of the Brethren saved Lordsburg by buying the Lordsburg Hotel and 100 city lots and opening Lordsburg College, now the University of La Verne, in 1891. Renamed La Verne in 1917, the settlement flourished in the 1920's as a major shipping point for oranges from its five citrus packing houses. The city's main streets and highways parallel footpaths made by Native Americans, later used by padres traveling from the San Gabriel Mission and by Spanish and Mexican land grant families on horseback and in two-wheeled oxcarts. Wagon trains carried goods from the harbor to the Mormon settlement at San Bernardino, and by 1855 a stage coach made daily runs. The Pacific Electric Railroad reached La Verne in 1912, providing commuter and freight service, and trains eventually gave way to autos and trucks as late 20th century technology brought modern freeways to the city's doorstep.

La Verne, California · United States