The Saugus Café, opened in 1888 by James Herbert Tolfree, became one of Southern California’s most colorful and historic eating establishments and the longest operating restaurant in Los Angeles County. Its name came from Saugus, a New England Narragansett Indian term meaning “small outlet or a sandy spit of land,” the place where Henry M. Newhall was born. Newhall, founder of the Newhall Land and Farming Company, developed the land and the railroad station that began the café in 1888. In 1898, Southern Pacific Railroad employee Richard R. Wood came to Saugus, purchased an option on the railroad eating house and a parcel of land, and the diner received the name Saugus Café. According to local legend, President Theodore Roosevelt stopped there in May 1903 and dined on a special New York steak he supposedly called “splendid.” On September 5, 1904, William Mulholland and former Mayor Fred Eaton ate breakfast there on their way to inspect the liquid assets of the Owens Valley. In 1916, the café moved from the train station and across the tracks to its present site. As the area became a favored film location, directors John Ford and D.W. Griffith stopped for meals, and in 1919 Douglas Fairbanks, Mary Pickford, and Charlie Chaplin visited the café, while Harry Carey, Hoot Gibson, Tom Mix, and William S. Hart were frequent guests. Clark Gable, Gary Cooper, John Wayne, Marlene Dietrich, Tex Ritter, and Frank Sinatra also ate there. The café long served as a gathering place for local residents discussing daily affairs, including Bobby and Florence Chesebrough reviewing cattle prices, Andy and Camille Jauregui planning rodeo events with Sam and Rudy Garrett, and Ed Thompson, a Robert Kennedy advisor and Democratic strategist, reviewing oil production from the mountain well. Under the ownership of Alfredo Mercado, the Saugus Café continues to serve meals at reasonable prices as a place rooted in tradition, California history, and local community life.
