Blood Orange

Blood oranges are my current citrus favorite. I think I ate most of the fruit our small tree produced this year.

There is an East Pasadena connection to the blood orange. Abbot Kinney, who spent his first night here sleeping on the pool table of the Sierra Madre Villa Hotel, was known throughout the state for the blood oranges grown at his Kinneloa Ranch.

Abbot Kinney and Mt. Wilson

While we're on Abbot Kinney....

One of our local peaks was nearly named after Kinney -- and not just any peak. Mt. Wilson was, for a short time, referred to as Mt. Kinneyloa. In 1887 a US survey team mapped the local mountains renaming the peak as "Mt. Kinneyloa" in honor of Mr. Kinney and his foothills ranch. However, as described in The Mount Wilson Observatory by Allan Sandage, the name change was short-lived. Sandage writes:

The ensuing local uproar - led by Los Angeles Times publisher Harrison Gray Otis - was fierce. In a scathing editorial Otis extolled Don Benito Wilson as "one of the foremost citizens of Los Angeles County and Southern California. If [Kinney] hungers and thirsts after a mountain [to be named after him], let him build a trail to the summit of one of the many Sierra Madre peaks yet unchristened, with chisel in hand. and let him cut deep into the face of its topmost granite rock the talismanic word KINNEYLOA, but keep Wilson's Peak for Don Benito."

Otis' editorial was not only hilarious with its image of Kinney chiseling his name on a mountaintop, but was apparently effective. Except for the surveyor's map, the peak continued to be named after Don Benito Wilson.

Thanks to Nat Read, who relates this story in his excellent book Don Benito Wilson: From Mountain Man to Mayor.

Abbot Kinney and the Sierra Madre Villa Hotel

The extension of Kinneloa Avenue brings to mind the name of Abbot Kinney. He is celebrated for founding Venice. Before that he was an influential conservationist and rancher. He and good friend, John Muir, were instrumental in establishing the San Gabriel Timberland Reserve, forerunner to the Angeles National Forest.

But, were it not for the Sierra Madre Villa Hotel, Abbot Kinney may never have set foot in Southern California.

It's a good story and here it is:

Sierra Madre Villa Hotel, ca. 1886, Carleton E. Watkins
Courtesy of the California History Room
California State Library, Sacramento, California

Abbot Kinney was both gifted and privileged. Educated on the east coast and in Europe, young Kinney became fluent in six languages. At the age of 26, Kinney travelled to Egypt in search of fine tobaccos for the family business. But, instead of returning home when business was done, Kinney embarked on a world tour. Over a three year period, he travelled through Europe, Asia, Australia and Hawaii.

Having seen the world, Kinney decided to return to New York. In January 1880, he arrived in San Francisco and waited for a train to take him east. However,travel eastward was temporarily blocked by snow storms in the Sierras.

Rather than sit idle in San Fransisco, Kinney booked a train south to visit the Sierra Madre Villa Hotel. Kinney had heard of the Villa and its healthful climate. He was an insomniac and asthma sufferer and anxious for a respite. Upon his arrival in Los Angeles, he immediately drove out to the Villa. But, in his haste, he had not made reservations.

So it was that one January evening in 1880, Abbot Kinney arrived at the Sierra Madre Villa Hotel only to find that the hotel was full. Fortunately for Kinney, the owner (possibly William Cogswell) took pity on the weary traveller. Kinney was offered accommodations in the Villa's parlor. He would have a pool table for a bed.

Kinney had a magnificent night's sleep. He awoke refreshed and quickly became enamored with the area. He cancelled his plans to return to New York and continued his stay at the Villa.

Abbot Kinney had found home. He had visited the world's greatest cities and had the means to live anywhere in the world. But, he chose for himself the foothills above what is now East Pasadena.

Soon, Kinney purchased 550 acres of mesa land just west of the Villa. There, he built Kinneloa. The rest, as they say, is history.