Manuscripts
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Los Angeles land papers
Manuscripts
These papers document the transfer of land in Los Angeles County during the first few decades of California statehood. This collection consists of the original documents certifying the sale, purchase, pre-emption, or surveying of land by sheriffs, clerks, notary publics, and surveyors of Los Angeles County between 1850 and 1889. Some of these legal proceedings partially document the transfer of land ownership from Californio to American hands. Many of these documents are "pre-emption" claims to land made mostly by new American immigrants to California under the Possessory Act of April 20, 1852, which gave individuals the right to claim 160 acres of public lands for the purposes of mining or agriculture. The "inventories of women's separate property" were a result of the California State law enacted on April 17, 1850, entitled "Act defining the rights of Husband and Wife." This collection includes mortgage agreements and releases; inheritances and wills; certificates of sale due to taxes owed, law suits, and foreclosure; claims of preemption; land documents of individuals significant to Los Angeles history including Abel Stearns, Pío Pico, Ignacio del Valle, Francis P.F. Temple, and Benjamin D. Wilson; lease agreements; and additional miscellaneous legal documents relating to land transfers.
mssLAL
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Certificates of Sale because of Law Suits
Manuscripts
These papers document the transfer of land in Los Angeles County during the first few decades of California statehood. This collection consists of the original documents certifying the sale, purchase, pre-emption, or surveying of land by sheriffs, clerks, notary publics, and surveyors of Los Angeles County between 1850 and 1889. Some of these legal proceedings partially document the transfer of land ownership from Californio to American hands. Many of these documents are “pre-emption” claims to land made mostly by new American immigrants to California under the Possessory Act of April 20, 1852, which gave individuals the right to claim 160 acres of public lands for the purposes of mining or agriculture. The "inventories of women’s separate property" were a result of the California State law enacted on April 17, 1850, entitled "Act defining the rights of Husband and Wife." This collection includes mortgage agreements and releases; inheritances and wills; certificates of sale due to taxes owed, law suits, and foreclosure; claims of preemption; land documents of individuals significant to Los Angeles history including Abel Stearns, Pío Pico, Ignacio del Valle, Francis P.F. Temple, and Benjamin D. Wilson; lease agreements; and additional miscellaneous legal documents relating to land transfers.
mssLAL
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Documents related to Hastings Ranch and Rancho Santa Anita, California
Manuscripts
The four volumes are entitled: 1. "Hastings Ranch - Chapman Tract;" 2. "Hastings Ranch - Learned Place, U.S. Govt Lands;" 3. "Hastings Ranch - Bailey Tract and U.S. Lands;" and 4. "Hastings Ranch - Learned Place, Sierra Madre Tract." The volumes contain handwritten and printed copies of the following documents: agreements, abstracts of title, land deeds, land grants (patents), legal documents, mortgages, plats, wills, tax documents, survey results, estate records, and inventories of property. The documents cover a 42-year history of Rancho Santa Anita and Hastings Ranch, California. All of the various owners of the property are represented in the volumes including: Hugo Reid, Henry Dalton, Lewis L. Bradbury, Alfred and William Chapman, Albert and Thomas Dibble, William Corbett, Lewis and William Wolfskill, Benjamin Davis Wilson, Leonard J. Rose, Joseph A. Rowe, María Victoria Bartoloméa Comecrabit Reid, and Charles Cook Hastings. More specifically there are several documents dealing with the estates of Hugo and Victoria Reid, the Chapmans, the Wolfskills and Charles Cook Hastings. There are also documents involving the Southern Pacific Railroad Company of California. Volume 4 includes one letter about a survey of the land.
mssHM 76514-76517
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Oversize
Manuscripts
The collection consists of letters, manuscripts, documents and maps related to the life and business affairs of Benjamin D. Wilson. Subject matter includes business and social life in California (1850-90), Indian affairs in Southern California (1852-56), the wine industry, the Santa Fe trade, the estate settlement of Solomon Sublette, and the early history of Pasadena, San Marino, and Wilmington, California. There is also a great deal of personal correspondence from Wilson's wife Margaret S. Hereford Hereford Wilson, his daughters Maria de Jesus Wilson Shorb, Ruth Wilson Patton, and Annie Wilson, his son John B. Wilson, Ruth's husband George S. Patton, Sr., and many of Margaret's Hereford relatives. Also included are diaries kept by Margaret, Ruth, and Annie Wilson. Other individuals represented in the collection include Phineas Banning, Edward Fitzgerald Beale, Joseph Lancaster Brent, Cave Johnson Couts, Stephen Clark Foster, John Charles Fŕemont, John S. Griffin, William McKendree Gwin, Benjamin Hayes, Henry Edwards Huntington, George S. Patton, Jr., and Jonathan Trumbull Warner.
mssWN 1-2419
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Legal and administrative documents
Manuscripts
Series includes a 1769 copy of Abraham Chapman's 1752 will; an appointment of Thomas Chapman to office of Register for Knox County, Tennessee, 1792 June 16; and a 1797 copy made by Thomas Chapman of a 1794 deed for land in Tennessee to James Richardson. Also present is an 1852 deed for land in Edwardsville, Illinois, with the secretarial signature of President Millard Fillmore. Series also includes several William Wesley Chapman items: a receipt for passage on ship J.M Ryerson from San Francisco to Realejo, Nicaragua, and Panama, 1850 September 12; an appointment of Chapman to the office of County Surveyor for Scott County, Illinois, 1855 November 13; and an indenture agreement with the Chicago Home for the Friendless to house and educate Tell Cloud, a three-year-old boy, 1866 October 22.
mssChapmanf
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Huntington Land & Improvement Company documents, report, and financial papers
Manuscripts
Enclosed in: cost sheets of lands acquired for the Pacific Electric Railway Co....was in letter from Huntington Land & Improvement Company to Huntington, 1903 September 9. Includes: list of Central Avenue property; balance sheets; cost sheets of lands acquired for the Pacific Electric Railway Co. from the Los Angeles Land Co., Huntington Hotel report on operations, 1916; map of San Marino, California, 1927; salaries of officers, 1914.
mssHEH