Spadra, The Community That Vanished

Maybe the road to Spadra wasn’t the mystical road to Shangri-la, but it definitely served a purpose in local California history.  In 1887, the Amerige brothers bought land that would eventually become Fullerton.  There was already a north-south trail nearby that aided transportation. That trail was named Spadra Road (or Spadra Street, to some).

But then there was another name change many years later.  Spadra Road became Harbor Blvd. sometime in the late 1950s.  That’s the street that runs right past present-day Disneyland in Anaheim and down to the beach.  To the north, in the mid-1800s, Spadra Road was a meandering combination of what is now Harbor Blvd., Brea Blvd., Brea Canyon Blvd., and finally Diamond Bar Blvd.

At the end of that route, the traveler from yesteryear would encounter the settlement of Spadra, which was founded in 1866 by a man named William “Uncle Billy” Rubottom.  (Mr. Rubottom was reported as having to explain to people that his name was pronounced “Roo-bottom,”  not “Rub-bottom.”)

Uncle Billy had bought the land that would become Spadra from the wealthiest man in Los Angeles County, Louis Phillips.  Phillips, a rancher, owned part of the Rancho San Jose and sold a parcel of land to Rubottom for $1,000.  Rubottom named his new settlement Spadra after his hometown of Spadra, Arkansas.

In its heyday, the settlement was populated with almost 500 residents. To lure travelers to Spadra, Rubottom built a hotel and tavern shortly after the town was founded.  The tavern was the first place in California to serve opossum as a delicacy on its menu.  (Billy was a lover of roasted opossum and had some living ones “imported” from Arkansas.)

Rubottom and Phillips remained close with Rubottom convincing Phillips to build a house in Spadra.  Phillips had signed a contract with the Southern Pacific Railroad in 1873 to build a rail line (from Los Angeles?) to Spadra.  Since things seemed to be looking up, Phillips went ahead with the construction of his mansion, which was finished in 1875.

Ironically, in the same year, the Southern Pacific Railroad decided to extend its rail line beyond Spadra to Colton, which is thirty miles to the east.  The number of people traveling to Spadra began to sharply decline after Colton became the final stop on the rail line.  A few years later (1887), Fullerton received its own rail stop, further reducing the need to travel to Spadra.

Further research shows that in 1920, a state hospital for the “feeble-minded” was built near Spadra.  In 1957, some of the settlement even became a landfill.  What was left of Spadra was finally annexed by the city of Pomona in 1964.

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Yesterday Tom and I took a drive out to Pomona, which is about twenty-five minutes away from our house.  We had no problem finding the Phillips Mansion on Pomona Blvd.  It’s surrounded by a chain-link fence in a neighborhood of industrial buildings.  According to its website, the property is accessible only a few times a year.  Despite some vandalism (hence, the chain-link fence), it still is a very grand building.  Some renovation continues to be done inside by the local historical society.

Then we tried to find the Spadra Cemetery.  It is located just east of the 57 freeway, not far from the mansion we had just visited.  Because of vandalism, it is inaccessible to the public except for special tours.  Tom, my intrepid photographer, found a service road near the train tracks and was able to reach the cemetery.

 

 

The notables – Louis Phillips (1829-1900), his wife Esther (1849-1918), Billy Rubottom (1809-1885), and his wife Sarah (1811-1880) – are buried in this non-denominational cemetery.  All other cemeteries nearby were Catholic.  When the non-Catholic residents in Spadra began dying from natural causes or gunfights, Phillips, who was Jewish, decided he would give up some of his land to create a cemetery.  In the photo above, you can see the large marker for Louis Phillips.

Was the town of Spadra a victim of circumstances?  The railroad, with its extension to Colton a few miles to the east, seemed to leave Spadra in the dust.  As one historian noted, the town “withered” after the railroad was extended.  The only remnants of Spadra nowadays are the Phillips mansion and the cemetery.  It would be fascinating to travel back in time to this little settlement in its heyday when life there was happy and hopeful.