If you follow urban gardening/agriculture issues, you may have heard about a disagreement that’s received quite a bit of attention.  Folks are upset with the Dervaes family of Pasadena because they have trademarked the terms “Urban Homestead” and “Urban Homesteading”.  This family has operated an impressive mini-farm in their yard for a number of years, and has a website that shares information on how to become self-sufficient by producing food around your home.  They have recently sent letters to others who use the terms “Urban Homestead” and “Urban Homesteading” in blogs, on Facebook pages, and even book titles, asking them to remove these terms or provide attribution.  This has not been well received, to say the least.  The OC Weekly and the LA Times, among others, have covered this issue in detail.

Rather than rehash the debate, I want to share what may be a little known fact; that Los Angeles was home to a movement which was a precursor to present-day interest in urban sustainability.

The trend was called “Small Farm Homes”, or “Little Farms” and gained momentum in the 1920s, then continued full-force for several decades.  As the population of Los Angeles County mushroomed, and real estate boomed in tandem with growth, subdivisions were developed with micro farming in mind.  Many homes were constructed on lots of one half to three acres, and marketed as “small farm homes” to newcomers flocking to Los Angeles.  Many were Midwestern farmers who no longer wanted large farms and cold weather, but didn’t quite want to give up their agricultural heritage.  Others drawn to these new homes were city people, attracted by publicity campaigns touting Southern California’s abundant harvests and golden sunshine and hoping to try their hand at small-scale farming.  The automobile helped to promote the popularity of small farms on the periphery of the city, as newly mobile Angelenos could now easily transport their harvest to local markets.

The Los Angeles Chamber of Commerce did much to promote this “little farm development” around Los Angeles County.  According to the Chamber, it was possible to make a living on a small farm on the outskirts of the city.  People might make a go of it farming, according to the Chamber, with vegetables, fruit trees, and at least 200 laying hens on two to five acres.  These small family-run, home-based farms helped to feed the demand of the growing city.  The number of farms of less than 3 acres in Los Angeles County increased substantially during the 1920s, with 1,334 recorded in the 1920 census, and 5,000 in the 1930 census (White, 1933).

The Chamber, in cooperation with the LA Times, ran an annual Small Farm Home contest, publishing photos and stories about the winners, with the following entry a typical example:

“The one-acre farm of C.E. Drummond, 15219 Stagg Street, in West Van Nuys, is another where beauty and utility have been successfully combined in the making of a rural home.  Here, again, are flowers for joy and recreation, vegetables and fruits for the table, and chickens to help swell the family purse (Scarborough, 1930, p. K12).”

Small farm homes contributed significantly to Los Angeles County’s status as the number one agricultural county in the US during this era.  They also helped to make Los Angeles food-secure.  According to a 1940 Los Angeles Chamber of Commerce brochure, “nearly half of the Los Angeles food supply originates on farms within 50 miles of the city”.

The small farm home trend continued through the Depression and well into the 1950s.  In 1949, the University of California reported there were approximately 10,000 families living on small farms of one acre in size or smaller in Los Angeles County.

There are certainly differences between yesterday’s small farm homes, and today’s urban homesteads (TM).  Today’s urban and suburban lots are much smaller.  The Dervaes family’s Pasadena home is on a 1/5 acre lot, and certainly, many urban dwellers have much less space.  The harvest from an urban yard today is more likely to supplement a family’s diet and income, rather than constitute a main component.  Still, the motivators for self-sufficiency today and eighty years ago are similar; good food, a little relief for the family budget, and a sense of pride in “growing your own.” Whether you call it an "urban homestead (TM)", or a "small farm home", or maybe just "planting a garden", it’s a Los Angeles tradition that is once again gaining momentum.

Sources: 

Scarborough, O. (1930, Jan. 5, 1930). What acre offers. Los Angeles Times.

What the newcomer should know about agriculture in Los Angeles County and Southern California (1940). In L. A. C. C. o. Commerce (Ed.) (pp. 51). Los Angeles: Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors.

White, R. P. (1933, Jan. 3). The new city of country homes. Los Angeles Times.

With the gubernatorial elections in California just weeks away, I have been thinking more about what I'd like to hear from the candidates.  Hunger is a big problem here in Los Angeles County.   I'd like to see our state doing more to address hunger and access to healthy food.  For example, why does California have such low rates of food stamp participation? I haven't yet heard the candidates discuss hunger or food access.    

In doing some research on Depression-era agriculture in Los Angeles, I was excited to learn about another contender for the job of California governor, 1934 candidate Upton Sinclair.  He would probably have a lot to say to 2010 candidates Jerry Brown and Meg Whitman on fighting poverty and hunger.  

A well-known novelist, Sinclair made his home in the Los Angeles area beginning in 1916.  His novel, “The Jungle”, published in 1906, exposed the unsafe and unsanitary conditions of the meatpacking industry, sparking a national outcry which led to the passage of the Pure Food and Drug Act. Sinclair was an opinionated and prolific author of books and tracts on numerous topics.  He was also a dedicated Socialist, who nonetheless decided to run for governor of California as a democrat.  In other times, he and his campaign might not have gotten much traction, but the Depression and its devastating effects earned him a wide audience. His plan for a transformed California, EPIC (for “End Poverty in California") was inspiring to the unemployed and became a phenomenon in 1933 and 1934.   The EPIC campaign was headquartered in Los Angeles, and encouraged supporters to form EPIC clubs at the local level.  Soon, almost 1,000 such clubs had formed throughout the state (Starr, 1996).

A cornerstone of EPIC was a plan to use idle land to create farming colonies, where the unemployed would be put to work growing food to feed the hungry.  Sinclair envisioned communal colonies, where excess farm products would be bartered for other goods.  Idle factories would also be put to use employing those out of work.  Cash would be less important in Sinclair’s vision, as barter and exchange of goods would become the focus of the economy.  Sinclair also proposed that small farmers would pay their taxes in the form of agricultural products, rather than cash. 

To Sinclair, it made sense that unused land would be put to use for the greater good.  He wrote about the use of vacant land, “In Germany, every square foot of such land was planted with vegetables and small fruits.  Why could not we in California have garden plots where there were now burned out patches of weeds?" (Sinclair, 1994, p. 17).  In Sinclair’s vision, no one would go hungry. His EPIC Plan would primarily be financed by taxing corporations and utilities.

Sinclair and EPIC were surprisingly successful.  He won the democratic primary and registered thousands of voters.  However, Southern California businesses mobilized against him, as they found his vision of agricultural and economic reform threatening.  The publisher of the Los Angeles Times, Harry Chandler, and the President of Los Angeles-based Sunkist, Charles Collins Teague (also President of the California State Chamber of Commerce) were just two major players in a campaign to discredit Sinclair.  Through newspaper articles, advertisements, and newsreels, Sinclair was painted as a communist and his plans as dangerous (Sackman, 2005).

One typically over-the-top anti-Sinclair advertisement said of EPIC that “if it is successful, it will destroy California’s business structure, bankrupt our families, overthrow our organized labor, confiscate our homes, wreck our industries, and rob our employed workers of their employment".

Sinclair was also blamed by his powerful detractors for a trend that was beginning to rise to the top of the political agenda in California: Dustbowl migrants entering the state looking for work.  According to his critics, Sinclair’s EPIC plan, with its assurances of food and employment for all, was responsible for the influx of thousands of impoverished families from Oklahoma and other states.  (The reasons for that migration are complex, and had little to do with Sinclair or EPIC, and much to do with New Deal agricultural policies, desperation, and the perceived availability of jobs in California).  Ultimately, while Sinclair lost to conservative republican Frank F. Merriam, he still received 879,537 votes, or 38% of the vote, and more than 20 candidates running on an EPIC platform made it to the State Assembly (Starr, 1996).   

While the specifics of Sinclair's plan might not be practical today, what struck me most about his EPIC Plan was the idea that food and access to it should be a major focus of state government. We all need to eat.  And today, as in Sinclair's era, California is a state of amazing agricultural abundance.  Why should anyone go hungry here? Can't we and shouldn't we do more?

Jerry and Meg, let's hear what you have to say about hunger and food access.

Sackman, D. C. (2005). Orange empire : California and the fruits of Eden. Berkeley: University of California Press.
Sinclair, U. (1994). I, candidate for governor : and how I got licked. Berkeley: University of California Press.
Starr, K. (1996). Endangered dreams : the Great Depression in California. New York: Oxford University Press.

Many people might be surprised to find out that California’s first commercial wine country wasn’t in the Napa or Sonoma Valleys, but Los Angeles County.

Grapes were first planted in Los Angeles in the late 1780’s, as Spanish missionaries planted cuttings they brought with them from Spain and Portugal. Unlike the vintners of today, the Franciscan fathers made their wines strictly for private consumption. Not surprisingly, the grapes they produced became known as “mission” grapes.

Because wine grapes followed the slow expansion of the missions, vineyards planted by individuals were few and far between, and mission vineyards dominated through the early 1830s. As a result, Southern California was the primary winegrowing region of the state with Los Angeles being the largest area in the region.

Even as the mission variety of grapes spread to private growers, they didn’t sell or grow them for commercial purposes either. There were exceptions. In Los Angeles, some early Mexican growers including Tiburcio Tapia, Ricardo Vejar, and Tomas Yorba did sell to the locals but not as a large-scale commercial industry.

In 1826, Joseph Chapman put in 4,000 vines and became the first American grower on record in Los Angeles. For the next decade, he grew grapes in Los Angeles, eventually moving to Santa Barbara.

Then, in the 1830s, as European immigrants moved into Los Angeles, they started to plant other varieties, and planted them with the intention of making money.

In 1831, Frenchman Jean Louis Vignes moved to Los Angeles and purchased 104 acres of land and created a commercial vineyard where Union Station is today. He called the ranch El Aliso, named for the large Alder tree on his property. As a result, he became known as Don Luis del Aliso.

It was Vignes who made winegrowing a commercial enterprise in Los Angeles, leading directly to it becoming California’s first commercial winegrowing region. Not happy with the grape quality here of the “mission grapes” he brought in Cabernet Franc and Sauvignon Blanc from France.

He was soon followed by others and Los Angeles was on its way to becoming the state’s wine growing capital. In 1831, more than 100,000 vines were growing within the current city limits of Los Angeles, or, one-half of those in the state (Carosso 1951).

And, in 1833, Los Angeles had six wine growers owning nearly 100 acres of vineyards and approximately 100,000 vines (Carosso 1951).

By 1839, Vignes had over 40,000 vines thriving on his acreage and shipped wine at San Pedro, using ships he chartered for regular wine and brandy shipments to the ports of San Francisco, Monterey, and Santa Barbara. In 1849, he had the largest vineyard in California.

By end of the 1840s, the Gold Rush led to demand for winemaking, and viticulture became one of the most profitable agriculture industries in California.

By the mid-1850s, there were over 100 wineries in the Los Angeles area, with at least seventy-five within the town itself (Carosso 1951).

Watch For Part Two: Commercial Winemaking Explodes in Los Angeles

Carosso, Vincent P. (1951) The California Wine Industry: A Study of the Formative Years. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press.

Sullivan, Charles L., (1998). A Companion to California Wine: An Encyclopedia of Wine and Winemaking From the Mission Period to the Present. Berkeley: University of California Press.

Workman, Boyle, (1936). Boyle Workman’s The City That Grew. Los Angeles: Southland Publishing Company.

The Great Depression arrived as Los Angeles was booming.  Oil was big business.  Automobiles had begun to transform the landscape.  The movie studios had come to Hollywood.  Industry was increasing throughout the Southland.  And Los Angeles County was the most productive farming county in the US.  At first, the 1929 stock market crash did not have much impact on the average Angeleno.  But quickly, unemployment rose.  By January 1930, a Los Angeles City Council resolution noted that “the unemployment situation is becoming more and more acute each day” (Leader, 1991, p. 4).  The situation grew severe in the months that followed.  Of 700,000 jobless people in California in June, 1932, fully half were residents of Los Angeles County (Kerr & Taylor, 1935).

Deprivation existed along side over-abundance and waste.  Farmers were unable to harvest all of their produce, often because they couldn’t afford labor, and enormous quantities of food were left in the fields as people went hungry.

One response of Los Angeles County residents was to organize into “self-help cooperatives”.  Unlike marketing cooperatives, self-help cooperatives were based on bartering labor for goods, for example, harvesting farmer’s crops for a share of the harvest.  Members were unemployed, often retired people who preferred to work rather than accept public assistance.  The first such cooperative was organized in Compton in 1932.  A year later 45 such cooperatives had been established in LA County.  The movement spread to other parts of the US, but was strongest in Southern California, especially Los Angeles County.   In 1934, there were 14,000 members of self-help cooperatives in LA County, about 10% of the total US membership (Panunzio, Church, & Wasserman, 1939).  Cooperatives usually had elected leaders, and were organized into area “conferences”.

Farm work and gardening were common components of the self-help cooperatives, although they encompassed a wide variety of activities, including bakeries, fishing, canning and more.  Typically, members worked 16 hours per week in support of their cooperative and its projects.  At the cooperative in Santa Monica, members worked at local dairies for milk and cheese.  They had an arrangement with the College of Agriculture at UCLA to tend the trees at UCLA's experimental farm in exchange for fruit.  The Huntington Park Cooperative had vegetable gardens on vacant land, harvesting more than 27,000 pounds of fresh produce in just one quarter of 1936.  Typically, cooperatives were able to find vacant buildings to use at no charge for meeting places, to store their bartered goods, and to conduct business.

Many cooperatives helped local farmers harvest their produce in exchange for a share of the harvest, often the “seconds” that were unmarketable.  Japanese farmers were especially receptive to bartering with the cooperatives for labor in exchange for food (Kerr & Taylor, 1935).

Through participation in these cooperatives, families were able to secure 60 to 75% of their food budget, and other supplies as well, such as second-hand clothes.  The movement’s slogan was “Self-help beats charity:  Charity is for abnormal people in normal times; we are normal citizens in abnormal times”.

Kerr, C., & Taylor, P. S. (1935). Self-help cooperatives in California Essays in Social Economics (pp. 191-225). Berkely, CA: University of California Press.

Leader, L. J. (1991). Los Angeles and the Great Depression. New York: Garland.

Panunzio, C. M., Church, W. E., & Wasserman, L. (1939). Self-help coöperatives in Los Angeles. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press.