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    Lemon Grove
    Lemon Grove
    Lemon Grove
    Ebook203 pages35 minutes

    Lemon Grove

    By Helen M. Ofield, Pete Smith and Lemon Grove Historical Society

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    About this ebook

    Lemon Grove dates to 1892 when it first appeared in the San Diego County records as “Lemon Grove.” The tiny, whistle-stop town emerged during the “second gold rush,” the rise of California’s citrus industry, which was facilitated by the 1849 Gold Rush, the break up of the Mexican ranchos in Alta California, and the advent of statehood for California in 1850. Land speculators poured into California, lured by the exquisite climate, five growing seasons, and the possibilities for success in agriculture and business. Lemon Grove became home to gentlemen farmers from the East and Midwest, whose descendants live on in the community to this day.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherArcadia Publishing
    Release dateSep 18, 2012
    ISBN9781439623459
    Lemon Grove
    Author

    Helen M. Ofield

    Authors Helen M. Ofield and Pete Smith serve on the board of the Lemon Grove Historical Society. A writer for television and film and a 35-year veteran in historic preservation, Ofield is the founder and curator of the Parsonage Museum of Lemon Grove and the restoration chair of its companion building, the Tudor Revival H. Lee House, now the city�s cultural center. Pete Smith, a Lemon Grove native, is a professional photographer who specializes in architectural photography and photojournalism. He has been instrumental in building the Lemon Grove Historical Society�s photographic archives, which supply the basis for this book.

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      Book preview

      Lemon Grove - Helen M. Ofield

      archives.)

      INTRODUCTION

      Lemon Grove arose, literally, from the primeval ooze. Over the millennia, plate tectonic shifts below the earth’s mantle caused the movement of land masses, including the future Lemon Grove, northward from the area of Sonora, Mexico, toward the polar cap. The fossil record, dating from the Eocene epoch 40 to 45 million years ago, in both Northern Mexico and Southern California, shows that similar species inhabited the vast primordial sea that covered the entire area. Fossils of those vanished creatures continue to be discovered today.

      The region of Lemon Grove was first inhabited in the late Stone Age, about 10,000 BCE, by the San Dieguito Complex people. They lived in small groups and were primarily hunter-gatherers. About 1,500 to 1,200 BCE, a new Yuman-speaking group, who called themselves the Kumeyaay (or kumiai, meaning the people of the earth), arrived in the region from the Colorado River Basin. They were later called the Diegueño culture by the Spanish conquerors.

      The confrontation between this Stone Age society and the Iron Age Spanish was catastrophic. The Kumeyaay were decimated by disease, loss of customs and subsistence, and displacement from ancestral lands. Yet the Kumeyaay endured into the 19th and 20th centuries and, with Anglo-European, Japanese, and Latino peoples, helped to build modern Lemon Grove.

      In 1769, the area that became Lemon Grove was part of Mission San Diego de Alcalá—the mission lands colonized by Spain for the purpose of developing trade and spreading Catholicism. When Mexico gained independence from Spain in 1821, residents of Alta California, known as Californios, farmed and ranched on huge land grants. Many land grants were given to soldiers in lieu of salaries or to those who gained political favor. One landholder, Santiago Argüello, was awarded more than 59,000 acres.

      Lemon Grove’s progenitor, Robert Allison, arrived in 1850 to Sacramento, where he ran a hotel for gold miners. In 1869, he purchased thousands of acres of land from the heirs of Santiago Argüello—land that would become Lemon Grove, La Mesa, Encanto, and part of Spring Valley. In 1886, he became a director and stockholder of the San Diego and Cuyamaca Railroad and built the Allison Flume. Both rail transport and water were critical to the success of the future lemon groves.

      In 1892, Allison’s son, Joseph, filed subdivision maps for the town site known as Lemon Grove, a name probably coined by his mother, Tempa Waterman Allison. Parcels of land were sold, and citrus groves were planted. The gentle climate and constant mild breeze were ideal for growing all types of subtropical fruits as well as vegetables.

      Gentlemen farmers from the East and Midwest looking to farm in a flawless climate formed the Lemon Grove Fruit Growers Association in 1893. By 1894, the San Diego Union called Lemon Grove a sea of lemon trees. In 1922, reporter C. A. McGrew called it one of the most attractive communities in the county . . . lemons, oranges, grapefruit and similar fruits ... have received medals for excellence. The railroad carried millions of tons of fruit across the growing nation. Ranchers built handsome homes, established a community, and launched the onward rush into the 20th century.

      Central to the growth of modern Lemon Grove was the Sonka clan. In a classic immigrant success story, the brothers, Joseph and Anton Sonka, fled the turmoils of Bohemia (today the Czech Republic) for America. They settled in Seguin, Texas, where they launched several businesses and ran a saloon. After a fraternal quarrel, Anton and his German American wife, Anna Klein Sonka, took their six children to San Diego. There they heard of a mercantile opportunity in Lemon Grove. They bought the general store and proceeded to boost the town’s economy with a business that became the Walmart of its day. Everyone for miles around shopped at A. Sonka and Son. The eldest son, Anthony Tony F. Sonka, became a force in the region, but it was his support of a unique project that would give the town its major landmark: a humongous lemon perched by the railroad tracks.

      Lemon Grove had long participated in parades in downtown San Diego to advertise its fruit; however, the 1928 Fourth of July La Fiesta de San Diego parade was different. Lemon Grove had just won the 1928 trophy for best fruit at the county fair. Main Street had just been paved for the first time. The four-year-old grammar school was booming. There were seven chicken ranches and five dairies. The town was growing. Life was good. Sonka, along with a committee of local ranchers, commissioned a gifted local architect, Alberto Treganza, to design an immense lemon that would make the ultimate statement about the town’s purpose, prosperity, and optimism.

      Led by Edmund Dunn, a British orchardist who settled in Lemon Grove in 1921, the ranchers built the lemon of plaster, wire, and wood and hoisted it onto a farm wagon. Weighing 3,000 pounds and aptly dubbed The Big Lemon, the float won third prize in the parade and was towed home in triumph. Lemon Grovians loved their creation and refused to part with it. Tony Sonka shrewdly had it placed opposite the store’s front door on Main Street, adjacent to the railroad tracks in the center of town. From that day on, but for occasional shifts to accommodate railroad repairs, The Big Lemon

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