Original Covina Landowners

While digging into old real estate records earlier this month, I decided to make a map showing the names of the first owners of every parcel in the Phillips Tract. Whenever I found an original title conveyance by trustee James F. Houghton, I made a note of the grantee and the date in the corresponding square on Eaton's survey.

Earliest owners of lots in the Phillips Tract. Click image to view an enlargement. A legend for the colors displayed can be found there.

Why would I go to the trouble of doing that, you might ask? Well, it was primarily to fact-check a similar cartographic record in the collection of the Covina Valley Historical Society, the accuracy of which I have since come to question.

Back in 2016, the late Covina historian Glenn Reed lent me a copy of an old map whose caption said showed the names of the original Covina landowners. It was said to've been the work of Charles Bemis: a prominent first-generation Covina pioneer.¹ What a treasure, I thought at the time, and scanned it for future reference.

I never found particular reason to question the map's historical content until 2023, when I was researching the family of another first-gen pioneer, Lambert L. Ratekin.²

What first aroused my suspicion was that the Bemis Map showed Phillips Tract Lot 6 Block 10 belonging to a "R. Ratekin," as you can see below. That is indeed where the Ratekins lived (237 S. 4th St.),³ but the family first came to Covina in 1894,² which is a little late to be an original owner of any piece of land in early Covina. Not impossible, but unlikely. Also, no one in this little family of three had a first or middle name beginning with "R."^2,3,4 This led me to suspect that whoever wrote the names on that map did not actually know Ratekin personally, which Charles Bemis most assuredly did.

The Bemis Map. The Ratekin property is highlighted. Courtesy Glenn Reed/Covina Valley Historical Society. Click image for an enlargement.

Professionally, both men were citrus growers, and both were sitting directors of the A. C. G. Deciduous Association^1,2 concurrently, as well.⁵ Additionally, in their leisure time, they were both members of the Covina Odd Fellows lodge.^1,2 So with that level of familiarity, there's just no plausible way that Charles Bemis would get Lambert Ratekin's name wrong.

The actual chain of title of Lot 6 Block 10 itself also serves to disprove Bemis's authorship. The true first owner of that land was Joshua W. Condell, who, on the very same day he purchased it in January of 1887, "flipped" the property for more than double his purchase price to Charles E. Bemis himself!⁶

So, quite obviously, Bemis had first-hand knowledge of exactly who the original owner was, and it was emphatically not anyone named "R. Ratekin."

Chas. Bemis owned Lot 6 Block 10 until June, 1889, when he sold it to Joseph Amon.⁷

Then in 1894, L. L. Ratekin became the 4th owner of said 10.1-acre lot.⁸

It's not just that one name that's incorrect, either. There are many errors and misspellings on the map. The Ratekin example is merely the one that stood out as most obvious to me.

In conclusion: I believe the so-called Bemis Map does in general show who owned a particular piece of Covina real estate at a particular point in time, but not any earlier than 1894, and in most cases, the names shown are not the original landowners. Furthermore, I believe I've provided sufficient evidence to doubt that Charles Bemis was author of the map at all. It may indeed have come from his estate, but the map does not depict what Bemis's daughter apparently assumed it did.

All this only serves to confirm something I've learned myself the hard way through long experience: never 100% trust a caption on any historical photo or document!

Anyway, enjoy the map of the real first owners! Or I should say, the first owners as best I've been able to determine at present. I'm sure at least a few of my notations will be proven incorrect in the future, either by me or by someone else. That's just how history sleuthing works!

References:

¹ Guinn, J. M., 1901. Historical and Biographical Record of Los Angeles and Vicinity, Chapman Publishing Co., Chicago, p.434.
² Ibid, p.423.
³ United States Census, 1930.
⁴ Lambert L. Ratekin at FamilySearch.org.
⁵ Los Angeles Times, October 5, 1895, p.8.
⁶ Los Angeles Herald, January 21, 1887, p.7.
⁷ Los Angeles Times, June 12, 1889, p.7.
⁸ Los Angeles Times, April 19, 1894, p.7.