History
In 1901, Henry E. Huntington (nephew and heir to the fortune of Southern Pacific Railroad founder Collis P. Huntington) began the Pacific Electric Railway as a way to develop the lands surrounding Los Angeles. The main trunk line eastwards into the San Gabriel Valley passed to the south of Pasadena (with branch lines peeling off), skirting the line of hills just south of the San Gabriel Mountains. Huntington chose for himself a large tract of land on one of these hills (which on a clear day has a view of the ocean, 22 miles (35 km) distant). When automobile ownership rose in Southern California, this main line was converted into a wide divided highway, with four tracks running down the median. In 1925, Pacific Electric began converting its train lines into bus routes, a process that culminated in 1953, when the bulk of its routes were closed.
Read more about this topic: Huntington Drive
Famous quotes containing the word history:
“At present cats have more purchasing power and influence than the poor of this planet. Accidents of geography and colonial history should no longer determine who gets the fish.”
—Derek Wall (b. 1965)
“It’s a very delicate surgical operation—to cut out the heart without killing the patient. The history of our country, however, is a very tough old patient, and we’ll do the best we can.”
—Dudley Nichols, U.S. screenwriter. Jean Renoir. Sorel (Philip Merivale)
“We don’t know when our name came into being or how some distant ancestor acquired it. We don’t understand our name at all, we don’t know its history and yet we bear it with exalted fidelity, we merge with it, we like it, we are ridiculously proud of it as if we had thought it up ourselves in a moment of brilliant inspiration.”
—Milan Kundera (b. 1929)