Sixty Years in Southern California

This week we’re listening to a sample from Harris Newmark’s memoir, “Sixty Years in Southern California".

We’ll be listening to the first 2 chapters in which Newmark recounts his upbringing and how he ended up traveling to California from Prussia covering the years 1834-1853

Transcript

Hello and welcome to Narrated Archives. Thanks for joining me, Sally Barron, your host. Here at Narrated Archives we’re exploring the public domain to find interesting, absorbing and thoughtful writings from past generations.  

This week we’re listening to a sample from Harris Newmark’s memoir, “Sixty Years in Southern CA”.  

Harris Newmark was born in Prussia in 1834 and became a prominent Jewish merchant, pioneer  and civic leader who immigrated from Prussia to Los Angeles in 1853, significantly shaping the city's early commercial development. 

As a highly successful wholesale grocer, hide dealer, and real estate developer, he was instrumental in founding the Los Angeles Board of Trade, the Chamber of Commerce, and the Public Library. Newmark was considered a patriarch of the Jewish community, playing key roles in establishing Congregation B'nai B'rith and the Jewish Orphans Home. His immense business influence propelled major regional infrastructure projects, including early railroad expansion. Later in life, he penned the invaluable historical memoir which we are sampling,  Sixty Years in Southern California: 1853-1913. This memoir provides a detailed account of the city's rapid growth. Known as a "father of Los Angeles," Newmark's legacy remains embedded in local development and philanthropy. 

We’ll be listening to the first 2 chapters in which Newmark recounts his upbringing and how he ended up traveling to California from Prussia. 

Sixty Years in Southern California

Chapter I - Childhood and Youth

1834-1853

I was born in Loebau, West Prussia, on the 5th of July, 1834, the son of Philipp and Esther, née Meyer, Neumark; and I have reason to believe that I was not a very welcome guest. My parents, who were poor, already had five children, and the prospects of properly supporting the sixth child were not bright. As I had put in an appearance, however, and there was no alternative, I was admitted with good grace into the family circle and, being the baby, soon became the  pet.

My father was born in the ancient town of Neumark; and in his youth he was apprenticed to a dealer in boots and shoes in a Russian village through which Napoleon Bonaparte marched on his way to Moscow. The conqueror sent to the shop for a pair of fur boots, and I have often heard my father tell, with modest satisfaction, how, shortly before he visited the great fair at Nijni Novgorod, he was selected to deliver them; how more than one ambitious and inquisitive friend tried to purchase the privilege of approaching the great man, and what were his impressions of the warrior. When ushered into the august presence, he found Bonaparte in one of his characteristic postures, standing erect, in a meditative mood, braced against the wall, with one hand to his forehead and the other behind his back, apparently absorbed in deep and anxious thought.

When I was but three weeks old, my father's business affairs called him away from home, and compelled the sacrifice of a more or less continued absence of eight and one half years. During this period my mother's health was very poor. Unfortunately, also, my father was too liberal and extravagantly-inclined for his narrow circumstances; and not being equipped to meet the conditions of the district in which we lived and our economical necessities, we were continually, so to speak, in financial hot water. 

While he was absent, my father traveled in Sweden and Denmark, remitting regularly to his family as much as his means would permit, yet earning for them but a precarious living. In 1842 he again joined his family in Loebau, making visits to Sweden and Denmark during the summer seasons from 1843 until the middle fifties and spending the long winters at home. Loebau was then, as now, of little commercial importance, and until 1849, when I was fifteen years of age and had my first introduction to the world, my life was very commonplace and marked by little worthy of special record, unless it was the commotion centering in the cobble-paved market-place, as a result of the Revolution of 1848.

With the winter of 1837 had come a change in my father's plans and enterprises. Undergoing unusually severe weather in Scandinavia, he listened to the lure of the New World and embarked for New York, arriving there in the very hot summer of 1838. The contrast in climatic conditions proved most disastrous; for, although life in the new Republic seemed both pleasing and acceptable to one of his temperament and liberal views, illness finally compelled him to bid America adieu.

My father was engaged in the making of ink and blacking, neither of which commodities was, at that time, in such universal demand as it is now; and my brother, Joseph Philipp, later known as J. P. Newmark, having some time before left Sweden, where he had been assisting him, for England, it was agreed, in 1849, after a family council, that I was old enough to accompany my father on his business trips, gradually become acquainted with his affairs, and thus prepare to succeed him. Accordingly, in April of that year, I left the family hearth, endeared to me, unpretentious though it was, and wandered with my father out into the world. Open confession, it is said, is good for the soul; hence I must admit that the prospect of making such a trip attracted me, notwithstanding the tender associations of home; and the sorrow of parting from my mother was rather evenly balanced, in my youthful mind, by the pleasurable anticipation of visiting new and strange lands.

Any attempt to compare methods of travel in 1849, even in the countries I then traversed, with those now in vogue, would be somewhat ridiculous. Country roads were generally poor—in fact, very bad; and vehicles were worse, so that the entire first day's run brought us only to Lessen, a small village but twelve miles from home! Here we spent the night, because of the lack of better accommodations, in blankets, on the floor of the wayside inn; and this experience was such a disappointment, failing to realize, as it did, my youthful anticipations, that I was desperately homesick and ready, at the first opportunity, to return to my sorrowing mother. The Fates, however, were against any such change in our plans; and the next morning we proceeded on our way, arriving that evening at the much larger town of Bromberg. Here, for the first time, the roads and other conditions were better, and my spirits revived.

Next day we left for Stettin, where we took passage for Ystad, a small seaport in southern Sweden. Now our real troubles began; part of the trip was arduous, and the low state of our finances permitted us nothing better than exposed deck-quarters. This was particularly trying, since the sea was rough, the weather tempestuous, and I both seasick and longing for home; moreover, on arriving at Ystad, after a voyage of twelve hours or more, the Health Officer came on board our boat and notified us that, as cholera was epidemic in Prussia, we were prohibited from landing! This filled me with mortal fear lest we should be returned to Stettin under the same miserable conditions through which we had just passed; but this state of mind had its compensating influence, for my tears at the discouraging announcement worked upon the charity of the uniformed officials, and, in a short time, to my inexpressible delight, we were permitted to land. With a natural alertness to observe anything new in my experience, I shall never forget my first impressions of the ocean. There seemed no limit to the expanse of stormy waters over which we were traveling; and this fact alone added a touch of solemnity to my first venture from home.

From Ystad we proceeded to Copenhagen, where my father had intimate friends, especially in the Lachmann, Eichel and Ruben families, to whose splendid hospitality and unvarying kindness, displayed whenever I visited their neighborhood, I wish to testify. We remained at Copenhagen a couple of months, and then proceeded to Gothenburg. It was not at this time my father's intention to burden me with serious responsibility; and, having in mind my age, he gave me but little of the work to do, while he never failed to afford me, when he could, an hour of recreation or pleasure. The trip as a whole, therefore, was rather an educational experiment.

In the fall of 1849, we returned to Loebau for the winter. From this time until 1851 we made two trips together, very similar to the one already described; and in 1851, when I was seventeen years of age, I commenced helping in real earnest. By degrees, I was taught the process of manufacturing; and when at intervals a stock had been prepared, I made short trips to dispose of it. The blacking was a paste, put up in small wooden boxes, to be applied with a brush, such a thing as waterproof blacking then not being thought of, at least by us. During the summer of 1851, business carried me to Haparanda, about the most northerly port in Sweden; and from there I took passage, stopping at Luleå, Piteå, Umeå, Hernösand, Sundsvall, Söderhamn and Gefle, all small places along the route. I transacted no business, however, on the trip up the coast because it was my intention to return by land, when I should have more time for trade; accordingly, on my way back to Stockholm, I revisited all of these points and succeeded beyond my expectations.

On my trip north, I sailed over the Gulf of Bothnia which, the reader will recollect, separates Sweden from Finland, a province most unhappily under Russia's bigoted, despotic sway; and while at Haparanda, I was seized with a desire to visit Torneå, in Finland. I was well aware that if I attempted to do so by the regular routes on land, it would be necessary to pass the Russian customhouse, where officers would be sure to examine my passport; and knowing, as the whole liberal world now more than ever knows, that a person of Jewish faith finds the merest sally beyond the Russian border beset with unreasonable obstacles, I decided to walk across the wide marsh in the northern part of the Gulf, and thus circumvent these exponents of intolerance. Besides, I was curious to learn whether, in such a benighted country, blacking and ink were used at all. I set out, therefore, through the great moist waste, making my way without much difficulty, and in due time arrived at Torneå, when I proceeded immediately to the first store in the neighborhood; but there I was destined to experience a rude, unexpected setback. An old man, evidently the proprietor, met me and straightway asked, "Are you a Jew?" and seeing, or imagining that I saw, a delay (perhaps not altogether temporary!) in a Russian jail, I withdrew from the store without ceremony, and returned to the place whence I had come. Notwithstanding this adventure, I reached Stockholm in due season, the trip back consuming about three weeks; and during part of that period I subsisted almost entirely on salmon, bear's meat, milk, and knäckebröd, the last a bread usually made of rye flour in which the bran had been preserved. All in all, I was well pleased with this maiden-trip; and as it was September, I returned to Loebau to spend one more winter at home.

CHAPTER II

WESTWARD, HO!

1853

In April, 1853, when I had reached the age of nineteen, and was expected to take a still more important part in our business—an arrangement perfectly agreeable to me—my father and I resumed our selling and again left for Sweden. For the sake of economy, as well as to be closer to our field of operations, we had established two insignificant manufacturing plants, the one at Copenhagen, where we packed for two months, the other at Gothenburg, where we also prepared stock; and from these two points, we operated until the middle of May, 1853. 

Then a most important event occurred, completely changing the course of my life. In the spring, a letter was received from my brother, J. P. Newmark, who, in 1848, had gone to the United States, and had later settled in Los Angeles. He had previously, about 1846, resided in England, as I have said; had then sailed to New York and tarried for a while in the East; when, attracted by the discovery of gold, he had proceeded to San Francisco, arriving there on May 6th, 1851, being the first of our family to come to the Coast. In this letter my brother invited me to join him in California; and from the first I was inclined to make the change, though I realized that much depended on my father. He looked over my shoulder while I read the momentous message; and when I came to the suggestion that I should leave for America, I examined my father's face to anticipate, if possible, his decision. After some reflection, he said he had no doubt that my future would be benefited by such a change; and while reluctant enough to let me go, he decided that as soon as practical I ought to start. We calculated the amount of blacking likely to be required for our trade to the season's end, and then devoted the necessary time to its manufacture. 

My mother, when informed of my proposed departure, was beside herself with grief and forth with insisted on my return to Loebau; but being convinced that she intended to thwart my desire, and having in mind the very optimistic spirit of my brother's letter,  I yielded to the influence of ambitious and unreflecting youth, and sorrowfully but firmly insisted on the execution of my plans. I feared that, should I return home to defend my intended course, the mutual pain of parting would still be great. I also had in mind my sisters and brothers (two of whom, Johanna, still alive, and Nathan, deceased, subsequently came to Los Angeles), and knew that each would appeal strongly to my affection and regret. This resolution to leave without a formal adieu caused me no end of distress; and my regret was the greater when, on Friday, July 1st, 1853, I stood face to face with the actual realization, among absolute strangers on the deck of the vessel that was to carry me from Gothenburg to Hull and far away from home and kindred.

With deep emotion, my father bade me good-bye on the Gothenburg pier, nor was I less affected at the parting; indeed, I have never doubted that my father made a great sacrifice when he permitted me to leave him, since I must have been of much assistance and considerable comfort, especially during his otherwise solitary travels in foreign lands. I remember distinctly remaining on deck as long as there was the least vision of him; but when distance obliterated all view of the shore, I went below to regain my composure. I soon installed my belongings in the stateroom, or cabin as it was then called, and began to accustom myself to my new and strange environment.

There was but one other passenger—a young man—and he was to have a curious part in my immediate future. As he also was bound for Hull, we entered into conversation; and following the usual tendency of people aboard ship, we soon became acquaintances. I had learned the Swedish language, and could speak it with comparative ease; so that we conversed without difficulty. He gave Gothenburg as his place of residence, although there was no one at his departure to wish him God-speed; and while this impressed me strangely at the time, I saw in it no particular reason to be suspicious. He stated also that he was bound for New York; and as it developed that we intended to take passage on the same boat, we were pleased with the prospect of having each other's company throughout the entire voyage. Soon our relations became more confidential and he finally told me that he was carrying a sum of money, and asked me to take charge of a part of it. Unsophisticated though I was, I remembered my father's warning to be careful in transactions with strangers; furthermore, the idea of burdening myself with another's responsibility seeming injudicious, I politely refused the request, although even then my suspicions were not aroused. It was peculiar, to be sure, that when we steamed away from land, the young man was in his cabin; but it was only in the light of later developments that I understood why he so concealed himself.

We had now entered the open sea, which was very rough, and I retired, remaining in my bunk for two days, or until we approached Hull, suffering from the most terrible seasickness I have ever experienced; and not until we sailed into port did I recover my sea legs at all. Having dressed, I again met my traveling companion; and we became still more intimate. On Sunday morning we reached Hull, then boasting of no such harbor facilities as the great Humber docks now in course of construction; and having transferred our baggage to the train as best we could, we proceeded almost immediately on our way to Liverpool. While now the fast English express crosses the country in about three hours, the trip then consumed the better part of the night and, being made in the darkness, afforded but little opportunity for observation.

Hardly had we arrived in Liverpool, when I was surprised in a way that I shall never forget. While attempting to find our bundles as they came from the luggage van—a precaution necessitated by the poor baggage system then in vogue, which did not provide for checking—my companion and I were taken in hand by officers of the law, told that we were under arrest, and at once conducted to an examining magistrate! 

As my conscience was clear, I had no misgivings on account of the detention, although I did fear that I might lose my personal effects; nor was I at ease again until they were brought in for special inspection. Our trunks were opened in the presence of the Swedish Consul who had come in the meantime upon the scene; and mine having been emptied, it was immediately repacked and closed. What was my amazement, however, when my fellow-traveler's trunk was found to contain a very large amount of money with which he had absconded from Gothenburg! He was at once hurried away to police headquarters; and I then learned that, after our departure, messages had been sent to both Hull and Liverpool to stop the thief, but that through confusion in the description, doubtless due to the crude and incomplete information transmitted by telegraph (then by no means as thoroughly developed as now), the Liverpool authorities had arrested the only two passengers arriving there who were known to have embarked at Gothenburg, and I, unfortunately, happened to be one of them.

At the period whereof I write, there was a semi-monthly steamer service between Liverpool and New York; and as bad luck would have it, the boat in which I was to travel paddled away while I was in the midst of the predicament just described, leaving me with the unpleasant outlook of having to delay my departure for America two full weeks. The one thing that consoled me was that, not having been fastidious as to my berth, I had not engaged passage in advance, and so was not further embarrassed by the forfeiture of hard-earned and much-needed money. As it was, having stopped at a moderately priced hotel for the night, I set out the next morning to investigate the situation. 

Speaking no English, I was fortunate, a few days later, in meeting a Swedish emigration agent who informed me that the Star King, a three-masted sailing vessel in command of Captain Burland—both ship and captain hailing from Baltimore—was booked to leave the following morning; and finding the office of the company, I engaged one of the six first-class berths in the saloon. There was no second-cabin, or I might have traveled in that class; and of steerage passengers the Star King carried more than eight hundred crowded and seasick souls, most of whom were Irish. Even in the first-class saloon, there were few, if any, of the ordinary comforts, as I soon discovered, while of luxuries there were none; and if one had the misfortune to lose even trifling delicacies such as I had, including half a dozen bottles of assorted syrups—put up by good Mrs. Lipman, on my leaving Gothenburg, and dropped by a bungling porter—the inconvenience of the situation was intensified.

We left Liverpool—which, unlike Hull, I have since seen on one of my several visits to Europe—on the evening of the 10th of July. 

On my way to the cabin, I passed the dining table already arranged for supper; and as I had eaten very sparingly since my seasickness on the way to Hull, I was fully prepared for a square meal. The absence not only of smoke, but of any smells as from an engine, was also favorable to my appetite; and when the proper time arrived, I did full justice to what was set before me. Steamers then were infrequent on the Atlantic, but there were many sailing vessels; and these we often passed, so close, in fact, as to enable the respective captains to converse with each other. 

In the beginning, we had an ample supply of fresh meat, eggs and butter, as well as some poultry, and the first week's travel was like a delightful pleasure excursion. After that, however, the meat commenced to deteriorate, the eggs turned stale, and the butter became rancid; and as the days passed, everything grew worse, excepting a good supply of cheese which possessed, as usual, the faculty of improving, rather than spoiling, as it aged. Mountain water might justly have shown indignation if the contents of the barrels then on board had claimed relationship; while coffee and tea, of which we partook in the usual manner at the commencement of our voyage, we were compelled to drink, after a short time, without milk—the one black and the other green. 

Notwithstanding these annoyances, I enjoyed the experience immensely, once I had recovered from my depression at leaving Europe; for youth could laugh at such drawbacks, none of which, after all, seriously affected my naturally buoyant spirits. 

Not until I narrowly escaped being shot, through the Captain's careless handling of a derringer, was I roused from a monotonous, half-dreamy existence.

Following this escape, matters progressed without special incident until we were off the coast of Newfoundland, when we had every reason to expect an early arrival in New York. 

Late one afternoon, while the vessel was proceeding with all sail set, a furious squall struck her, squarely amidships; and in almost as short a time as it takes to relate the catastrophe, our three masts were snapped asunder, falling over the side of the boat and all but capsizing her. The utmost excitement prevailed; and from the Captain down to the ordinary seaman, all hands were terror-stricken. The Captain believed, in fact, that there was no hope of saving his ship; and forgetful of all need of self-control and discipline, he loudly called to us, "Every man for himself!" at the same time actually tearing at and plucking his bushy hair—a performance that in no wise relieved the crisis. 

In less than half an hour, the fury of the elements had subsided, and we found ourselves becalmed; and the crew, assisted by the passengers, were enabled, by cutting away chains, ropes and torn sails, to steady the ship and keep her afloat. After this was accomplished, the Captain engaged a number of competent steerage passengers to help put up emergency masts, and to prepare new sails, for which we carried material. For twelve weary days we drifted with the current, apparently not advancing a mile; and during all this time the Atlantic, but recently so stormy and raging, was as smooth as a mill-pond, and the wreckage kept close to our ship. It was about the middle of August when this disaster occurred, and not until we had been busy many days rigging up again did a stiff breeze spring up, enabling us to complete our voyage.

On August 28th, 1853, exactly forty-nine days after our departure from Liverpool, we arrived at New York, reaching Sandy Hook in a fog so dense that it was impossible to see any distance ahead; and only when the fog lifted, revealing  the great harbor and showing how miraculously we had escaped collision with the numerous craft all about us, was our joy and relief at reaching port complete. I cannot recollect whether we took a pilot aboard or not; but I do know that the peculiar circumstances under which we arrived having prevented a health officer from immediately visiting us, we were obliged to cast anchor and await his inspection the next morning. 

During the evening, the Captain bought fresh meat, vegetables, butter and eggs, offered for sale by venders in boats coming alongside; and with sharpened appetites we made short work of a fine supper, notwithstanding that various features of shore life, or some passing craft, every minute or two challenged our attention, and quite as amply we did justice, on the following morning, to our last breakfast aboard ship. 

As I obtained my first glimpse of New York, I thought of the hardships of my father there, a few years before, and of his compulsory return to Europe; and I wondered what might have been my position among Americans had he succeeded in New York. 

At last, on August 29th, 1853, under a blue and inspiriting sky and with both curiosity and hope tuned to the highest pitch, I first set foot on American soil, in the country where I was to live and labor the remainder of my life, whose flag and institutions I have more and more learned to honor and love.

Before leaving Europe, I had been provided with the New York addresses of friends from Loebau, and my first duty was to look them up. One of these, named Lindauer, kept a boarding-house on Bayard Street near the Five Points, now, I believe, in the neighborhood of Chinatown; and as I had no desire to frequent high-priced hotels, I made my temporary abode with him. I also located the house of Rich Brothers, associated with the San Francisco concern of the same name and through whom I was to obtain funds from my brother with which to continue my journey; but as I had to remain in New York three weeks until their receipt, I could do little more in furthering my departure than to engage second-cabin passage via Nicaragua by a line running in opposition to the Panamá route, and offering cheapness as its principal attraction. Having attended to that, I spent the balance of the time visiting and seeing the city, and in making my first commercial venture in the New World. 

In my impatience to be doing something, I foolishly relieved Samuel, a brother of Kaspare Cohn, and a nephew of mine, of a portion of his merchandise; but in a single day I decided to abandon peddling—a difficult business for which, evidently, I was ne ver intended. 

After that, a painful experience with mosquitoes was my only unpleasant adventure. I did not know until later that an excited crowd of men were just then assembled in the neighborhood, in what was styled the Universal Ice-Water Convention, and that not far away a crowd of women, quite as demonstrative, excluded from the councils of men and led by no less a personality than P. T. Barnum, the showman, were clamoring for both Prohibition and Equal Suffrage!

I find Harris Newmark’s tales of his journeys fascinating, so don’t be surprised if you hear more of his settling in CA in future Narrated Archives episodes.

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