Looking into the (forgotten) legacy of the last governor of Mexican California

PIO PICO by JOE MCGARRY

Strange as it may seem, there was a time in California when everything curved towards God. It was back then that the streets and houses and churches were all planned according to the heaven-sent laws of the Spanish government, when colonialism still reigned and Los Angeles was a little pueblo. That, of course, didn’t last—Mexican independence and the eventual American invasion made sure of that. It was in those transitions of power, though, that Pío Pico—the last governor of Mexican California, and a man now remembered only by streets and schools—got left behind.

At first, Pico’s story seems as though it’s bound to Los Angeles. He was born at Mission San Gabriel in 1801 and, 93 years later, died in downtown Los Angeles. He launched rebellions in the Hollywood Hills and grabbed up huge chunks of land all over the city. When Pico took hold of the governor’s office in 1845, he even lobbied to relocate the capitol to Los Angeles. But even with all of that, Pico’s story has never seemed to gain hold. His name does grace a few streets and businesses, but that’s where it stops.

Instead, it picks up about 20 miles south in Whittier.

It’s just off the 605 freeway at Pioneer Boulevard that you’ll stumble into Pico’s past. There, set back against the flood-controlled banks of the San Gabriel River, is Pico’s longtime home, the so-called El Ranchito. As it stands now, the ranch recalls much of the land’s former elegance: smooth dirt paths, tall iron gates, plots of carefully manicured orange trees. The building itself looks fresh and preserved: a crisp white adobe outlined in a dark orange. Even with all of the noise pouring off the 605, El Ranchito still feels like a little beacon of wealth.

But it was only a few years ago that the building was in ruins: the adobe walls crumbling under their own weight, wood beams cracking and splintering with each earthquake. In a lot of ways, the place stood only as a testament to the failure of Pico’s legacy. It wasn’t until the state and the Friends of Pío Pico, a nonprofit group dedicated to preservation, stepped in and turned the ranch into Pío Pico State Park that the place saw any improvements. Since 2001, a tremendous amount of energy has gone into rehabilitating the land and the structure. What’s more, with El Ranchito’s not-so-subtle history lessons, the same seems to have been done for Pico, too.

And that’s good, because Pío Pico’s history is an important one. After all, Pico was one of the last vestiges of old California, a man from that halcyon time when Los Angeles had a city plaza and the 9,000-acre El Ranchito was considered small. Not surprisingly, Pico gained most of his stature through his dealings in the California land market, buying his way into the company of the other great California Dons. Among Pico’s hundreds of thousands of acres are parcels of land that now make up places like Whittier, Cerritos, San Gabriel, and Camp Pendleton.

Pico, however, wasn’t modest with his wealth. He was a dapper man: tailored suits, gaudy medals, a jewel-encrusted cane. And he wasn’t afraid to gamble that wealth, either, famously losing thousands of dollars in card games and horse races.

But that didn’t stop Pico from heading into the public sphere, as he served in California’s early legislative bodies and, eventually, as governor. His term was a short one, though, cut off by the Mexican-American War. Despite Pico’s efforts to defend his home, nothing could stop the eager Americans. As they marched down the coast, Pico offered these foreboding words: “Shall these incursions go on unchecked, until we shall become strangers in our own land?”

Ultimately that’s what happened. Pico was forced to flee to Mexico, leaving his home and family behind. Though it was only a few years before Pico made his way back to California, he never seemed able to adapt to the American way of life, one that left him plagued by lawsuits and loan sharks. Everything eventually caught up with Pico in 1892 when he was forced to sell off his holdings and shutter El Ranchito. On Sept. 11, 1894, he died penniless and unknown in the home of his daughter in Los Angeles.

There’s no doubt that Pío Pico State Park offers up plenty of that glossed-over nostalgia, but it also provides a look into the life of a forgotten man. To some, it’s probably little more than a tragic, perhaps forgettable, tale of someone caught behind the times. And maybe that’s true. But it’s important that we acknowledge Pico because, whether we realize it or not, his times still disorient us. They manifest themselves in the cities that surround us and in the curved streets of downtown Los Angeles, a place that, for people like author D.J. Waldie, physically clashes with the strict, neat grids of the rest of the city. But it’s more than just geographical—it’s ideological. It’s about a long-gone way of life that, for one reason or another, we’ve all but purged from memory.

Pico’s legacy and the Whittier mansion he left behind almost seem to say more about who we are than who he was. After all, we’ve done it again: the fragile little adobe forgotten now as it’s forced up against street after street of tract homes and gas stations.

PIO PICO STATE HISTORIC PARK 6003 PIONEER BLVD | WHITTIER 90606 | 562.695.1217 | PIOPICO.ORG | OPEN WED-SUN, 10AM-5PM

Tags: dons, el ranchito, pio pico, ranchos, Whittier