How the tiny city of San Fernando in the Valley avoided being swallowed up by LA

A lot of misconceptions exist about the San Fernando Valley — like those strongarm claims online that it’s not part of Los Angeles.

Spoiler alert: Much of the region is governed by the city of L.A. But it also has some cities that have stayed independent. One of those is the Valley’s namesake, San Fernando, and it’s somewhat the runt of L.A. County.

A map of Maclay's lot subdivisions circa 1888.

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San Fernando Land & Water Company

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Huntington Rare Book Maps/Huntington Digital Library

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San Fernando is geographically one of the smallest cities in the county at just over 2 square miles, yet it holds the title of oldest town in SFV. The “Mission City,” as it’s called because of its closeness to the Spanish mission, is completely surrounded by the city of L.A. How did this tiny titan stand on its own?

How the Valley’s oldest town began

Before it was ever known as a city, this part of the Valley was Native land that eventually fell under Mexican rule. Then in 1874, after California became part of the U.S., state senator Charles Maclay bought the north half of the Valley in Ex-Mission de San Fernando, the Mexican land grant that covered much of the area.

He was eager to develop it and paid $115,000 for 57,000 acres. The land was split into sections — Maclay took control of the eastern side while his partners took the rest.

This is where Maclay lived out his real estate goals. He came up with a map to divide about 1,000 acres into small lots, with streets named after men he favored (e.g. Griswold Avenue, named after his son-in-law), and even left space for a railroad depot and hotel. This created the first township in the Valley, San Fernando, which got its name by a vote of Maclay’s friends at a picnic.

New city pavement on Maclay Avenue in the city of San Fernando in 1922.

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Courtesy Automobile Club of Southern California

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University of Southern California Digital Libraries

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He worked quickly to attract new residents by building up the area and leveraging his close ties to Southern Pacific Railroad, which offered prospective settlers discounted rides from L.A. to San Fernando.

But Maclay’s decisions impacted the Fernandeño Tataviam Band of Mission Indians, who negotiated for land of their own prior to American rule that was then stripped away.

Rogerio Rocha, a tribal captain, was part of a group who lived on land connected to the San Fernando Mission. Maclay claimed this land through court order, and eventually forcefully evicted Rocha with a sheriff after he refused payment to leave. A plaque at Rudy Ortega Park says that Rocha’s wife died from pneumonia after cold exposure post-eviction. (The tribe was welcomed back onto the land more than 100 years later through a joint agreement with the city.)

Water and power

That eviction sparked some concern in the community, but town growth continued. Thousands moved to the area to get their share.

San Fernando officials, on an unknown date, sample water pouring from pipe from a well that yielded 650 gallons per minute.

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Valley Times Collection/Los Angeles Public Library

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Maclay leaned into the Valley’s status as an agriculture haven by offering cheap farming land starting at $5 an acre. Its rich soil yielded bountiful crops of wheat and barley within a couple of years, and it was even said that “San Fernando ought to rank as one of the richest agricultural precincts in Southern California.”

What made the area particularly fruitful was water. This small but mighty town had a natural abundance of groundwater. Deep wells were tapped into the Sylmar Basin’s aquifers to keep crops saturated.

Other towns however weren’t so lucky. As they grew, they needed access to water — and the most obvious way to get it was to be annexed by the city of L.A. which had built its new major aqueduct in 1913.

But small San Fernando didn’t need the aqueduct, so to keep its autonomy and avoid annexation by the L.A. behemoth, residents voted in August 1911 to incorporate as an independent city. It was a tight election that only passed by eight votes.

Today, San Fernando is still run by its own local government, and still gets its water from the aquifers, which have groundwater at least 1,000 feet underneath the city.