5/8/2024 0 Comments Huntington beach parcel map“Just for buying a set of books,” she said. The history professor at Golden West College visited the Huntington Central Park Equestrian Center on a recent afternoon and speculated that perhaps the land was given away as part of plan to populate what would become Surf City, an effort still used by communities like Mankato, Kan., which is trying to grow its population, according to the Center for Rural Affairs. Tustin resident Sunshine McClain said she was surprised to hear of the land’s past. “There’s no way of knowing where your lots are,” Derigo said. Distinguishing one lot from another was nearly impossible, he said. Louie Derigo, a longtime resident, owned two lots until he sold them to the city a few years ago. “For the most part it’s just wide-open, undeveloped fields,” Wentworth said. The area remains a largely undeveloped expanse enclosed by white fences. In 1991, an Orange County Superior Court judge sided with the city and approved its plan to acquire two lots using eminent domain. That same year, one landowner sued the city over the land use, according to news accounts. In 1990, a group of landowners rejected the city’s offer of $10,000 for each lot and protested at a City Council meeting over the city’s plan to use eminent domain to widen Ellis Avenue. In at least one instance, the use of encyclopedia lots was a battle that played out in the courtroom. View premium apartments, convenient amenities, and outstanding. Shortly after it was given away, in 1920 oil was discovered in Huntington Beach and some owners made good money from their mineral rights, Wentworth said. Experience luxury apartment living at Beach & Ocean Apartments in Huntington Beach, CA. The land is adjacent to Central Park to the south, and the city’s Urban Forest sits on what was once encyclopedia land, according to the city map. “It’s just a jigsaw puzzle trying to track them down.” “It’s a nightmare finding who owns them,” said Duane Wentworth, the chairman of the city’s Historic Resources Board and a former public works employee. Tracking down all of the landowners proved to be an extraordinary task, as the titles were given away in the 1910s to people across the country. The city sold hundreds of lots to the encyclopedia company and since has bought back all but 38, according to a city map of the land. They’re rich with history from a time when land in Huntington Beach was so inexpensive that buyers of a $126 set of encyclopedias were given a deed to a 25-foot-by-112-foot plot. The rambling hills to the north of Ellis Avenue are covered in yellow wildflowers and well-worn equestrian paths reminiscent of the Old West.īut for some, the hills are more than a reminder of the days before homes and horsehead oil pumps.
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