O.C.’s First Automatic Elections Equipment

Two Coleman vote talley systems in 1964.

Concerns about the accuracy and security of automatic vote tallying isn’t something new, or even something that arrived with the infamous “hanging chads” of 2000. In Orange County, specifically, those headaches began in 1964 -- when the very first time such machinery was introduced: The Coleman Electronic Vote Talley System (sometimes called the Coleman-Gyrex System). 

Coleman Engineering Co., Inc, was founded in 1950 by Northrop Aircraft vice president Theodore C. "Ted" Coleman as a small R&D firm working for military missile test centers. Over time, it transitioned to manufacturing and selling products for industrial photography, electronic controls, data handling, security and metal finishing. Originally based in Los Angeles County, the company headquarters later moved to 3209 W. Central in Santa Ana. In 1962, Coleman Engineering bought the Norden division of United Aircraft. Originally a separate company known as the Norden-Ketay Corp., it had developed an electronic vote tallying device. 

By noon on election day 1964 – Orange County’s first election with the Coleman Electronic Vote Talley System -- it was already clear that there were big voter fraud problems. The system's special ballot-marking pens had been sabotaged in more than 100 of the county's 1,021 precincts -- mainly in the Anaheim, Huntington Beach, Westminster, and San Clemente areas. It was the Orange County Republican Party that raised the alarm and soon Ted Coleman was able to confirm that "about one in every eight pens reported as faulty were definitely tampered with."

But the County continued to use the Coleman system. Upgraded equipment used in the June 1968 primaries had some glitches and was slow, but ultimately proved to be extremely accurate. 

The County last used Coleman equipment in the special election of Nov. 6, 1979, then migrated to a new system sold by Valtec Corp. and built in Costa Mesa by Major Data Concepts. This new system worked well mechanically, but suffered from programming errors that threw the election results into doubt.

So, what happened to Coleman Engineering? In September 1968, they bought five other companies: Salsbury Corp, Keystone Abrasive Supply, Knodsen Engineering, Industrial Hydraulics, and Kasco Abrasives. The latter two of these were had been owned by Frank E. Vachon. The mergers resulted in the company being renamed Coleman Systems and moving to 18842 Teller Ave. in Irvine in 1970 or 1971. Later in 1971, Ted Coleman retired as head of Coleman Systems and left Vachon in charge. The business was still operating in Irvine as of 1977.

Today, the County of Orange uses dramatically more sophisticated and accurate equipment from entirely different vendors to scan and tally votes. Every step of the process has safeguards to prevent errors or fraud and voters can even go onto the Registrar of Voters' website to track their ballot and confirm that their vote was counted.

Carl R. Nelson (1930–2024)

Carl R. Nelson in 1989

One of the individuals most responsible for the way modern Orange County looks and functions has passed. Carl Nelson was an expert on countless aspects of local infrastructure, past and present, and was a tremendously helpful resource to those wanted or needed to understand such things. 

And as much as he shared his knowledge with others, he also never stopped wanting to learn. He was a longtime member of the Orange County Historical Society, and a frequent visitor to the Orange County Archives -- so we saw each other often. I also called him occasionally, when I thought there was something he should be involved in or when I needed to pick his brain. 

Carl in 1958, working for the State Division of Highways.

Back in 2009, when realized that wildfires had burned away a century of brush that had overgrown historic irrigation canals in Santa Ana Canyon, my first call was to Carl. He knew the stories behind each of those canals and he needed to be part of a hike to see them. Ultimately, a whole passel of us historical folk tagged along. It was an unforgettable day.

A few years ago, Carl suggested we collaborate on an article about some aspect of water in Orange County. (I forget what exactly.) I liked the idea and started to research the subject, only to find that Carl himself had published a comprehensive article on the topic himself, years earlier! I don't know what he thought I might bring to the table, but there's no way I could ever out-Carl Carl on topics relating to water and public works. I stepped back, knowing I was out of my depth.

Just back from our hike through Santa Ana Canyon, 2009.

I'm taking Carl's obituary (shown in quotes, below) as I found it online, and interspersing it with other information I have about Carl from other sources, to paint a little more of the portrait of this man who contributed to so much to Orange County, ...

"Carl Richard Nelson was born December 31, 1930, in Los Angeles, California, to Eric and Alma Nelson. He passed away on October 22, 2024, surrounded by family. The son of Scandinavian immigrants, Carl’s early life took him across Southern California, including Lawndale [and] Santa Monica..."

Carl visits construction site on Santa Ana River near Angels Stadium, Anaheim

His family moved to the San Fernando Valley when Carl was nine and he graduated from Vista High School in 1948. He attended Palomar Junior College and was accepted at UCLA but enlisted in the U.S. Air Force in 1951 as an electronics technician and instructor. "Carl honorably served in the U.S. Air Force during the Korean War." He left the service in 1955. 

"He graduated from UCLA with a bachelor’s degree in engineering" in 1958, obtained his engineering license in 1961, "and earned a Master of Science in Civil Engineering from USC [1964], setting the foundation for a distinguished career. Carl was a member of the Lambda Chi Alpha fraternity at UCLA."

Carl Nelson at the Old Orange County Courthouse, circa 1989.

Carl then became a junior engineer with the State Division of Highways Bridge Department. In late 1960 he joined the Orange County Flood Control Department. 

"For fourteen years, Carl was the Orange County Director of Public Works and County Surveyor, where he directed the planning, design, construction, and maintenance of vital infrastructure, including roads, flood control systems, harbors, beaches, and parks." He was also the right-hand man of Environmental Management Agency Director George Osborne and together they were responsible for creating much of what we now know as South Orange County.

Carl and his family. Circa 1960s.

Carl's "commitment to public service extended beyond his role; he was an active member of the American Society of Civil Engineers [ASCE], the Southern California Chapter of the Public Works Association, the Orange County Historical Society, and the Laguna Niguel Historical Society. Carl was also a member of the Sons of Norway."

He also enjoyed sports, including bowling, and he famously Bowled a sanctioned 300 game at Saddleback Lanes in Mission Viejo in 1982.

Carl on the stump

After retirement, Carl joined The Keith Companies, Inc., and later Holmes and Narver Engineering. In 2009 he wrote a history of water resources development on the Irvine Ranch. He also wrote a number of other historical articles for the local ASCE chapter. 

In his later years, he tackled consulting work on projects that interested him -- including beach erosion problems in South Orange County. And right up until the end and was an active, well known, liked, and respected member of the local historical community.

George Osborne and Carl Nelson of the Orange County Environmental Management Agency visit a washout at Trabuco Creek in Live Oak Canyon above O'Neill Park.

In his retirement years, I often picked his brain on issues relating to water, flood control, planning, or countless other projects he worked on for the county. There was never a short answer with Carl because he wanted you to understand the whole context. But his answer was always a definitive one. He was particularly helpful to me when I was working on a necessarily complicated history of the County’s old Environmental Management Agency (EMA). Carl knew Orange County history in ways that no one person likely ever will again. He'd not only studied it; he'd also been integral to creating a good share of it himself.

Within just the past couple years, he'd been doing research and trying to work out solutions to the terrible beach erosion problems down at Capistrano Beach. He wasn't being paid as a consultant. He was just a concerned citizen -- with tremendous knowledge and experience -- offering what he saw as a more viable approach. Carl was being Carl.

Carl photographs historic irrigation infrastructure in 2009.

"Carl is survived by his beloved wife, Donna; four children; three stepchildren; five grandchildren; and his brother, John Nelson. His legacy of dedication and service will be remembered by all who knew him."

What was happening at Huntington Beach in 1884?

Sedgwick Post G.A.R.’s shrine to fallen comrades, circa 1887, Santa Ana. (Courtesy Library of Congress)

Two blurbs published in the Los Angeles Herald in June 1884 were undoubtedly unremarkable at the time, but now provide a glimpse of some of the earliest recorded events on the coast at what's now Huntington Beach. Both items deal with a gathering held by the Grand Army of the Republic (G.A.R.) – an organization for Civil War veterans of the Union Army – at “Shell Beach,” which became Pacific City in 1901, and finally Huntington Beach around 1903. The two blurbs follow:

• "…Sedgwick Post of the G.A.R. of Santa Ana contemplates a grand encampment at the ocean beach down near Newport. They will take their wife and families and stay during the 2d, 3d, and 4th of July. A jolly, happy idea." (6-17-1884)
• "The members of Sedgwick Post, G.A.R., have made arrangements for a campfire at Shell Beach, on July 2, 3, 4 and 5. Army rations, pork, beans and coffee will be issued each day." (6-24-1884)

The General John Sedgwick Post, No. 17, was the local G.A.R. chapter, based in Santa Ana. Their 1884 Shell Beach encampment is the first known of its kind that we now know about. Until now, the earliest known event of this kind in Orange County was held in 1888 by the Southern California Veteran's Association (SCVA) – an informal branch of the G.A.R. that planned their encampments – at Anaheim Landing (now part of Seal Beach). According to local Civil War historian Charles Beal, the 1888 event was probably the SCVA’s first encampment. 

It wasn’t until 1905 that the SCVA held its first of numerous large-scale encampments for G.A.R. members at the Methodist Campgrounds, centered at what’s now the intersection of Pecan St. and 12th St. in Huntington Beach. These large conventions, held at what was dubbed “Tent City” or “Arbamar,” were very important to the local economy prior to the Huntington Beach oil boom of 1920. These veterans’ events filled the tents on the Methodist Campgrounds and the (few) local hostelries, like the Evangeline Hotel. The encampments were heavily photographed and extensively written about in the local newspapers. They were important events in the early Huntington Beach.

Sunset at Huntington Beach. (Photo by author)

The references to an event in the summer of 1884 are significant in that they suggest the G.A.R. came to Huntington Beach much earlier than previously known, that the G.A.R. was holding encampments here even prior to the SCVA, and that people were using the strand at Huntington Beach for events much earlier than was previously known. 

Unfortunately, while there are multiple references in the newspapers for weeks prior to the 1884 event, so far no post-event summaries have come to light. Is it possible the event was rained out (unlikely in July) or that it proved so underwhelming that nobody saw fit to mention it again? Perhaps further details will on day come to light. 

O.C. Q&A: Halloween Edition

Q:  Are there any Nessie-type lake monsters in Orange County?

A:  The closest thing to such a legend was Old Bob, the “monster of Laguna Lake” – a dark presence that menaced ducks and snapped fishing lines from the 1950s into the 2000s. 

While draining the lake for maintenance in 2004, workers finally discovered what appeared to be a large log but which snapped at them with incredibly powerful jaws. Old Bob was a 4-foot long, 100-pound alligator snapping turtle. Native to the American southeast, ugly as sin, and downright dangerous, his specie is the largest among freshwater turtles. Old Bob was likely a pet someone dumped long ago.

He was briefly displayed at the Fullerton Arboretum’s Fall Festival before going into retirement in a pond (with a cave, waterfall and plenty of fish) provided by the O.C. Chapter of the California Turtle and Tortoise Club. Old Bob died of natural causes at his “turtle assisted living facility” around 2010. 

Q:  What's a somewhat forgotten Orange County Halloween tradition?

A:  The Halloween concerts of ska-infused New Wave octet Oingo Boingo were a local holiday tradition through the 1980s until their final show in 1995. From 1986 to 1993 -- at the height of their popularity -- those shows were held at Irvine Meadows (later Verizon Wireless Amphitheater and now apartments).  

Band leader Danny Elfman (now better known for movie scores) belted out peppy/macabre songs like "Dead Man's Party" and “No One Lives Forever.” Costumed revelers danced through shows that lasted for hours.  

Many of the band members still perform Halloween shows as the creatively-named Oingo Boingo Former Members. 

Elfman said long ago that he was done with concerts, citing partial deafness from years of loud music. But in the last couple years, advances in Weird Science allowed Elfman to return to the stage without further hearing damage. But he has not performed again with his former band.

Q:  What's the strangest beast ever to have washed up on Orange County's beaches?

A:  Not counting a couple of my surfer friends, the strangest bit of local flotsam was probably the 22-foot "sea serpent" that washed up in Newport Beach in February 1901. It turned out to be an oarfish, a rarely-seen deep sea animal. It made quite an impression on those who saw it and read about it in the newspapers. The Newport Harbor Chamber of Commerce was still putting it on their promotional maps of the area in the 1950s.

O.C. Q&A: Potpourri Edition, Part II

Santa Ana River in Santa Ana Canyon, pre-WWII.

Q:  Is the Santa Ana River man-made?

A:  Although it looks like a concrete flood control channel today, the Santa Ana River is ancient. In the past, its course changed wildly -- creating Newport Bay, carving the bluffs below downtown Huntington Beach, and sometimes cutting across Anaheim and meeting the sea as far north as Alamitos Bay. But as Orange County became more populous, an ongoing battle to tame the river began. From reinforced berms, to Prado Dam, to concrete channels, we've come a long way toward protecting ourselves from nature's wrath. 

Q:  I'm going to Tustin Tiller Days. What's a tiller? 

A:  In this case, a tiller isn't what you steer a boat with. Instead, it's a reference to the farmers (those who till, or turn over soil for planting) who once made up much of Tustin's population. Tustin High School opened in the early 1920s and nicknamed themselves the "Tustin Tillers." In 1957, the name was adopted by a new annual community festival which continues today. The Tustin Tiller Days event is generally held in early October and includes a carnival, a parade, a pancake breakfast, contests, local vendors, live music, and more. Don't expect to see many farmers,... or boats.

Q:   Someone told me some musicians founded Anaheim as "a temple to Bacchus." True?

A:   Sort of, but not exactly. With the dream of creating a wine business in Southern California, a group of several professional musicians—Germans living in San Francisco—started the Los Angeles Vineyard Society, which ultimately led to the founding of the vineyard colony of Anaheim in 1857. But the town’s German pioneers and planners also included lawyers, surveyors, merchants, and many others. Like the Anaheimers of today, they threw great parties but were also no strangers to hard work. When actress Helena Modjeska and her aristocratic artist friends arrived in Anaheim a couple decades later to start their own agricultural colony, their nearly immediate crash-and-burn stood in stark contrast to the success of the Germans.

Q:  What's the most historically important thing to happen in Orange County?

A:  Opinions vary. Orange County's been around 125 years (this month), and many important things have happened here. You could easily argue for our involvement in the space program, or in biotech innovations like the artificial heart. We introduced America to the Valencia orange, Sunkist, Richard Nixon and European Modern architecture. And don't forget the 800-pound mouse in the room: Disneyland's impact on the amusement park and tourism industries, urban planning, family entertainment, and popular and corporate culture is vast and deep.

The Slaying of Frank Wilson by Alfred Wolff at San Juan-by-the-Sea

Santa Fe depot at San Juan-by-the-Sea, 1888. The architecture is extremely similar to the depots at San Marcos and Escondido on the same line. It was located between Las Vegas Ave. and Domingo Ave. (Photo courtesy CSUF Special Collections)

On May 23, 1888 a strange foursome drove a rented wagon into the tiny beach resort of San Juan-by-the-Sea (now part of Dana Point), armed and looking for trouble. They’d left the little village for Santa Ana about a week before but now, ominously, returned to settle “unfinished business.” The group included pharmacy clerk Alfred Rudolph Hugo von Luedinghausen Wolff – generally known as Alfred R. H. Wolff. He was a short, bearded, florid, hook-nosed 29-year-old who’d been busted a year earlier for pretending to be a doctor.

Alfred R. H. Wolff (San Francisco Examiner, May 27, 1888)

Wolff claimed descent from the noble line of Baron von Luedinghausen-Wolff of Prussia and would collect a variety of aliases and name variants over the course of his sordid life. When he used the name Luedinghausen at all, it often morphed into Ludenhauser, Luedinghausen, or Ludenheiser (each with or without “Wolff” or “Wolf” attached to it). And he often provided different given names as well, including, Hans, John, Rudolph, Hugo, or even his father’s name, Oscar. 

With him was his 20-year-old wife, Bertha Marie “Berta” (Maass) Wolff, who was described in the press as a fat but not unattractive little blonde with a turned-up nose. On this day, she carried her baby, "Artie," with her. 

The final member of the party was Alfred Emanuel Peterson, a tailor in his late thirties and a native of Gattenberg, Sweden. The newspapers described as tall and “wild appearing.” 

Alfred E. Peterson (Courtesy Aaron Peterson/FamilySearch)

Some months earlier, Alfred Wolff had returned to California’s Bay Area after a stint at sea aboard the USS Pinta as a pharmacist, only to find Berta with baby Artie, who had been fathered by Peterson. Driven into a fury, Wolf had shot Peterson, inflicting a light neck wound. But soon all was forgiven and, as the San Francisco Chronicle put it, "Wolff's jealousy of Peterson . . . subsided into a complaisance which tolerated the continued presence of the latter as one of the family."

And so it was as an unorthodox family that the four arrived in San Juan-by-the Sea. There, Alfred Wolff sought out fisherman Frank Wilson in the local saloons and ultimately gunned him down on the steps of the Pioneer Hotel. 

The Pioneer Hotel, shown after its move to Newport Beach and its renaming to Sharp’s Hotel. It was originally located on the southeast corner of Santa Fe Ave and Las Vegas Ave in San Juan-by-the Sea. The hotel’s livery stable was located just across the alley to the east. (Photo courtesy Santa Ana Public Library)

RAILROAD BOOM TOWN

San Juan By-The-Sea was one of Southern California’s many short-lived 1880s Railroad Boom towns. San Franciscan civil engineer John P. F. Kuhlman had moved to the site to lay out the town of San Juan-by-the-Sea for the Pacific Land Improvement Co. (the real estate investment branch of the Santa Fe Railroad) which had high hopes for big real estate sales. Born at the peak of the boom in 1887, the village was located along the tracks near the mouth of San Juan Creek. 

Promotional map of San Juan-by-the-Sea, 1888 (Courtesy the Huntington Library)

The first lots went on the market on July 15, 1887. The first trains were advertised to arrive in fall of 1887, but heavy rains delayed completion of the line until January of 1888. Visitors could rent an "elegant" tent for $2 a week or $5 a month.

In late August 1888, a Los Angeles Times correspondent (signing their work “B.A.S.”) described their recent experience at San Juan-by-the-Sea while on one of the many special excursions offered by the Santa Fe Railroad to promote the town: 

“The village consists of about a dozen houses [primarily beach cottages] and between thirty and forty tents of families camping here for the heated term [summer]. The Santa Fe has a very neat depot building here, and excursion trains are switched off on a ‘Y’ on the great sand dyke which stretches from bluff to bluff at the mouth of the San Juan River.

Detail of 1888 "Capistrano Valley" map, showing features that were never completed, like the large blufftop hotel and two parks. The "Widow's House" to the north is the historic "Hide House"/Pryor Adobe. Strangely, railroad tracks are not depicted. (Courtesy the Huntington Library. And thanks to Rick Blake.)

“Here the passengers alight from the cars into a large pavilion [with a chandelier], which affords ample shade and is a good place to enjoy the pleasures of the dance, or a delightful prospect of the sea on one side and the mountains on the other. A band furnishes music here every Sunday. There are two restaurants on the beach that sell good lunches, and a bathhouse that rents suits for bathers. Opposite the depot is a fairly good family hotel, with a livery stable attached. A store of general merchandise, a saloon and the water works of the town are among the other attractions. Last year the streets were all graded, and a big reservoir was built back in the hills. A winding road has been graded up the hill side to the top of the south bluff…

Members of an excursion party at San Juan-by-the-Sea’s pavilion, 1887. (Photo courtesy Santa Ana Public Library)

“…A broad mesa slopes down from [inland] to the sea, breaking off in bold, perpendicular white-faced bluffs from 100 to 150 feet high. The San Juan River [San Juan Creek], a beautiful, limpid stream, runs through this mesa for about twenty miles in a narrow, little valley, from a mile or two miles wide, the line of bluffs being entirely absent at the mouth of the river… The railroad, on emerging from the San Juan Valley, runs along on the beach between the roaring surf on one hand and the great cliffs on the other... Beside the railroad is a fine carriage drive on the hard sand...”

The beach at San Juan-by-the-Sea, late 1880s. (Photo courtesy UC Berkeley, Bancroft Library)

The hotel was the small Pioneer Hotel, owned by Jonathan H. Sharps. And the aforementioned saloon, owned by one Harry Potter, was still housed in a tent.

The Pacific Land & Improvement Co. had already begun excavation for a much larger – and ultimately never built -- blufftop hotel, which it promised would offer a “panoramic view of bewitching and beautiful grandeur, which will excite the wonder and admiration of all Christendom."

Site of the Pioneer Hotel, Aug. 2024. This lot is now a metal-working yard for Doheny Builder’s Supply. (Photo by author)

Neighboring Capistrano’s most prominent citizen, Judge Richard Egan (who also happened to be the local right-of-way agent for the Santa Fe Railroad), tried to encourage San Juan-by-the-Sea to develop into a coastal hub for artists and intellectuals. Although it briefly was a spot where the few “society” folk of what’s now south Orange County came to picnic and attend dances, the village was better described as “rough and tumble” than “high society.” 

Judge Richard Egan: “The King of Capistrano.”

Of “the much-hyphenated development,” historian Jim Sleeper wrote, “…As a special come-on, bull fights were staged each Sunday. A frequent visitor, the late Percy Rice recalled, ‘Buyers even went out with lanterns to buy lots.’ Property sales for a single day once hit $30,000.”

San Juan-by-the-Sea tract map, July 1887. (Courtesy Orange County Archives)

THE TOWN’S FATE

Like so many boom towns, San Juan-by-the-Sea and its fortunes “went up like a rocket and came down like a stick.” The village fizzled out after the railroad boom went bust in the early months of 1888. A poor water supply only hastened its demise. Today, some of the streets still survive, including Victoria Boulevard, Domingo Ave. and Las Vegas Ave.

Promotional art, circa 1888, depicts San Juan-by-the-Sea as it might have been had the real estate boom continued.

In 1892, the long-derelict Pioneer Hotel saw some activity again when Egan talked his friend, famed actress Helena Modjeska, into renting the abandoned hotel for the entire summer. She brought her own furniture, grand piano, pets, servants, and entourage of twenty guests with her. Modjeska said, "the sympathy between nature in the person of these lovely hills and sweet valley and the glorious air is not equaled elsewhere in California."

Theatrical poster of Madam Helena Modjeska. (Courtesy New York Public Library)

San Juan-by-the-Sea would continue to be one of Modjeska favorite spots for beach outings even as the town disappeared. 

In 1893, the Pioneer Hotel was moved to Newport Beach where it operated as Sharps’ Hotel until it burned down in 1910. In 1894, San Juan-by-the Sea’s pavilion was removed, and its depot burned down in an apparent act of arson.

Advertisement for the first excursion train to San Juan-by-the-Sea from San Bernardino. (San Bernardino Times-Index, May 29, 1889)

“Those who have seen San Juan-by-the-Sea in its palmy days cannot bear to look at it now,” wrote Dr. Alexander Hamilton Rowan in an August 1894 article in the Santa Ana Standard. “Wrecks of the hotels, cottages and once-imposing depot are now in ashes and have marred the place beyond recognition. Stupid greed did it. Nothing is left standing by the water tank, the Dutch Hall and an unsightly barn within the limits of the original townsite. It looks for all the world like a desert surrounded by a thousand graveyards.”

In 1895, the Los Angeles Times noted that "The town came too late in the boom,... [and] was recently sold as acreage at a very reasonable price.” Aside from natural beauty, the area’s only remaining claims to fame were as a popular spot for hobos and lobster fishing. 

The Pioneer Hotel (by then "Sharps' Hotel") at it'snew location (under red dot) at Newport Beach, circa 1907. (Photo courtesy Orange County Archives)

By 1907, the area had been re-dubbed “Serra,” in honor of Fr. Junipero Serra, and by 1908 there was just enough of a population scattered across the area to warrant the formation of the Serra School District.

Another attempt to create a town at what had been San Juan-by-the-Sea – called Capistrano Beach – was launched in 1925 but largely failed until oil scion Edward Doheny, Jr. began promoting the area in 1928. The spot was renamed Doheny Park in the wake of Doheny’s 1931 death but reverted to Capistrano Beach in the late 1940s. The rail stop there continued to be called Serra. The area ultimately became part of the City of Dana Point in 1989.

Site of the old San Juan-by-the-Sea Santa Fe depot, at what’s now Doheny Builder’s Supply in Aug. 2024. The depot closed in 1898 and was removed around 1899. (Photo by author)

RAISED BY WOLFFS

Alfred Wolff was born in Magdeburg, Germany on January 4, 1859 to Oscar and Marie Wolff. Sometime after 1862, the family moved to the United States. They may have originally settled in Davenport, Iowa, as Alfred would spend most of his life claiming to be a native of that city. 

Around 1870, the family moved from Detroit to San Francisco. His parents and his uncle, Fritz Bolhmer, later lived on Park St. in nearby Alameda and were reportedly wealthy. Alfred was a sailor by age seventeen and later worked as a hospital nurse and a clerk in his father’s pharmacy. 

In 1884, Wolff left Alameda and went to Winnemucca, Nevada to "follow his profession" as a druggist. It was there he met teenager Berta Marie Maass, who was also a native of Germany and had been born in Perleberg in 1867. 

Winnemuca, Nevada, 1880s (Photo courtesy University of Nevada, Reno, Special Collections)

According to Alfred, Berta was "stuck on him" and pursued him. After "courting" for three weeks, they asked Berta's uncle (her guardian) for permission to marry. The uncle refused to allow his underage niece to marry. But the couple visited the County Clerk anyway, hoping to find a loophole. The Clerk told them that if they gave Berta's OTHER uncle, Charles Lash, fifty dollars, Lash would give them his blessing. They did. He did. And Alfred brought Berta home to Alameda as his wife.

After returning to Alameda, Alfred Wolff struck up a fast friendship with Alfred Peterson and (according to the San Francisco Examiner) they went into business together, robbing graves and selling the bodies to medical schools. 

There was something of an epidemic of grave robbing in the 1870s.

Perhaps looking for a more respectable line of work, Alfred Wolff then tried his luck at sea, serving a fifteen-month stint as doctor's clerk aboard the U.S. Navy’s USS Pinta – an iron-hulled screw tug patrolling the seal fisheries of Alaska. When Wolff returned, he found Berta and Peterson were gone, along with most of the household belongings. His wife and best friend had left a “Dear John” letter for him, explaining (among other things) that while he was at sea Berta had given birth to Peterson’s child: Carl Arthur Emanuel "Artie" Peterson. 

“When I read that letter,” Alfred Wolff told the Examiner, “I was so mad that I wanted to find them and shoot them. But what is the good? If I do, I will be put in prison and be tried and acquitted. It will make too much trouble for me. My father, sister and friends tell me I can shoot them any time I see them and I will be acquitted.” 

The USS Pinta in Juneau, Alaska, 1889. (Photo courtesy U.S. Navy)

Instead, when Alfred Wolff finally tracked down his wife and Peterson, he forgave them both. Then the three adults – along with baby Artie – formed a rather non-traditional family. Predictably, this arrangement was a rocky one, with repeated instances of Peterson being chased off at gunpoint, only to be welcomed back later. In at least two instances, Alfred Wolff was also accused of trying to kill the child (for whom he had no love), although none of the charges stuck.

They later moved to Fort Bragg, California, where outbursts from Alfred Wolff included shooting Peterson in the neck and attempting to kill Berta and (again) the baby. A lack of witnesses kept him out of prison, but he was literally run out of town by an angry mob with tar and feathers. His "family" followed him and together they would soon find their way to San Juan-by-the-Sea.

ARRIVAL AT SAN JUAN BY-THE-SEA

At the end of April 1888, Mr. and Mrs. Wolff, baby Artie and Peterson, arrived in the little beach resort village of San Juan-by-the-Sea from the San Francisco area.  More specifically, they came from Mendocino on a steam ship headed to San Diego. The ship stopped in Capistrano Bay (now the site of Dana Point Harbor) to unload railroad ties. It was there that luckless fisherman Frank Wilson came aboard and told them that they had a better chance of finding a job in San Juan-by-the-Sea than in San Diego. They came ashore at 8:00 p.m.  Wilson offered to let them stay in his one-room cabin until they could find jobs and their own place to live. They immediately moved in.

Steamship in San Francisco, 1880. (Courtesy San Francsico Public Library)

Wilson was in his early-to-mid thirties, a native of Vermont, and a heavy drinker. He told Alfred Wolff he could find work in a drug store, but it turned out there wasn't one in the San Juan area. He told Berta that she could also find work as a dressmaker in the town, but no job opportunities along those lines proved to exist. 

Wilson set up some cloth partitions in his cabin to make his guests feel more comfortable. But he soon realized that he really had more guests than space. Wilson temporarily moved himself into the Pioneer Hotel. Depending on which accounts one reads, it’s unclear whether Wilson moved out immediately or sometime during the next few days. However, he still frequently came back to the cabin for one reason or another. 

Alfred Wolff and Peterson got jobs unloading railroad ties. The Santa Fe was still at work on their new “Surf Line” (Santa Ana to Oceanside) and was presently building the portion of the line from San Juan-by-the-Sea toward Oceanside.

This train, built in 1887, is pictured near San Juan on the “Surf Line” around the 1890s. San Juan-by-the-Sea was the end of the Santa Fe line for the seven months after it was built in 1888, at which point the line was extended further south. (Photo courtesy First American Corp.)

By his second day on the job, Wolff decided the work was too difficult and he quit. He told Berta they were going to leave town. But Wilson convinced the Wolffs to stay, again claiming that Berta could find work as a dressmaker. By then, Wilson had a new reason to keep his guests in town: He’d become infatuated with Mrs. Wolff.

Phillip, Edward, and Mark Mendelson at their dry goods store in San Juan Capistrano. (Photo courtesy El Pueblo Monument, Los Angeles)

The next day, Wilson drove Berta into San Juan Capistrano in Mr. Sharps’ buggy to buy dry goods at Mendelson's store. During that excursion, Wilson asked Berta for money for booze and became belligerent when she refused. Later, his attitude shifted, and he began showing Berta “unwanted attentions”: propositioning her, and hugging and kissing her. Some accounts say he assaulted and “made love” to her. It’s unclear which parts of Wilson’s behavior may have been witnessed by others. But Mr. Mendelson – a well-known and respected member of the community – went to Judge Bacon and requested a warrant against Wilson. Oddly, the Judge refused the request. 

The nearby “big city” of San Juan Capistrano, viewed from the hills west of Trabuco Creek, circa 1887. (Photo courtesy USC Special Collections)

When Alfred Wolff heard about Wilson’s behavior that night, he was enraged. A confrontation ensued in which he later alleged Wilson choked him, beat him, threatened him with a knife and called him a "galoot" and a "son of a bitch." Purportedly, Wilson also told Alfred that Berta wanted a divorce. Then Wilson turned to Berta, expressed his love for her, said he would send her letters, and told her “If you ever want to leave your husband, I will help you." She quickly left the cabin with the baby and went to Santa Ana where she stayed in a hotel. 

Meanwhile, Alfred and Peterson left Wilson’s cabin but stayed in town, having found several days of work on the construction site of a new bathhouse.

Fourth Street: The primary commercial street in the new county seat, Santa Ana, 1889. (Photo by B. F. Conaway courtesy Orange County Archives)

Berta later returned to San Juan-by-the-Sea and asked her husband to return to Santa Ana with her. Soon thereafter, the Wolffs and Peterson all left for Santa Ana together, where Alfred Wolff quickly found a job as a drug store clerk.

RETURNING TO SAN JUAN-BY-THE-SEA

But the unorthodox family wasn’t done with San Juan-By-The-Sea yet.  They returned on May 23rd in a two-horse carriage. Alfred Wolff wore a Navy petty officer's uniform, likely acquired during his time aboard the Pinta. Nominally, they had returned to settle accounts on a freight overcharge with the local station agent, 38-year-old Charles H. Pope, and to collect some of their belongings from Wilson's cabin. 

In reality, they were searching high and low for Wilson. They made inquiries throughout the area for several hours and checked in all the local saloons, asking if anyone had seen him.  

Southbound Amtrak train pauses at the former San Juan-by-the-Sea, Aug. 2024. (Photo by author)

By noon they pulled up to Harry Potter's Saloon in San Juan-By-The-Sea -- a rather makeshift establishment in a tent. Santa Ana bartender Robert L. King saw Alfred Wolff and Peterson there. “The tent is about 300 yards from the pavilion near the beach,” said King. “Wilson's cabin is about a half a mile from the tent on the opposite side from the pavilion. Peterson was in Potter's tent and spoke about making a suit of clothes for Potter. Wolff was talking to Potter. He said he had come down to make a settlement with Wilson. "

THE KILLING

Around 11:00 a.m., undoubtedly thinking the coast was clear, a thoroughly inebriated Wilson had staggered off the train at the Serra train platform. He asked Station Agent Charles Pope if he could borrow money but was refused. He sat around on the platform for about an hour and a half before wobbling over toward the Pioneer Hotel. He reached the hotel just as the Wolffs and Peterson drove up to the building. He spoke with them briefly in the street before they drove around and hitched their horses in the corral about 125 feet behind the hotel.  

The Wolffs and Peterson then walked back around to the front of the hotel, and this time Alfred Wolff confronted Wilson aggressively: 

"You have stated that you have twice kissed my wife unknown to me," said Wolff. 

Wilson said nothing. Berta and Peterson stood about twenty feet away, watching the confrontation.

"You have further stated that you were going to write her letters," Wolff told Wilson.

"Yes,” replied Wilson, "I was going to write to find out about things." 

Alfred Wolff continued, “You have also stated that you were going to make love to my wife." As he said this, he glanced over Wilson's shoulder at railroad watchman George E. Theisen who had looked up from his newspaper to observe the conversation. Alfred Wolff took a step to one side to put Theisen out of the line of fire, reached into his hip pocket, pulled out his Smith & Wesson revolver and aimed it at Wilson. The drunk fisherman turned to run and Wolff shot him in the back, sending him sprawling onto the hotel's porch. He fell on his right side, with his face down and his feet hanging over the edge of the porch. 

Wolff took several steps up toward the porch as Wilson struggled to get up. His second shot also hit Wilson in the back, knocking him flat again. After the first two shots – fired from six to ten feet away – Wilson was still moving his arms and legs around and it seems he may have rolled onto his back. The third and fourth shots missed Wilson and went into the porch. Wilson stopped flailing and just kicked a little after the third shot rang out and stopped moving altogether after the fourth. 

"Take that, you dirty ___ ____ ____," Alfred Wolff told Wilson. "That is what you deserve!" Wolff then walked past Theisen, held up his gun and said something like, "Did you see that, my friend?" to which Theisen said, "Yes, I believe I did." 

The killer stalked away. 

Theisen and W. B. Van Hooser -- a waiter at the hotel and an acquaintance of Wilson -- rushed over to the dying man. Van Hooser turned Wilson over, "so as to let the blood drain from his mouth," he later testified. "It was full of blood, as he lay on his back and he was strangling. I turned him on his right side to let the blood run out, and then on his back when he drew two long breaths and died."

Still-undeveloped Capistrano Bay, site of today's Dana Point Harbor, circa 1910. (Photo courtesy Orange County Archives)

THE ARREST 

After the first two shots, Station Agent Pope ran to his office and tried to reach the authorities in Santa Ana or San Juan Capistrano by telegraph, to no avail.

He then grabbed his Winchester repeating rifle and headed for the hotel. He intercepted the Wolffs and Peterson as they came back around the hotel in their carriage. By this point, civil engineer John Kuhlman had also run the three hundred yards from the railroad office and stood with Pope.

Pope aimed his rifle at the carriage’s passengers and demanded they put up their hands. Alfred Wolff would not. Berta yelled at Pope: "What is it your business? It is none of your funeral! You are no gentleman!" 

Pope told her to shut up and told Alfred Wolff to “throw up your hands you son of a bitch or I'll raise the top of your head!” To drive home the point, Kuhlman pulled out a pistol and fired it into the air several times. 

Peterson, who was driving the carriage, immediately dropped the reigns, jumped down, and put his hands over his head. Kuhlman had him covered. 

The carriage had stopped mid-turn, and the horses kept slowly turning until the wheels clinched, threatening to tip the vehicle over. At this point, Alfred Wolff put his hands up and surrendered. There was no chance of escape.

With one hand holding the rifle aimed at Alfred Wolff's head, Pope used his free hand to remove the pistol from Wolff's pocket. Pope handed off his rifle to a Mr. F. P. Moore (likely a hotel employee) and went back to his office. This time, he successfully reached the Sheriff's office in Santa Ana via telegraph. Then, along with a Mr. Fox, he took the prisoners and their carriage to San Juan Capistrano and handed them over to Constable Edward Weber.

On the short trip to San Juan Capistrano, Alfred Wolff made the first of multiple statements to the effect that he did not regret killing Wilson and that his victim had it coming. “I killed that man,” he said. “He made false statements against my wife.” 

Meanwhile, Berta’s reaction to being held at gunpoint was to blather incessantly. Amongst her ceaseless chatter, however, it was noted that she also made no bones about the killing: “He [Wilson] got no more than he deserved,” she said, “and he [Alfred Wolff] did right to kill him.”

Upon their arrival at the town jail, Constable Weber found a small, nickel-plated pistol still in Peterson's possession. 

BACK TO SANTA ANA IN CHAINS

That night, Santa Ana City Marshal George T. Insley drove down to San Juan and collected the prisoners along with Wilson’s body and escorted them to Santa Ana on the train. There had already been whispers of lynching in San Juan and he wanted the prisoners safely in a secure jail.

During the trip to Santa Ana, Wolff again said he was glad he’d killed Wilson and that he’d been driven to do it. And Berta remained a nonstop chatterbox. By the time they arrived in Santa Ana, Pope said he was ready to strike her if she did not pipe down. Even during the pre-trial hearing, Berta called Pope (who appeared as a witness) a litany of vile names until the San Juan Justice of the Peace, Judge J. E. Bacon, threatened to have her gagged if she didn’t shut up. By this point, Bacon may have regretted his earlier decision not to issue a warrant against Wilson.

Meanwhile, Los Angeles County Coroner James M. Meredith held an inquest on Wilson’s body in Santa Ana, with Dr. C. D. Ball performing the actual autopsy. 

Dr. Charles Dexter Ball: Respected Santa Ana physician and first president of the Orange County Historical Society.

Alfred Wolff was charged with murder, and Berta and Peterson were charged as accessories. A trial -- People vs A. R. H. Wolff, Berta Wolff, A. E. Peterson – was set for August 1, 1888 in Los Angeles Superior Court. (Exactly one year before Orange County split away from Los Angeles.) But the trial was delayed a couple months.

BEFORE THE COURT

The trial ultimately was held from October 10th to October 30th before Judge William P. Gardiner and a jury in Department 2 of Los Angeles Superior Court. The jury was composed of Charles Charnock, W. Dockstader, Frank L. Floyd, Frank A. Bliss, F. B. Alderson, J. P. Cannon, J. S. Talkington, C. J. Morrison, J. J. Vollikutt, Jacob M. Rogers, Charles W. March, and George E. Torrey.

Los Angeles County Courthouse, circa 1889 (Photo courtesy USC Libraries)

Lead defense attorney Col. Guilford Wiley Wells’ only real argument was that Wilson was about to draw a knife and attack. Wolff admitted in court to killing Wilson, but said it was self-defense. He and Berta both said that Wilson was reaching for a large knife in his pants. But it soon came to light that the knife in question was resting on a shelf in Wilson’s cabin at the time of the killing.

 Col. Guilford Wiley Wells, a Union Army veteran and former Congressman from Mississippi, defended the Wolffs and Peterson in court. (Photo by Matthew Brady)

District Attorney James R. Dupuy’s job was relatively easy. He had the killer’s confession and a town full of witnesses. Even Berta and Peterson pointed the blame at Alfred Wolff while casting themselves as innocent bystanders. 

James R. Dupuy, Los Angeles District Attorney (Photo courtesy Metropolitan News-Enterprise)

Meanwhile, the Los Angeles press covered the trial closely, with each newspaper giving it two or three columns a day. The Los Angeles Times ran such even-handed headlines as, “Wicked Wolff” and “The Murderer Wolff.”

Ultimately, Alfred Wolff was found guilty of the reduced charge of manslaughter and was sentenced to nine years at San Quentin State Prison. Co-defendants Berta Wolff and Alfred Peterson were found innocent.

Los Angeles Times, May 25, 1888.

Berta divorced Alfred Wolff in Los Angeles Superior Court on June 14, 1889, on the grounds that he was a felon. She seemed very pleased to quickly untie the knot. A week later, she married Peterson in San Pedro.

PRISON

Meanwhile, at San Quentin, Wolff was assigned to duty as a “cell tender.” According to prison records, he did a satisfactory job and through good behavior he was on track to get out of prison after six years rather than the full nine to which he’d been sentenced.  

But from the moment he arrived at San Quentin, Wolff refused to take his sentence lying down and he soon had a plan to petition for a pardon. To pay the associated lawyers’ fees, Wolff’s seventy-year-old immigrant father, Oscar H. Wolff Von Luedinghausen, began stealing money from his employer, the New Zealand Insurance Company in Alameda, California. When caught and brought up on twenty charges of embezzlement, Oscar stated outright that he needed the money to help his son. 

San Quentin, circa 1880s (Photo courtesy Marin History Museum)

By whatever means, eventually enough money was gathered to pay the needed legal work. After almost a year at San Quentin, Alfred Wolff submitted the following paid announcement to the Los Angeles Herald:

NOTICE: To the Hon. Frank P. Kelly, Esq., District Attorney of Los Angeles County … I will on the 15th day of November 1890, or as soon thereafter as the same may be heard, apply to the Governor … for a pardon of the crime of which I was convicted … on the 30th day of October 1888; and for which I was sentenced to nine years imprisonment in the State prison. Dated, October 8th, 1890.  A. R. H. Wolff.

Indeed, he did apply for a pardon. A petition, sent to Governor Robert Waterman from eleven of the trial’s jurors, claimed that “subsequently acquired knowledge” would have changed how they’d voted. They now claimed to know that Berta and Peterson had goaded Alfred Wolff – who “was weak-minded, hot tempered, and of a disposition easily persuaded” -- into killing Wilson. The couple’s goal had supposedly been to send Alfred Wolff either to his maker (at Wilson’s hand) or to prison – either of which would allow Berta to divorce her husband and marry Peterson. The jurors also said they wouldn’t have voted for a manslaughter conviction if they’d known it would result in a sentence as harsh as nine years in prison. 

Based on the jurors’ petition and the strength of Wolff’s good behavior in prison, Judge Gardiner himself joined in the petition as well.

On November 14, 1890, A. M. Armstrong, the San Francisco attorney hired to prepare Wolff’s pardon petition, sent a collection of pleas and petitions to the Governor’s secretary. In his own cover letter, Armstrong stated that Alfred Wolff had largely been convicted on the testimony of Berta Wolff and Alfred Peterson. He also said of the trial, “…that the Jury stood eight for the acquittal of said Wolff, and four for the conviction, and that the compromise verdict was determined upon, and rendered, as set forth in the Jurors’ Petition for said Wolff’s Pardon: that several of said jurymen personally informed affiant that they rendered said verdict of guilty because of public opinion and popular prejudice against said Alfred R. Wolff, and in the belief that owing to said popular prejudice another Jury would do likewise, should the then acting Jury ‘hang,’ that they believed Mrs. Wolff and Peterson should have been convicted, but that they framed their testimony so as to convict Alfred R. Wolff and acquit themselves.”

Alfred Wolff was pardoned by Governor Waterman on Dec. 30, 1890. The pardon itself – signed by Waterman – included the following as justification:

“The entire Jury and Judge W. P. Gardiner who presided at the trial, have recommended the pardon on the grounds that Wolff was the victim of a conspiracy and was convicted on perjured testimony and they State… that the evidence to substanciate (sic) these views has come to light since the conviction.”

Gov. Robert Whitney Waterman also signed off on the creation of Orange County in 1889. (Photo courtesy CSU Chico Library)

Genealogist Hartmut Verheyen, who has studied the case, speculates that the business and political success of Alfred Wolff’s uncle, Alameda County pioneer Fritz Boehmer, may have also played a role in garnering support for a pardon. 

LIFE AFTER PRISON

Berta and Peterson moved to Ogden, Utah. Their marriage lasted until April 1902, when Peterson was granted a divorce from Berta on grounds of desertion. Their child, Artie Peterson, died of an accidental electric shock in Ogden, Utah at the age of eleven. 

As she’d hoped to do while in San Juan-by-the-Sea, Berta became a well-known dressmaker in Ogden. In 1904, she married merchant Hugh Friede, who she’d met while traveling in Germany and who then moved to America to be with her. They were married in Utah by a minister of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Ultimately, the couple moved back to their native Germany. Berta died in Berlin on April 12, 1941.

Like Berta, Peterson remarried. In July of 1897 Peterson was back in Los Angeles at least long enough to marry Utah native and fellow Mormon, Mary Sorenson. She was thirty years his junior. They would raise six sons in Ogden, where Alfred worked repairing cars in a railroad shop. Peterson died in Ogden in December 1922.

After his release from prison, Wolff enlisted in the U.S. Army on March 24, 1891. The Indian Wars were in their waning years and Private Wolff of Battalion L, 5th U.S. Artillery was initially assigned to Fort Spokane, Washington -- on the "Indian frontier" -- where the Army policed the Spokane and Colville Reservations and acted as a buffer between the native peoples and the growing number of white settlers. 

Fort Spokane, Washington, circa 1895.

In April 1892, Wolff was transferred to the Army’s Hospital Corps. It’s likely his pharmacy skills were once again put to use. It’s unclear if (or for how long) Wolff remained at Fort Spokane, but his discharge, in June 1894, was issued at Fort Sherman, at Coeur d'Alene, Idaho. 

Like Fort Spokane, Fort Sherman’s mission had been to quell Indian hostilities. But such hostilities were mostly a thing of the past by the time Wolff got to Idaho. In fact, the only noteworthy action seen by the troops at Fort Sherman in the early 1890s was in 1892, when they were sent to Wardner, Idaho, to quell riots and other violence stemming from a mining strike. The troops occupied the area and aided civil authorities in arresting more than six hundred unionized miners and their sympathizers.

Immediately after his discharge from the Army, Wolff married Katherine Arnold on July 2, 1894. They would have four children together. 

Wolff enlisted in the National Guard (California Company F, 5th Infantry Regiment, 2nd Brigade) in November 1896 and served at the Presidio in San Francisco. He was honorably discharged in April 1897. 

Wolff was working as a clerk when, in October 1898, he got a job as a mailman in Alameda County. In the early days of 1905, he was reprimanded for being abusive and for disrespectful language to people on his mail route. When asked by his supervisor to return paperwork relating to the reprimand, Wolff refused, resulting in a five-day suspension. But Wolff showed up for work anyway and made a scene when he was turned away. The police were called to resolve the situation and Wolff was fired “for the good of the service.” By late February he was completely broke.

In 1908 Wolff applied for a job as a substitute letter carrier in the San Francisco area. He claimed he’d never worked for the United State Postal Service before and was hired. In May of the following year the jig was up and he was arrested for perjury. 

At the request of Mrs. Clara von Luedinghausen (Oscar’s wife and Alfred Wolff’s stepmother), Katherine Wolff began helping care for the home of her stepson (from her previous marriage), Oakland planning mill foreman Louis Graff. Gradually, Katherine spent more and more time at Graff's house until she finally deserted her husband entirely. In July 1909 Alfred Wolff sued Graff for $10,000 damages for the loss of his wife's affections. 

Graff denied knowledge of any problem and told the press that Mr. Wolff was "afflicted with numerous troubles of [a] wholly imaginary sort." Wolff did not receive $10,000 and soon found himself divorced again. There were several lawsuits involving custody of the children. But when Katherine died in 1912, a judge determined Wolff was not fit to raise his children and placed them with guardians.

On April 4, 1925, at age 66, Alfred Wolff married Adella Darling Duryer (five years his junior) at Swartz Creek, Michigan.

Barracks of the Pacific Branch of the National Home for Disabled Veteran Soldiers, Los Angeles. Designed by noted architect Stanford White and completed in 1888. (Photo courtesy Workman & Temple Family Homestead Museum)

Back in California by 1927, Wolff filed for his military pension as an "Army invalid." He had become totally deaf in his left ear and somewhat deaf in the right ear. He died April 9, 1930, in Los Angeles, where he lived in the Pacific Branch National Military Home. He is buried in Los Angeles National Cemetery. 

LAST GASP FOR THE OLD WEST

In the greater scheme of things, the killing of Frank Wilson had no more historical impact or significance than many other murders in the history of Southern California. But the story is worthy of attention for numerous reasons. 

First, it was one of the only notable incidents to arise from short-lived San Juan-by-the-Sea and it sheds light not just on this largely forgotten town but on the ephemeral railroad boom towns of the 1880s in general. 

The crime was also remarkable considering its time and place. The entire area which would become Orange County (less than a year later) had only about 15,000 residents, three incorporated cities, and no paved roads. A murder was still a major news story. Despite still retaining an air of the Wild West, in 1888 only 270 criminal cases were tried in all of Los Angeles County. Of those, only thirteen were for murder. And of those murders, only four murders took place in the region that would become Orange County (the other three taking place in Garden Grove and Anaheim). The shooting of Frank Wilson was a major story on the West Coast and newspapers throughout the West covered the story. 

Despite the Orange County area’s sleepy reputation at the time, such tales point out that it was hardly immune from the “the Wild West” atmosphere and the rough, eccentric, and often violent element that inhabited more famous spots like Deadwood, South Dakota and Tombstone, Arizona in greater numbers. 

The killing of Wilson and the events surrounding it took place just as the Railroad Boom brought prosperity to the area and immediately before Orange County separated from Los Angeles County. Soon, growing cities, a larger population, and a higher degree of civilization would be brought to bear on the area. There would be a sheriff’s department, jail, and courts located in Santa Ana rather than an additional thirty-some miles away (on rutted dirt roads) in Los Angeles. And unlike the Los Angeles authorities – which cared little about the “cow country” to the south – the new Orange County authorities would not tolerate “the Wild West.” There was, as historian Stephanie George describes it, “an expectation of behavior that came with no longer being in the middle of nowhere.”

One of the few last gasps of Old West-style lawlessness to stain Orange County following Wilson’s death occurred in 1892, when laborer Francisco Torres murdered Madame Modjeska’s ranch manager, the popular William McKelvey. (In fact, Modjeska learned of the murder during her extended stay at San Juan-by-the-Sea.) Torres was locked up in the new county’s makeshift jail and an extra guard was posted, but a mob broke him out and hanged him from a telegraph pole. 

Francisco Torres. (Photo courtesy Santa Ana Public Library)

The Orange County Board of Supervisors -- which was presently faced with creating a wide array of infrastructure for the new county – soon elevated the building of a secure jail to the top of their to-do list. Even the hoped-for Courthouse – which would house almost every county government office – would have to wait. They wanted to end frontier lawlessness like the Torres lynching once and for all. 

Although reflecting a turning point in history, the story of the murder at San Juan-by-the-Sea also shows that some things never change. Its characters and relationships are reminiscent of daytime “trash TV” talk shows over a century later. Violent crime, substance-abuse, undiagnosed psychological problems, people living on the fringes of society, and the related community upheaval are still very much with us.

View of former San Juan-by-the-Sea from across the tracks, Aug. 2024. (Photo by author)

Big thanks to Stephanie George, Hartmut Verheyen and Eric Plunkett. Thanks also to Keith Johannes, Paul R. Spitzzeri, Yvonne Scholz, Robert McKenney, Stephen E. Donaldson, Jill Thrasher and her staff at the Sherman Library, Cliff Prather and the staff of the California State Archives.

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