Colonel Ed Fletcher Collection, 1881-1965

Summary

Creators:

Fletcher, Ed, 1872-1955

Abstract:

This collection contains papers pertaining to Colonel Ed Fletcher’s business in real estate, water development, and other commercial ventures in San Diego County in the late nineteenth to mid-twentieth centuries, as well some of his personal papers.

Extent:

13.5 Linear feet (29 boxes)

Language:

Preferred citation:

Colonel Ed Fletcher Collection, MS 135, San Diego History Center Document Collection, San Diego, CA.

Background

Scope and content:

This collections contains papers pertaining to Colonel Ed Fletcher’s work in real estate, water development, and other business ventures in San Diego County in the late nineteenth to mid-twentieth century, as well some of his personal papers.

Fletcher’s real estate papers include numerous deeds, mortgages, correspondence, maps, and other business papers regarding his management of lands around Encinitas, Camp Kearny, Lake Hodges, Del Mar, Solana Beach, Mount Helix, Poway, San Dieguito, and the City of San Diego. The Camp Kearny papers relate specifically to Ed Fletcher’s dispute with the United States Army after he leased them the land during World War I. Additionally, this collection contains some financial documents, business agreements, and publicity for the Ed Fletcher Company.

Fletcher’s water development papers include deeds, correspondence, financial documents, maps, and project plans generated by his involvement with the La Mesa, Lemon Grove, and Spring Valley Irrigation District, the San Dieguito Irrigation District, and the Santa Fe Irrigation District, as well as the Cuyamaca Water Company, the Pamo Water Company, the San Dieguito Mutual Water Company, the Sherman Water Company, and the Volcan Land and Water Company. There are also legal papers from several of his court cases: the settlement of the James A. Murray estate, lawsuits with the City of San Diego regarding San Diego River rights, and a lawsuit by John Treanor regarding the purchase of the San Pasqual Ranch property. Additionally, this collection contains correspondence and research notes accumulated by Ed Fletcher for several more water projects such as the La Jolla-Del Mar Pipeline .

This collection also contains meeting minutes, stocks, and financial papers regarding film productions by Grossmont Studios (previously S&L Studios), as well as minutes, financial papers, stocks, and business ledgers from the San Diego Independent Publishing Company.

Ed Fletcher’s personal papers include correspondence, financial papers, brochures and pamphlets, and numerous photographs of his family, his friends, his San Diego properties, and some of his travels.

At the end of this collection, a set of catalog cards has been included that was produced by an earlier collection processing project (see Comments).

Biographical / historical:

Ed Fletcher was born in Littleton, Massachusetts on December 31, 1872. He came to San Diego in 1888 and first found work selling produce in the city and surrounding countryside. He opened his first commission business with Omer C. Smith in 1894, and subsequently organized the Ed Fletcher Company. In 1896 he married Mary C. Batchelder and they had ten children: Catherine (Fletcher Taylor), Edward Jr., Charles, Lawrence, Willis, Stephen, Ferdinand, Mary Louise (Pitts Mack), Eugene, and Virginia.

Ed Fletcher and his business associates were responsible for developing a great deal of real estate in San Diego County, including lands in the San Luis Rey Valley, Grossmont, Fletcher Hills, Mount Helix, Del Mar, Pine Hills, Cuyamaca Lake, Lake Hodges, and Solana Beach. He was instrumental in developing all state and national highways leading into San Diego County, as well as the road from Mountain Springs to Imperial Valley, the plank road from Holtsville to Yuma, the Yuma highway bridge, and the highway from Gila Bend to Casa Grande.

In addition to his real estate work, Ed Fletcher was instrumental in developing the majority of San Diego County’s water systems, including the Cuyamaca Water System on the San Diego River (supplying the La Mesa Irrigation District and City of San Diego), the Volcan Water System (including Lake Henshaw Dam), the San Dieguito Water System, and the Lake Hodges and San Dieguito Dams (supplying San Dieguito and Santa Fe Irrigation District plus part of the City of San Diego).

Ed Fletcher’s civic work included service with the Finance Committee, the Y.M.C.A., the San Diego Club, and the California National Guard (from whence the nickname “Colonel” stuck). He was a director of the 1915 Panama-California Exposition, and in 1917 he successfully raised funds to save the Exposition buildings from destruction. He was later a director of the 1935 California Pacific International Exposition. He served as California State Senator from 1935-1947, during which time he authored the law creating the San Diego County Water authority and the law transferring Mission Bay Park lands to the City of San Diego.

Though he was a monumental figure in San Diego’s land and water development, Ed Fletcher’s activities did not proceed without conflict. Through the Cuyamaca Water Company he was embroiled in decades of lawsuits with the City of San Diego regarding rights to the water of the San Diego River.

Ed Fletcher passed away on October 15, 1955.

Processing information:

Collection processed by Samantha Mills on January 16, 2013.

Collection processed as part of grant project supported by the Council on Library and Information Resources (CLIR) with generous funding from The Andrew Mellon Foundation.

Arrangement:

Collection is arranged into 33 series:

Series I: Deeds and Mortgages

Series II: Real Estate: Avocado Acres

Series III: Real Estate: Camp Kearny

Series IV: Real Estate: Lake Hodges

Series V: Real Estate: Lake Hodges and Del Mar Road

Series VI: Real Estate: Lockwood Mesa / Solana Beach

Series VII: Real Estate: Mount Helix

Series VIII: Real Estate: Poway Ranch

Series IX: Real Estate: San Dieguito

Series X: Real Estate: Ed Fletcher Company

Series XI: Real Estate: Miscellanea

Series XII: La Mesa, Lemon Grove, and Spring Valley Irrigation District

Series XIII: San Dieguito Irrigation District

Series XIV: Santa Fe Irrigation District

Series XV: Cuyamaca Water Company

Series XVI: Cuyamaca Water Company: James A. Murray Estate

Series XVII: Cuyamaca Water Company: San Diego River Rights

Series XVIII: Pamo Water Company

Series XIX: San Diego County Water Company: San Pasqual Ranch Issue

Series XX: San Dieguito Mutual Water Company

Series XXI: Sherman Water Company

Series XXII: Volcan Land and Water Company

Series XXIII: Water Projects: La Jolla – Del Mar Pipeline

Series XXIV: Water Projects: Mission Gorge Dam Site #3

Series XXV: Water Projects: Santa Ysabel Creek and Black Canyon Creek

Series XXVI: Water Projects: Sutherland Reservoir

Series XXVII: Water Projects: Sweetwater System

Series XXVIII: Water Projects: Yuma Mesa Grapefruit Project

Series XXIX: Water Projects: Miscellanea

Series XXX: Grossmont Studios

Series XXXI: San Diego Independent Publishing Company

Series XXXII: Personal Papers

Series XXXIII: Catalog Cards

Items within each series are arranged by subject.

Rules or conventions:

Describing Archives: A Content Standard

Related resources

Related material:

Colonel Ed Fletcher Family Collection (C051) in SDHC Photograph Collection.

Separated material:

Map of "Aerial route of the United State - U.S. Army Air Service April 1919" previously separated to the SDHC Map Collection.

Other descriptive data:

The collection was donated in 1970 and initial processing began in 1978 through a grant-funded project. Collection materials were organized into file groups based on subject matter, material type, and time frame. A set of catalog cards was produced to record and describe the collection. The first box of catalog cards contains subject cards listing the file groups where relevant documents for those subjects can be found. This box also contains overview cards describing the general contents of each file group. The remaining four boxes of catalog cards contain individual cards describing each item in each file group. All five catalog card boxes are included in this collection.

The collection was reprocessed in 2012/2013 as part of the CLIR grant-funded project. Collection was rearranged to best reflect the subject relevance of the collection's materials. Penciled notes, identifying the file group and document number from the first processing project, remain on each document in the collection. The identifiers link the document to its original file group and document number for cross-referencing in the catalog cards.

Indexed terms

Subjects:

Account books
Actions and defenses
Administration of estates
Blueprints
Bonds
Evidence (Law)
Flood dams and reservoirs
Invoices
Land companies
Land grants
Land titles
Leases
Mortgages
Motion picture studios
Municipal bonds
Photographs
Pipelines
Publishers and publishing
Railroads
Rain and rainfall
Rainfall data
Real estate development
Real property
Water development, supply, and management
Water rights
Maps

Names:

Cuyamaca Water Company.
Ed Fletcher Company.
Grossmont Park Co..
Grossmont Studios.
La Mesa, Lemon Grove, and Spring Valley Irrigation District (Calif.).
Morse Construction Co..
Pamo Water Company.
San Diego Athletic Club.
San Diego County Water Company.
San Diego Independent Publishing Company.
San Dieguito Irrigation District (Calif.).
San Dieguito Mutual Water Company.
Santa Fe Irrigation District (Calif.).
Santa Fe Land Improvement Company.
Sherman Water Company.
United States. Army.
Volcan Land and Water Company.
War Department Claims Board.
Canfield, C. A.
Crouch, C. C.
Fletcher, Ed, 1872-1955
Fletcher, Mary
Haldorn, Stuart
Harbell, C. O.
Henshaw, William Griffith, 1860-1924
Hodges, W. E.
Murray, James A.
Murray, Mary H.
Salmons, Frank
Stern, Charles
Treanor, John

Places:

Black Canyon Creek (Calif.)
Camp Kearny
Carlsbad (Calif.)
Carroll Dam (Calif.)
Del Mar (Calif.)
El Cajon (Calif.)
Encinitas (Calif.)
Fletcher Hills (Calif.)
Hodges, Lake (Calif.)
La Jolla (San Diego, Calif.)
La Mesa (Calif.)
Lockwood Mesa (Calif.)
Mission Gorge Dam (Calif.)
Mount Helix (Calif.)
Murray Dam (Calif.)
Oceanside (Calif.)
Poway (Calif.)
Ramona (Calif.)
San Diego (Calif.)
San Dieguito (Encinitas, Calif.)
San Juan Basin (N.M. and Colo.)
San Luis Rey Valley (Calif.)
Santa Ysabel Creek (Calif.)
Solana Beach (Calif.)
Sutherland Reservoir (Calif.)
Yuma (Ariz.)

Restrictions:

This collection is open for research.

Terms of access:

The San Diego History Center (SDHC) holds the copyright to any unpublished materials. SDHC Library regulations do apply.

Preferred citation:

Colonel Ed Fletcher Collection, MS 135, San Diego History Center Document Collection, San Diego, CA.

Location of this collection:

San Diego History Center (formerly San Diego Historical Society)

1649 El Prado, Suite 3

San Diego, CA 92101, US

Contact:

(619) 232-6203

Website