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Finding Aid to the Llano del Rio Records, 1911-1969
MS 1304
MS 1304
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Table of contents
Title: Llano del Rio records
Date (inclusive): 1911-1969
Collection Number: MS 1304
Creator:
Llano Colony (Secular community)
Repository:
California Historical Society
678 Mission Street
San Francisco, CA, 94105
415-357-1848
reference@calhist.org
URL: http://www.californiahistoricalsociety.org/
Language of Materials: Collection materials are in English.
Extent:
5 boxes,
1 oversize folder
(2.0 Linear feet)
Abstract: Most of the collection was collected by longtime
colonist, Walter Millsap, and includes papers from the early years of the colony in
California and Louisiana (1911-1930), correspondence between Millsap and other
colonists (1920-1958), and files from the assets recovery attempt (1959-1969). Board
of directors' files (1959-1969) include minutes and papers, meeting proxies, and
other documents. Correspondence is chiefly between Millsap and over 100 other
colonists.
CHS is not taking appointments for research at this time. Please check the Library's website updates:
https://californiahistoricalsociety.org/collections/north-baker-research-library/
Copyright has not been assigned to the California Historical Society. All
requests for permission to publish or quote from manuscripts must be submitted
in writing to the Director of Research Collections. Permission for publication
is given on behalf of the California Historical Society as the owner of the
physical items and is not intended to include or imply permission of the
copyright holder, which must also be obtained by the reader.
[Identification of item], Llano del Rio Records, MS 1304. California Historical
Society, Manuscript Collection.
Collection also available on microfilm (NEG 23: 1-5).
Photographs transferred to Photography
Collection--Restricted Materials--General Subjects--Utopian
Communities.
Paul Kagan Papers
MS
3121
The following terms have been used to index the description of this collection in
the library's online public access catalog.
Collective settlements--California, Southern.
Collective settlements--Louisiana.
Millsap, Walter,
1886-1971.
Minutes.
Utopian socialism--California, Southern.
Utopian socialism--Louisiana.
Paul Kagan collected most of this material from Walter Millsap before his death
in 1971. See Series 2 folder 28, Series 3 folder 147 for material given by
Mellie Calvert. All of this was transferred to CHS in 1972.
No additions are expected.
Collection processed by CHS staff.
History of the Llano del Rio Cooperative Colony
The colony of Llano del Rio was formed in 1914 by Job Harriman, a socialist lawyer
and politician from Los Angeles. Harriman sought to provide an economic underpinning
to the ideas of socialism by organizing a cooperative colony. Harriman and a group
of associates sought land for the site of the colony, settling on 10,000 acres in
the Antelope Valley, north of Los Angeles. They incorporated the Llano del Rio
company in California in 1914, and later reincorporated under Nevada law in
1916.
Harriman placed advertisements in
Western Comrade and
the
California Social-Democrat, soliciting
individuals and families interested in participating in the venture. Membership was
achieved through a $500 purchase of 2,000 shares of stock in the company, the
balance to be paid in labor at a variety of jobs available at the colony.
The colony grew quickly, burgeoning to a thousand members by 1917. The first year saw
colonists living in tents while permanent structures were built - adobe houses and a
hotel boasting electricity and indoor plumbing. The colony sought to be as
self-sufficient as possible, and in addition to the cultivation of fruit trees,
melons, potatoes, beans and other crops produced dairy, poultry and pork products,
and had an apiary and a rabbitry. Colonists earned four dollars a day for their
work, a dollar of which paid off the balance of membership, and the rest going
toward living expenses.
By 1917, it became clear that the choice of site had been a mistake. Though
hydrological surveys indicated that sufficient water supplies existed to irrigate up
to 40,000 acres, the colony soon experienced a serious shortfall in water. Small
rainfall, an insufficient resevoir, and limited rights to water from Big Rock Creek
forced the colony to abandon the site and seek greener pastures elsewhere.
The Llano colonists boarded a chartered train, transporting themselves, machinery and
livestock to Stables, Louisiana, an anbandoned mill town, renaming it Newllano. Some
colonists were to remain in California, and develop the land to focus on fruit tree
production. The following year however, creditors began involuntary bankruptcy
proceedings against Llano, and the colony's California assets were foreclosed
upon.
Job Harriman returned to California, where he died in 1925. George Pickett stepped in
to lead Newllano until it declared bankruptcy in 1936, falling apart completely by
1938. An attempt to recover their assets was begun in 1959 by Pickett and
others.
Sources
Hoffman, A. (1961) A look at Llano: Experiment in Economic Socialism.
California Historical Society Quarterly. 40(3),
215-236
Huxley, A. & Kagan, P. (1972) A Double Look at Utopia: the Llano del Rio
Colony.
California Historical Society Quarterly.
51(2) 117-154
The collection is divided into two time periods. The first includes papers collected
by Walter Millsap from the early years in California and Louisiana, 1911-1930. The
second involves an attempt beginning in 1959 by George Pickett, Job Harriman's
successor, to reaquire the assets the Newllano, LA colony lost in 1936 bankruptcy
preceedings.
Administrative files from the first time period include documents pertaining to
incorporation and the issuance of stock, employment agreements and organizational
chart, memos and official correspondence, expense reports from the move by rail from
Palmdale, CA to Stables, LA.
Other materials representative of daily life in Llano include meal tickets, pamphlets
written by members pertaining to personal experiences and the economic and
organizational hardships of the colony, newspaper clippings, and other ephemera. A
survey of the Big Rock Creek Irrigation District is located in oversize map case
storage.Correspondence is from members and researchers such as Clark Kerr and Upton
Sinclair interested in the goings-on of the colony.
The second time period, 1959-1969, consists largely of minutes and meeting papers,
stockholder papers, and a proposed charter for the reorganization of the colony.
Correspondence from this period includes letters from ex-members, as well as those
desiring to continue with the colony.
Arranged into 4 series:
The first two series includes materials dating from 1911 to 1959.
Series 1: Administrative Files
Series 2: Correspondence
The second two series include materials from 1959 to 1969, when George T. Picket
attempted to regain the assests of Llano Colony after a 1936 bankruptcy filing.
Series 3: Board of Directors' Files
Series 4: Correspondence