Bixby Knolls is a neighborhood in

Long Beach, California Long Beach is a coastal city in southeastern Los Angeles County, California, United States. It is the list of United States cities by population, 44th-most populous city in the United States, with a population of 451,307 as of 2022. A charter ci ...

, named after the

Bixby family The Bixby family is an American family that was heavily involved in the development of California ranches and real estate in the 19th and 20th centuries. Through various companies, they controlled at one time or another large swathes of California ...

Location

Bixby Knolls is an area of Long Beach adjoining North Long Beach to the north, California Heights on the southeast, Wrigley on the southwest. Its approximate boundaries are the

405 Freeway Interstate 405 (I-405, locally referred to as the 405) is a major north–south auxiliary Interstate Highway in Southern California. The entire route is known as the northern segment of the San Diego Freeway. I-405 is a bypass auxiliary ...

to the south (or Wardlow Avenue), Del Amo Blvd to the north (or the

Southern Pacific The Southern Pacific (or Espee from the railroad initials) was an American Class I railroad network that existed from 1865 to 1996 and operated largely in the Western United States. The system was operated by various companies under the names ...

railroad tracks), the

Los Angeles River The Los Angeles River (), historically known as by the Tongva and the by the Spanish, is a major river in Los Angeles County, California. Its headwaters are in the Simi Hills and Santa Susana Mountains, and it flows nearly from Canoga Park ...

and the Lakewood city boundary to the west of Atlantic Avenue, south of Bixby Road. Atlantic Avenue and Long Beach Boulevard are the main north–south arteries through the neighborhood. The neighborhood includes the Los Cerritos - Virginia Country Club and the original

Los Cerritos Ranch House Los Cerritos Ranch House, also known as Rancho Los Cerritos or Casa de los Cerritos, in Long Beach, California, was "the largest and most impressive adobe residence erected in southern California during the Mexican period". Los Cerritos means " ...

historic site.

Description

The majority of the homes in the area were custom-built between 1920 and 1940, providing a variety of home architecture. Small shops and restaurants dot a strip of Atlantic Avenue south of San Antonio and north of the 405 Freeway, as well as on the streets surrounding this main thoroughfare. The neighborhood is also served by several nearby grocery stores and shopping centers. Bixby Knolls has an active local community. The Helen Borgers Theater, home to the Long Beach Shakespeare Company, and the Historical Society of Long Beach, are housed on Atlantic Avenue, just north of Carson Street. On the west side of the neighborhood, adjacent to the Los Angeles River, is the large Virginia Country Club, which is also the location of the

Rancho Los Cerritos Rancho Los Cerritos was a 1834 land grant in present-day southern Los Angeles County and Orange County, California The grant was the result of a partition of the Rancho Los Nietos grant. "Cerritos" means "little hills" in Spanish. The rancho l ...

historic site.

Schools

The

Long Beach Unified School District The Long Beach Unified School District is a school district headquartered in Long Beach, California, United States. Established in 1885, Long Beach Unified School District educates 64,000 students in 84 public schools in the cities of Long ...

serves Bixby Knolls. Bixby Knolls area public schools include Longfellow Elementary School, Los Cerritos Elementary School, Burroughs Elementary School. and Hughes Middle School. Several private schools are also in the area including St. Barnabas School. For high school, the home school is

Long Beach Polytechnic High School Long Beach Polytechnic High School, founded in 1895 as Long Beach High School, is a four-year public high school located at 1600 Atlantic Avenue in Long Beach, California, United States. The school serves portions of Long Beach, including Bixby ...

, but students can apply to any eligible program in the Long Beach Unified School District.

Parks

The Bixby Knolls Park is in the area. Other parks include Los Cerritos Park in the Los Cerritos neighborhood and Somerset Park in the Bixby Terrace neighborhood.

Historical places and notable architecture

Southern California chain

Robert's Robert's was a department store based in Long Beach, California. The chain began when Morris Burman opened the first store in East Los Angeles. In 1950, Burman bought an existing store in North Long Beach at 5350 Long Beach Boulevard, and opene ...

department store had its flagship store in Bixby Knolls at 4450 Atlantic Avenue. It opened in December 1967 and was 52,000 sq. ft. in size. closed in 1994, and sat empty for 15 years. It was razed only in 2009, to make way for a new

Marshalls Marshalls, Inc. is an American chain of discount store, off-price department stores owned by TJX Companies. Marshalls has over 1,000 American stores, including larger stores named Marshalls Mega Store (stores operating with HomeGoods combined), ...

. The loss of the store was long symbolic of the decline of Bixby Knolls as a retail center, and in a broader sense. The Petroleum Club operated between 1955 and 2019. Notable architecture includes:

References

External links

We Love Bixby KnollsBixby Knolls Business Improvement Association
{{coord, 33.8356, N, 118.1767, W, source:wikidata-and-enwiki-cat-tree_region:US, display=title Neighborhoods in Long Beach, California