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 real estate, much of it derived from Mexican land grants. Over several generations, their holdings included
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 ...
and
Rancho Los Alamitos
Rancho Los Alamitos takes its name from an 1834 Mexico, Mexican partition of the 1784 Rancho Los Nietos, a Ranchos of California, Spanish concession, covering an area in present-day California's southwestern Los Angeles County, California, Los ...
, and parts of
Rancho San Justo
Rancho San Justo was a Mexican land grant in present-day San Benito County, California given in 1839 by Governor Juan B. Alvarado to José Antonio Castro. The lands of the rancho include current day Hollister.
History
General José Castr ...
and
Rancho Palos Verdes
Rancho Palos Verdes is a coastal city in southern Los Angeles County, California, United States. Incorporated on September 7, 1973, the city has a population of 42,287 as reported in the 2020 United States census. The city sits atop the bluffs o ...
, totaling well over 100,000 acres. Parts of the towns of
Long Beach
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 ...
,
Bellflower,
Paramount
Paramount (from the word ''paramount'' meaning "above all others") may refer to:
Entertainment and music companies
* Paramount Global, also known simply as Paramount, an American mass media company formerly known as ViacomCBS.
**Paramount Picture ...
,
Signal Hill,
Lakewood, and
Los Alamitos emerged from former Bixby-held lands. Within Long Beach, the
neighborhoods
A neighbourhood (Commonwealth English) or neighborhood (American English) is a geographically localized community within a larger town, city, suburb or rural area, sometimes consisting of a single street and the buildings lining it. Neighbourh ...
Bixby Hill,
Bixby Knolls, and Bixby Village are named after the family, as well as Bixby Park in the
Alamitos Beach neighborhood.
The key members of the family connected to California real estate are the brothers Llewellyn and Jotham Bixby, their first cousins Thomas and Benjamin Flint, and a cousin of the next generation, John William Bixby. Llewellyn's daughter
Sarah Bixby Smith wrote a well-known memoir of growing up on the Bixby family ranches in the late 19th century; her second husband,
Paul Jordan-Smith, was also a writer. Jotham's daughter
Fanny Bixby Spencer was a philanthropist and anti-war activist who was also one of the nation's earliest policewomen.
Jotham and Margaret Bixby founded the
First Congregational Church in 1888 and later contributed to the construction of the 1914 building.
Bixby genealogy
(1) Joseph Bixby (1620-1701) born in Suffolk, England, emigrated to Boxford, Mass. before 1638; m. Sarah Herde
children
(13) Benjamin Bixby (1650-1727) born in Ipswitch, Mass.; m. Mary --
children m. Mary --
children
(134) Samuel Bixby (1689-1741) born in Topsfield, Mass.; m. Martha Underwood
children
(1343) Samuel Bixby (1721-1809) born in Sutton, Mass.; m. Lydia Bond
1 children
1 (one, unit, unity) is a number, numeral, and glyph. It is the first and smallest positive integer of the infinite sequence of natural numbers. This fundamental property has led to its unique uses in other fields, ranging from science to sp ...
(13436) Solomon Bixby (1761-1835) born in Sutton, Mass.; m. Lucy Taylor
2 children
(134363) Amasa Bixby (1794-1872) born in Norridgewock, Maine; m. Fanny Weston (1794?-1869);
3 children***
Llewellyn Bixby
Llywelyn, Llewelyn or Llewellyn is a name of Welsh language origins. See Llywelyn (name) for the name's etymology, history and other details.
As a surname Arts
* Carmen Llywelyn, American actress and photographer
* Chris Llewellyn (poet), America ...
(1825-96) m. Mary Hathaway
children****
Sarah Hathaway Bixby (b. 1871) m.
Paul Jordan-Smith
***
Jotham Bixby (1831-1917) m. Margaret Winslow Hathaway
children****
Fanny Weston Bixby (1879-1930) m. William Carl Spencer (1871-1950)
(134368) Simon Bixby (1803-1862) born in Norridgewock, Maine; m. Deborah Norton Flint (1806-76)
0 children***
John William Bixby (b. 1848) m. Susan P. Hathaway (d. 1906; sister of Margaret Winslow Hathaway)
See also
*
Bixby land companies
The Bixby land companies were a group of California-based land companies founded by various members of the Bixby and Flint families from Maine. In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, the firms of Flint, Bixby & Company, J. Bixby & Company, J. W ...
*
Los Cerritos Ranch House
*
Bixby Slough
Bixby Slough (American English pronunciation: “slew/slu”) was an ancient wetland in Los Angeles County, California. Also known as Machado Lake, the slough was a "large freshwater wetland in the Carson, California, Carson-Harbor City, Los Angel ...
*
Bixby Marshland
Bixby Marshland is a Delta wildlife area operated by the Los Angeles County Sanitation Districts in Carson, California, as part of the environmental mitigation of wastewater.
The space is in area and is a restoration of the old Bixby Slough. T ...
References
External links
Bixby correspondence, 1867-1923. California State Library, California History Room.
*Harris, Marcia Lee. ''Fanny Bixby Spencer: Long Beach's Inspirational Firebrand''.
*Smith, Sarah Bixby. ''Adobe Days: A Book of California Memories''. Los Angeles: J. Zeitlin, 1925. Cedar Rapids, Iowa: Torch Press, 1926 (2nd ed.). Reprinted 1987 by the University of Nebraska Press.
"Finding Aid for the Sarah Bixby Smith correspondence, 1871-1935" Online Archive of California.
Rancho Los Cerritos website
{{Authority control
Families from California
Ranchers from California