When I was a youngster growing up in the San Fernando Valley during the 1940s and '50s, the Valley was filled with Hollywood cowboys and beautiful horse ranches. In those days a Sunday drive along Devonshire Street through Chatsworth and Northridge was especially delightful. The two-lane road gently undulated through hills bordered by whitewashed four-rail fences. Over each fence was a view of majestic horses in lush green pastures.
We never gave a second thought to spotting movie stars, such as John Wayne and Roy Rogers, driving their sports cars along Ventura Boulevard, or seeing cowboy actor Ray "Crash" Corrigan making a guest appearance at the grand opening of a new shopping center. It just seemed natural. On New Year's Day we went to the Rose Parade to see our favorite cowboy heroes and their horses. We knew all the horses by name.
We went to the Coliseum to watch the Los Angeles Sheriff's Rodeo, which attracted thousands of fans and featured movie star grand marshals, such as Roy Rogers, Gene Autry, and William Boyd (Hopalong Cassidy).
In Woodland Hills, which was still rural in the 1950s, we had dirt roads, cattle ranches, and herds of sheep free-grazing on the oat-covered hills. And plenty of the kids in my neighborhood had horses in their backyards.
A hundred years earlier in the 1800s, ranching and vaquero traditions had been established here by the Spanish missions and Mexican ranchos. Those early gentlemen ranchers left us a legacy of fine horses and artistic trappings of leather and silver. Their fancy tooled saddles and engraved bits and spurs were admired and adopted by Hollywood cowboys.
Then in 1913, something magical happened: while looking for a location to shoot his epic Western The Squaw Man, filmmaker Cecil B. De Mille discovered the Valley. For the next sixty years, thousands of Western movies and TV shows were filmed in the Valley, making the film industry a major employer here.
In the 1930s, many of Hollywood's six-gun heroes who were under contract with Valley-based studios (Warner Bros., Universal, Republic) bought ranches and moved here to be closer to work. Some of these early cowboy stars included Gary Cooper, Tom Mix, John Wayne, and Clark Gable. Roy Rogers bought his Chatsworth ranch later in the 1950s.
Many more Hollywood celebrities, such as Barbara Stanwyck, Zeppo Marx, Janet Gaynor, William Holden, and Jack Oakie, boasted about owning working horse ranches in the Chatsworth and Northridge areas. In fact, Northridge billed itself "The Horse Capital of the West."
The end of World War II transformed the Valley and accelerated its growth. Vast tracts of suburban housing, shopping centers, and industrial parks began to replace the cattle ranches, walnut orchards, orange groves, and wheat fields that had existed here.
By the 1990s, real estate development had wiped out most of the movie-making locations and large horse ranches. Today only a few small pockets of rural landscape suitable for film-making and for horse-keeping remain in the Valley.
However, I still remember the good old days when I rode my horse on dirt roads from Calabasas to Chatsworth without ever having to dismount to open a gate.
About a dozen years ago I retired and moved to Chatsworth so I could keep horses in my backyard. From my front porch I can see the Garden of the Gods, Stoney Point, and what had been the Iverson Ranch. When I ride my horse in the canyons or along the ridges of the Santa Susana Mountains, it's like traveling back in time. I half expect to round a bend and run into the Lone Ranger and Tonto. Western movies have made the Chatsworth area is so recognizable that it has become a true icon for the Old West.
My goal in writing this book is to preserve the history of Santa Susana Mountains movie location ranches and to remind folks of the rich history of horse-keeping that has existed in and around Chatsworth for two hundred years.
Book: "Reel Cowboys of the Santa Susanas"
A photographic history of "B" Western movie location ranches in Chatsworth, California. More than 350 photos of scenes lensed in the Santa Susana Mountains.
Come ride with author Jerry England as he takes you on a photographic tour of famous Chatsworth area movie ranches.
Witness Tom Mix, Roy Rogers, Gene Autry, John Wayne, Allan Lane, Bill Elliott, Charles Starrett, the Lone Ranger, Buster Crabbe, Tim McCoy, Lash LaRue, and many other six-gun heroes as they ride the pony trails of the gone, but not forgotten Iverson Movie Location Ranch, Brandeis Movie Ranch, Bell Moving Picture Ranch, Corriganville Movie Ranch, Spahn Ranch, and Burro Flats.
View action scenes filmed at Chatsworth's reservoir, train depot, and railroad tunnels. Then follow your favorite Hollywood cowboy through the western streets, outlaw shacks, stagecoach stops, and ranch houses you've seen in hundreds of "B" Westerns.
$21.50 - paperback book 150 pages, 8.5" x 11"