Baxter Ward Schwellenbach (November 5, 1919 – February 4, 2002) was a television news anchor who served two terms on the

Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors The Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors (LACBOS) is the five-member governing body of Los Angeles County, California, United States. History On April 1, 1850 the citizens of Los Angeles elected a three-man Court of Sessions as their firs ...

. Prior to his election on the board, he ran third in an unsuccessful bid to unseat

Sam Yorty Samuel William Yorty (October 1, 1909 – June 5, 1998) was an American radio host, attorney, and politician from Los Angeles, California. He served as a member of the United States House of Representatives and the California State Assembly, ...

for Mayor of Los Angeles in 1969.

Background

The nephew of Lewis B. Schwellenbach, Ward was born in Superior, Wisconsin, and grew up in

Ephrata, Washington Ephrata ( ) is a city in and the county seat of Grant County, Washington, United States. Its population was 8,477 at the 2020 census. History Ephrata was officially incorporated on June 21, 1909 and was given the county seat for the newly creat ...

. Ward served as a Los Angeles County Supervisor from 1972 to 1980. As supervisor, Ward was an early advocate for passenger rail transportation in the county, something Los Angeles had lacked since the abandonment of the

Pacific Electric Railway The Pacific Electric Railway Company, nicknamed the Red Cars, was a privately owned mass transit system in Southern California consisting of electrically powered streetcars, interurban cars, and buses and was the largest electric railway system ...

in the 1950s. Under Ward, L. A. County purchased eight rail cars from the '' El Camino'' in an attempt to bootstrap

commuter rail Commuter rail, or suburban rail, is a passenger rail transport service that primarily operates within a metropolitan area, connecting Commuting, commuters to a Downtown, central city from adjacent suburbs or commuter towns. Generally commuter r ...

in the greater Los Angeles area. Baxter Ward's initial effort failed, dubbed "Baxter's Choo-Choo" by its numerous contemporary critics, and although the purchased cars were used on

Amtrak The National Railroad Passenger Corporation, doing business as Amtrak () , is the national passenger railroad company of the United States. It operates inter-city rail service in 46 of the 48 contiguous U.S. States and nine cities in Canada ...

's '' San Diegan'' for six months in 1978, the criticism stuck, ultimately contributing to his 1980 election loss to Michael D. Antonovich. The original commuter rail route envisioned by Ward eventually did come to fruition in the form of Metrolink's

Orange County Line The Orange County Line is a commuter rail line run by Metrolink from Los Angeles through Orange County to Oceanside in San Diego County, connecting with the Coaster commuter rail service to San Diego. The Orange County Line carries passenger ...

some years after the end of his career as a Los Angeles County Supervisor. During the 1950s and early 60s he introduced a

non-fiction Nonfiction, or non-fiction, is any document or media content that attempts, in good faith, to provide information (and sometimes opinions) grounded only in facts and real life, rather than in imagination. Nonfiction is often associated with b ...

documentary

television Television, sometimes shortened to TV, is a telecommunication medium for transmitting moving images and sound. The term can refer to a television set, or the medium of television transmission. Television is a mass medium for advertisin ...

show called Adventure Tomorrow with Dr. Martin L. Klein], which presented

technology Technology is the application of knowledge to reach practical goals in a specifiable and Reproducibility, reproducible way. The word ''technology'' may also mean the product of such an endeavor. The use of technology is widely prevalent in me ...

of the early Space Age. The program's producer, George Van Valkenburg described the series as covering anything that moves, flies or explodes. Ward also worked as a television news anchor first at KCOP-Channel 13, and then with KABC-Channel 7 in Los Angeles before he ran for Mayor. He ran for mayor of Los Angeles one last time in 1989 against Mayor Tom Bradley. Ward died in 2002, following a battle with lung cancer.

References

External links

Biography at OurCamcapigns.com
{{DEFAULTSORT:Ward, Baxter American television reporters and correspondents Television anchors from Los Angeles People from Ephrata, Washington Politicians from Superior, Wisconsin 1919 births 2002 deaths Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors 20th-century American politicians Candidates in the 1989 United States elections