Don Juan Temple (

né A birth name is the name of a person given upon birth. The term may be applied to the surname, the given name, or the entire name. Where births are required to be officially registered, the entire name entered onto a birth certificate or birth reg ...

Jonathan; August 14, 1796 – May 31, 1866) was a

California California is a state in the Western United States, located along the Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the most populous U.S. state and the 3rd largest by area. It is also the m ...

n ranchero and merchant. Born in Massachusetts, he emigrated to

Alta California Alta California ('Upper California'), also known as ('New California') among other names, was a province of New Spain, formally established in 1804. Along with the Baja California peninsula, it had previously comprised the province of , but ...

in 1827, becoming a Mexican citizen, adopting the

Spanish language Spanish ( or , Castilian) is a Romance language of the Indo-European language family that evolved from colloquial Latin spoken on the Iberian peninsula. Today, it is a global language with more than 500 million native speakers, mainly in the ...

and a Spanish name, and eventually marrying into a prominent

Californio Californio (plural Californios) is a term used to designate a Hispanic Californian, especially those descended from Spanish and Mexican settlers of the 17th through 19th centuries. California's Spanish-speaking community has resided there sin ...

family. After acquiring

Rancho Los Cerritos :''This article refers to the land grant. For the Rancho Los Cerritos adobe, see Los Cerritos Ranch House'' Rancho Los Cerritos was a 1834 land grant in present-day southern Los Angeles County and Orange County, California The grant was the res ...

in 1843, he became one of the largest landowners in

Los Angeles County Los Angeles County, officially the County of Los Angeles, and sometimes abbreviated as L.A. County, is the List of the most populous counties in the United States, most populous county in the United States and in the U.S. state of California, ...

Biography

Jonathan Temple was born in

Reading, Massachusetts Reading ( ) is a town in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, United States, north of central Boston. The population was 25,518 at the 2020 census. History Settlement and American independence Many of the Massachusetts Bay Colony's original settl ...

, to Jonathan Temple Sr. and Lucinda Pratt. From at least 1823, Temple was a merchant living in the

Hawaiian Islands The Hawaiian Islands ( haw, Nā Mokupuni o Hawai‘i) are an archipelago of eight major islands, several atolls, and numerous smaller islets in the North Pacific Ocean, extending some from the island of Hawaii in the south to northernmost ...

. In 1827 he migrated to the Pueblo de San Diego in Mexican

. Temple was baptized a Roman Catholic, made a Mexican citizen, and began to go by the name Juan. In 1827 Temple moved north to the Pueblo de Los Ángeles, where he opened the pueblo's first general store, a business he operated for almost thirty years. His younger brother. Francisco P. Temple joined him there later. Juan Temple married Rafaela Cota (1812–1887) in 1830, and they had one daughter, Francisca Temple (1831–1893). Jonathan Temple ancestry
/ref> In 1836, Temple hosted the first vigilance committee to form in California at his Los Ángeles residence. The committee later executed two lovers accused of the murder of the woman's husband, thereby committing the first

lynching Lynching is an extrajudicial killing by a group. It is most often used to characterize informal public executions by a mob in order to punish an alleged transgressor, punish a convicted transgressor, or intimidate people. It can also be an ex ...

in California.

Rancho Los Cerritos

In 1843, he purchased

from his wife's relatives, the Cota family. His 1844

adobe Adobe ( ; ) is a building material made from earth and organic materials. is Spanish for '' mudbrick''. In some English-speaking regions of Spanish heritage, such as the Southwestern United States, the term is used to refer to any kind of ...

survives as part of the

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 "t ...

National Historic Landmark A National Historic Landmark (NHL) is a building, district, object, site, or structure that is officially recognized by the United States government for its outstanding historical significance. Only some 2,500 (~3%) of over 90,000 places liste ...

site. Both Temple and his ranch house played roles in the

Mexican-American War Mexican Americans ( es, mexicano-estadounidenses, , or ) are Americans of full or partial Mexican heritage. In 2019, Mexican Americans comprised 11.3% of the US population and 61.5% of all Hispanic and Latino Americans. In 2019, 71% of Mexica ...

. Temple created a thriving cattle ranch and prospered, becoming after Abel Stearns, the wealthiest man in post-statehood

. During the 1840s, Temple was active in ship-bound trade throughout the coasts of Alta California and central Mexico, and owned extensive lands between

Acapulco Acapulco de Juárez (), commonly called Acapulco ( , also , nah, Acapolco), is a city and major seaport in the state of Guerrero on the Pacific Coast of Mexico, south of Mexico City. Acapulco is located on a deep, semicircular bay and has ...

and

Mazatlán Mazatlán () is a city in the Mexican state of Sinaloa. The city serves as the municipal seat for the surrounding '' municipio'', known as the Mazatlán Municipality. It is located at on the Pacific coast, across from the southernmost tip ...

. In 1856, by providing, through his son-in-law, Gregorio de Ajuria (1819–1861), the funds to finance the Plan of Ayutla removing Antonio López de Santa Anna as Mexico's president/dictator, he became the lessor of the Mexican national mint, a concession held by him and his daughter until 1893, when the mint was nationalized by Porfirio Díaz.

Post-statehood

Temple was also one of Los Angeles’ first developers, constructing such landmarks as the original Temple Block and the Clocktower Courthouse, Market and Theater, which later served as city and county administrative headquarters, contained the county

courthouse A courthouse or court house is a building that is home to a local court of law and often the regional county government as well, although this is not the case in some larger cities. The term is common in North America. In most other English-spe ...

, and featured the first true theater in southern California. He also served as the first

alcalde Alcalde (; ) is the traditional Spanish municipal magistrate, who had both judicial and administrative functions. An ''alcalde'' was, in the absence of a corregidor, the presiding officer of the Castilian '' cabildo'' (the municipal council) ...

(or mayor) of Los Angeles after capture of the pueblo by the United States during the

and served on the first American-period common (city) council. In 1849, after Los Angeles was ordered by California's military governor to conduct a survey, but couldn't pay for the work, Temple paid for the Ord Survey out of his own funds, and then was repaid by the sale of lots created in the survey.

Temple Street (Los Angeles) Temple Street is a street in the City of Los Angeles, California. The street is an east-west thoroughfare that runs through Downtown Los Angeles parallel to the Hollywood Freeway between Virgil Avenue past Alameda Street to the banks of the Los ...

was developed by him as a modest one-block dirt lane in the 1850s. The ill-fated timing of his construction projects in late 1850s Los Angeles, which was in an economic downturn, was exacerbated by a flood in 1861-62 and drought from 1862-65 that almost destroyed the cattle industry, then the backbone of the local economy.

San Francisco

Temple moved to

San Francisco San Francisco (; Spanish for " Saint Francis"), officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the commercial, financial, and cultural center of Northern California. The city proper is the fourth most populous in California and 17t ...

. Juan Temple lived his last years in San Francisco where he died in 1866, two months after selling Rancho Los Cerritos to Flint, Bixby & Co for $20,000, or less than a dollar an acre, during a prolonged depressed real estate market. Rafaela Cota de Temple moved to

Paris Paris () is the capital and most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), making it the 30th most densely populated city in the world in 2020. Si ...

to join her widowed daughter (Gregorio de Ajuria having died insane in Paris in 1861), and died there in the 1887.

References

* Paul R. Spitzzeri, "The Workman and Temple Families of Southern California, 1830-1930," (Dallas: Seligson Publishing Company,) 2008.

External links