Much to the disappointment of early developers, the railroad never came to Laguna. When the ATSF railway extended from Santa Ana to San Diego in the 1880s, there was hope it might come down Aliso Canyon, where a resort hotel was contemplated. When Heisler and associates developed north Laguna in the early 1900s, they hoped the electric railway connecting Long Beach to Los Angeles might extend this far, and the first plans for Cliff Drive called it “Electric Way.” This brings us to a little-known benefactor to Laguna’s development: The Auto Club.
We don't have shortages of gasoline that prevent you from filling up today. But in the 1970s, the high prices came with long waits and other inconveniences.
As the bleak winter of 1862 dragged on into 1863, the isolated, ramshackle town of Los Angeles was visited by a terrifying scourge smallpox.
With its telltale fever and disfiguring skin rash, the highly infectious disease jumped from adobe to adobe, killing more than 100 people and sickening hundreds of others. If those numbers don t sound like much, remember L.A. had only 4,000 or so souls at the time and the outbreak wiped out half of its indigenous residents. The city s smallpox wagon, dubbed the black Maria, was a frequent and disheartening sight as it rolled through the streets carrying victims to the city hospital, or pesthouse, writes John W. Robinson in