What or who is Hugo Reid?

  

Most people in Arcadia know Hugo Reid best as the name of a local street, park and school in the northwestern part of town, Hugo Reid Drive, Hugo Reid Park, and Hugo Reid Elementary School.

  

     

  

If you ask Arcadians the name of the man who founded Arcadia, those who have a guess will usually say Lucky Baldwin. That's correct.  

  

But the first individual to hold an official land grant and the first to build a house (at least, the first European) on the property that is now known as Arcadia was Scotsman Hugo Reid (pictured below).

  

   (Image at left from wikipedia.com.)

     

Reid is credited with building the first dwelling in Arcadia, the Hugo Reid adobe, which still survives at the Los Angeles County Arboretum and Botanic Garden but is steadily deteriorating.

  

  

Some Arcadians may be familiar with a statue of Reid and his wife and two of her children that used to stand in Los Angeles County's Arcadia Park until the Arcadia Historical Society spearheaded an effort to have the City of Arcadia restore the damaged and neglected statue and move it to the lawn in front of the Ruth and Charles Gilb Arcadia Historical Museum at 380 W. Huntington Dr. (picture below)

  

  

Did you know Anita Baldwin owned a custom-built 1927 Rolls-Royce?

We didn't.

While signing our new Arcadia photo history book at the Arcadia Historical Society table at the Firefighters' Pancake Breakfast on Saturday morning with Society president Carol Libby, a gentleman and his wife stopped by and mentioned that they had recently returned from an auto auction in Scotsdale, Ariz., where they tried to buy Anita Baldwin's Rolls Royce. (Anita Baldwin was the younger of two daughters of Arcadia founder Elias J. "Lucky" Baldwin, and it's not coincidence that her name of Anita is part of the common Arcadia name of Santa Anita.)

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We at the Society were greatly surprised to learn that Anita Baldwin owned a Rolls Royce (we knew she and her older sister Clara each had palacial personal railroad cars) and then immediately slightly disappointed to hear that the Arcadia resident who stopped by our table was unable to win the bidding, which wound up well over $200,000!

But I did find some photos of the 1927 Rolls-Royce Phantom I Pall Mall 6 Place Tourer and some background about it -- 6-cylinder; three-speed manual transmission; 120 HP -- at www.conceptcarz.com, so please enjoy at least reading about it and looking at it from afar as we are: