Cannery Women at Work

Preface

Introduction

Cannery Women at Work

Getting to Work

On the Cannery Floor

Leadership & Labor

CANNERY PHOTO GALLERY

Community

San Pedro & the Harbor

Free Harbor Fight

Cannery History

Newcomers

Fishing & Culture

Celebration!

Consumer & Kitchen

A Taste for Tuna

Changes in the Kitchen

PROMO LITERATURE GALLERY

Resources

Ernestine "Tina" Ursich

Goldeen Kaloper

Margie Falcone

Mary Oreb

Cannery Women in History

Bibliography

Author Bio

COMMUNITY

Free Harbor Fight


 
Commercial Development & the Free Harbor Fight


A NEW NAME
In 1891, the Los Angeles Terminal Railroad Company (LATR) purchased Rattlesnake Island for $250,000 from the Dominguez heirs of Rancho San Pedro.   A year later the rail company renamed the mudflat Terminal Island as part of a plan to make it the line's final destination.

CONFLICTS RISE

In 1890, Collis Huntington, owner of Southern Pacific Railroad increased his holdings of Santa Monica waterfront property and began to push Santa Monica as a site for a new southern California port.  Meanwhile, San Pedro had been acting as a port location and was anticipating its commercial growth.  Conflicts rose between Huntington's private resources and the movement for free enterprise at San Pedro. 

FREE HARBOR
The federal government was leaning in favor of Huntington until California Senator Stephen M. White took a stand.  Early in 1896, he proposed for an independent corps of engineers to choose the site.  In the summer of 1896, Los Angeles' San Pedro Bay was found to be superior.  By 1910, port development at San Pedro and Terminal Island was well underway.  

Los Angeles: Los Angeles Litho Co., 1899. Lithograph poster, Prints and Photographs Division Libary of Congress, LC-DIG-10486
 
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←  COMMUNITY
←  San Pedro & the Harbor

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San Pedro History Project

Between Catch & Can:
The Cannery Women of the Los Angeles Harbor, 1930-1960

Taran Schindler
San Pedro, CA
2008


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