ELI P. CLARK

Los Angeles County

Biographies

ELI P. CLARK

CLARK, ELI P., Railroad Interests and Investments, Los Angeles, California, was born near Iowa City, Iowa, November 25, 1847. He is the son of Timothy B. Clark and Elvira E. (Calkin) Clark. He married Lucy H. Sherman at Prescott, Arizona, April 8, 1880. To them were born four children, Mrs. Katherine Clark Barnard, Mrs. Mary Clark Eversole, Miss Lucy Mason Clark, and Eugene Payson Clark.

When Mr. Clark was eight years old his parents moved to Grinnell, Iowa, where he received his education in the public schools and at Iowa College, located there. When he was eighteen years of age, he taught his first school. Two years later (1867) the family moved to Southwest Missouri, where he engaged in farming with his father and teaching school during the winter.

In 1875, Mr. Clark crossed the plains with his team to Prescott, Arizona, the journey taking nearly three months. It was there that he first met his brother-in-law, General M. H. Sherman. Mr. Clark engaged in mercantile pursuits at Prescott, also serving one year as acting Postmaster. In 1878 he embarked in the lumber business with A. D. Adams, under the firm name of Clark & Adams. The year prior (in 1877) he was appointed Territorial Auditor for Arizona and served five terms, ten years in all. It was while in this position that was formed the friendship between Mr. Clark and General John C. Fremont, then Governor of Arizona.

While living in Prescott, Mr. Clark first became interested in the railroad question. He sided materially in the passage of a bill by the Legislature in 1885 granting a subsidy of four thousand dollars per mile for a railroad to be built from Prescott to connect with the Atlantic & pacific Railway at Seligman, Arizona. He was one of the organizers of the original company, being elected its Secretary and Treasurer. The organization was turned over to parties for construction and within a year the Prescott & Arizona Central Railroad was in successful operation. Ten years later it was succeeded by the Santa Fe, Prescott & Phoenix Railway.

In 1891, Mr. Clark went to Los Angeles, where he joined his brother-in-law, General Sherman, in the electric railway field. The Los Angeles Consolidated Electric Railway Company (now the Los Angeles Railway) was formed, with General Sherman as President and Mr. Clark the Vice President and General Manager. All the local lines were consolidated in 1894. Mr. Clark then acquired the local horse car lines in Pasadena and the Pasadena & Los Angeles interurban line was in operation in 1895. The same year saw the beginning of the line between Santa Monica and Los Angeles, known as the Los Angeles Pacific Railway. This was opened for traffic April 1, 1896. Mr. Clark was President and Manager of the latter company from its organization till the fall of 1909, when the property passed to the control of the Southern Pacific Company.

This property was the special pride of Mr. Clark, who, with General Sherman, made it one of the finest interurban railroads in the country. It served to build up the whole foothill country from Los Angeles to the sea. Another important work of Mr. Clark was the planning and the securing of property and rights of way necessary for the first subway projected for Los Angeles.

When these gentlemen first went to Los Angeles, it was a city of less than fifty thousand inhabitants, on the verge of civic bankruptcy, due to the great financial depression which overwhelmed its people following the collapse of the real estate boom of 1887. But with the building of the first electric railroad the citizens began to take hope, real estate values grew, new residents were attracted, manufacturing increased and the city was started on its way to its present position, with more than four hundred thousand inhabitants and millions of dollars invested in buildings and manufactures, among the leading cities of the United States.

The rapid transit facilities inaugurated by Mr. Clark and General Sherman, and carried on by their successors, have resulted in thickly populating the entire country immediately surrounding the city of Los Angeles, thereby increasing its city limits to nearly three times its original area. And it is a source of great satisfaction to them to feel that their twenty years’ labor there has contributed so largely to the growth and prosperity of the city of their choice.

In 1906, Mr. Clark organized and became President of the Mount Hood Railway & Power Company at Portland, Oregon. Work was pushed rapidly on power development and the railway and after the project was in successful operation, Mr. Clark disposed of his interests. It is now the property of Portland railway and power companies.

Mr. Clark and General Sherman having severed their railroad connections, have given their attention to their private investments, they having separated their principal properties.

Mr. Clark is now engaged in the erection of a large reinforced concrete business and hotel block, eleven stories above and two stories below ground, one of the largest in the city. Mr. Clark is President of the Clark & Sherman Land Company (a holding company), Vice President of the Main Street Company and of the Sinaloa Land Company.

He is President of the Board of Trustees of the First Congregational Church of Los Angeles, a Trustee for Pomona College, Claremont, California; and a Trustee of the Young Men’s Christian Association of Los Angeles. He is a member of the California Club, the Los Angeles Athletic Club, the University Club and other civic organizations.

Transcribed 5-22-08 Marilyn R. Pankey.

Source: Press Reference Library, Western Edition Notables of the West, Vol. I, Page 35, International News Service, New York, Chicago, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Boston, Atlanta. 1913.

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