Los
Angeles County
Biographies
RUDOLPH H.
SCHWARZKOPF
One of the most active and
successful men in the development of the Arcadia section of the San Gabriel
Valley is Rudolph H. Schwarzkopf, who in former days was a rancher and farmer,
but whose chief efforts in a business way have been given to the development of
the real estate interests of this section of the valley. He is credited with being the man primarily
responsible for the remarkable growth and upbuilding of this locality and now,
as the head of the Schwarzkopf Realty Company, is the leader in his field in
the San Gabriel Valley.
Mr. Schwarzkopf was born in Newark,
New Jersey, September 28, 1873, a son of C. G. and Bertha (Louis) Schwarzkopf,
who were born in Wurttemberg, Germany, came to America as children with their
respective parents, and were married in New Jersey in 1858. The father was a manufacturing jeweler in the
east. In his family were five sons, of
whom Rudolph H. Schwarzkopf is the youngest.
He attended the public schools of Newark and lived there until 1896,
when, at the age of twenty-three years, he came to California. For a time he traveled in the interests of an
eastern firm of jewelry manufacturers, but in 1897 entered Leland Stanford
University, from which he was graduated with the degree of Bachelor of Arts in
1901. He paid all of his expenses while
at college by working during vacations and was made a member of the Kappa Sigma
fraternity. On leaving college he
resumed his employment as a traveling salesman and for ten years covered the
territory from Denver to the Pacific coast.
Mr. Schwarzkopf then bought and
settled on a five-acre tract of land near Arcadia in the San Gabriel Valley and
built thereon a three thousand dollar home, one of the finest in this locality
at that time. He engaged in scientific
poultry raising, in which he did a very substantial
business, but at the end of two years he sold out and began the development on
a larger scale of a block of small poultry and fruit ranches in the Arcadia
district, the land being a tract of the old South Santa Anita Land
Company. Later he bought and developed
several subdivisions, comprising from ten to one hundred eighty-seven
acres. When he came here the land was
covered with old orchards and largely devoted to the pasturing of large flocks
of sheep, but it at once impressed him as being an ideal location for suburban
homes. He was the first man to subdivide
the Baldwin holdings into half-acre and one-acre villa lots, developing one
hundred seventy-eight acres in this way, all of which have been built
upon. His work has gone on until he has
converted about five hundred acres of land into small home ranches, and at this
time he has a thirty-one acre subdivision on Baldwin Avenue, Arcadia. He built the first two-story house between
San Gabriel Boulevard and Santa Anita Avenue, on the historic Baldwin Ranch,
and has been actively engaged in practically all of the development of West
Arcadia.
Mr. Schwarzkopf took a course in
land and property appraising at the University of Southern California and is
regarded as one of the reliable appraisers in this section of the state. He was formerly an appraiser on the appraisal
committee of the Los Angeles Realty Board.
He has done much appraising for Los Angeles County in road improvement
work and also for large Los Angeles financial interests. He was one of the organizers of the greater
Arcadia Building and Loan Association, of which he is a director and appraiser,
and is a member of the advisory board of the Arcadia branch of the Bank of
America. He was active in the
organization and has served four terms as president of the Arcadia Chamber of
Commerce, and was a director of the Inter-Community Chamber of Commerce,
comprising the Chambers of Commerce of twenty-five cities and towns in the San
Gabriel Valley. He was on the membership
committee of the Los Angeles Chamber of Commerce, the largest organization of
its kind in the world, and he was the principal speaker at a luncheon in the
Alexandria Hotel, on which occasion he advanced a new constructive program of
work, which received the hearty endorsement of the chamber. Mr. Schwarzkopf was one of thirty men who
conceived the idea of building the San Gabriel Valley Dam, which is now under
construction with a modification of the original plan. They visited the site of the dam in the
mountain district of Azusa and gave freely of their time and efforts, working
early and late in the interests of this gigantic project. The three lower dams, when completed, will
have cost about twenty-five million dollars.
Mr. Schwarzkopf is a member of the State Realty Board, of which he was
director in 1927, and belongs to the Arcadia Breakfast Club. He has been president of the South Santa
Anita school board and has declined a number of other local offices. He is a strong Republican in his political
views and is a member of the Masonic lodge at Palo Alto and of the Benevolent
and Protective Order of Elks at Monrovia.
In 1897, at Palo Alto, Mr.
Schwarzkopf was united in marriage to Miss Grace E. Hoon,
who came to California from Dixon, Illinois, and was a student in Leland
Stanford University. They have become
the parents of eight children, namely:
Chetwood T., who spent two years in the University of California, is
married and has two children, LeRoy and Donna; Bertha Elizabeth, who was a
student in the Otis Art Institute of Los Angeles, married David Anderson and
has two children, David and Jean; Kathryn Winifred, who attended the University
of California, married Richard Malvey and has one
son, Richard; Miriam Evelyn, the wife of Victor Klein and has a son Steven;
John Rudolph, who married Sylvia Hammer and has a son John Michael; Frank
Robert; Helen Dolly; and Jean Louise.
Chetwood T. Schwarzkopf was born in 1899 and shortly after he attained
the age of eighteen years enlisted as an ordinary seaman in the Navy for
service in the World War. He received
rapid promotion and at the time of his discharge was captain of a gunner’s crew
on the cruiser Seattle, in convoy service during the War. Not a single demerit mark was set against his
record while in the Navy. After his
discharge he spent two years in the merchant marine service and made several
trips to the Orient, but finally entered his father’s realty organization, in
which he did capable and effective work for several years. R. H. Schwarzkopf is entitled to specific
recognition for the important part he has played in the development of the San
Gabriel Valley and the abundant success which has crowned his efforts has been
but the legitimate fruitage of the able and farsighted policy which he has
consistently followed in his various operations since coming to this favored
section of California.
Transcribed
by V. Gerald Iaquinta.
Source: California of the South
Vol. IV, by John Steven McGroarty, Pages 661-664,
Clarke Publ., Chicago, Los Angeles, Indianapolis. 1933.
© 2012 V.
Gerald Iaquinta.
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