Talk:Santa Fe Dam Recreation Area

Latest comment: 5 years ago by Jordan Brown in topic Park/page Name


Ranch inside the Santa Fe Dam edit

I was looking at the history of the Santa Fe Dam and I noticed there was one fact that was missing. My Dad went to work at a Hog Ranch located inside the Santa Fe Dam. I can't give exact dates but I'll be close. We moved a lot when I was very young,  from birth in May 1944 to 1949 I know of four places we lived in that time. 
My dad went to work on the Ranch in 1949 as a ranch hand, there was three homes on the ranch, the owners Ranch House and the Forman's House, the Forman and his wife had two boys and one girl and our house in 1949 had three girls and one boy, myself. Them in 1950 my youngest sister was born.
I don't remember the owners name but I think his last name was Wilson or Watson. He had a small herd of Cattle and another small herd of Horses but the Hogs was the main source in income. I can't say how many hogs he had but if I guessed I would say a couple hundred. He had a contract with the county of Los Angeles to dispose  of the county's garbage. 
In those days, the garbage was collected separately from the trash. There was a fleet of trucks with special designed compartments on the back. The drivers and his helper would dump the garbage into these compartments. As the trucks became full, they would go to the Ranch and unload into a long pens or shoots that had gates in order to close off the long pen at regular intervals. 
The operation went like this. As the trucks came in they back into the long pen or shoot and stop at a closed gate. the doors on the back of the truck bed would be opened and then the bed of the truck would raise and as it raised the garbage would tumble out the back and at the same time they would move forward until empty. this would continue truck after truck, as they came to a gate , it would be closed to create separate pens and as they closed a gate another gate to the hog pens would open and the hogs would come in and eat the garbage. There was about 20 pens serviced each shoot. I can remember three sets of pens. The trucks were a dark green in color.  
I had two older sisters and the other kids was older then me and all went to school in Irwindale. the bus stop was on Gladstone and Irwindale Ave. out the back gate. The front entrance was off Irwindale Ave , were the Miller Brewery is now.  
 I thought this information was significant because it was part of Santa Fe Dam's History. --Rcstov44 (talk) 02:40, 19 March 2018 (UTC) Rocky Stovall— Preceding unsigned Rcstov44 (talk) 02:40, 19 March 2018 (UTC)comment added by Rcstov44 (talkcontribs) 01:05, 17 March 2018 (UTC)Reply 

--Rcstov44 (talk) 02:40, 19 March 2018 (UTC) Rocky StovallReply

Park/page Name edit

The LA County Parks & Rec page calls it the Santa Fe Dam Recreational Area, not Recreation Area. I'm tempted to rename the page to match, but nobody else seems to call it that. Jordan Brown (talk) 15:54, 24 October 2018 (UTC)Reply