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Show The Tanners and the San Bernardino Mission 171 member of the Tanner family was organized. The organization also included a ward with the usual officers, a Sunday school, and day school. Few congregations of Latter-day Saints have ever had so much leisure time on their hands as this group waiting for the mature land purchase. The mountains, valleys, and streams were carefully explored by curious people anxious to know what was nearby. They discovered that the mountains in Cajon Pass were only 6,000 feet high, and that the valley floor around San Bernardino was 1,000 feet above sea level. The mountains were found to be rugged and well timbered. In the future they would construct roads to the timber and bring it down to build their homes. The terms of the land deal with Senior Lugo are of particular interest. The land had been acquired by the Lugo brothers in a grant from the Mexican government. The terms of this grant were somewhat vague and could be interpreted in various ways. When the Mormons purchased the property they understood it comprised about 80,000 acres. The Lugos actually had title to but eight leagues, which would be between 35,000 and 36,000 acres. But the grant was so worded that the eight leagues could be chosen from a much larger piece of land, and they would have considerable time to decide which areas in the larger piece would be included in the eight leagues. Most folks in the San Bernardino country thought the Lugos owned the entire 80,000 acres, including Lyman and Rich who made the the Mormons took over, their title was the the former owners, and this was to cause much trouble. purchase. When as same price to be paid for the ranch was $77,000, with $25,000 paid when the deal was closed and the balance at two and one half percent monthly interest. It took a bit of scheming for Lyman and Rich to find the $25,000 to make the down payment. They made a number of trips to the gold fields east of San Francisco where generous church members freely contributed to assist the brethren who Even so the payments on were trying to open up this new area. the San Bernardino ranch would hang as a heavy load on the two apostles throughout the entire occupancy of San Bernardino. The to be Soon after the settlers moved to occupy the ranch there was a serious Indian scare, and it was decided to construct a fort for their protection. It was built as a stockade with timbers standing on end set three or four feet in the ground and rising ten or twelve feet above. The structure was 760 feet at its greatest length and 320 feet wide. |
