A thousand years before Julius Caesar set foot in Rome, the Tongva [ /ˈtɒŋveɪ/ or tong-vā] people indigenous to the Woodland Hills area were enjoying beautiful views from the top of Topanga Canyon and living in the same balmy Mediterranean climate we do today. For millennia the native population thrived on fish and small game, growing to an estimated 5,000 to 10,000 by the time the Mission San Gabriel Arcángel was established in 1771. But 220 years later the Tongva stood at the brink of extinction, ravaged by smallpox, measles, and other Old World diseases that killed 95% of their people.

The area that was to become Woodland Hills was dry and largely unpopulated in 1900, though limited portions of the land were being farmed for citrus, walnuts, and wheat. Water remained a major issue: either there was not enough to support residential development, or too much of it due to flash flooding during the Southland’s torrential rains in winter.

Completion of the Los Angeles Aqueduct in 1913 by William Mulholland solved the shortage of water by building an aqueduct from the Owens Valley to Los Angeles. News of a steady supply of water newly available in the Valley attracted homesteaders from across the United States. The news also caught the attention of Victor Girard (originally named Victor Girard Kleinberger), a Persian-rug salesman from Kentucky.

Girard purchased 2,886 acres of land in the southwest corner of the San Fernando Valley in 1922, then subdivided the land into tiny lots, 6,826 of them. After building two Turkish mosque-inspired buildings and towers on Ventura Blvd., one one each side of Topanga Canyon Blvd., early in February 1923 Girard held the Grand Opening of his new town, “Girard.” During this period he planted 120,000 eucalyptus, pepper, and other shade trees throughout the area (Brenoff, 2008).

Girard provided free transportation for prospective buyers from downtown Los Angeles, with his “sucker busses” driving to Santa Monica and up the coast to Topanga Canyon before turning inland to his sales center on the corners of Ventura and Topanga Canyon Blvds. Visitors arrived to see two exotic-looking ‘mosques,' each with its own minaret looming over the landscape like a lighthouse. Stretching eastward toward Don Pio Drive was a long, single story building that appeared to house thriving businesses but in fact was nothing more than a façade of theatrical scenery designed to deceive.

After Girard's complimentary barbecue lunch, prospects met his aggressive team of commission-based salesmen, who worked hard to sell his lots. For sale were those undersized lots of undeveloped land—the more attractive of which were, according to some accounts, sometimes sold and resold multiple times to unsuspecting buyers. Nevertheless, thousands of parcels were sold as the population began to grow.

Girard’s success began to fade, beginning with a brush fire in 1927 that burned the Girard Golf Clubhouse to the ground. When the emergency call for help went out to Van Nuys Engine Company No. 39, the fire department responded by "indicating that the Girard division never existed or was no longer in operation” (Carmack & Treffers, 2014). Landowners began to complain about Girard’s deceptive sales practices and unusually small lot sizes, since parcels selling elsewhere in the Valley were many times larger.

The October 1929 stock market crash and the Great Depression ended further development in Girard. To avoid bankruptcy Girard attached liens to landowners’ land without informing them, ultimately causing many to walk away from their properties. Soon after, Girard’s company collapsed, and Victor Girard moved on to new adventures in real estate development elsewhere. Girard died in 1954 at 74.

During the Depression the population of Girard declined to 75 families, but the town remained on the map. In 1941 the community established its own Chamber of Commerce and renamed itself Woodland Hills, an appropriate moniker considering the many thousands of trees that had matured since being planted throughout the area in the 1920s. Also in the 1940s, Harry Warner developed a horse ranch on the 1,100 acres he purchased.

Amidst the postwar housing boom of the sixties and seventies Harry Warner’s ranch was subdivided and sold to become the home of Warner Center, Topanga Plaza, Kaiser Hospital, Rocketdyne, and Litton Industries. In 2005, a citizen’s advisory committee created the Warner Center Plan 2035, a development strategy that will create many thousands of new jobs and dwelling units in Warner Center.

Brenoff, A. (2008). Dig into History, You’ll Strike Snake Oil. Los Angeles Times. https://articles.latimes.com/2008/feb/10/realestate/re-guide10

Cacioppo, R. K. (1982). The History of Woodland Hills and Girard. (Girard photo). Panorama City, CA: White Stone, Inc.

California State University, Northridge. (n.d.). (Reliable Service Garage advertisement). Delmar T. Oviatt Library. http://digital-library.csun.edu/cdm/singleitem/collection/SFVH/id/3543/rec/16 [archived]

Carmack, S. and Treffers, S. (2014). Historic Impacts Report for the Old Fire Station 84 Pocket Park Project, City and County of Los Angeles, California. (PDF). https://www.laparks.org/environmental/pdf/oldFire/appB.pdf [archived]

Girard, V. (1924, December 27). No Speculation in the Future of Valley, Says Victor Girard. The Girard News, p. A-7. http://digital-library.csun.edu/cdm/singleitem/collection/SFVH/id/3317/rec/1 [archived]

Pierce, C. C. (n.d.) Drawing of Tongva village of Yang-na Indians in Chavez Ravine. http://dotsx.usc.edu/newsblog/index.php/main/comments/l.a._times_features_usc_digital_library_image_of_chavez_ravine_village/ [archived]

Rocketdyne. (n.d.). In Wikipedia. (photo). Retrieved September 11, 2015. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Pratt_%26_Whitney_Rocketdyne_Division.JPG

Treffers, S. (2014, April 16). How a Visionary Scoundrel Created Woodland Hills in the 1920s. Curbed LA. (Girard quote). https://la.curbed.com/archives/2014/04/how_a_visionary_scoundrel_created_woodland_hills_in_the_1920s.php

Water and Power Associates, Inc. (n.d.). William Mulholland Biography. (Mulholland photo). https://waterandpower.org/museum/Mulholland_Biography.html


Sources used for Figures

Figure 1. The Girard News, December 27, 1924, page A-7