The parcels they bought on Block 10 were in the City of Belmont Heights (incorporated from 1908-1909) which had recently been annexed to the City Long Beach to the west. Growth had spread east from Redondo Avenue where the Red Cars ran, providing easy access to the north (Los Angeles city) and to downtown Long Beach via Broadway.
An announcement of the construction. Southwest Builder and Contractor Journal, August 26, 1921, p. 32
Since the area was so rural, the Jones’ leased part of their land on Block 10 to Charles and Mary Ballard, recent arrivals from Denver, Colorado. This entrepreneurial family used the land as a mushroom farm. After the Ballards established their business, they moved into a house on Prospect near Broadway.
Who were the Jones’?
Julia A. Bunch Jones (1853-1933) was born in Tennessee, but moved to Sebastian County, Arkansas as a young child. Her father, William Bunch, was a fairly wealthy farmer.
In 1873 she married fellow Arkansan, George Emerson Jones (1851-1921). The couple shortly after struck out for Oregon and California via wagon train in 1875. George had been a farmer for most of his life; however, he also was an ordained Baptist minister. The latter he considered his true calling. As a family they lived the pioneer life. Most, if not all, property was purchased in Julia’s name, even the 160 acres they bought from the Federal government to settle in the Oregon Territory.
The couple and their nearly adult children moved south, first to Los Angeles, then to Long Beach, around 1910. They initially settled at 945 Temple, but began buying lots in the Alamitos Tract and the Belmont Heights Tract.
The First House at 4826 Vista
The first house addressed as 4826 Vista was moved onto the lot in 1912. That year Julia Jones paid Bucy Moving Company to “move and repair a seven-room frame dwelling … at 4826 Vista.”
Long Beach Daily Telegram, Aug 8, 1922. This item made the front page.
Long Beach Daily Telegram, May 8, 1917 p. 5
4826 E. Vista – 2nd Structure
On July 17, 1921, the Reverend George E. Jones died at age 70. On August 18, 1921 a permit was issued to Julia A. Jones for the construction of a new house at 4826 E. Vista.
Long Beach Press, July 18, 1921
Original permit for 4826 E. Vista, dated August 18, 1921
In 1923, the Sanborn Map Company* issued a fire insurance map for this area of Belmont Heights (below). Notice that the parcel on which 4826 Vista is located is surrounded by numerous empty lots, as this area of Long Beach was not well populated yet.
She died on April 18, 1933 while staying with her daughter in San Bernardino.
Julia A. Jones’ Obituary in the San Bernardino County Sun, April 19, 1933
1930s-1954
The house was occupied by a series of residents, one of which was a fan of the British Empire. In 1944 and 1945, Mrs. E.C. Corwin hosted a garden fund raiser for the Kitchener Chapter of the Daughters of the British Empire.
Long Beach Press Telegram, Sept. 10, 1944
Long Beach Independent, March 28, 1954
Long Beach Independent, April 11, 1954
Spanish Bungalow Architecture
A number of firms, like Roy Hilton Company and Henry L. Wilson, sold “plans” for many of these homes, designed for those who hired their own contractor. Or, a contractor would present plan books to clients, adding and subtracting details as needed.
This Vista home has a centered covered porch and entry, flanked by wide, horizontal windows, which would originally been fixed plate glass. The flat composition roof is hidden by a sculpted parapet (false front). A band of tile just below the roof lends depth and a Spanish architectural detail.
Permit drawing for 2003 remodel of patio and deck.
The new owner of 4826 E. Vista will continue the stewardship of one of Belmont Heights’ oldest homes, the legacy of a pioneer family who arrived in California at the turn of the last century.
Once the marshland that is now Belmont Shore was dredged and filled in (c1923), a new shopping and commercial area was available to the tracts farther east, such as the Belmont Heights Tract and the Alamitos Heights Tract. The bluffs upon which the Belmont Heights Tract sits provided views, sunlight and ocean breezes. The Belmont Heights Tract grew in stature and desirability as the 1920s progressed. A greater number of people had automobiles so they relied upon the Red Car less.
By the 1930s, the Belmont Heights Tract seemed impervious to the growing Great Depression with many of Long Beach’s professional class making their homes there. Some of the best architects and builders selected these lots for themselves and were commissioned by clients that ranged from lawyers, doctors, politicians and small business owners. The area grew so quickly that both Lowell Elementary and Lowell Junior High (now Will Rogers Middle School) were erected in the mid-1920s to serve the new families moving in.
The early stakeholders in this Estates Section reads like a Who’s Who of Long Beach leading families:
From 1925 – 1940, Estates Section residents included:
Ernest and Katherine Dearle, Real Estate, retired furniture mogul
Charles V. and Telia Pugh, Builder
William F. and Clara McKinley, U.S. Navy
Brice and Florence Sainsbury, Real Estate
Irvin and Irene Bechtel, Riddell & Bechtel Insurance Robert and Pearl Garth, Real Estate
Bryant and Ruth Bennett, Builder
Max and Marion Lowe, Citizen Bank HarryCytron,Owner,CytronFurnitureCompany Dr. George and Florence Paap
Albert and Everett Hilton, Builders
Alonzo and Hazel Peek, Security Bank
Chester and Mabel Hatfield, Dentist
Eugene and Anna Tincher, Attorney, LBUSD Board
President (Tincher School namesake)
Earl and Ada Suydam, Suydam Baking Company
Louis B. and Nell Gunn, Builder
Frank and Lulu Barnes, City Councilman
G. P. Taubman, Jr., Lawyer and son of the fiery Rev. G.P.
Taubman, Pastor of First Christian Church
Charles and Mary Windham, Partner with Mason &
Windham Law Firm
This 1922 photo shows early Naples, Seal Beach, Alamitos Heights, developing Belmont Heights and a freshly filled-in Belmont Shore.
[Spence Air Photos for the City Engineer’s office, archived at Long Beach Public Library]
