The Downey Patriot

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Two historic colleges were founded in Downey

DOWNEY--A brass monument in front of Fire Station No. 1 commemorates one of Downey's two historic colleges that helped shape the history of early Los Angeles.

The fire station on Paramount Boulevard at Alameda Street is where Los Nietos College Institute, the first Protestant college in Los Angeles County, once stood.

The college was founded in 1868 when Methodist minister John C. Ardis bought the plot of land to found a private school.

Ardis and his family had come west by covered wagon from Arkansas.

A graduate of Emery College in Atlanta, Ardis had taught at Arkansas State College for several years. On arrival here he first established the small Alameda School District which he ran for a year. But even as he ran the small grade school, he recognized the need for a larger school with more advanced grades.

Luckily, the Methodist Church had decided to erect a college somewhere in the West. In line with the local need the Methodist Assembly convened in what later came to be Downey on March 19, 1869. They laid the college's cornerstone and named former governor John G. Downey the school's chairman, and Ardis its secretary.

After the cornerstone was in place, an auction of lots was held, establishing a community that came to be known as the College Settlement. It included an area between Paramount Boulevard and Montgomery Street, and from Alameda Street to Orange.

The first building erected was described as "barn-like" and seated 100. The five acre campus was surrounded by a picket fence which was prettily decorated with shrubs and flowers.

Soon another large building-the general store-went up at College and Alameda. The Masonic Lodge met there.

In 1876 a Methodist Church was erected on an acre-and-a-half of property at College (as Paramount Boulevard was then called). William Steel donated the land, and the church was considered a landmark because of its 110-foot steeple.

Unfortunately, the church chose to sell the college.

Its operators chose to close it in 1879, reopened it in 1894, then closed it for good in 1897.

Meanwhile, another Downey institution of higher learning had come into being. Southern Pacific College was founded in 1877 by Downey, the same ex-state governor who had been originally named chairman of Los Nietos College Institute.

This second and even larger school, Southern Pacific College, stood on a 10-acre tract of property just north of Fifth Street. The land was donated by Judge M. C. Crawford, a good friend and business partner of the ex-governor's.

At its peak, Southern Pacific College had 200 students, who studied in a spacious three-story building under the direction of the Rev. J. M. Monroe of the Christian Church.

Unfortunately, the building was leveled by flames in 1880. It was the midst of a depression, and money could not be raised to rebuild.

The college had established a loyal alumni which honored its name by holding reunions which continued to the mid-1930s. They met at the Central Christian Church where Monroe was pastor.