North Hollywood Metro Station

North Hollywood Metro Station. . , A Fruitful Land , Literally , During the land boom of the 1880s, a retired New Orleans judge and banker named John M. Bonner came west and bought land in the future North Hollywood, including 110 acres of fruit orchards along what would become Lankershim and Chandler boulevards. The real estate boom went bust, but the farms didn't. Still, it was the land, and not the agriculture, that prompted the Southern Pacific Railroad to buy up some of Bonner’s property. In 1895, the railroad opened the Lankershim depot, across from the Toluca post office, a reflection of the rival factions trying to brand the town. Ranchers and farmers joked that they shipped the merchandise to Lankershim, but billed it to Toluca. , But Bonner wasn't out of the fruit business, not by a long shot. The deal just expanded his reach. In 1897, Bonner built a fruit cannery and shipping plant just east of the depot. Soon, hundreds of fruit-picker's tents sprang up along Lankershim and Magnolia boulevards. , Death and Transition , In September 1900, Bonner died of a heart attack, sitting in his favorite chair at the California Club. George Smith Patton II, the father of the renowned World War II general, was walking past when he found Bonner there, his head dropped to his chest and a newspaper still in his lap. Bonner was 70. , He left most of his estate to a niece in New Orleans, including the fruit operations, which were shuttered until 1907, when they were sold for $20,500 to Guy Weddington, son of pioneer Wilson C. Weddington. , Weddington bought new equipment and turned the plant into the town's biggest employer - 265 employees at the height of the season. Each year the company was canning a million pounds of peaches, apricots and other fruit, and shipping them from the depot. , The New Cash Crop , Even as the area was growing more urban in the 1920s, and Lankershim called itself "progressive and impressive," it laid claim to the world's largest apricot tree. It was annexed to the city of Los Angeles in 1923, and four years later, took the name North Hollywood. , After the Second World War, the new hot cash crop in the San Fernando Valley became houses. Perhaps the best real estate salesman for the Valley was Bing Crosby, himself a resident of Toluca Lake. His song "San Fernando Valley" lured uncounted numbers to the area. Today, people still come in droves to North Hollywood; the town is the northern terminus for Los Angeles' subway system. Its above-ground equivalent is the Orange Line, a 14-mile dedicated bus route starting at the Red Line subway station in North Hollywood and ending in Woodland Hills.