Chantry Flat
Encyclopedia
Angeles National Forest
The Angeles National Forest of the U.S. National Forest Service is located in the San Gabriel Mountains of Los Angeles County, southern California. It was established on July 1, 1908, incorporating the first San Bernardino National Forest and parts of the former Santa Barbara and San Gabriel...
, about three miles (5 km) into Big Santa Anita Canyon
Santa Anita Canyon
Santa Anita Canyon is a canyon in the San Gabriel Mountains, within the Angeles National Forest in Los Angeles County, California.-Geography:...
, and is closely associated with the towns of Arcadia
Arcadia, California
Arcadia is an affluent city in Los Angeles County, California, United States, and located approximately northeast of downtown Los Angeles in the San Gabriel Valley and at the base of the San Gabriel Mountains....
and Sierra Madre, CA. The flat itself houses a large public picnic area, and is the starting point for several historic trails of the San Gabriel Mountains
San Gabriel Mountains
The San Gabriel Mountains Range is located in northern Los Angeles County and western San Bernardino County, California, United States. The mountain range lies between the Los Angeles Basin and the Mojave Desert, with Interstate 5 to the west and Interstate 15 to the east...
, including the 28.5 miles (45.9 km) Gabrielino Trail
Gabrielino Trail
The Gabrielino Trail is a United States National Recreation Trail that runs through the Angeles National Forest with trailheads at Windsor Avenue in Altadena, California on the west end and Chantry Flat, just north of Arcadia, California, on the east...
. The US Forest Service estimates the road to Chantry as the third busiest entry into the Angeles, next to CA State Highways 2 and 39
California State Route 39
State Route 39 is a state highway in the U.S. state of California that travels through Orange and Los Angeles counties. Its southern terminus is at Pacific Coast Highway , in Huntington Beach, and its northern terminus is at Islip Saddle on Angeles Crest Highway in the Angeles National...
.
Historical significance
Chantry Flat is home to the last pack stationPack station
A pack station is the base of operations for transporting freight via pack animals in the Sierra Nevada mountains. The station facilitates the transition from mechanized transportation to pack animals, and necessarily includes a corral for the animals and sometimes a stock loading ramp...
in Southern California
Southern California
Southern California is a megaregion, or megapolitan area, in the southern area of the U.S. state of California. Large urban areas include Greater Los Angeles and Greater San Diego. The urban area stretches along the coast from Ventura through the Southland and Inland Empire to San Diego...
. It is also the trailhead to Sturtevant's Camp, the oldest resort in the San Gabriels and one of a handful that still exist. The Chantry Flat/Big Santa Anita Canyon area boasts the last magneto-type crank phone system
Party line (telephony)
In twentieth-century telephone systems, a party line is an arrangement in which two or more customers are connected directly to the same local loop. Prior to World War II in the United States, party lines were the primary way residential subscribers acquired local telephone service...
in the United States. The entire watershed is a living museum to the "Great Hiking Era".
The Story
The story indirectly begins in 1905 with the arrival of IowaIowa
Iowa is a state located in the Midwestern United States, an area often referred to as the "American Heartland". It derives its name from the Ioway people, one of the many American Indian tribes that occupied the state at the time of European exploration. Iowa was a part of the French colony of New...
-born Charley Chantry to Sierra Madre, CA. He prospected his way here from the Black Hills
Black Hills
The Black Hills are a small, isolated mountain range rising from the Great Plains of North America in western South Dakota and extending into Wyoming, USA. Set off from the main body of the Rocky Mountains, the region is something of a geological anomaly—accurately described as an "island of...
of the Dakotas by way of the San Gabriel
San Gabriel Valley
The San Gabriel Valley is one of the principal valleys of Southern California, United States. It lies to the east of Los Angeles, to the north of the Puente Hills, to the south of the San Gabriel Mountains, and west of the Inland Empire. It derives its name from the San Gabriel River that flows...
back country. He erected a sturdy tent cabin in Little Santa Anita Canyon
Santa Anita Canyon
Santa Anita Canyon is a canyon in the San Gabriel Mountains, within the Angeles National Forest in Los Angeles County, California.-Geography:...
from which he rented riding donkeys to kids staying at nearby Carter's Camp. Soon his stock was packing into any and all of the mountain resort
Mountain resort
A mountain resort is a place to holiday or vacation located in a mountainous area. The term includes ski resorts, where winter sports, including skiing, snowboarding, ice climbing and ice skating are practiced, as well as places where summer activities such as mountain biking, mountain boarding,...
s from his Mount Wilson
Mount Wilson (California)
Mount Wilson is one of the better known peaks in the San Gabriel Mountains, part of the Angeles National Forest in Los Angeles County, California. It is the location of the Mount Wilson Observatory and has become the astronomical center of Southern California with and telescopes, and and tall...
Stables.
While packing to Sturtevant's Camp, Charley passed through an oak-studded bench 600' above Big Santa Anita Canyon's bottom at the San Olene Gap. With a reliable spring in adjoining San Olene Canyon (a corruption of the original Santa Oline) and the relatively flat land of an ancient slide, Chantry imagined this to be an ideal site for a small ranch. The details of his official occupation of the "flat" are unclear, even from reading John Robinson's The San Gabriels. The 1977 printing suggests that his plans for a home and orchard were thwarted by enactment of the Forest Homestead Act (1906) which forbade such development. The 1991 copy reports that he was granted a permit for 20 acres (80,937.2 m²) in 1907, that he failed to act on his plans and that he allowed the permit to lapse, returning control to the Forest Service. Glen Owens, author of The Heritage of the Big Santa Anita believes the latter to be true and substantiates his claim with the witness of a Forest Service agricultural permit in Charley's name. Whatever happened when and whether he was permitted, Charley and his dog, Patch, did occasionally occupy a tent here, grazed his stock here, and spent enough time here to have his name permanently attached to the area now known as Chantry Flat (formerly Poison Oak Flat).
Charley died in 1936, one year after Los Angeles County paved a road to his old stomping grounds from the top of Santa Anita Ave. The road in was originally planned as a highway to join the Angeles Crest Highway
Angeles Crest Highway
The Angeles Crest Highway is a two-lane segment of California State Route 2 in the United States. The road is in length, with its western terminus at the intersection at Foothill Boulevard in La Cañada Flintridge and its eastern terminus at State Route 138 northeast of Wrightwood...
(state hwy 2) at Shortcut Canyon. The Forest Service never allowed it. It would have been a largely unwelcome introduction of modern civilization and would have obliterated the charm and beauty of both the Big Santa Anita and the West Fork of the San Gabriel River
San Gabriel River (California)
The San Gabriel River flows through southern Los Angeles County, California in the United States. Its main stem is about long, while its farthest tributaries extend almost altogether...
. Los Angeles county was permitted, however, to build a road into Winter Creek. They stopped short with a less intrusive terminus at Chantry Flat. The Civilian Conservation Corps
Civilian Conservation Corps
The Civilian Conservation Corps was a public work relief program that operated from 1933 to 1942 in the United States for unemployed, unmarried men from relief families, ages 18–25. A part of the New Deal of President Franklin D...
built a campground here which was later remodeled by the Forest Service in 1958 and designated a picnic area. Also in 1958, the USFS built the existing firehouse
Fire station
A fire station is a structure or other area set aside for storage of firefighting apparatus , personal protective equipment, fire hose, fire extinguishers, and other fire extinguishing equipment...
with barracks
Barracks
Barracks are specialised buildings for permanent military accommodation; the word may apply to separate housing blocks or to complete complexes. Their main object is to separate soldiers from the civilian population and reinforce discipline, training and esprit de corps. They were sometimes called...
and information center
Visitor center
A visitor center or centre , visitor information center, tourist information center, is a physical location that provides tourist information to the visitors who tour the place or area locally...
, the two 3-bedroom houses to house employees, and installed a water system (315000 gallons (1,192,404.8 l) capacity) drawn from a lateral well
Water well
A water well is an excavation or structure created in the ground by digging, driving, boring or drilling to access groundwater in underground aquifers. The well water is drawn by an electric submersible pump, a trash pump, a vertical turbine pump, a handpump or a mechanical pump...
(the lateral well was later replaced by the vertical well currently in use.
The Picnic Area
The picnicPicnic
In contemporary usage, a picnic can be defined simply as a pleasure excursion at which a meal is eaten outdoors , ideally taking place in a beautiful landscape such as a park, beside a lake or with an interesting view and possibly at a public event such as before an open air theatre performance,...
grounds of Chantry Flat, known to locals as The Picnic Grove, are authorized for day
Daytime (astronomy)
On Earth, daytime is roughly the period on any given point of the planet's surface during which it experiences natural illumination from indirect or direct sunlight....
use only. Full renovation was completed in August 2006. The site offers 35 tables, each with a charcoal
Charcoal
Charcoal is the dark grey residue consisting of carbon, and any remaining ash, obtained by removing water and other volatile constituents from animal and vegetation substances. Charcoal is usually produced by slow pyrolysis, the heating of wood or other substances in the absence of oxygen...
BBQ; most are wheelchair accessible. Water
Drinking water
Drinking water or potable water is water pure enough to be consumed or used with low risk of immediate or long term harm. In most developed countries, the water supplied to households, commerce and industry is all of drinking water standard, even though only a very small proportion is actually...
spigots are installed throughout, and there are two flush toilet
Flush toilet
A flush toilet is a toilet that disposes of human waste by using water to flush it through a drainpipe to another location. Flushing mechanisms are found more often on western toilets , but many squat toilets also are made for automated flushing...
restrooms.
Pack station
Adams' Pack Station is a permitted outfitter and general store that has operated at Chantry Flat since 1936. One can purchase a Forest Adventure Pass there, and they also offer food and other gear as well as additional parking for visitors. The Pack Station General Store is open to the public on weekends and holidays until 5:00 PM.Parking fee
The road to Chantry Flat is open daily from 6:00AM to 8:00PM. Car parking at Chantry Flats, and many places in the Angeles National Forest, are required to have a National Forest Adventure PassNational Forest Adventure Pass
The National Forest Adventure Pass is a recreation fee pass issued by the United States Forest Service that permits bearers in the four National Forests in Southern California to park their cars for the purpose of recreation...
. National Forest Adventure Pass may be obtained online or from Forest visitor centers and local sporting good merchants. Currently it is $5.00 a day or an a yearly pass $30. The Parking lot fills quickly in the morning on the weekends.
Driving Directions
From the Foothill Freeway (I-210)Interstate 210
Interstate 210 may refer to:*Interstate 210 or the Foothill Freeway, a major east-west freeway running through the valleys north and east of Los Angeles, California*Interstate 210 , a bypass route in Lake Charles, Louisiana...
take the Santa Anita Avenue exit north. Follow Santa Anita Ave. through the residential neighborhood until it ends at the foot of the mountains. Pass the yellow pipe gate and continue 3 miles (4.8 km) into the mountains to the end of Santa Anita Canyon Road.