H. J. Whitley
American businessman, California land developer (1847-1931)
Hobart Johnstone Whitley (October 7, 1847 – June 3, 1931) was a Canadian-American businessman and real estate developer. Whitley is best known for helping create the Hollywood subdivision in Los Angeles. He is among those known as the "Father of Hollywood."
Early life
Whitley was born in Toronto, the seventh and youngest son of Joseph Whitley and Eleanor Johnstone. He grew up in Flint, Michigan, and attended Toronto Business College. Whitley became a naturalized citizen of the United States in the 1870s.
In 1887, Whitley married his second wife, Margaret Virginia Ross.
Early career
Whitley moved to Chicago, where he owned a hardware store and candy store. He became interested in land development, became a land agent for the Rock Island Railroad and was elected to its board of directors. He plotted and organized towns in the Cherokee Strip region of Oklahoma, and in 1912 he "declined the first governorship."
California
Hollywood
Whitley came to California in 1893; the next year, 1894, he established the HJ Whitley Jewelry Store in Los Angeles.
Hollywood was then a rural settlement of eighteen families; Whitley envisioned Hollywood "as a thriving suburb of Los Angeles." He subdivided 400 acres of open fields and gardens into a residential section, and more families came here to live."
Whitley became a major shareholder, with Harrison Gray Otis and George W. Hoover, of the Los Angeles Pacific Boulevard and Development Company.
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This entry incorporates text from “H. J. Whitley” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.