Rancho La Ballona
Historical ranch in Los Angeles, California, USA
Rancho La Ballona was a 13,920-acre (56.3 km2) Mexican land grant in the present-day Westside region of Los Angeles County, Southern California.
The rancho was confirmed by Alta California Governor Juan Alvarado in 1839, to Ygnacio and Augustin Machado and Felipe and Tomas Talamantes. The Machados and Talamanteses had already been given a Spanish concession to graze their cattle on this land in 1819. Many Machado and Talamantes family members of the late 19th century and early 20th century are buried at the north edge of the former Mexican Rancho La Ballona at a cemetery on Pico Boulevard, which was known as the La Ballona Cemetery, later in 1876 as the Ballona Township Cemetery, and then as the Woodlawn Cemetery of Santa Monica in the early 20th century.
The grant stretched from inland (near the present day San Diego Freeway) to Santa Monica Bay, from present day Mar Vista, Westside Village, Palms, and Culver City; northwest to Pico Boulevard and the Ocean Park district of Santa Monica; and south along Ballona Creek through Venice, the Ballona Wetlands, and present day Marina del Rey, Playa Vista, and Playa Del Rey. Neighboring ranches included Rancho San Vicente y Santa Monica, Rancho Rincón de los Bueyes, Rancho Aguaje de la Centinela, and Rancho Sausal Redondo.
History
In 1821 they applied again, joined by Augustin's brother Ygnacio, and Felipe's son Tomas. The military commander, José de la Guerra y Noriega, gave them permission to graze cattle on the future Rancho La Ballona lands, when they were living in the Pueblo de Los Ángeles. In 1839 Mexican Governor Alvarado confirmed the land grant for Rancho La Ballona to them.
The cession of California to the United States followed the Mexican–American War, and the 1848 Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo promised that the existing land grants would be honored.
Begin with the source’s own compact description: “Rancho La Ballona” is historical ranch in Los Angeles, California, USA. The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through Rancho, Ballona and Historical, not as a finished interpretation.
Why this record matters
The phrase “historical ranch in Los Angeles, California, USA” supplies a clear boundary for inquiry. It also exposes the unanswered questions: who defined that boundary, when it became stable and which sources sit outside it.
Chronology, provenance and viewpoint should be read together before a broad social or political interpretation is accepted. The source revision retrieved here is dated Mar 22, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q2679042. Authority coordinates are 34.010, -118.420. 1 of 2 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1839, 1819, 1876 and 1821.
Institutional narratives can privilege the records that survived while minimizing voices that were never formally collected. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
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Three-step research path
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This entry incorporates text from “Rancho La Ballona” 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.