Elias   "Lucky" Baldwin

The transformation of California from Indigenous homelands to a state dominated by private landowners and settlers was neither peaceful nor inevitable. It was shaped by the U.S. conquest, broken treaties, and a systematic campaign of violence that dispossessed Native communities. Among those who rose to power in this turbulent period was Elias Jackson “Lucky” Baldwin — a man whose legacy continues to cast a long shadow over Southern California.  This page explores the lesser-known history of how Baldwin built his empire and the cost borne by the Kizh Nation and other Indigenous peoples.

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The U.S. Invasion and the Betrayal of California Tribes

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When the United States invaded and annexed California in 1848, it quickly moved to dismantle the sovereignty of Native nations. Federal agents negotiated 18 treaties with California tribes, including the Kizh, which would have recognized tribal territories and provided at least a measure of protection. But in 1852, the U.S. Senate refused to ratify these agreements, locking them away in secrecy.  This betrayal unleashed a land rush. Speculators, ranchers, and businessmen flooded into California, taking advantage of a chaotic legal environment to claim Indigenous lands by any means necessary.

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The Formation of Baldwin’s Settler Empire

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Elias Jackson Baldwin arrived in California during the Gold Rush. While he earned the nickname “Lucky” for his gambling success and shrewd investments, much of his fortune was built on the violent disruption of Native life. By the late 19th century, Baldwin had acquired over 60,000 acres across Southern California.  He did this through exploitative land deals that preyed on debt-ridden rancheros whose properties overlapped Native villages.  He utilized legal manipulations and foreclosures, seizing land when owners could not pay.  And he directed armed intimidation to clear Indigenous people from the landscape. At this point, his holdings included the hills that today bear his name — Baldwin Hills, large parts of the San Gabriel Valley, including what is now Arcadia and Monrovia and expanses of the Los Angeles Basin once stewarded by Kizh villages.

The story often told about Baldwin is one of entrepreneurial genius. The story less often told is how this empire was founded on violence and erasure.

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Armed Posses (Militia) and Settler Violence

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California’s first decades of statehood were marked by state-sanctioned genocide. From 1851 to 1873, the government authorized and funded campaigns to hunt down Indigenous people, issuing payments totaling over $1.5 million to settlers for militia operations. These payments effectively reimbursed massacres as “public service.”  Baldwin was not a passive beneficiary of this environment — he was an active participant. Oral histories and tribal accounts, as well as contemporary reports, describe how Baldwin led and financed the removal of Native families from lands he wanted to control.  He hired armed men and deputized them to forcibly clear encampments. He also issued ultimatums: leave or be killed. Survivors and descendants recount how Baldwin’s men targeted Kizh families in the San Gabriel Valley and Baldwin Hills. In some cases, raids ended in gunfire, people were lynched or driven deep into the canyons and entire communities disappeared under the threat of annihilation.

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In some documented cases, Baldwin’s men opened fire on Kizh and Tataviam families living in the hills and valleys. Those who resisted were shot, lynched, or driven into the wilderness. The presence of these killings was well-known in the region, but newspapers at the time either celebrated the acts as “necessary for settlement” or ignored them altogether. This violence was not rogue behavior—it was integral to Baldwin’s real estate empire. Clearing Native people was seen as clearing obstacles to profit. His business model depended on the erasure of Indigenous presence — not only physically, but legally and culturally. These acts were not exceptional — they were standard practice in a system that viewed Indigenous people as obstacles to private wealth.

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Erasure and Naming as Colonial Tools

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After forcibly removing Native families, Baldwin moved quickly to cement his claim. He renamed the land, ensuring that his identity was enshrined in place names. What had been known in Kizh language as sacred ridgelines and gathering places were rebranded Baldwin Hills, Baldwin Park and Baldwin Avenue.  This renaming served two purposes.  One was to naturalize his ownership, transforming violence into legacy.  Two was to erase Indigenous presence, severing the connection between the land and the people who had cared for it for generations. Today, public schools, city parks, and entire neighborhoods bear Baldwin’s name — often without acknowledgment of the dispossession and killings that underwrote his wealth.

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A Legacy That Demands Reckoning

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Too often, Baldwin is remembered as a colorful eccentric: the horse breeder who founded Santa Anita Racetrack, the tycoon whose mansion was a local landmark. But the full story requires a sober reckoning with how his fortune was made.  He utilized a state-enabled genocidal policy. He targeted violence against Native families and his focus was legal and cultural erasure. The places that carry Baldwin’s name are reminders that history is written not just in books but in the names of our landscapes. As more communities revisit whose stories are honored, there is an opportunity to confront this legacy honestly — and to uplift the histories of those who resisted and survived. Today, the Kizh Nation and its sister Tribes in the north and south endure as a living people whose descendants remain in their ancestral homelands, committed to protecting these lands and sharing the truth of what was done — and the resilience that has carried them forward.

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References

• Madley, Benjamin. An American Genocide: The United States and the California Indian Catastrophe, 1846–1873. Yale University Press, 2016.

• McWilliams, Carey. Southern California: An Island on the Land. Gibbs Smith, 1946.

• Rawls, James J. “Gold Diggers: Indian Miners and Native Resistance.” California History, 1976.

• Deverell, William. Whitewashed Adobe: The Rise of Los Angeles and the Remaking of Its Mexican Past. University of California Press, 2004.

• Salas Teutimez, Ernie. Oral History, 2012–2022.

• Kizh Nation Tribal Archives, on settler violence in the San Gabriel Valley and Baldwin Hills region.