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History
A Little Bit of Meadowbrook History
(As I Know It) by Nancy Gruttman-Tyler
Really Old Stuff
Beginning of Development
What it Was Like Here
Early Meadowbrook Homes
Local Area
Meadowbrook Post Office
Electricity and Water
Terrain and Environment
Telephones
Climate
Fires
Conclusion
Beginning of Development
What it Was Like Here
Early Meadowbrook Homes
Local Area
Meadowbrook Post Office
Electricity and Water
Terrain and Environment
Telephones
Climate
Fires
Conclusion
In the early 1800s, Native Americans used some land in the Meadowbrook area as a sacred burial ground. It was mostly ignored by the local residents until the end of the 1900s when grave robbers began a campaign to unearth the remains and steal the native artifacts. The community brought attention to this desecration, and a 12-acre area was fenced off and officially recognized by the federal government. Today it is designated as federally protected Native American Sacred Burial Grounds.
In the mid to late 1800s, Meadowbrook was the site of an active and prosperous gold mine. Hwy 74 was once a trail used by the miners to go to the mine from the train station in Perris. Railroad tracks also ran through Meadowbrook, along Hwy 74 between Lake Elsinore and Perris to support the mining operations. Some remnants of the mining operations still exist in the form of mine shafts. Today, these are closed up and considered too dangerous to explore.
In the late 1940s and early 1950s, land speculators (real estate partners, Charles Watkins and Lynn Gritton) bought acreage along Hwy 74 between Lake Elsinore and Perris, divided it into parcels of one acre to several acres, and began offering it for sale. Residents from Orange and San Diego Counties began looking to the desert communities for simple weekend retreats from their fast-developing hometowns. In those days, Meadowbrook acreage had little to offer, except for large boulders, scattered sagebrush, wind-blown tumbleweeds, and some spring blossoms to nurture the lizards, roadrunners, and occasional rattlesnakes. However, the air was clear of smog and pollution that plagued the more popular and cooler Orange County cities.
In the 1950s and 1960s, the Meadowbrook night sky was quite dark and the Milky Way Galaxy was brilliant on moonless nights, showing billowing “clouds” of stars overhead. During the full moon, the entire area was so lit up throughout the clear sky, that it was possible to go anywhere outside and easily see great distances—even well enough to drive the back roads without headlights. Also, the few homes in the Meadowbrook valley gave off no light pollution that is so disruptive of the night atmosphere today. Hwy 74 had little traffic, with perhaps one car every 15 or 20 minutes during the day, and hardly any cars traveling at night. No unsightly, lighted billboards hawked commerce in those days. The twists and turns of the highway kept a driver’s attention, even before it became a dangerous thoroughfare for speeding motorists in a hurry to get somewhere.
Some of Meadowbrook’s parcels had small wooden structures that were shanties previously used by the railroads in the 1930s to house equipment and offer shelter from the elements to the working railway crews. These one-room shanties were easily portable because they were small (about 12’x 15’x 8’) with a single door and three or four windows. They were elevated above the ground on cement blocks. These humble shacks became desert retreat homes to the earliest Meadowbrook residents who chose a rustic lifestyle over the fast growing suburbs of a more populated and California southland. Some of these old wooden buildings can still be seen today as reminders of our historic past.
In the 1950s, Meadowbrook’s fledgling property owners experienced considerable hardships to sustain a living in this high desert area. The nearest city, Lake Elsinore, had a population of about 3,000 and a few food stores, gas stations, and other sources of goods, such as Elsinore Pioneer Lumber. The Meadowbrook Market at the intersection of Hwy 74 and Meadowbrook Avenue, offered grocery store staples before the term “convenience store” was invented.
In a small building next door to the Meadowbrook Market was the Meadowbrook Post Office. When the US Postal Service reorganized its post offices into sectional centers, our post office was shut down, and the mail was routed via ZIP code through Perris, which changed our mailing address from “Meadowbrook” to that distant and unrelated city. We used to have to include the name "Meadowbrook" on our mail. After the change, the mailman would scribble out "Meadowbrook" in the address on the mail I received. I kept using it anyhow, figuring I'd outlive him. I did.
As development and infrastructure came to the inland desert, Meadowbrook was in the middle of two expanding areas for public utilities. Power lines were brought in from Lake Elsinore in the west and from Perris in the east to meet within the Meadowbrook community. In the late 1950s, there was no water available within the community, except for a few individual wells. Outhouses were “out back” of nearly every home. Today, some of them are still found, now being used a tool sheds. The nearest water line was at the intersection of two narrow highways, Hwy 74 (running between Perris and Lake Elsinore), and Hwy 71 (which went from Corona to Lake Elsinore). A small wooden structure called “the pump house” (about 5’x4’x3’) was located in a vacant field where the Burger King parking lot is today at I-15 and Hwy 74. Inside the pump house was a water pump that had to be primed to produce water. Meadowbrook residents and owners paid $3/month rental to the local real estate agent for a key to the lock to gain access to the water inside. The water had to be pumped into barrels which were transported to the property for use in the house and surrounding plants and fledgling trees.
Many owners planted and nurtured oleanders, California pepper trees, eucalyptus trees, and some avocado and citrus trees in an effort to turn the desert green. A few residents “went native” and created more naturally designed cactus gardens by bringing in specimens from other nearby desert areas. The general terrain was quite different in those days of the 1950s and thru the 1970s, with mostly bare, rocky ground between the sagebrush bushes. There was no green knee-high grass in the spring and fall back then—before the horse country from nearby Temecula and Murrietta came into existence. The hay and grasses fed to the animals were spread by the wind to the surrounding hillsides and over the decades they spread miles away to produce grassy green hills in the spring and fall after a rainy season. These grasses are the bane of today’s homeowners who must clear the land, season after season, to meet fire department regulations. In those decades, a simple clearing of the sagebrush once every four or five years handled the job. Also, no mustard weed flowers grew back then, but the famous California Poppies carpeted some areas after the seasonal rains.
In the very late 1960s, telephones began ringing in Meadowbrook homes. The first phones were on “party lines” which meant that two or three houses shared a single phone line. When you picked up the telephone to make a call, if you heard your neighbor’s voice, you had to hang up and wait until they were finished before you could make your call. It was a “kinder and gentler” community in those days because you had to be considerate of others due to situations like this. In most cases, you knew who was on your party line. You had to show respect for them, as you would wish to receive it yourself. As with the electricity, the phone lines came from Perris and Lake Elsinore and met within Meadowbrook. In some areas, one side of the street (like Walnut Street) had an Elsinore exchange of 674, while the neighbors across the street had a Perris exchange of 657. It was a long distance call between these two exchanges and cost more money to call across the street than it did to call next door. When fiber optics came through in the early 1970s, the party lines became obsolete. When the deregulation of the phone companies took place, the area rates changed, and nearby calls no longer cost more money, regardless of the exchange.
Aside from the hottest summer months, the spring and fall weather was very mild and comfortable. Hot, dry winds blew in the fall and the tumbleweeds literally tumbled over acres and acres of open land, coming to rest beside some building or caught among the stubborn sagebrush that failed to yield a path. The dry desert air had remained clear and clean for several decades, until recently. During the past 15 years, the air is changing as the humidity goes up due to irrigation, sprinklers, landscaping, and commercial agriculture. In the past, cold, fierce winds blew during the winter, and even sometimes uprooted entire rows of old and tall eucalyptus trees. Meadowbrook residents usually cut up the wood for their fireplaces and wood burning stoves and planted more trees in the spring.
Along with the winds came fires—as it still is today. The brush fires were unpredictable and scary. But the biggest difference is that today there is more at stake. The homes are bigger, and values are higher, but the loss was always potentially great when it’s YOUR home at stake. In past decades there was more open space between houses. Over the years, Meadowbrook’s multi-acre parcels have been reduced and split and now, sometimes, there are two or more dwellings where one only stood in the past. The dry sagebrush would burn fast, with no dry grasses on the rocky ground in between for added fuel, and the fire would come and go so quickly that tall trees would be only scorched and the occasional home would often remain undamaged as the fire swept by, low to the ground with few sparks flying high. Many of the sagebrushes would only burn on the outside, and the plants revived with the next season’s rainfall. The sight of smoke in the distance always brings anxiety, regardless of the decade. Watching the tanker planes dropping their loads of fire retardants and water is always a comfort and brings hope that the fire won’t come close. Fire season is always a dangerous time.
These are some of the things I remember and know from my time in Meadowbrook since 1957—through a combination of 50 years that include: weekend visits in the 1950s and 1960s, residence in the 1970s, visits to other residing family members in the 1980s and 1990s, and semi-annual residence in the new millennium. All of my family has lived here at one time or another, and half of my family has died here. I cherish my memories of Meadowbrook, and hope it can remain an enclave of independence and a world of its own.
In the mid to late 1800s, Meadowbrook was the site of an active and prosperous gold mine. Hwy 74 was once a trail used by the miners to go to the mine from the train station in Perris. Railroad tracks also ran through Meadowbrook, along Hwy 74 between Lake Elsinore and Perris to support the mining operations. Some remnants of the mining operations still exist in the form of mine shafts. Today, these are closed up and considered too dangerous to explore.
In the late 1940s and early 1950s, land speculators (real estate partners, Charles Watkins and Lynn Gritton) bought acreage along Hwy 74 between Lake Elsinore and Perris, divided it into parcels of one acre to several acres, and began offering it for sale. Residents from Orange and San Diego Counties began looking to the desert communities for simple weekend retreats from their fast-developing hometowns. In those days, Meadowbrook acreage had little to offer, except for large boulders, scattered sagebrush, wind-blown tumbleweeds, and some spring blossoms to nurture the lizards, roadrunners, and occasional rattlesnakes. However, the air was clear of smog and pollution that plagued the more popular and cooler Orange County cities.
In the 1950s and 1960s, the Meadowbrook night sky was quite dark and the Milky Way Galaxy was brilliant on moonless nights, showing billowing “clouds” of stars overhead. During the full moon, the entire area was so lit up throughout the clear sky, that it was possible to go anywhere outside and easily see great distances—even well enough to drive the back roads without headlights. Also, the few homes in the Meadowbrook valley gave off no light pollution that is so disruptive of the night atmosphere today. Hwy 74 had little traffic, with perhaps one car every 15 or 20 minutes during the day, and hardly any cars traveling at night. No unsightly, lighted billboards hawked commerce in those days. The twists and turns of the highway kept a driver’s attention, even before it became a dangerous thoroughfare for speeding motorists in a hurry to get somewhere.
Some of Meadowbrook’s parcels had small wooden structures that were shanties previously used by the railroads in the 1930s to house equipment and offer shelter from the elements to the working railway crews. These one-room shanties were easily portable because they were small (about 12’x 15’x 8’) with a single door and three or four windows. They were elevated above the ground on cement blocks. These humble shacks became desert retreat homes to the earliest Meadowbrook residents who chose a rustic lifestyle over the fast growing suburbs of a more populated and California southland. Some of these old wooden buildings can still be seen today as reminders of our historic past.
In the 1950s, Meadowbrook’s fledgling property owners experienced considerable hardships to sustain a living in this high desert area. The nearest city, Lake Elsinore, had a population of about 3,000 and a few food stores, gas stations, and other sources of goods, such as Elsinore Pioneer Lumber. The Meadowbrook Market at the intersection of Hwy 74 and Meadowbrook Avenue, offered grocery store staples before the term “convenience store” was invented.
In a small building next door to the Meadowbrook Market was the Meadowbrook Post Office. When the US Postal Service reorganized its post offices into sectional centers, our post office was shut down, and the mail was routed via ZIP code through Perris, which changed our mailing address from “Meadowbrook” to that distant and unrelated city. We used to have to include the name "Meadowbrook" on our mail. After the change, the mailman would scribble out "Meadowbrook" in the address on the mail I received. I kept using it anyhow, figuring I'd outlive him. I did.
As development and infrastructure came to the inland desert, Meadowbrook was in the middle of two expanding areas for public utilities. Power lines were brought in from Lake Elsinore in the west and from Perris in the east to meet within the Meadowbrook community. In the late 1950s, there was no water available within the community, except for a few individual wells. Outhouses were “out back” of nearly every home. Today, some of them are still found, now being used a tool sheds. The nearest water line was at the intersection of two narrow highways, Hwy 74 (running between Perris and Lake Elsinore), and Hwy 71 (which went from Corona to Lake Elsinore). A small wooden structure called “the pump house” (about 5’x4’x3’) was located in a vacant field where the Burger King parking lot is today at I-15 and Hwy 74. Inside the pump house was a water pump that had to be primed to produce water. Meadowbrook residents and owners paid $3/month rental to the local real estate agent for a key to the lock to gain access to the water inside. The water had to be pumped into barrels which were transported to the property for use in the house and surrounding plants and fledgling trees.
Many owners planted and nurtured oleanders, California pepper trees, eucalyptus trees, and some avocado and citrus trees in an effort to turn the desert green. A few residents “went native” and created more naturally designed cactus gardens by bringing in specimens from other nearby desert areas. The general terrain was quite different in those days of the 1950s and thru the 1970s, with mostly bare, rocky ground between the sagebrush bushes. There was no green knee-high grass in the spring and fall back then—before the horse country from nearby Temecula and Murrietta came into existence. The hay and grasses fed to the animals were spread by the wind to the surrounding hillsides and over the decades they spread miles away to produce grassy green hills in the spring and fall after a rainy season. These grasses are the bane of today’s homeowners who must clear the land, season after season, to meet fire department regulations. In those decades, a simple clearing of the sagebrush once every four or five years handled the job. Also, no mustard weed flowers grew back then, but the famous California Poppies carpeted some areas after the seasonal rains.
In the very late 1960s, telephones began ringing in Meadowbrook homes. The first phones were on “party lines” which meant that two or three houses shared a single phone line. When you picked up the telephone to make a call, if you heard your neighbor’s voice, you had to hang up and wait until they were finished before you could make your call. It was a “kinder and gentler” community in those days because you had to be considerate of others due to situations like this. In most cases, you knew who was on your party line. You had to show respect for them, as you would wish to receive it yourself. As with the electricity, the phone lines came from Perris and Lake Elsinore and met within Meadowbrook. In some areas, one side of the street (like Walnut Street) had an Elsinore exchange of 674, while the neighbors across the street had a Perris exchange of 657. It was a long distance call between these two exchanges and cost more money to call across the street than it did to call next door. When fiber optics came through in the early 1970s, the party lines became obsolete. When the deregulation of the phone companies took place, the area rates changed, and nearby calls no longer cost more money, regardless of the exchange.
Aside from the hottest summer months, the spring and fall weather was very mild and comfortable. Hot, dry winds blew in the fall and the tumbleweeds literally tumbled over acres and acres of open land, coming to rest beside some building or caught among the stubborn sagebrush that failed to yield a path. The dry desert air had remained clear and clean for several decades, until recently. During the past 15 years, the air is changing as the humidity goes up due to irrigation, sprinklers, landscaping, and commercial agriculture. In the past, cold, fierce winds blew during the winter, and even sometimes uprooted entire rows of old and tall eucalyptus trees. Meadowbrook residents usually cut up the wood for their fireplaces and wood burning stoves and planted more trees in the spring.
Along with the winds came fires—as it still is today. The brush fires were unpredictable and scary. But the biggest difference is that today there is more at stake. The homes are bigger, and values are higher, but the loss was always potentially great when it’s YOUR home at stake. In past decades there was more open space between houses. Over the years, Meadowbrook’s multi-acre parcels have been reduced and split and now, sometimes, there are two or more dwellings where one only stood in the past. The dry sagebrush would burn fast, with no dry grasses on the rocky ground in between for added fuel, and the fire would come and go so quickly that tall trees would be only scorched and the occasional home would often remain undamaged as the fire swept by, low to the ground with few sparks flying high. Many of the sagebrushes would only burn on the outside, and the plants revived with the next season’s rainfall. The sight of smoke in the distance always brings anxiety, regardless of the decade. Watching the tanker planes dropping their loads of fire retardants and water is always a comfort and brings hope that the fire won’t come close. Fire season is always a dangerous time.
These are some of the things I remember and know from my time in Meadowbrook since 1957—through a combination of 50 years that include: weekend visits in the 1950s and 1960s, residence in the 1970s, visits to other residing family members in the 1980s and 1990s, and semi-annual residence in the new millennium. All of my family has lived here at one time or another, and half of my family has died here. I cherish my memories of Meadowbrook, and hope it can remain an enclave of independence and a world of its own.
