On February 21, 1852, 160 years ago today, the Los Angeles Star published the first of Hugo Reid’s 22 letters about language, laws, religion, food, clothes, and customs of the local Tongva tribe in Southern California (letters are online at Library of Congress), before the arrival of the Spaniards as well as their experiences after the conquest and under mission rule. Reid (pictured above in a 1931 drawing by Maynard Dixon) married Victoria Bartolomea, a Tongva woman, raised at the Mission San Gabriel. From her and her family, he gathered the information for his letters which are still quoted by historians.

One of Reid’s friends was Antonio Coronel, who later shared Reid’s story with Helen Hunt Jackson. Jackson modeled her famous story of Ramona after the Reids. For more about Reid, see A Scotch Paisano, Hugo Reid’s Life in Califoronia. 1832-1852.

For a romanticized view of Reid, listen to this episode of the 1941 radio program, Romance of the Ranchos.