Dateline>City of Angels

Just south of L.A.’s Elysian Park, along an unpretentious turn of Stadium Way, you’ll find a little street named for a once very big man about town.

Don’t blink, though, or you might miss it. After all, Coronel Street is a poorly paved, “substandard” dead end, merely 11 houses long. Not the sort of honor you’d expect for its legendary namesake.

A Man for All Seasons

Lawyer, politician and all-around man of letters, Antonio F. Coronel was born in Mexico City, Oct. 21, 1817. At age 17 his family migrated to California along with other Mexican colonists.

In 1838 he was made Assistant Secretary of Tribunals of the City of Los Angeles, as well as a Judge of the First Instance (Justice of the Peace). In 1844, Mexican Gov. Manuel Micheltorena appointed him Captain and Inspector of the southern missions. When Yankee forces marched on California during the Mexican-American War, he served as a captain of artillery against the invaders.

Once the U.S. took California, however, Coronel became a leading citizen in the New Order. Consider his resume:

• L.A. City and County Assessor, 1850-56.
• L.A. Superintendent of Schools, 1850-55.
• L.A. City Mayor, 1853-54.
• L.A. City Councilman, 1854-55.
• L.A. City Council President, 1857-59, 1861-65, 1866-67.
• L.A. County Supervisor, 1860.
• California State Treasurer, 1866-70.
• California State Assemblyman, 1870-71.

And Cultured as Well…

On the cultural front, Coronel was a member of the State Horticultural Society, president of the Spanish Benevolent Society, and a founding member of the Historical Society of Southern California. He briefly worked the California Gold Rush, and was a friend of Ramona author Helen Hunt Jackson, a fellow advocate of Indian rights.

In 1873, he married the significantly younger Mariana Williamson and together they romanced Los Angeles’ elite with social events featuring Early California music, food and costume.

In addition to politics and society, Coronel was also a master of the changing economic climate.

Although he lost his own family’s land claims north of Rancho Verdugo, he wielded much influence in the land disputes that flooded American courts after California joined the Union. Keen to the Yankee notion of land as a commodity, he brokered numerous real estate deals for rancheros eager to cash out in the face of the 1860s cattle industry collapse.

For his part, Coronel kept a modest adobe near the intersection of Alameda and 7th. He also owned an adobe block at one end of Calle de los Negros near the town plaza, which became a flashpoint for the Chinese Massacre of 1871.

Maligned in Folklore?

Of course, as executor of the estate of Don Antonio Feliz, he was also the powerful de facto ruler of Rancho Los Feliz (now Griffith Park) for several years. The suspicious nature of the 1863 will that Coronel drafted for Feliz, along with his questionable activities as the land’s trustee during probate, helped inspire the Legend of the Feliz Curse — a tale that many historians insist unfairly maligns Coronel’s reputation.

In fact, local historian Abraham Hoffman has called Coronel one of the region’s most fascinating movers and shakers, writing:

“There is hardly a book on California or Los Angeles dealing with the Hispanic period that fails to include photographs or pictures of Don Antonio and members of his family… Antonio Coronel represents a transitional figure in Los Angeles, someone who was able to thrive even as he moved from one life style to a dramatically different one… someone whose life spanned most of the 19th Century but [is] known to us only in bits and pieces.”

Coronel died midnight, April 17, 1894, and was buried from the Plaza Church at Old Calvary Cemetery. After briefly highlighting his bigger accomplishments, his Los Angeles Times obituary concluded:

“For many years, Mr. Coronel, as a politician, was most influential, but of late years he has lived out of the political arena and given himself to his books, curios, and friends. His death will be deeply regretted by a wide circle of friends who have held him for many years in such high esteem.”

An understated tribute? No question…

But no more so than the obscure little street named for him.