Daniel Freeman

Daniel Freeman (1837–1918) was an American landowner in southwestern Los Angeles County, California, and a developer in downtown Los Angeles during the 19th century. He was the founder of the City of Inglewood and the first farmer to engage extensively in wheat cultivation in Southern California.

Life

Freeman was born in Norfolk County, Upper Canada, on June 30, 1837, the son of Daniel Wesley Freeman (1807–1877) and Isabella Bailey (1811–1856). He had a brother, Charles Edwin Freeman, and a sister, Phoebe Amelia Freeman. He attended the common schools in Norfolk County and then went to Lynn Grove Academy until 1857. He earned his law degree from Osgoode Hall, University of Toronto in 1864.

Freeman died of "an attack of heart failure" on September 28, 1918, at the age of 81 in his home on Inglewood Avenue in Inglewood, California. A "strictly private" and "unusually simple" service was held in the home of C.F. Howland, his son-in-law, followed by another service at the Inglewood Episcopal Church and cremation at Rosedale Cemetery in Los Angeles. Notable honorary pallbearers included newspaper editor and writer Charles F. Lummis and attorney Henry O'Melveny.

Freeman was survived by two children, Grace Howland, wife of C.H. Howland of Inglewood, and A.C. Freeman, who was living in Paris, France.

Vocation

Freeman taught school in 1857 to 1858, studied law in 1859 to 1864, and practiced law in 1864 to 1873, when he moved to the United States and took up farming. He styled himself a "farmer" or a "rancher."

The rancho was at first given over to sheep farming, but Freeman soon became "the first man in Southern California to engage in the extensive planting of wheat." He sold off his rancho properties and invested elsewhere, including the 1889 construction of a "substantial" three-story bring building at Sixth and Spring Streets, Los Angeles, known as the Freeman block and housing the Los Angeles Trust and Savings Bank. It was known as the "pioneer of large buildings on Spring street."

He was an investor in the Panorama Building, a commercial building and separate exhibition space for a panoramic painting, debuting in late 1887: a copy of the Panorama of the Siege of Paris by Henri Felix Emmanuel Philippoteaux, depicting a battle of the 1870-1871 Franco-Prussian War, the last one between the French resistance and the Prussian besiegers, which led to the fall of Paris in January 1871. The exhibition rotunda became a skating rink and was demolished to make way for the Adolphus (later Hippodrome) Theatre. Today. the site is a large open-air parking lot.

In 1892, Freeman bought a steamer, the Southern California, and began importing coal from British Columbia. He next engaged in brick-making "and made the building materials for many of the business blocks on Spring street and on Broadway."