1889
OJAI THROUGH THE years
1922 1947
The town of Nordhoff was founded with great fanfare by Thomas Royce Surdam, a very busy real estate developer and former gold miner. He bought 1,700 acres that year and built the Blumberg Hotel. More than 300 people attended the opening event and he sold land for $6.25 an acre.
1874
Long regarded as one of the finest prep schools in the country, The Thacher School was founded by William and Sherman Thacher and has several famous alumni, including Thornton Wilder, Howard Hughes and actor Noah Wylie. Its original motto was “Teach a boy to shoot a rifle, ride and horse and tell the truth.”
1889
Changed name to Ojai after a massive redevelopment project led by Edward Drummond Libbey, an Ohio glass magnate and frequent winter visitor. The fire of 1917 burned so many buildings that Libbey and others used that blank canvas to rebuild in the spirit of the “City Beautiful Movement,” which held that people are shaped by their living environments. Among the landmarks built in that epochal period were the Post Office Tower; modeled after the Campanile in Havana, Cuba; Libbey Bowl, the Arcade; the St. Thomas Aquinas Church; (now the Ojai Valley Museum); and the Ojai Country Club, now the Ojai Valley Inn.
1917
1921 30
City officially incorporated with great
fanfare. Jiddhu Krishnamurti comes to town, sponsored by the Theosophist Society, along with his tuberculosis-suffering younger brother Nitya. Positioned by the Theosophists as the “World Leader,” Krishnamurti rejected that title with his famous essay, “Truth is a Pathless Land.” He once held the Guinness Book of World Records for being the world’s most prolific public speaker.
1922
1937
“Lost Horizon” is released. The Frank Capra-directed film starred Ronald
2022 OJAI VISITOR
