Charles B. Hopper
(from Mtns. to the Sea)

Charles B. Hopper. If there is such a thing as a real estate man "to the manner born," the description would fit Charles B. Hopper probably better than any other man in Southern California. The real estate business seems to have run in the Hopper family. Mr. Hopper's father was a successful real estate operator in the East, and also on the Pacific Coast, and Mr. Hopper himself grew up in the atmosphere of a real estate office and has known and wanted no other field of work since he was a boy.

He is the subdivision man supreme and pre-eminent, and his work in developing and selling subdivisions in and around Los Angeles is probably too well known to require further introduction. In later years his name and enterprise have been especially identified with the Southgate Gardens and South Park Gardens.

Mr. Hopper was born at Titusville, the famous center of the Pennsylvania oil industry, September 26, 1880, a son of Isaac B. and Elizabeth (Harriman) Hopper, the former a native of New Jersey, and the latter of Adrian, Michigan. The family came to California and located at Los Angeles in 1895. Isaac Hopper died March 11, 1911, having been retired several years before his death. Charles B. and his sister, Mrs. Kelley Rees, of Portland, Oregon, are the only survivors of four children.

Charles B. Hopper, the youngest, was educated in the gramm-'r and high schools of Los Angeles, attended Leiand Stanford University, and in 1896 went to work in the real estate business with his father. He has been an independent operator since 1903, and it can be safely said that no one is better versed in real estate values in Southern Ca'ifomia than he. He is a specialist in subdivision property. He has built over six hundred houses in this section, having developed the Lawndale district, between Los Angeles and Redondo, and also the Western avenue and Jefferson street district.

For the last two years he has been handling the famous Cudahy Ranch under the name of the Southgate Gardens, a tract of about two thousand acres adjoining Los Angeles on the south. By 1919 a quarter of this property had been sold. Development work began on the ranch property in 1917, and within less than two years it has been completely transfonned, now having broad paved avenues, with sewers, • lectric light and all modern improvements, and many of the avenues are lined by attractive homes, the grounds being subdivided in half-acre units. Besides the Southgate Gardens subdivision as a whole, there is a townsite of Southgate, opened March 1, 1918, and now well developed with stores, churches and schools.

The South Park Garden district is a very ambitious project, involving one thousand acres, located south of the new Goodyear Rubb?r Company plant, which will give employment to about seven thousand men. South Park Gardens is divided into Mr. Hopper's favorite unit, a half acre of ground, with all city improvements, a low price and good transportation.

Mr. Hopper knows how to market property and get it placed with the right class of people, so that satisfaction is insured to all concerned. He has been author of some of the most effective advertising campaigns employed in the development and sale of Southern California property. He has five real estate oiffices, including those at Ocean Park, Whittier and Santa Ana. His main office, at 61 1 South Hill street, on the ground floor of the Consolidated Realt}- Building, is said to be the largest and finest real estate office on the Pacific Coast, and the best equipped subdivision office in the West, or west of Chicago, though probably not even \ Chicago has any office of the kind that equals it. Tlie office is exceedingly large, with six thousand square feet of floor space, has special auditorium for lectures and moving pictures, and this auditorium is used every Tuesday and Thursday evenings and has been the medium for a great deal of educational instruction regarding the citrus district. Mr. Hopper operates three automobile excursions, with a free ranch dinner, every Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday, and altogether he furnishes a dollar's worth of service for every dollar he receives as commission. Mr. Hopper is a member of the Los Angeles Realty Board, the Los Angeles Chamber of Commerce, Los Angeles Athletic Club, California Club, Los Angeles Country Club, Gramercy Tennis Club, and is a republican. But the organization where his name is especially enshrined is the Automobile Club of Southern California. He helped organize this club, and in the capacity of secretary and treasurer for about four years was the individual chiefly responsible for making it a real club, developing its membership from thirty to two thousand. Most of the real work of increasing the membership and building up the organization was done in Mr. Hopper's real estate office as a pastime from his other duties. In recognition of what he did for the club, he was made an honorary member for life, with no dues to pay. He is also a director and one of the organizers of the Inglewood Park Cemetery Association, which has one of the largest sites for cemetery purposes in California. Mr. Hopper's recreation is in golf and tennis and in real estate. His home is at 716 South Manhattan Place. He married Miss Helen MacDonald, of Columbus, Ohio, at Los Angeles, June 28, 1909. She was born and educated in Ohio, but finished her schooling in Los Angeles. Mrs. Hopper is a member of the Friday Morning Club of Los Angeles. They have two native daughters of Los Angeles, Virginia and Elizabeth.