Mike Schaadt - San Pedros Cabrillo Beach

The federal government considered building a major port for Southern California in Santa Monica, Marina del Rey, and Redondo Beach as well as San Pedro. After much lobbying, San Pedro was selected. The government decided to build a breakwater to protect San Pedro Bay and the new world-class port. Construction began on the San Pedro Breakwater in 1899. The first 2-mile stretch was finished in 1912.

On April 26, 1899, President McKinley pressed a button in the library of the White House whereby the machinery was set in motion to fill the air chambers of this barge, causing it to roll over on one side and the rocks to tumble into the water. Unfortunately, the mechanism of the new barge failed to work, so the rocks had to be pushed off by hand. This was accepted as symbolic of the entire harbor undertakingnothing about it had come easily. If not for tremendous individual and community efforts, it could have never been accomplished.

After the first rocks were dumped to start the breakwater, a large Free Harbor Jubilee celebration sponsored by the government was held that lasted two days. Twenty thousand people were in attendance. The following day a flower parade was held in Los Angeles celebrating the event.

Sen. Stephen M. White was one of the honored guests at what is believed to be the first picnic at Cabrillo Beach.

The original breakwater was to be 8,500 feet long at a cost of $2.9 million. Pilings were driven out into the water 2.5 miles and a track laid on the pilings. The breakwater was built toward the shore and the tracks removed and the pilings cut off as the breakwater grew toward land.

The main channel and Terminal Island can be seen, before the breakwater was extended, in the background of this c. 1904 photograph. The foreground shows the flatcars of rock being transported from the Chatsworth Quarry in Chatsworth, California, to be used for the breakwater. Originally rocks for the breakwater were quarried from Santa Catalina Island, but due to multiple complications, a mainland source was chosen later in the project.

A shack was built to store tools at the beginning of the railway pier that was used to make the breakwater. The locomotive on the tracks would stop and workers would load or unload the hand tools needed for the days work. This photograph was taken around 1888.

Some of the stones used in the breakwater weighed from 6,000 to 16,000 pounds each. They were arranged like steps with the heavier ones on the sea side. The breakwater was built like a flight of seven steps with 2-foot risers on the harbor side and four steps of 4-foot risers on the sea side.

A drawing by the Los Angeles Harbor Department in 1905 shows an active main channel and an undeveloped Cabrillo Beach area in the upper left.

In the 1950s, the Los Angeles Harbor Department included a plan for further development of the harbor that included plenty of dock space in and around Cabrillo Beach for the growing number of people moving into communities around Los Angeles.