Way back in 1874, “Truxton” was the working title of the city that became Santa Monica. Yet five miles away we have Truxton Avenue, born on the Westport Heights tract in 1940. Was tract developer Silas Nowell, a Salt Lake City boy (see Naylor Avenue for bio), up on his Santa Monica history? Doubtful. So maybe he named this street after Thomas Truxtun (1755-1822), one of the first commodores in the U.S. Navy? After all, Truxtun’s name was misspelled “Truxton” so many times that it’s uncertain how the man himself spelled it. But that’s not likely either. The most plausible theory is that Nowell or one of his colleagues (mis)named this street after the USS Truxtun, one of several Naval vessels that commemorated the commodore, since three other Westport Heights avenues – Vicksburg, Yorktown, and Kennebec (now part of 83rd Street) – were also names of Navy ships.
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