This street honors a breed of chicken. Leghorn Ave. was named on a 1917 tract co-owned by James Hayden John (1884-1951), who had recently moved here from Philadelphia with his wife Frances (1884-1979). An 1918 article in the Van Nuys News stated that John “expects to engage in the poultry business”, leaving no doubt as to the provenance of this street. (Chicken ranches were all the rage in the Valley those days; see Runnymede Street for another example.) John, who lived right around the corner on Magnolia, gave up on his feathered friends in 1927 and opened a copper engraving shop with Frances’s brother George Elmer Allen (1880-1956). Allen was listed as this tract’s co-owner in 1917 – his obituary said he bought the land back in 1911, about which I’m skeptical – but he didn’t leave Philly for the SFV until 1924. When he did arrive, he brought his parents, sisters, wife Elsie, and daughter Jeanette with him. He and Elsie lived on Leghorn Ave. itself.
Find it on the map:
