Fremont Ackerman (1859-1942) laid out the tract on which Ackerman Drive was born in 1923, but it’s unclear whether he was patting himself on the back or if landowner George Barry (see Barryknoll Drive) gave him this namesake street as thanks. Ackerman was born into a farming family near Columbus, OH. Shortly after graduating from Ohio State in 1883, he entered the field of civil engineering, spending some years in Helena, MT before moving to Los Angeles in 1892 with his wife Abbie (née Coit, 1863-1954) and their baby daughter Ruth. Here Ackerman would survey important developments all across the Southland, from East Pasadena’s Sunny Slope neighborhood in 1895 (where he owned significant acreage himself) to Manhattan Beach in 1902-1904 to the Venice canals in 1905. Family footnote: UCLA alumni surely remember Ackerman Union – the student union building was named after Fremont and Abbie’s son Bill (1902-1988), who as director of students was so central to the school’s growth that he was known as “Mr. UCLA”.
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