Canoga Park was born in 1893 as the tiny Canoga station along the Southern Pacific Railroad’s Burbank–Chatsworth line. Why “Canoga”? There are several theories. Here’s the likeliest: canoga is a Cayuga Iroquois word meaning “sweet water” (there’s a Canoga Spring near New York’s Lake Cayuga), someone at the Southern Pacific saw it translated as “watering hole”, and figured that was a good name for the station as there was an old well at the site and/or the station was a water stop for steam trains. True or not, the town that grew up around the station was known as Canoga until some Valley landowner – reportedly L.A. Times publisher Harrison Gray Otis – dubbed it Owensmouth in 1911, a nod to the forthcoming aqueduct that would bring water down from the Owens River. (Canoga Avenue itself was named a year earlier.) Many residents found the Owensmouth name geographically confusing and generally unpleasant; led by ranch owner Mary Orcutt, they got the post office – and thus the community – rebranded Canoga Park in 1931.
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