Named for Azusa farmer John Turberville Gordon (1826-1916) as his reward for helping establish Pomona. Officially, Gordon was VP of the syndicate that founded the town in 1875 – the Los Angeles Immigration and Land Co-operative Association – but he was most likely just an investor. What we know of Gordon’s early life comes from his obituary, which hailed him as “Azusa’s most distinguished citizen.” He was born in Washington, D.C.; became a sailor boy at fourteen and remained at sea for five years; obtained a law degree in the 1850s; sided with the Confederates during the Civil War and was purser on a supply ship for them; came to El Monte in 1868. He finally settled in Azusa in 1870 and served as that town’s first justice of the peace. He married Emma Jane Gordon (1845-1922; her maiden name was Gordon) in 1875 and had three children with her. J.T. Gordon spent the 1870s as a beekeeper but moved on to growing citrus in the 1880s.
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