Like most Huntington-themed place names in Southern California, this street honors railroad/streetcar baron Henry E. Huntington (1850-1927; see Huntington Drive for a bio). It was laid out in 1906 on the Ramona Acres tract, which Huntington himself had nothing to do with. Real estate agent Willis George Emerson, who didn’t own Ramona Acres but promoted the hell out of it, named most if not all of its streets (hence Emerson Avenue). Huntington Avenue’s name was thus part of Emerson’s marketing scheme: ads claimed that Ramona Acres was “within a few feet” of Huntington’s upcoming railway to Covina and that “H.E. Huntington has purchased nearly every inch of land adjoining this property.” Safe to say those ads stretched the truth a little – Willis Emerson tended to do that.
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