Leadora Whitcomb (1839-1929) was the wife of Glendora founder George D. Whitcomb, who took the “dora” from her name to form “Glendora” in 1887. She was born Leadora Bennett in Wheeling, West Virginia, back when it was still part of Virginia. Her father Abraham was a steamboat captain on the Ohio River; in the 1850s, he moved the family to Saint Paul, Minnesota, where Leadora met George Whitcomb and married him in 1859. The years 1863-1864 were hard for Leadora: Abraham was killed by a train and her little boy Henry died at ten months; it’s said that George then built her a namesake steamboat to lift her spirits. The Whitcombs’ six surviving children were George B. (wife: Meda), Carroll (wife: Ada), William, Leadora, Elizabeth, and finally Virginia. William went on to run his father’s locomotive company; Leadora the younger became a prominent sociologist; Elizabeth instructed teachers at UCLA.
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