When this road was first announced in 1913, it was dubbed “Riverside-Redondo Boulevard” – and was indeed supposed to run all the way between the city of Redondo Beach and Riverside County! Obviously that didn’t quite work out, so it quietly dropped that name by 1940. The Redondo name itself stems from Rancho Sausal Redondo (“Round Willow Grove Ranch”), a 22,458 acre land grant given c. 1840 to Antonio Ygnacio Ávila (1781-1858). California was Mexican territory back then, and its governors – in this case, Juan Bautista Alvarado – made a habit of carving up the territory and parceling it out to soldiers and ranchers like Ávila, whose brother Francisco’s adobe still stands on Olvera Street. Ironically, Redondo Beach was founded in 1887 on a different land grant: Rancho San Pedro. But north Redondo lies on old Rancho Sausal Redondo land, as do the cities of El Segundo, Manhattan Beach, Hermosa Beach, Lawndale, Hawthorne, and Inglewood.
Find it on the map:
