Jacob Strickland (c. 1839-1917) and his wife Julia (née Bader, c. 1850-1932) didn’t own the tract on which this street was named in 1906 – they lived around the corner on Figueroa, where they were establishing the Strickland Home for Boys. Jacob Strickland was a British taxidermist and florist who first settled in Chicago. He married Julia, a Connecticut native, in Wisconsin in 1882. The couple moved to Los Angeles in 1895, returned to Chicago for a couple of years, and were back in L.A. in 1902. Three years later, they bought a farm on Figueroa (then called Eagle Rock Avenue) and soon began housing troubled lads, many sent to them by juvenile court. Although the Stricklands and their adopted son William decamped for San Diego in 1915, the Strickland Home for Boys serves the community to this day under its current name: Optimist Youth Homes and Family Services.
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