Befitting a street adjacent to Forest Lawn Glendale, Treadwell Street honors the man who established Forest Lawn in 1906: John Bartlett Treadwell (1846-1931). A civil engineer originally from Maine, the onetime Civil War drummer boy would oversee mineral mining and oil drilling operations throughout California, Nevada, and Arizona – particularly on behalf of the Southern Pacific Railroad. He bought this property in October 1905 and incorporated the Forest Lawn Cemetery Association three months later. By January 1910, he had parted ways with his company; no reason was publicized. He continued to live on nearby Dolores Street and – either fittingly or ironically – is buried at Forest Lawn. Widowed in 1924, Treadwell left the bulk of his impressive estate to one Lillian Bishop Ross, who he claimed was his “daughter”. Treadwell’s actual daughter Florence Boynton contested the will, claiming that Treadwell had been “infatuated” with Ross since 1900. Boynton, who had been bequeathed a measly $5, lost her case.
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