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Our Second Beauty School Opened in the Antelope Valley
The Kitanemuk Indians originally occupied the area. They were hunter gatherers living off the land, neither farming nor establishing permanent communities. Captain Pedro Fages was probably the first man of European origin to walk the Antelope Valley in 1772. Jedediah Smith was the first American in 1827 followed two years later by Kit Carson. The valley was left in relative peace, known as hunting ground for antelope and an escape route for bandits like the notorious Tiburcio Vasquez, namesake of Vasquez Rocks.
Settlers ignored the valley for the most part until after the Civil War. The Southern Pacific Railroad completed its line from Los Angeles to San Francisco through the Antelope Valley in September, 1876. Towns followed: Lancaster was a named as one of three valley stops that year as was Alpine, now Palmdale.
Between 1894 -1897 most settlers left the due to a severe water shortage. In fact a building lot in Lancaster at Tenth Street and Antelope Avenue could have been had for $25. Water saved the Antelope Valley after the construction of the Los Angeles Aqueduct. The area became a farming center producing mostly alfalfa.
Judy Garland got her start here singing as Baby Frances Gumm at the Valley Theater on Antelope Avenue in Lancaster. John Wayne also lived in Lancaster. Then known as Marion Morrison, as a school boy he was scolded for not tying up his horse properly.
With the establishment of an air field, in 1933, aerospace was soon to leave its mark. In 1947, Chuck Yeager broke the sound barrier from what is now Edwards Air force base. Many space shuttles have landed at Edwards. The Antelope valley is the base of Dick Rutan who with Jeana Yeager, flew around the world without refueling in 1986. In 2004 his company completed the first privately funded human space flight winning the ten million dollar X prize.
Housing tracts unrolled in the early eighties, causing the population of Palmdale to increase by a factor of 10 and Lancaster by 5 as the Antelope Valley became a bedroom community to Los Angeles. A massive retail build-out followed. All produced a demand for beauty services.
The Western Beauty Institute opened its second school in Lancaster early in 2005 to serve this growing need.
