Iris H.W. Engstrand Rancho Los Cerritos: A Southern California Legacy Preserved, Southern California Quarterly Spring 2000, 82, no. 1, pp. 1-42.
Introduction: . . . lying within the city limits of Long Beach, its 4.7 acres . . . in an otherwise closed residential area.
Rancho Los Cerritos . . . possesses outstanding potential for interpretation of historical themes beginning with the period of Native American occupation and continuing through the romanticized Spanish Colonial Revival period of the 1920s and 1930s. The story of Native American occupation, Manuel Nieto's great land holdings, John Temple's initial efforts at cattle ranching, and the Bixby family's sheep-ranching enterprises coupled with other business ventures parallels the development of southern California into the economic center it is today. It clearly illustrates how "the pastoral ranch system of Hispanic culture retreated before large scale crop production, small farm subdivision, and urbanization brought about by Anglo-American settlers after California became a state . . .