TEJON RANCH CO.

In 1843, the Mexican government made grants for the land that became three ranches: the 26,626-acre (107.75 km 2 ) Rancho Los Alamos y Agua Caliente; the 97,617-acre (395.04 km 2 ) Rancho El Tejon; and the 22,178-acre (89.75 km 2 ) Rancho Castac. A fourth tract, the 48,800-acre (197 km 2 ) Rancho La Liebre, was granted in 1846.

At the urging of Edward Beale, Superintendent of Indian Affairs in California, the Sebastian Indian Reservation was established in 1853 on Rancho El Tejon, and Fort Tejon was established by the U.S. Army in 1854 on Rancho Castac. These were federal projects, consisting of major developments and improvements, on what was the Mexican grantees' private land.

In 1855, Edward Beale purchased Rancho La Liebre. The Army abandoned Fort Tejon in 1864. Beale bought Rancho El Tejon and Rancho de los Alamos y Agua Caliente in 1865, and Rancho Castac in 1866. With the purchase of these four Mexican land grants, Beale created the present day Tejon Ranch.

Beale's son, Truxtun Beale, sold the Tejon Ranch in 1912 to a syndicate of investors headed by Los Angeles Times publisher Harry Chandler and land developer Moses Sherman. Both also had extensive holdings in the San Fernando Valley. In 1917, some surviving Kitanemuk Indians lived on Tejon Ranch.

In 1936, the Tejon Ranch Company became a public company, with the Chandler–Sherman group retaining a controlling interest. The Chandlers' Times Mirror Company sold its stake in 1997. It has been publicly listed since 1973 and most recently has been on the New York Stock Exchange.

"In 1916 El Tejon Land Company of Kern County filed suit to evict the El Tejon Indians from the El Tejon Ranch, which the Indians owned under Spanish and Mexican laws that the United States had agreed to uphold under the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo. The company had been renting the land from the Indians and employing Indians to work on it. They began to withhold rent payments, and the Indians, fearful of losing their jobs, dared not demand the rent be paid. After waiting the requisite number of years, the company claimed ownership of the land on the basis of peaceful possession."

Hunting

In 2012, the ranch suspended all hunting after a 2011 California Department of Fish and Game investigation into the illegal killing of mountain lions. The investigation was spurred by a whistleblower named Bron Sanders who filed a lawsuit on May 3, 2011. Sanders claimed to have witnessed the killing of 20 mountain lions, which he claimed were motivated by the ranch managers' views on the California Wildlife Protection Act of 1990, which banned the hunting of mountain lions for sport. Ranch officials initially called Sanders' allegations "ridiculous and untrue". The investigation supported Sanders' claims that mountain lions were illegally killed. Tejon Ranch agreed to pay $136,500 in fines and restitution for the killing of 11 mountain lions.