Daniel Freeman (Los Angeles County)

Daniel Freeman (1837–1918) was a landowner in southwest Los Angeles County, California, and a developer in downtown Los Angeles during the 19th century. He was the founder of the City of Inglewood , and the first farmer to engage extensively in wheat cultivation in Southern California.

Freeman was born in Norfolk County, Ontario, on June 30, 1837, the son of Daniel Wesley Freeman (1807–77) and Isabella Bailey (1811–56). He had a brother, Charles Edwin Freeman, and a sister, Phoebe Amelia Freeman. He attended the common schools in Norfolk County and then went to Lynn Grove Academy until 1857. He earned his law degree from Osgoode Hall, University of Toronto in 1864.

Freeman was married to Catherine Grace Christie Higginson on July 13, 1866, in Vienna, Canada, and they moved to San Francisco, in 1873 and later to Los Angeles County. There were three children, Archibald Christie (1867), Charles (1868) and Grace E. (1870). His wife predeceased him.

For many years the family lived in a small house on his property that later became known as the Centinela Adobe and is now on the National Register of Historic Places. In 1891 he built a large residence in Inglewood which later became a local historic site but was torn down because there were no funds for upkeep and the site was needed by Daniel Freeman Memorial Hospital for its own use.

An Episcopalian and a Republican, he was an organizer and the first president of the California Club of Los Angeles, as well as president of the Los Angeles Chamber of Commerce in 1893–94. He was a life member of the British Benevolent Society.

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