Hitching post donated to Museum of Redlands – Redlands Daily Facts

REDLANDS >> Fred and Barbara Ford recently donated a granite hitching post to the Museum of Redlands.

Fred Fords career in Redlands and the Inland Valley in the past 40 years has been in land clearing.

In the 1970s, when the former Jennie Davis-Joe Prendergast house was being moved from Brookside Avenue in Redlands to Sierra Way in Fontana, Ford helped the contractors clear the property, and he retrieved the granite hitching posts from the site.

An apartment complex was then built on that property, which is about 10 lots west of the former Redlands Daily Facts building on Brookside Avenue. The former Facts building will be renovated to house the Museum of Redlands.

The donation of the hitching post has other historic relevance in addition to the post having come from a site near the future museum building.

Fred Ford is the grandson of Isaac Ford, who was city engineer for Redlands, one of the founders of First Baptist Church and the University of Redlands and for whom Redlands Ford Park and Ford Street are named.

Connected to the house that was moved from Brookside Avenue is Jennie Davis daughter Gwen Davis, who married Joe Prendergast. Prendergasts sister was Lucretia Prendergast Moore, who was the wife of wife of Paul Moore, longtime owner of the Redlands Daily Facts.

Lucretia Moore was also the mother of William G. Moore, 40-year publisher and co-owner of the Facts with his brother Frank, and grandmother of Lucretia Moore Irving, who still lives in Redlands.

Bill and Frank Moore owned the Redlands Daily Facts when they had the former Facts building, future home of the Museum of Redlands, built in 1956.

A number of hitching posts still remain in Redlands, but seeing one out of the ground with its hewn-granite base is unusual.

Fred Ford, one of five generations of Fords in Redlands and of four generations who graduated from Redlands High School, noted that hitching posts were hewn from solid granite and often have hairline cracks, making them fragile to move.

The one the Fords donated to the Museum of Redlands has a decorative ball on the top of the post.

Horses were tethered to an iron ring inserted in the hole drilled through the top of each post.

To donate historic items related to Redlands and the Redlands area, contact Maria Carrillo or Nathan Gonzales at the A.K. Smiley Library Heritage Room, 909-798-7632.

Source: Museum of Redlands

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Hitching post donated to Museum of Redlands - Redlands Daily Facts