This is the view from the estate of Henry Miller, the Cattle King of California. He owned so much land that you could walk from Mexico to Canada on his property, a.. 1.4 million acres of it. And he built an estate in Mt. Madonna here, which burned and has been weathered all the way down to the stone since it was finished in 1901. The ghosts of his whole family are said to haunt the mountain, riding horses, wandering the woods. And why not? It’s one of the most beautiful places in the South Bay. Here’s some pics of the ruins www.weirdca.com/location.php?l…. Henry Miller(real name Heinrich Alfred Kreiser) wasn’t a the land grubbing soulless cattle baron of muckraker novel cliche. He was a naturalist, dedicated to preserving the land, and he accomplished a very interesting feat during his lifetime: he saved the California Elk.

At one point elk were thought to be extinct in California, but as Miller was out one day, he and his game warden AC. Tibbett saw the last pair on his land in the marshes near Buena Vista lake in 1874. Well since he was practically the wealthiest man in the US at this point, he ordered a full-time guard out to keep watch over the elk, and armed guards kept both people and predators away, fed the elk, and saw to it that the herd thrived was cared for. Nowadays the population is around 4,200 elk in 22 herds across the entire state and is no longer considered to be in danger. I’ve even seen the herds a few times.

I was in his granddaughter’s house when it was for sale a few years ago…it was one of the strangest places I’ve ever seen. Right down to a locked door in the hillside with a plaque above it that said KGB in Cyrillic characters. Go figure.

Henry Miller the California rancher is not to be confused with Henry Valentine Miller, the beatnik author. (I’m not the only one to give people weird ‘V’ names)