Glendale, California Biographies

        Mary Ogden Ryan is the principal of the Broadway School, which position she has filled for seventeen years; the eight years prior to which she had been principal of what was then known as the West Glendale School; a record of twenty-five years continuous service as a teacher of grade schools in what is now Glendale. During the first twenty-three years she never missed a day from her school room, which is another record seldom equaled.

        She is the daughter of Hiram and Marie (Whiteaker) Ogden. The Ogden family was established in America in the pre-Revolutionary days by three brothers who left England and came to the colonies. Two of them remained loyal to the King and went to Canada, but after the war returned to the states and founded Ogdensburg, New York. William, the great grandfather of the subject of this review, was a soldier in the Revolutionary War, and afterwards settled in Pennsylvania. Hiram Ogden was born in Huron County, Ohio and as a young man made his way to Oregon, arriving there November 27, 1851. He drove an oxen team from Keokuk, Iowa to Portland, the journey taking six months to the day. His compensation for driving the oxen team was his board and medical attention. He has one sick spell lasting two weeks. He walked most of the distance. The caravan consisted of five trains at the outset, each train containing three wagons, hauled by five yoke of oxen, one yoke of cows and a team of horses. After crossing the continental divide, the caravan divided, two of the trains going to California. He remained in the great Northwest for nineteen years, where most of his time was devoted to ranching. He fought in the Indian wars in the Yakima country. While residing on a ranch near Walla Walla, Washington, in the short space of less than one and one-half years, the family suffered the loss, but death from epidemics, of their four oldest children, their ages ranging from three to nine years. This terribly discouraged the parents, so in 1870 the family moved to Fairbault, Minnesota, where a large farm was purchased. The journey from Walla Walla to Ogden, Utah, was made by state, the distance being over five hundred miles. They remained in Minnesota for five years and then came to Los Angeles, arriving here on May 8, 1875.

        In Los Angeles County Mr. Ogden ranched and developed real estate. He owned a home on Seventh Street at Charity Street (now Grand Avenue), Los Angeles. Later he owned a residence on Sixth Street, between Broadway and Spring Streets, where the Chocolate Shop is now located. Selling the city property he invested in a large vineyard at Cucamonga and later moved on a ranch at Burbank. His death occurred in March, 1920, at the home of Mrs. Ryan in Glendale, while in his ninety-first year. Mrs. Ogden passed away in 1904.

        Mrs. Ryan was born at Walla Walla, Washington. She attended the grammar schools of Los Angeles, graduated from the Los Angeles High School, and from the State Normal School. In Los Angeles she married William A. Ryan. To this union was born one daughter, Evelyn, now the wife of Dr. C. E. Hyde of San Francisco. Mrs. Hyde is a graduate of the Glendale Union High School and of the Southern Branch of the University of California.

        Mrs. Ryan is a member of the Tuesday Afternoon Club, the Glen Eyrie Chapter, Order Eastern Star, of which she is a Past Matron and a former Secretary, the Business and Professional Women’s Club, the Glendale Teachers’ Club, of which she is first vice-president, the Glendale Music Club, and is a member of the Presbyterian Church. During the war she was active wherever duty called, assisting more particularly in questionnaire and Red Cross work.

        The West Glendale School was Mrs. Ryan’s first school, since which time she has resided in Glendale. Her present home is at 316 North Maryland Street, a duplex that she built in 1921. Her life work has been well applied and fully appreciated by her pupils and the school board. In the building of Glendale no one has played a more important part, for truly it can be said of Mrs. Ryan, that she has built character and ideals in her pupils which will permanently affect the city.