Griffith Ranch

The bronze calls the film immortal. The Birth of a Nation opened in 1915 out of Thomas Dixon's Klan novel, the second Ku Klux Klan formed that year and recruited with it, and the NAACP fought it city by city. What Griffith actually shot on this ground is thinner than the plaque suggests. The Massacre and The Battle at Elderbush Gulch were made here in 1912 and 1913; the famous features have never been documented on the ranch. It is a propane yard now.

What the plaque says

Originally part of the San Fernando Mission lands, this ranch was purchased by David Wark Griffith, revered pioneer of silent motion pictures, in 1912. It provided the locale for many western thrillers, including "Custer's Last Stand", and was the inspiration for the immortal production, "Birth of a Nation". It was acquired by Fritz B. Burns in 1948, who has perpetuated the Griffith name in memory of the great film pioneer. California Registered Historical Landmark No. 716 Plaque placed by the California State Park Commission in cooperation with Mr. Fritz B. Burns; the History and Landmarks Association of the San Fernando and Antelope Valley Parlors, Native Sons and Native Daughters of the Golden West; and the San Fernando Mission Parlor No. 280, Native Daughters of the Golden West, December 13, 1959.

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Mission San Fernando Rey de España — 3.1 mi
  The seventeenth Alta California mission, founded at the Tataviam village of Achoicominga, with the largest adobe building in the state standing beside it.
• The Cascades — 5.4 mi
  The concrete chute where the Los Angeles Aqueduct arrives, and where forty thousand people watched the Owens Valley come south in 1913.
• Oak of the Golden Dream — 6.9 mi
  Gold was found in California here in 1842, six years before Sutter's Mill, and the oak it was found under is still standing.
• Pioneer Oil Refinery — 8.3 mi
  The first commercially successful refinery in the West, built in 1876 to take the crude coming down the pipeline from Pico Canyon.

More markers nearby

• San Fernando Cemetery — 3.0 mi
• Mission San Fernando Rey de España — 3.1 mi
• Brand Park (Memory Garden) — 3.2 mi
• Rómulo Pico Adobe (Ranchito Rómulo) — 3.4 mi