San Diego History Center

Why the Scripps Family Came to San Diego
E.W. Scripps at Miramar, ca. 1900. ©SDHC #89:17480.
of heritage to pass on to others. I feel sometimes as though I would like to go and
bury myself in the desert, out of sight and hearing and knowledge of everybody I
belong to!” 75 Nevertheless, she felt obliged to support her brother in his determination
to create a family compound. She acknowledged the fact that Will and Fred
needed a greater degree of independence than the ranch could provide. The former
returned to his property in Altadena while the latter was helped to buy a 55-acre
tract adjacent to Miramar. Ellen consoled E.W., “You call yourself a dead failure
because everybody doesn’t slip into the grooves you cut for them, and all revolve
in the same sphere without collision…I suppose you made some mistakes, but
don’t give up because you haven’t found your material as pliable as you expected. I
suppose the generation to come will rise up and call you blessed.” 76
Miramar may have been a less-than-perfect social experiment but it changed
E.W. for the better, or so he claimed. He shed his formal black suit and mustache,
gained thirty pounds, grew a beard, and dressed in “last year’s clothes” and a
crumpled old hat. He cursed his Scripps heritage, “the ability to make money and
the necessity of doing so,” and harkened back to his maternal ancestor, Absalom
Blair, who roamed “virgin forests” with “gun and rod, an ‘expert fisherman,’ and
a ‘crack shot,’ free from British rule and free from all other ambition than that of
living as Nature’s friend rather than her master.” 77 E.W. and his wife frequently
traveled by horseback along canyons, across mesas and up mountains. Days
were spent hunting and shooting quail, inspecting the ranch’s dams and cisterns,
planting orchards, and wrangling with the Irrigation District. He reflected that
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