Foothill Boulevard Mile Marker
1320 East Colorado Boulevard,
Pasadena, California
91106
Let's go back to the early 1900s, before Route 66 ran through Los Angeles. Back when a road called the Foothill Boulevard Highway ran through Pasadena. Foothill Boulevard Highway ran from downtown Los Angeles up to the the San Gabriel Mountains and the various miles were marked by a series of small stone monoliths. One of the markers still exists standing outside a McDonalds with a circular shaped front part, a McDonalds that sits on Colorado Boulevard. The marker is not tall, about three and a half feet tall, and only has a few numbers and letters carved into it, but it is the last remnant of the old road system. It is twelve inches wide and six inches thick. And there use to be many more.
The numbers on the marker are in the Bancroft System created by Albert Bancroft. The Bancroft System started in Contra Costa County in 1892. The marker has an "11" in a circle at the top representing mile 11 which represented 11 miles from the Los Angeles Courthouse. Then the marker had a "220" and "222" referring to the block numbers, within Mile 11. Finally followed by "F.B." which is the abbreviation for Foothill Boulevard.
Back in the early 1900s from 1902 through 1908, the Highway Commission of Los Angeles actually laid out six different routes throughout the county, placing markers with the Bancroft milestones along them. This is the last marker that still remains from the old system and it was placed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1996. Pasadena rapidly however, moved away from the entire system in 1908. The road is now Colorado Boulevard and was at one time part of Route 66.
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First Created: 2021-06-13
Last Edited: 2021-06-13
