Picture from the Past
The historic Lyndon home went out in blaze of glory
By John S. Baggerly
What the McCarty family means to the history of Saratoga, the Lyndons mean to that of Los Gatos. Although the house of John Lyndon--the elder of Los Gatos' pioneering brothers--is now gone, it did manage to survive for almost a century.
The final Lyndon residents of 1 Broadway were William W. Lyndon and his sister, Ray Lyndon Lee, offspring of James S. Lyndon. William commuted to San Francisco by train to his position with Roebling Wire Co., supplier of wire for the bridges that connected San Francisco with other shores.
In 1972, the Lyndon house was jacked up and moved from Broadway to E. Main Street. The difficult move was made possible by boarding the underpart of the house so that huge telephone-like poles could roll the dwelling northward on S. Santa Cruz Avenue and then eastward at the entrance to W. Main Street, over the Main Street Bridge and onto a lot opposite Los Gatos High that today harbors a 7-Eleven market.
Arranging the move was Jerry Aikman, a hair stylist who purchased the house from the Lyndons, refurbished the dwelling and then sold it to buyers whose plans were uncertain. Unaware that the automatic furnace was activated, the new owners moved in and stacked paper goods over the floor furnace. That ignited a fire that destroyed the dwelling in 1975.
The house had sported a contrasting coat of pastel paint that highlighted some of its 19th-century features. Among these were wood-simulated shingles in the gables, square-cornered bay windows and, on the third level, an "eyebrow" window peeking through the roof. The whole thing is a somewhat "warmed-over" variant on late Victorian forms, in which comfort was preferred over style.
James H. Lyndon and family lived from 1878 through 1964 in this attractive abode. Before building the house, which stood on part of 100 acres John Lyndon subdivided in 1877, James and his wife Anna, and James Lloyd Lyndon, the elder of their six children, had lived in the 10 Mile House, a wayside inn at the south end of S. Santa Cruz Avenue. For a while, the elder James managed the hotel in partnership with his brother, John, who became 10 times richer than James, according to The Valley of Santa Clara Historic Buildings 1792-1920, by Phyllis Filiberti Butler.
Readers may recall James Lyndon was elected the Sheriff of Santa Clara County in 1894. He worked on the famous McGlincy murders, in which James C. Dunham killed all of his wife's McGlincy kin and servants except for his infant son. The son grew up elsewhere under a different name and eventually inherited part of the McGlincy estates. James Lyndon, apparently the more outgoing of the brothers, also served as Los Gatos' postmaster and president of the town's board of trustees.
John Lyndon built Hotel Lyndon before the turn of the century, which stood for many years facing S. Santa Cruz Avenue from Broadway to W. Main Street. He later went into the lumber business.
After the last of the original Lyndons died in 1964, the residence stood vacant and was scheduled to be torn down. As reported above, the new owner, Jerry Aikman, rescued the historic old dwelling and moved it to E. Main Street, where it remained until its 1975 fire.
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Los Gatos, California Since 1881
