A family, a dream, a mountain for the ages

Every family dreams of leaving something for the next generation. But it’s not often that the legacy includes both a chapter from Los Angeles history and an actual Southern California mountain.

Both have recently come to the Ballard family—and, notably, to the youngest among them: the great-great-great grandchildren of pioneering homesteader John Ballard, whose memory was honored Saturday at a stirring and sometimes emotional ceremony to officially rechristen “Negrohead Mountain” as “Ballard Mountain.”

These members of the Ballard 6.0 generation are the ones who will carry the family line forward and tell its story to future generations. For them, the entire saga stands as both an historical awakening and a highly personal connection to the meaning of family, race and social change across the sweep of time.

Ryan and Nicole Ballard, parents of 4 ½-year-old Dylan and 2-year-old Emile, have been working to incorporate the story of the boys’ great-great-great grandfather into the stories they tell about still-living relatives.

“I think it’s important to know who you are anyway. This is just a tremendous bonus,” Ryan said. “I think that too many young people today do not appreciate history. The president would not be the president today if it wasn’t for history. Even though [Dylan] is a four-year-old, he needs to know.”

One of Dylan’s older cousins, 19-year-old Christopher Ballard, a student at West L.A. College, called his connection to the John Ballard story “kind of an eye-opener.” Almost as if he was realizing it for the first time, he said:

“Oh, I have a long history. A very long history. Part of our family contributed to the history of the state. We have our own landmark now. Now we have our own mountain.”

Christopher, Dylan and a lively cohort of young Ballards were out in force, along with much of the rest of the family, at Saturday’s Agoura Hills festivities, set to formally mark the name change of the peak that, long before it was called “Negrohead Mountain,” went by a version of the name containing a racist epithet.

“We’re thrilled that so many Ballards have come out of the woodwork,” Supervisor Zev Yaroslavsky said to laughter and applause from the audience of about 80. “It was a trickle at first, and then a cascade.”

For the parents in the group, the Ballard saga provides a rich lode of material. “It almost goes without saying that as a mother, you try to look for teachable incidents,” said Ryan’s sister, Rhonda Ballard Sullens. One of the lessons here: “When people work hard for something, you can accomplish something.”

For some of the younger generation, Ballard Mountain is not just name, or a dramatic landmark. It’s a looming physical reality that they’ve actually experienced—and not in an easy way.

In late December, Christopher Ballard joined his cousins Anna Sullens and Nickolas Ballard, his uncle Ryan and other family members in a trek to the mountaintop, led by Kenneth W. Hudnut, a geophysicist with the U.S. Geological Survey.

It was tough going. “There were seven of us at the start. Toward the end, just five…I reached the top,” Christopher said. “It was kind of like that feeling when you have a victory or something.”

They left a hand-written paper sign up there, something that will go unseen by the thousands who drive by the official Ballard Mountain marker that soon will be placed on Kanan Road. But those who made it to the top will know it is there.

“We made it to Ballard Peak,” it read. “Thanks for the persistence.”

Speakers at Saturday’s ceremony included Yaroslavsky, who took up the cause of the neighbors who initiated the name change crusade, and Marcia McNutt, director of the U.S. Geological Survey, which responded by making the change in “record time.” Also speaking were representatives of First A.M.E. Church, which Ballard helped found in 1869, and two of the neighbors—Nick Noxon and Paul Culberg–who started the campaign to change the mountain’s name. (Read our earlier coverage here.)

Yaroslavsky credited all who had worked toward the new designation with righting “this historical wrong,” and said he took personal joy in the knowledge that the group had been able to “do something for someone who cannot possibly do anything in return.”

Moorpark College history professor Patty Colman talked about hardships that Ballard, who came to Los Angeles in 1859, had had to endure after relocating with his family in the 1880s to the mountain area known today as Seminole Hot Springs.

His cabin was burned out by marauders trying to jump his claim. But Ballard hung tough, Colman said, and posted a sign on the burned-out debris reading “This is the work of the devil.”

Today, she said, “That sign is gone but we’ve got a plaque now.”

Ryan Ballard, speaking on behalf of the family, told the audience that it is impossible to separate African-American history from American history as a whole, and also noted the excitement of finding other possible branches of the family via Facebook and other new connections.

“For us, this is just the beginning,” he said. “We’ve only scratched the surface.”

He also spoke about the life and image of John Ballard, and how they’ve fired the imagination of his living descendants, like Reginald Ballard, Sr., Ryan’s father.

“My father likes to quip about imagining John Ballard standing there in his dungarees and overalls and mis-shaven appearance and saying, ‘I’m not going anywhere,’ ” Ryan told the crowd.

Fifteen-year-old Anna Sullens has spent some time trying to imagine her great-great-great grandfather, too. When she thinks of him, she says, “I think of a man with dignity. An honorable man. Someone people look up to.”

Her 12-year-old brother Ahijah said he is just beginning to get comfortable with his own part in the family story.

“I’m not used to it yet,” he said, “but I’m trying to get used to it.” His middle school classmates at times have been skeptical. “They didn’t believe me because having a mountain, that’s hard to believe.”

But their 13-year-old brother Asa has figured out how to quiet the doubters:

“I just show people a picture of the mountain.”

Posted 2/22/10

For more Ballard Mountain coverage, check out this NBC video clip.