Miller & Lux: The California Partnership That Built a Cattle Empire

How Did Miller and Lux Start?

Henry Miller was born Heinrich Kreiser in 1827 in Brackenheim, Wurttemberg, and arrived in California in 1850. According to his Wikipedia biography, he worked as a butcher in New York and then San Francisco, taking the name Miller from a steamer ticket he bought under another man's name. American Heritage's profile says he opened his own butcher shop in 1851 and in 1853 bought the first herd of American cattle driven into San Francisco.

In 1858 he partnered with a former competitor, Charles Lux, also a German immigrant. Lux handled marketing and the city side, while Miller assembled the land and cattle. The firm shifted from meat toward raising its own cattle.

How Much Land Did Miller and Lux Own?

Miller's first big purchase, in 1863, was 8,830 acres of the Santa Rita ranch in the San Joaquin Valley for $10,400, and within five years he had added 70,000 adjacent acres. By its peak the company owned about 1.4 million acres and controlled about 22,000 square miles across California, Nevada and Oregon through leases and grazing, per Wikipedia. A National Park Service page puts the holdings at about 15 million acres, so published figures vary widely.

Livestock numbers were large as well, roughly one million cattle and over 100,000 sheep at the peak, according to American Heritage. Miller bought most of the Spanish and Mexican land grants between San Francisco and the San Joaquin for around $1.15 an acre.

Canals, Levees and the Water Fight

Water made the land valuable. Miller built thousands of miles of levees and ditches, three major canals totaling 190 miles and a 350-foot dam across the San Joaquin River, and is estimated to have made more than 150,000 acres of near-desert fertile. He won a riparian-rights case before the California Supreme Court by a 4 to 3 vote, a decision tainted by suspicion of bribery, and the ruling made him very unpopular. Riparian doctrine stayed in state law for about fifty years.

Land Methods and Criticism

The methods behind the empire drew criticism. American Heritage lists buying out heirs to Spanish land grants, foreclosing on farm mortgages and using dummy homesteads to get government land. He also bought over 180,000 acres of federal land through scrip at about 55 cents an acre. Miller also gave several thousand free meals a year to tramps, one meal and one night's lodging per visitor, and the route between his ranches became known as the Dirty Plate Route. Historian Paul S. Taylor argued the size of his holdings shaped California's large-scale agriculture and blocked small farms, and Carey McWilliams compared Miller to the great robber barons.

Death, Decline and the Breakup

Miller died on October 14, 1916, at age 89, with an estate appraised at about $40 million, less than at his peak. After his death the holdings were largely sold off, owing to land demand from growing towns, a hoof-and-mouth epidemic and inheritance taxes. The Henry Miller Trust dissolved in 1962 after the death of his last grandchild.

Visit or Learn More

Records of the company are held in archives such as the Online Archive of California. For more on ranching history see the farm.FM ranching section and a farm.FM story about Henry Miller and California cattle.