Will Keith Kellogg - Arabian Horse Breeder

Arabian Horse Breeder

Kellogg had a longtime interest in Arabian horses. In 1925, he purchased 377 acres (1.5 km2) for $250,000 in Pomona, California, to establish an Arabian horse ranch. Starting with breeding stock descended from the imports of Homer Davenport and W.R. Brown, Kellogg then looked to England, where he purchased a significant number of horses from the Crabbet Arabian Stud, making multiple importations during the 1920s. The Kellogg ranch became well known in southern California not only for its horse breeding program but also for its entertaining, weekly horse exhibitions, open to the public and frequently visited by assorted Hollywood celebrities. Among many other connections to Hollywood, the actor Rudolph Valentino borrowed the Kellogg stallion, "Jadaan," for use in his 1926 movie, Son of the Sheik, along with a Kellogg employee, Carl Raswan, who rode in certain scenes as Valentino's stunt double.

In 1932, Kellogg donated the ranch, which had grown to 750 acres (3 km²), to the University of California. During World War II, the ranch was taken over by the U.S. War Department and was known as the Pomona Quartermaster Depot (Remount). In 1933, the ranch obtained some of the horses sold in the dispersal of Brown's Maynesboro stud.

In 1948, the ranch was transferred to the U.S. Department of Agriculture; and in 1949, the land was deeded to the W. K. Kellogg Foundation. Later in 1949, title to the then 813-acre (3.3 km2) ranch and horses was passed to the State of California, with the provision that the herd of Arabian horses must be maintained. The ranch became part of the Voorhis unit of what was then known as the California State Polytechnic College in San Luis Obispo. This became known as the Kellogg Campus, and in 1966, it was separated to form California State Polytechnic College Pomona (now California State Polytechnic University, Pomona).

The ranch was also the location of the W.K. Kellogg Airport (not to be confused with the W. K. Kellogg Airport in Battle Creek, Michigan). It operated from 1928 to 1932, and was then the largest privately owned airport in the country.

Some of Kellogg's property near Battle Creek, Michigan, was donated to Michigan State College (later known as Michigan State University) and is now the Kellogg Biological Station.