Spas in the News

Glen Ivy Hot Springs Spa Celebrates 150 Year Anniversary in 2010

CORONA, Calif. – 6/23/09 - In 2010 Glen Ivy Hot Springs Spa celebrates its 150th anniversary.

On July 27, 1860, John J. Skinker wrote a short advertisement to attract Los Angeles residents to Temescal Sulphur Springs. Printed in the Sept. 8, 1860 edition of the Los Angeles Star, the ad announced that Skinker had “fitted up BATHS for the accommodation of all who may desire to use them, either for health or recreation.” Although it would be almost 30 years before this Temescal Valley establishment was re-named Glen Ivy Hot Springs, it was in 1860 that the spa of today had its genesis as a commercial business.

A century and a half is a long time for a business to stay successful, not that there haven’t been challenges along the way. However, through several major wars, waves of migration and population growth, economic booms and depressions, and unparalleled technological shifts, Skinker’s early hopes, or maybe visions, have proven true. The natural waters remain a vital part of what Glen Ivy is today, but water alone has not made Glen Ivy Hot Springs Spa such a lasting fixture in Southern California culture. Unpretentious prices, good service, and high value contribute, but the central timeless essence seems to be the experience of wellbeing people discover when they’re there and take with them when they leave.

“Game in abundance is to be found in the vicinity of the Springs, and every facility afforded for out-door amusement,” wrote John Skinker. He and early guests at the hot springs lived in a world very different from today. Automobiles and airplanes were nearly half a century ahead in an unforeseen future. Life moved at a slower pace. The railroad was coming into broad use, but still the fastest many people had traveled then was on a galloping horse. The Pony Express began mail service from St. Louis to Sacramento on April 3, 1860. Abraham Lincoln was campaigning for President, home canning jars and the Winchester rifle had just been invented, and the latest census showed that the United States had 31,443,321 people. Land was selling for $3 to $5 an acre, and a laborer’s wage without board was 90 cents for a 12-hour workday.

What $100 could buy in 1860 would cost almost $3,000 now. Rent was cheap – one ad offered a four room apartment for $4.45 per month! – but to city dwellers, food was a relatively high cost of living, and only available locally and in season. A dozen eggs cost comparatively more in 1860: the 20 cent price then equates to about $4.60 per dozen now. Charles Darwin’s The Origins of Species had been out a year, Longfellow’s Paul Revere’s Ride was printed, and Ralph Waldo Emerson’s Conduct of Life was published. Golfer Willie Park won the first British Open with a 36-hole score of 174 at the coastal resort of Prestwick, Scotland. The Civil War was looming when Lincoln was elected President on Nov.6, 1860. There were 33 states, only white male adults could vote, and four million people were slaves.

In 1860 it was 80 years before the first McDonald’s opened, 109 years before Neil Armstrong walked on the moon, 111 years before the first Starbucks, 120 years before cell phones, and 130 years before the World Wide Web. So much that was wholly unimaginable then is part of our daily lives just 15 decades later. John Skinker published an ad that he hoped a few hundred people in L.A. might notice, and today 150,000 Glen Ivy Spa guests receive e-mails in an instant.

It seems like so much has changed, but so much hasn’t. At Glen Ivy Hot Springs Spa, the water, the sky, the earth, the sun are still very much as they were when the first Americans immersed themselves in this sacred place, and long before the Spanish arrived in the Temescal Valley about two centuries ago. Today some 165,000 guests come annually to Glen Ivy Hot Springs Spa for “health or recreation,” as Skinker put it, drawn by the Earth’s gift of healing waters in this natural cathedral without walls or roof.

The mineral water bathing enjoyed by Native Americans remained unchanged for untold centuries, but in the decades following Skinker’s 1860 advertisement all would begin to evolve, slowly at first, then with greater pace. An adobe inn was built to offer public accommodations, and later a mineral water swimming pool enclosed in a barn-like structure. As the years passed, hundreds, then thousands, and now millions of guests have enjoyed Glen Ivy Hot Springs Spa. Today 19 pools and spas are combined with professional body treatments and skin care services, a unique outdoor red clay mud bath, and The Grotto, a moisturizing body treatment, underground. On busy days the lushly landscaped grounds, extensive indoor and outdoor facilities, and 72 spa treatment rooms absorb a thousand and more happy guests tended to by 350 employees. “I just love this place!” many say.

Jim Root, Glen Ivy’s CEO and President, is well known in Spa Industry circles, perhaps most widely as the immediate past Chair of the International Spa Association, ISPA, and as a well-traveled leader at some of the industry’s top destination spas. John Gray, founder of the present corporation in 1977 and Glen Ivy’s CEO for 30 years, now serves the company in community relations, marketing, and various special projects. Café Solé, under the guidance of Executive Chef Bill Wavrin of Rancho La Puerta, Golden Door, and Miraval fame and now working with Jim again for the third time, offers simple and award-winning cuisine. Jim, John and Bill have long shared a commitment to spa as lifestyle, and more recently began to share a deep love for Glen Ivy, its history, and its extraordinary qualities as a haven of well being.

Though times have changed, values haven’t. Glen Ivy’s vision, “Elevating Life Experience,” is practiced, not preached. Staff camaraderie is infectious, and guests feel both at home and transported as if for a two-week vacation in a day. As Glen Ivy’s sesquicentennial year approaches and throughout 2010, there will be events and fun and food and more, but the real celebration is an inner one about timeless truths, what was and is and is to be, about service and nature, about life.

The story continues, and Glen Ivy stands ready to offer welcome and wellbeing to the world for the next 150 years.

About Glen Ivy Hot Springs Spa

Stretched across 12 acres of lush landscaping and gardens, Glen Ivy Hot Springs Spa features 19 pools and spas and unique attractions including naturally thermal mineral water baths and Glen Ivy’s famous “Club Mud,” California’s only therapeutic red clay mud bath. Celebrating 150 years of healing water and extraordinary service in 2010, Glen Ivy Spas in Corona, Brea and Valencia welcome over 250,000 guest visits annually and employ 450 people in Southern California. A Founding Seed Spa in the Green Spa Network and member of the International Spa Association (ISPA) and the Day Spa Association, Glen Ivy Hot Springs Spa was named Favorite Hot Springs Spa and Most Affordable Spa in America in Spa Magazine’s 2008 Reader’s Choice Awards.

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