Frank H. Buck, Henry E. Huntington, William G. Kerckhoff, William F. Herrin, W.S. Porter and Frank H. Balch formed the Amalgamated Oil Company, bought the Hammel and Denker ranch, and began looking for oil. They did not find enough to exploit commercially by the standards of the time, though. In 1906, therefore, they reorganized as the Rodeo Land and Water Company, renamed the property "Beverly Hills," subdivided it, and began selling lots. The development was named "Beverly Hills" after Beverly Farms in Beverly, Massachusetts and because of the hills in the area. The Los Angeles Times reported on September 2, 1906: Percy H. Clark Company are managing the development of the foothill portion of the Hammel & Denker ranch for the Rodeo Land and Water Company (the Canfield-Huntington-Kerckhoff syndicate), to be known as Beverly Hills. No expense is being spared to make this a fine suburban district. . . . The property has been laid out on beautiful curved lines. The first house in the subdivision was built in 1907, but sales remained slow. Beverly Hills was one of many all-white planned communities started in the Los Angeles area around this time. Restrictive covenants prohibited non-whites from owning or renting property unless they were employed as servants by white residents. It was also forbidden to sell or rent property to Jews in Beverly Hills. Burton Green began construction on The Beverly Hills Hotel in 1911. The hotel was finished in 1912. The visitors drawn by the hotel were inclined to purchase land in Beverly Hills, and by 1914 the population had grown enough to qualify for incorporation as an independent city. That same year, the Rodeo Land and Water Company decided to separate its water business from its real estate business. The Beverly Hills Utility Commission was split off from the land company and incorporated in September 1914, buying all of the utilities-related assets from the Rodeo Land and Water Company. In 1919, Douglas Fairbanks and Mary Pickford bought land on Summit Drive and built a mansion, finished in 1921. and nicknamed "Pickfair" by the press. The glamour associated with Fairbanks and Pickford as well as other movie stars who built mansions in the city contributed to its growing appeal. By the early 1920s, the population of Beverly Hills had grown enough to make the water supply a political issue. In 1923 the usual solution, annexation to the city of