The porch roof of his wagon shop at the corner of Los Angeles Street and Commercial Street , which was a block south of Negro Alley , then part of Chinatown , was used as a lynching spot in the Chinese massacre of 1871 , in which eighteen Chinese were confirmed dead . Aided by newly discovered documents from the Huntington Museum , John H. Johnson Jr. wrote for the LA Weekly 140 years later that : Goller was a model citizen , a former city councilman , respectful husband and dutiful father . He objected bitterly as the Chinese were hoisted outside his windows . There are small children inside , he protested . " You dry up , you son of a bitch , " growled a teamster as he leveled a rifle at Goller . Goller was the second man in the Los Angeles area — the first being Robert Carlisle — to invest in a good team of trotters , at a time when it was not the taste of the native population to ride in carriages or vehicles of any sort . They had been trained to ride astride of a horse and not behind him . The Sepulvedas , Estudillos , Zameranos and other grantholders , had their huge family carriages , drawn by the biggest mules money could buy , but a decade had passed before anybody began to think of purchasing fast horses for their buggies . Goller died July 7 , 1874
Chinese massacre of 1871
Chinese massacre of 1871
John Goller