EDITOR'S NOTE: This is one in a series of stories commemorating the 40th anniversary of the creation of the city of Thousand Oaks.

If you look off to the right while exiting northbound Highway 101 at The Oaks mall, you might be able to see irrigation pipes that served the Janss' Conejo Ranch less than 50 years ago.

Modern stores have replaced the clean, neat, red-and-white ranch buildings at the mall site. Thoroughbred horses no longer strut in green paddocks framed by brightly painted fences. Homes have taken root where the ranch's apricot and apple orchards once grew. But if Edwin Janss Jr., who owned that ranch, were alive today he probably would be proud of the city he helped develop.

"He wanted to make it a separate, integrated community," Joe Leggett said of Janss, with whom he worked for many years. "He felt it was an opportunity to define a community from scratch rather than just an appendage to a sprawling metropolitan area."

As the city of Thousand Oaks marks its 40th anniversary this month, the legacy of multigenerations of the Janss family can be seen throughout the community. From the city's early subdivisions to one of its main shopping centers, the family and its namesake, Janss Investment Corp., have helped shape key elements of the community.

The Janss family has been involved in the Conejo Valley for close to 100 years.

The connection started with Dr. Peter Janss, a physician who came to Los Angeles in 1893 and became intrigued with the real estate market, opening a small office. His sons, Edwin Sr. and Harold, took over management of the office in 1906 and were soon swept up in the booming real estate market. They acquired property in Westwood, Holmby Hills and parts of Chatsworth and most notably sold land at well below market rate that eventually became the site of the University of California, Los Angeles.

In 1910 the Janss interests purchased 6,000 acres from the remaining estate of John Edwards in the Conejo Valley. Eventually the ranch totaled 10,000 acres, extending from about Lawrence Drive in Newbury Park to Erbes Road in Thousand Oaks and from the ridgeline on the south to below the Norwegian grade on the north.

Edwin Sr. lived in Bel Aire and had someone manage the ranch, but in 1931 he built a house that served as headquarters for the ranch and a weekend getaway for himself and his wife, Florence. Eventually he sent his son Edwin Jr. to take over management of the ranch. In 1943, Edwin Jr. and his bride, Virginia Caswell of Oxnard, moved into the house and raised their three children there. The family eventually sold the land south of the freeway to the city at below market rate and the house was the site of the Arts Council Center and Conejo Recreation and Park District offices for many years.

The legacy continues with Edwin Jr.'s son Larry, born and raised in the Conejo Valley. Larry continues to live in Thousand Oaks with his wife, Marney, raising his son, Andrew, and stepson, William, in the city.

Ranch was his playground

Larry Janss recently sat down to reminisce about growing up on one of the last of the great ranches in Southern California. The entrance to the ranch was at the eastern end of the shopping center, he recalled. He would often ride his bike across the highway from the ranch to their house, always mindful of his mother's warning to stop and look before crossing. The whole ranch was his playground.

"The ranch became more active under my father's tutelage," Janss said.

"My father became very interested in race horses and he became very educated, proficient and prolific at it," he said. At one point, he had as many as 300 thoroughbred horses.

In addition to the horses, they had a herd of cattle used for movie filming. Janss remembers helping herd the cattle but speculates they probably gave him the job to keep him out of the way after he inadvertently rode his bike into a scene.

'Nobody else around'

"My dad and brother and I would go bird hunting. We could walk all day and there would be nobody else around," he said.

On the south side of the highway there were only five houses from Newbury Park to about Hampshire Road, he said.

"As I look back it was kind of idyllic," he said.

Everything changed in the mid-1950s when his father had houses built for some ranch hands.

"People driving by would pull off the road and ask how much they were selling for," Janss said. "That caused the light bulb to illuminate for my dad."

One day the tack room on the ranch was cleaned out and desks and drawing tables moved in.

"A bunch of grown-ups showed up in starched shirts and ties," Janss said. "I didn't understand what was going on, but it was the initial plan for the subdivision of the ranch."

After seeing how quickly lots sold in the initial Conejo Oaks subdivision, his father wanted a pedestrian-friendly community and shopping area. Although it never fully met his expectations, the Conejo Village center eventually evolved into the Janss Mall.

"Dad had seen the leapfrogging of development in North Hollywood and (the Valley) and how business areas would infill with houses. He saw the inevitability of that coming to Thousand Oaks and he was about 10 years ahead of the curve," Janss said. "Of course he had the advantage of owning the land."

'It was very, very easy'

Leggett saw the development almost from the beginning.

Before incorporation of the city, building approval came from Ventura County. There were fewer requirements in those days, Leggett said.

"It was very, very easy," he said.

The company once had a joint partnership with Harris Goldberg in 1962 to build Golden Circle Estates, a subdivision north of Hillcrest Drive and west of Erbes Road.

"We got the permit in a week for some 100-odd houses, and it took no more than 10 weeks before the models were built, landscaped and ready to go," he said.

The houses sold for $37,500 at the high end, he said, and it took a couple of years for sellout.

The company followed a plan the Stanford Research Institute presented for an integrated community -- shopping, industrial, commercial, schools, all phases of community life, Leggett said. They got the Rockwell Science Center to come out and developed the Rancho Conejo Industrial Park.

"It was a huge quantum step from the San Fernando Valley to Thousand Oaks," he said. "If they hadn't done that, Thousand Oaks wouldn't have developed for years."