See Part I at: Irving Gill, Homer Laughlin and the Beginnings of Modern Architecture in Los Angeles, Part I: 1893-1911
(Click on images to enlarge)
Miltimore House, South Pasadena, Irving Gill, architect, 1911. Gill, Irving, "The Home of the Future: The New Architecture of the West: Small Homes for a Great Country," The Craftsman, May 1916, p. 146.
In early September 1911 the Olmsted's resigned from their Exposition commission over an ongoing site-planning dispute with Goodhue and the Exposition's Director of Works Frank Allen. ("Olmsted Quits in a Huff," Architect and Engineer, November 1911, p. 101). Out of sympathy with Olmsted, Gill's patron and client George Marston also resigned his position as chair of the Exposition’s Buildings and Grounds Committee. By then Gill must have realized that he had been aced out of a position of any significance despite being well-connected to some of the Board members, especially Marston. This coupled with his differences in design philosophy with Goodhue caused him to cut all ties with the Exposition by the fall of 1911. (Author's note: For the most detailed analysis of Gill's brief involvement with the Exposition see Amero, Richard, "The Question of Irving Gill's Role in the Design of the Administration Building in Balboa Park," San Diego History Center).
Marion Olmsted, date and photographer unknown. From the National Park Service.
Fascinatingly, sometime in March of 1911 Gill was commissioned to design a cottage for the Olmsted brothers' sister Marion for a piece of property she owned at the southeast corner of Randolph and Stockton (now Arbor Dr.) Streets in San Diego's Mission Hills neighborhood. It has not as yet been determined how this commission came about. Perhaps she had met Gill in 1900-01 while he was overseeing the construction of her Uncle Albert's mansion "Wildacre" in Newport, Rhode Island and/or at one of the numerous social events surrounding the planning for the Exposition during the winter of 1910-11. She also may have been introduced to Gill by fellow artist Alice Klauber at a local art opening. In any event the house was never built and the land became the site of the Francis W. Parker School which was founded in 1912.
Gill likely watched with much interest as yet another Harrison Albright reinforced concrete mega-project took shape in 1908-9 for automobile parts mogul Henry H. Timken, Sr., inventor and patent holder of the tapered roller bearing and many other parts used in the burgeoning automobile industry (see above and below). Ironically, the same week Gill's Laughlin House bids were being received in the Laughlin Building, Albright was also receiving bids in his Laughlin Building office for the 8-story office building at the corner of 6th and E Streets in San Diego for Timken. ("Eight-Story Building to Cost $250,000," LAH, April 12, 1908, p. 8)).
While the Timken Building was under construction Timken's wife Fredericka (see above) passed away in late 1908 followed by Timken himself in early 1909. ("Millionaire Carriage Manufacturer Expires," LAH, March 17, 1909, p. II-2). Frequent San Diego winter visitors, the Timkens led by Henry Timken, Jr. traveled from the Midwest to settle their father's affairs. Henry, Jr. met Albright and through him almost certainly Laughlin and Gill. This ultimately resulted in Timken, Jr. commissioning Gill to design a grand residence at 335 Walnut Ave. around the corner from his father's estate at 3430 4th St. in May or June 1911 (see below). ("Contracts Awarded: San Diego [Timken House]," SWCM, July 1, 1911, p. 11).
Timken family portrait, ca. early 1900s. Photographer unknown. Seated in front, Henry, Sr. and Fredericka, with their five children. Henry, Jr. back row second from left. From Timken by Bettye H. Pruitt, Harvard Business School Press, 1998, p. 17.
While the Timken Building was under construction Timken's wife Fredericka (see above) passed away in late 1908 followed by Timken himself in early 1909. ("Millionaire Carriage Manufacturer Expires," LAH, March 17, 1909, p. II-2). Frequent San Diego winter visitors, the Timkens led by Henry Timken, Jr. traveled from the Midwest to settle their father's affairs. Henry, Jr. met Albright and through him almost certainly Laughlin and Gill. This ultimately resulted in Timken, Jr. commissioning Gill to design a grand residence at 335 Walnut Ave. around the corner from his father's estate at 3430 4th St. in May or June 1911 (see below). ("Contracts Awarded: San Diego [Timken House]," SWCM, July 1, 1911, p. 11).
Henry Timken, Jr. Residence, 335 Walnut Ave., San Diego, Irving Gill, architect, 1911. From Roorbach, Eloise, "Outdoor" Life In California Houses, As Expressed in the New Architecture of Irving Gill," The Craftsman, July 1913, pp. 435-38.
Gill traveled to Chicago via Los Angeles, Seattle and Minneapolis in June 1911, possibly to go over the plans with Timken. He continued on to New York and his hometown of Syracuse, perhaps for the graduation from the Syracuse University School of Architecture of his nephew Louis who he invited to join his office in San Diego later that year. Contracts were signed and a building permit was issued for the Timken House in early July. (op. cit.). This Gill-Albright-Timken connection would likely have paid dividends to Homer Laughlin, Jr. when he began his automobile production company a few years later (see later discussion below). (Various correspondence in the Panama-California Exposition Digital Archive, Olmsted Papers. "Sunbeams: New Timken Residence on 4th Street between Upas and Walnut," San Diego Union, September 14, 1911).
Henry Timken, Jr. Residence, 335 Walnut Ave., San Diego, Irving Gill, architect, 1911. Ibid.
"Huge Fee for Laying Out Industrial City" LAT, December 23, 1911, p. II-1).
While his brother John and associate partner James Dawson were still engaged with the San Diego Exposition, Frederick Law Olmsted, Jr. was contacted in Brookline, MA by George A. Damon, pioneering Pasadena city planner and recently appointed Dean at Cal Tech, on behalf of Jared Torrance's Dominguez Land Company. (Letter from Damon to Frederick Olmsted, Jr. June 14, 1911, Torrance Historical Society Olmsted Papers). Electrical engineer Damon had collaborated with Olmsted on the preparation of a report "Pittsburgh Main Thoroughfares and the Down Town District" project in 1910. Damon was inquiring as to Olmsted's availability for a trip to Los Angeles to discuss plans for what would become the new Industrial City of Torrance. In late 1911 it was announced that Olmsted had signed a $10,000 contract with the Dominguez Land Company to prepare the site planning and infrastructure specifications for the Torrance project. His preliminary plan was completed by the end of the year. (Ibid and "Modern City Takes Shape," LAT, December 27, 1911, p. II-6).
"Riverside Portland Cement Co.'s Enlarged Plant" and Olmsted, Frederick Law, "City Planning, Street Platting, Transportation, Building Codes and Grouping," SWCM, January 20, 1912, pp. 10-12.
On January 6, 1912 Olmsted spoke on "City Planning: Street Platting, Transportation, Building Codes and Grouping" at the Los Angeles City Club with Damon and Gill likely in attendance. The talk was excerpted in the January 20th issue of Southwest Contractor and Manufacturer (see above). Coincidentally, across the fold in the same issue Gill likely read with great interest was a feature story on the Riverside Portland Cement Plant where he would be commissioned to design worker's barracks only a few months later (see discussion later below). (Ibid). The article and accompanying ad (see below) highlighted the major projects in Los Angeles and San Diego the company supplied cement for, many of which were designed by Albright.
"A Record in Cement," SWCM, January 20, 1912, p. 27.
Jared Torrance, ca. 1906, photographer unknown.
LAT, July 21, 1912, p. II-9.
Through the largess of Olmsted, who possibly felt some residual pangs of guilt and regret over his aggressive lobbying for Goodhue in San Diego, Gill was one of five architects including Richard Farquhar, Elmer Grey, Sumner Hunt and Parker O. Wright selected by Olmsted in early 1912 to submit schemes for the general layout for the new city (see above). Tilt-slab construction patent holder Thomas Fellows also lobbied Olmsted strongly for the position. ("Experts to Make Plans for New Industrial City," LAH, February 5, 1912, p. 9. For more on Fellows and his lobbying of Olmsted for the position see my "Irving Gill's First Aiken System Project" (Gill-Aiken)).
Henry H. Sinclair at the helm of "Lurline." "Contenders In Transpacific Yacht Race, Commanders and Cup," LAH, July 4, 1908, p. 1.
Gill was finally chosen in April by Jared Torrance's Dominguez Land Company General Manager and former vice-president of the Edison Company, H. H. Sinclair (see above), to head the company's architectural department. The well-connected H. H. Sinclair also had close ties to Spreckels having purchased his yacht "Lurline" in 1903. (Author's note: Spreckels had first "discovered" San Diego while sailing the Lurline into San Diego Bay in 1887 on a pleasure cruise.) (San Francisco: Its Builders Past and Present, Chicago 1913, Vol. I, pp. 12-17. Cited in Frank Lloyd Wright, Louis Sullivan and the Skyscraper by Donald Hoffmann, Dover, 1998, p. 88, n. 4).
Sinclair had also hired Ralph Bennett as Chief Engineer to design and construct the public works infrastructure needed to fulfill Olmsted's plan. Gill would have especially relished being chosen over Elmer Grey if he was aware of the role he played in Goodhue's selection over him for the San Diego Exposition. (For example, Letter from Elmer Grey to Bertram Goodhue, January 4, 1911). (Author's note: Like Sinclair Jared Torrance was also a former vice-president of Edison Electric which later merged to become part of Southern California Edison. Gill's 1910 client Frederick Lewis also later became a Southern California Edison vice-president. Coincidentally, by then having become Edison's Los Angeles District Superintendent, Lewis was most likely involved in providing power to the new city of Torrance from Edison's Long Beach Steam Plant. ("Electricity a City Builder," Torrance Herald, February 20, 1914, p. 1). Torrance was also a major benefactor of Charles Lummis's Southwest Museum under construction the same time the City of Torrance broke ground. Joining Torrance on the museum's board of trustees were Gill clients Homer Laughlin, Jr. and Bishop Johnson. Lummis's Landmarks Club had earlier commissioned Hebbard and Gill to perform emergency restoration work on the San Diego Mission.).
After Gill gave Sinclair and Bennett a tour of his work, most likely the Laughlin and Miltimore Houses, and the more apropos for the workingmen of Torrance, his Lewis Court project, Sinclair wrote to Olmsted of his selection of Gill,
"After careful study of the architectural work to be done at Torrance we yesterday appointed Mr. Irving J. Gill, of San Diego, our Consulting and Supervising Architect, which appointment I feel sure will meet with your hearty approval, as I recollect your strong endorsement of his work. I have, in company with Mr. Bennett, personally visited many of the houses built by Mr. Gill and have become quite enthusiastic about his type of construction, especially the interior work. Mr. Gill will give practically his entire time to the work and at a very moderate compensation. He will have an office with us and make his office in Los Angeles. I have advised the other architects, who furnished us sketches in competition, of this appointment and made payment to them in the amount agreed upon. In addition I have written Mr. Farquhar a personal letter explaining more fully than to the others." (Henry H. Sinclair to Frederick Law Olmsted, Jr., April 16, 1912. Olmsted Papers, Torrance Historical Society).
By this time Gill already had under design a railroad depot for the Pacific Electric Railway Company (see above and below). The Los Angeles Times reported,
"Under the arrangement just perfected he will have full charge of the architectural work on all the buildings to be erected by the Land Company of Torrance. Mr, Gill has established offices in the Title Insurance Building at Fifth and Spring Streets. At present he is preparing plans for the new railroad station to be erected at Torrance. Among other buildings that are to be built as soon as plans are out are a city building, a hotel, administration building, stores, rooming-houses, and about 100 cottages. The land company is considering the erection of only fireproof buildings, but this plan has not as yet been definitely settled upon." ("Select Architect," LAT, April 28, 1912, p. V-1 and "Building: Station," SWCM, April 13, 1912, pp. 16-17).
Pacific Electric Railway Depot, Torrance, 1912. Irving Gill, architect. From "Torrance, The Modern Industrial City: Being the Tale of To-Day and To-Morrow," West Coast, January 1913, p. 48.
While Gill was negotiating his Dominguez Land Company contract with Sinclair which would keep him busily employed for the next year, Homer Laughlin also commissioned him to prepare landscaping and preliminary site plans for the subdivision of Laughlin Park (see discussion later below). Gill was assisted in the task by fledgling landscape architect Lloyd Wright who was by then in his employ.
Shortly after the Olmsteds September resignation from the Exposition over the site layout dispute with Goodhue, Lloyd excitedly wrote his father of leaving his Exposition "gardening" job to throw in his lot with his old Adler and Sullivan stablemate Irving Gill. He thought he had little chance for advancement at the Exposition with the Olmsteds no longer in the picture. Unbeknownst to Lloyd was the role his father played in Gill's leaving Adler and Sullivan for San Diego as discussed early in Part I. Lloyd further reported to his Taliesin-preoccupied father on his and Woolley's visit with Gill and his subsequent job offer.
Not long after going to work for Gill, Lloyd was joined by brother John in the Elk Apartments (see end of Part I). (My Father, p. 61). After a brief stint working for a paving contractor in Portland, Oregon, John made his way south to move in with older brother Lloyd as he was acclimating in Gill's office and perhaps working on the installation of the landscaping for the Timken House then nearing completion (see above). By then Gill's nephew Louis had also made his way to San Diego to go to work for his uncle. The Gill's live in his personal cottage at 3719 Albatross St. (see below). Lloyd brought his beloved cello to San Diego, John brought his violin and Gill bought a piano for nephew Louis and the three played for hours at a time in Gill's cottage (see below).
John aimlessly ran through a series of odd jobs including hawking advertising posters designed by Lloyd. (My Father, p. 61). The nervy nineteen year old soon found employment with the Pacific Building Company as a draftsman where he coincidentally worked on the plans for the Barney House across the street from Gill's house for George Marston (see below). (Seventh Avenue Historic Home Tour, Save Our Heritage Organization, 2010, pp. 18-19). (Author's note: Also working for the same company around this time was Gill's former field superintendent Richard Requa. Gill's influence imbued the work of former employee and partner Frank Mead and his former field Requa who designed a house next door in 1913 for the Barney's son and daughter-in-law.).
After a modicum of success repetitiously drawing bungalow elevations he decided to try his hand in a real architectural office. Possibly trading on his name, the then wannabe architect John quickly found menial office boy work with the busy Laughlin Annex architect Harrison Albright in late 1911 (see below). (My Father, p. 63).
Union Building, 2nd and Broadway, San Diego, Harrison Albright, architect. From San Diego History Center.
Perhaps one of the Gill landscape projects Lloyd was alluding to in his September 1911 letter to his father was related to Laughlin Park, a planned subdivision of land Homer Laughlin, Sr. began accumulating in 1890 with an initial purchase from James Lick, founder of the Lick Observatory. His holdings eventually grew to 33 acres total and became known as Laughlin Hill situated between Los Feliz Blvd. and Franklin Avenue in Hollywood (see below). Broadway Department Store owner Arthur Letts had purchased the adjacent 70 acres to the east in 1904.
Sometime in the 1890s Laughlin, Sr. hired noted East Coast landscape architect Nathan F. Barrett to develop a landscape plan which, over a 12-year period, resulted in over 50,000 trees and shrubs being planted on the property. The hundreds of olive trees that were planted were likely obtained through the largess of the Miltimore Ranch in the San Fernando Valley. Laughlin had originally envisioned building a palatial family home on the site but the death of his wife in 1909 altered the plan. In 1911 a still distraught Laughlin, Sr. sold his prized acreage to a syndicate headed by his son who formed the Laughlin Park Company. Laughlin, Sr. passed away on January 13, 1913. (Author's note: A San Diego colleague of Gill's, San Diego horticulturalist Kate Sessions, came to Los Angeles to consult with Barrett during his 1902 Laughlin Hill site visit. "Bennial Notes," LAH, May 9, 1902, p. 9).
Coincidentally, Corbett had in 1910 completed a palatial home in Berkeley Square for real estate mogul C. Wesley Roberts who had in July of 1912 become one of the financial backers for Gill's Concrete Building and Investment Company discussed later below.
The well-connected Corbett would also design a house for earlier-mentioned Gill client Frederick B. Lewis in 1914 (see "Lewis" in Part I). Lewis's rapid rise through the ranks at the Southern California Edison Company and steady income from his Gill-designed Lewis Court units in Sierra Madre enabled the construction of the 12-room, 2-story, $7,000 house at the then tony address of 1754 Camino Palmero in the heart of Hollywood (see upper left above).
In 1916 Dodd's neighbor, C. F. Perry's widow Ada sold her estate to Cecil B. De Mille for the then princely sum of $27,893. (Empire of Dreams: The Epic Life of Cecil B. DeMille by Scott Eyman). Dodd quickly befriended De Mille and developed strong ties to well-heeled developers and the movie industry through his new neighbor and his Paramount Pictures partner Frank A. Garbutt who was a fellow Los Angeles Athletic Club and Uplifters Club crony. As previously mentioned in Part I, Garbutt was also a close friend of Homer Laughlin, Sr. through their Automobile Club connections. It was thus most likely through Laughlin and/or Dodd that Lloyd met Garbutt (and possibly De Mille) and was put in charge of Paramount's set design and drafting department for much of 1916-17. (Lloyd Wright, Architect by David Gebhard and Harriette Von Breton, Art Galleries, UC-Santa Barbara, 1971, p. 22). (For much more on the Dodd-Wright relationship see my "SWMZW" and "Firenze Gardens, 5218-5230 Sunset Blvd., William J. Dodd, Architect, 1920"). For much on Garbutt see my "Playa del Rey: Speed Capital of the World, 1910-1913").
Lloyd Wright ca. 1910. From Lloyd Wright: The Architecture of Frank Lloyd Wright, Jr. produced and photographed by Allen Weintraub, Abrams, 1998, p. 232.
Taylor Woolleyt at Villino Belvedere, Italy, 1910. Photo likely by Lloyd Wright. From Building Taliesin: Frank Lloyd Wright's Home of Love and Loss by Ron McRea, Wisconsin Historical Society Press, 2012, p. 21. Courtesy of University of Utah Library, Taylor Woolley Papers.
Lloyd first met Gill the previous August when he and his fellow Wasmuth Portfolio worker and European travel-mate Taylor Woolley (see above) proudly paid a visit to Gill's office with the likely intent of selling him a copy of the portfolio on which they had labored so hard. The previous May or June 1911 Lloyd's father had arranged with his periodic draftsman Woolley, who was then back at his home in Utah, a strategically planned West Coast sales trip. Wright armed Woolley with copies of the first volume of the portfolio and a prospectus of same published by Ralph Fletcher Seymour (see below). (Alofsin, p. 92). (Author's note: Seymour would in 1912 also publish Wright's The Japanese Print. Seymour and his wife Harriet also during 1916-18 hosted former Smith College roommates Sophie Pauline Gibling and Marian Da Camara while Harriet and the girls were teaching at the progressive Ravinia School. This led to a lifelong friendship with the Schindlers. For more on the Schindlers-Seymours friendship see my "Chats" and "The Schindlers in Carmel, 1924").
Prospectus for Ausgeführte Bauten und Entwürfe von Frank Lloyd Wright (aka Wasmuth Portfolio), Ralph Fletcher Seymour, 1911. (From Steinerag.com)
Before making his way to Southern California Woolley had likely first visited the Pacific Northwest where former fellow Wright apprentices Andrew Willatzen and Barry Byrne had formed a partnership after leaving Wright's Oak Park Studio and Walter Burley Griffin's Steinway Hall office a few years earlier. This is evidenced by Byrne and Willatzen seeking to buy the second volume of the portfolio upon its release around the end of 1911. (Alofsin, p. 308). (Author's note: As discussed later below, Woolley would go to work for Byrne between 1914 and early 1917 in Walter Burley Griffin's Monroe Building office after he left for Australia with wife Marion Mahony for the Canberra project.).
Irving Gill's San Diego Office between 1908 - 1917, 752 5th St. From Google Maps.
The impressionable architects' sales call at Gill's office (see above) undoubtedly resulted in a wonderful exposure to his modernistic oeuvre not to mention his take on the activities and politics then in play surrounding the Panama California Exposition site planning. In late August Wright summoned Woolley back to Chicago to help with the construction of Taliesin, his new home and studio in Spring Green, Wisconsin on which he began work about the same time Gill started on the Torrance project (see below). (Alofsin, p. 342, n. 52).
Taliesin, fall 1911. Photo by Taylor Woolley. Courtesy University State Historical Society, Taylor Woolley Photograph Collection..
"I therefore went to Architect Gill of this city. Woolley can tell you more of him than I can write. He is a good sound man with ideas and ideals. He is, to say the least, appreciative of your work. ... To the inspiration he gained at that time, he lays a great deal of his success. ... I had a talk with him, a fine talk. The upshot of it was that he would turn over all of his client's landscape work to me, give me a desk in his office, all the material and aids I needed with free reign to handle the matter as I saw fit. With the proviso always...that I receive my pay when I made the department pay. Don't laugh and say that I was a silly ass for taking it up for I am not. I know what lies in this particular job, I know what an opportunity is, and I seized it. I have been in the work head over heels for the last week. I have already had two propositions handed me to lay out and handle and more in view at 10%. ... but I don't get any 10% until the gardens are under construction or near completion which will be sometime next spring. ... I wouldn't let the opportunity slip [by] me without giving it a good six months tryout for anything in the world. It will mean the making of me if I can hang on." (Lloyd Wright to Frank Lloyd Wright, n.d., ca. early September 1911. Frank Lloyd Wright Correspondence, Getty Research Institute and Alofsin, p. 342, n. 52).
Timken House, 4th and Walnut, San Diego, 1911. Irving Gill, architect. From Roorbach, Eloise, "Outdoor Life in California Houses," The Craftsman, July 1913, pp. 435-8.
Not long after going to work for Gill, Lloyd was joined by brother John in the Elk Apartments (see end of Part I). (My Father, p. 61). After a brief stint working for a paving contractor in Portland, Oregon, John made his way south to move in with older brother Lloyd as he was acclimating in Gill's office and perhaps working on the installation of the landscaping for the Timken House then nearing completion (see above). By then Gill's nephew Louis had also made his way to San Diego to go to work for his uncle. The Gill's live in his personal cottage at 3719 Albatross St. (see below). Lloyd brought his beloved cello to San Diego, John brought his violin and Gill bought a piano for nephew Louis and the three played for hours at a time in Gill's cottage (see below).
Irving Gill Residence, 3719 Albatross St., San Diego, 1908. Photo by author, May 16, 2015.
John aimlessly ran through a series of odd jobs including hawking advertising posters designed by Lloyd. (My Father, p. 61). The nervy nineteen year old soon found employment with the Pacific Building Company as a draftsman where he coincidentally worked on the plans for the Barney House across the street from Gill's house for George Marston (see below). (Seventh Avenue Historic Home Tour, Save Our Heritage Organization, 2010, pp. 18-19). (Author's note: Also working for the same company around this time was Gill's former field superintendent Richard Requa. Gill's influence imbued the work of former employee and partner Frank Mead and his former field Requa who designed a house next door in 1913 for the Barney's son and daughter-in-law.).
George and Anna Barney House, 3530 7th St., San Diego, Pacific Building Company. (Ibid)..
After a modicum of success repetitiously drawing bungalow elevations he decided to try his hand in a real architectural office. Possibly trading on his name, the then wannabe architect John quickly found menial office boy work with the busy Laughlin Annex architect Harrison Albright in late 1911 (see below). (My Father, p. 63).
Harrison Albright, ca. 1912. Photographer unknown.
Albright had opened his San Diego office the year before in the recently completed Union Building he had designed for his best client J. D. Spreckels in 1907-08 (see above).
Various newspaper clippings ca. late December 1911. From Building Taliesin: Frank Lloyd Wright's Home of Love and Loss by Ron McCrea, Wisconsin Historical Society Pres, 2012, p. 122.
Not long after going to work for Albright, the scandal surrounding his father's love affair with Mamah Borthwick Cheney and their new love nest Taliesin then under construction in Spring Green, Wisconsin hit the front pages of newspapers across the country including San Diego (see above for example). Likely the main motivation for John and Lloyd migrating to the West Coast was to distance themselves from the steady stream of gossip and negative press surrounding their father's affair. John was deeply concerned for his job upon seeing the headlines on Christmas Eve, 1911. He need not have been concerned as the compassionate Albright immediately set him at ease. John recalled Albright from that point on taking a keener interest and beginning more of a mentoring relationship with him. Over many weekends Albright had John drive them in his Detroit Chalmers out to his Spring Valley ranch east of San Diego which he had purchased in 1909. ("Architect Buys Fine Fruit Ranch," San Diego Union, November 25, 1909, p. 6, My Father, p. 61 and postcard below).
"The Harrison Albright Ranch," postcard from the internet.
I speculate that the Wright brothers moved into one of the two Gill cottages on what is now Robinson Mews (see below) sometime in mid-1912 evidenced by the fact that former Gill partner Frank Mead and draftsman Maury Diggs also lived at the same location in 1907 and 1908 respectively. The 1912 San Diego City Directory also still listed the boys as living at the Elk Apts. (San Diego City Directories for 1907, 1908 and 1912). (Author's note: Gill offered Diggs the rent-free use of the same cottage in 1913 during his headline news Mann Act trial.).
Gill Cottages, 3732-34 1st St. (now Robinson Mews), 1904. From San Diego History Center.
Perhaps one of the Gill landscape projects Lloyd was alluding to in his September 1911 letter to his father was related to Laughlin Park, a planned subdivision of land Homer Laughlin, Sr. began accumulating in 1890 with an initial purchase from James Lick, founder of the Lick Observatory. His holdings eventually grew to 33 acres total and became known as Laughlin Hill situated between Los Feliz Blvd. and Franklin Avenue in Hollywood (see below). Broadway Department Store owner Arthur Letts had purchased the adjacent 70 acres to the east in 1904.
View from Laughlin Hill, 1905. From USC Digital Library.
Sometime in the 1890s Laughlin, Sr. hired noted East Coast landscape architect Nathan F. Barrett to develop a landscape plan which, over a 12-year period, resulted in over 50,000 trees and shrubs being planted on the property. The hundreds of olive trees that were planted were likely obtained through the largess of the Miltimore Ranch in the San Fernando Valley. Laughlin had originally envisioned building a palatial family home on the site but the death of his wife in 1909 altered the plan. In 1911 a still distraught Laughlin, Sr. sold his prized acreage to a syndicate headed by his son who formed the Laughlin Park Company. Laughlin, Sr. passed away on January 13, 1913. (Author's note: A San Diego colleague of Gill's, San Diego horticulturalist Kate Sessions, came to Los Angeles to consult with Barrett during his 1902 Laughlin Hill site visit. "Bennial Notes," LAH, May 9, 1902, p. 9).
"Hollywood Beauty Spot a Landscape Masterpiece," LAH, September 13, 1913, p. 15. Rendering most likely by Lloyd Wright.
Las Casas Grandes, Laughlin Park, Hollywood, April 12, 1912. Irving Gill, architect. Drawing by Lloyd Wright. Courtesy UC-Santa Barbara Architecture and Design Collections, Irving Gill Collection.
Laughlin, Jr. had a grand vision for subdividing Laughlin Park and commissioned Gill to prepare landscape design and site plans and presentation drawings to help market the property. Gill also authored a lengthy feature story for the Los Angeles Herald describing in detail the history of the property and the landscaping features he, with Lloyd's assistance, was designing to enhance the building sites in the development (see above and below).
Gill, Irving, "Unique Landscaping for Laughlin Park. Designed by Architect Irving Gill" LAH, August 23, 1913, p. 19.
Laughlin had selected an Italian villa theme for Laughlin Park residences and instructed Gill to implement a complementary landscape design for three "Cascade Vistas" which would enhance the marketability of the building sites (see above for example).
"The architecture probably will be largely what we are accustomed to call Italian, but only because Italian architecture has been developed along lines of fundamentals. In other words, Italian architecture—so called—has had a real reason for doing things, whether from a decorative or practical point of view." (Ibid).Out of respect for his father's labor of love, Laughlin directed that Gill's "Vistas" design take special care to minimize disruption to the existing landscape infrastructure created for his father by Barrett. Likely very educational for fledgling landscapist Lloyd, Laughlin also hired Knapp & Woodward, civil and landscape engineers, "to complete a botanical map ... drawn to scale, showing contour lines in every five feet of elevation. It shows the position of every tree and shrub, its size and botanical name." ("Unique Vistas at Laughlin Park," LAH, November 8, 1913, p. 14).
Las Casas Grandes, Laughlin Park, Hollywood, 1912. Irving Gill, architect. (Rendering by Lloyd Wright?). Courtesy UC-Santa Barbara Architecture and Design Collections, Irving Gill Collection.
Development progress at Laughlin Park was well-publicized throughout most of 1913. For example Gill's design philosophy for the residences was quoted in a December article in the Herald (see below).
“The houses to be built in Laughlin Park will be generally of plaster, fireproof construction, with red tile roofs, this red tile forming a natural and practical medium as it will give another primary color to the landscape, while the white of the houses will heighten the toning of the natural colors," said Irving J. Gill, who has charge of the landscape plans." ("Sewer Connection for Laughlin Park," LAH, December 13, 1913, p. 17).
"Mid Cypress and Hedges," LAT, August 10, 1913, p. VI-1. (Note C. F. Perry Residence at top of hill).
Laughlin Park development activity began in earnest in 1913 with C. F. Perry purchasing one of the 40 original home sites and commissioning architect B. Cooper Corbett to design his Italian villa (see above and below). ("Will Crown Hill; Laughlin Park Home to Follow Italian Villa Type; Grounds to be Elaborately Laid Out," LAT, March 9, 1913, p. VI-1). Perry was likely a close friend of the Laughlins and a fellow Automobile Club member as his motoring exploits were also frequent fodder in the Los Angeles Times. (See for example "Auto Log Kept on Round Trip; Run to San Francisco and Back Interesting," LAT, December 27, 1908, p. VI-2)).
C. F. Perry Residence, 4 Laughlin Park Dr., Laughlin Park, 1914. B. Cooper Corbett, architect. Purchased by Cecil B. De Mille in 1916. From Early Hollywood by Marc Wanamaker and Robert N. Nudelman, Acadia, 1907, p. 90. (Possibly the William J. Dodd Residence in the background also purchased by De Mille in 1920.).
Coincidentally, Corbett had in 1910 completed a palatial home in Berkeley Square for real estate mogul C. Wesley Roberts who had in July of 1912 become one of the financial backers for Gill's Concrete Building and Investment Company discussed later below.
Frederick B. Lewis Residence, 1754 Camino Palmero, Hollywood, B. Cooper Corbett, architect. "Homes Display Individuality," LAT, December 27, 1914, p. VI-1.
The well-connected Corbett would also design a house for earlier-mentioned Gill client Frederick B. Lewis in 1914 (see "Lewis" in Part I). Lewis's rapid rise through the ranks at the Southern California Edison Company and steady income from his Gill-designed Lewis Court units in Sierra Madre enabled the construction of the 12-room, 2-story, $7,000 house at the then tony address of 1754 Camino Palmero in the heart of Hollywood (see upper left above).
William J. Dodd, ca. 1910. From Wikipedia.
Intrigued by all the publicity surrounding the Laughlin Park development shortly after his 1913 arrival in Los Angeles, architect William J. Dodd (see above) purchased from Homer Laughlin the lot next to Perry's commanding site at the top of the hill and began designing his personal residence. Through Laughlin Dodd soon met Gill, Lloyd Wright, and fellow architect J. Martyn Haenke who also bought a prominent lot in Laughlin Park. ("Architects Build at Laughlin Park," LAH, September 13, 1913, p. 15. Author's note: Dodd also joined the Los Angeles Athletic Club in 1913 and was one of the foundimg members of the LAAC-affiliated Uplifter's Club for whom he designed a clubhouse in 1921. For much more on the Dodd-Lloyd Wright relationship see my "R. M. Schindler,Edward Weston, Margrethe Mather, Anna Zacsek, Lloyd Wright, Lawrence Tibbett,Reginald Pole, Beatrice Wood and Their Dramatic Circles"(SWMZW)).
Getting his start in the Chicago office of William LeBaron Jenney eight years before Lloyd's father began with Silsbee and remaining in the Midwest until moving to Los Angeles, Dodd would have been very familiar with Wright, Sr.'s work. Dodd took an immediate liking to Lloyd putting the rapidly blossoming designer to work on his estate landscape design. Lloyd's rendering for same was exhibited in the annual exhibition of the Los Angeles Architectural Club (see below). (Author's note: Intriguingly Dodd, Laughlin, Gill and Harrison Albright likely all met and socialized during the elder Wright's May 1913 Los Angeles stopover on the way back to Taliesin from Japan where he had just landed the Imperial Hotel commission (see discussion later below)).
Entrance to the Dodd Residence, 5 Laughlin Park Dr., Laughlin Park. Rendering likely by Lloyd Wright. From Grey, Elmer, "Fifth Annual Architecture Exhibit at Los Angeles," Architect and Engineer of California, March 1916, p. 47.
Dodd broke ground on his residence in the fall of 1913 and completed it in early 1915. He would continue to involve Lloyd on various other projects between 1914 and 1922. (SWMZW). ("Architects Build at Laughlin Park," LAH, September 13, 1913, p. 15. "First of Fine Homes Finished," LAT, August 2, 1914, p. V-1. Author's note: Around the time Lloyd was likely installing the landscape for Dodd's home in Laughlin Park he had also prepared landscaping plans for Dodd's Frank Upman House at 401 S. Westmoreland. LAH, December 24, 1914, p. 10).
"Italian Villa for Mary Garden," Laughlin Park, (unbuilt), J. Martyn Haenke, architect, Industrial and Building News, January 14 and February 25, 1914, Plate A. Rendering possibly by Lloyd Wright.
Haenke also designed at least preliminary plans for an elaborate estate which period Los Angeles City Directories indicate may not have been built. Haenke did publish an elaborate rendering possibly by Lloyd (see above) of an Italian Villa seemingly intended for popular opera star Mary Garden. This indicates that he may have been planning to turn a tidy profit from a quick turnaround on his property. Haenke and Laughlin perhaps were collaborating to take advantage of the voluminous publicity surrounding Mary Garden's comings and goings to hopefully convince the opera star to buy in Laughlin Park and help market the sales of the rest of the lots. (Author's note: Dodd's meeting of Haenke via Laughlin resulted in the two collaborating on the unbuilt Mountain Mission Inn project in Banning and the Los Angeles Examiner Building also with Julia Morgan. Lloyd's drawings for Haenke (and possibly Dodd) were completed before he left with brother John for Chicago in the fall of 1913 or Barry Byrne and/or Alfonso Iannelli in February 1914 based on his Haenke rendering being published in the January 14, 1914 number of Building and Industrial News (see above and discussion later below.).
Cecil B. De Mille family in their Laughlin Park yard ca. 1920. Photographer unknown.
After leasing his house to Charlie Chaplin during 1918, Dodd would also sell his 5,600 sq. ft. home to De Mille in 1920. (Eyman). This enabled the larger-than-life mogul to join the two buildings to create a majestic compound at his egotistical new street address of 2000 De Mille Drive. De Mille in turn commissioned Dodd to remodel the compound for him in 1921 (see below). (For photos of Dodd's remodel for De Mille see California Homes by California Architects by Ellen Leech, California Southland Magazine, Los Angeles, 1922, pp. 12-13).
De Mille and granddaughter Cecelia in the loggia designed by Dodd connecting the two houses. Photographer unknown, ca. 1940.
Landscape for Cecil B. De Mille Residence, 2000 De Mille Dr., Laughlin Park, ca. 1914-1921. William J. Dodd, architect, Lloyd Wright, landscape architect. (Leech, p. 13). (See also Lloyd Wright papers, 1920-1978, Box 628, UCLA Library Special Collections, Charles E. Young Research Library).
Dodd's renovations of his former house for De Mille included new offices, a library, a screening room and guest accommodations and connecting the two houses with an elaborate loggia (see above and below). Dodd bought another nearby Laughlin Park lot and broke ground for his new 2-story, 10-room, $30,000 house at 2 Laughlin Park Dr. (now 5226 Linwood Dr.) in April 1921. Shortly thereafter he began another mansion at 7 Laughlin Park Dr. (now 5235 Linwood Dr.) for real estate and automobile sales mogul Kenneth Preuss. Both Dodd and Preuss commissioned Lloyd to design their extensive landscape plans. ("[Preuss] Residence," SWBC, July 8, 1921, p.19. "Erecting Home of Unusual Design in Foothill Tract," LAT, December 18, 1921, p. V-1. Author's note: Lloyd would in 1922 begin design and break ground on a house for Martha Taggart, the mother of his close friend Reginald Pole's wife Helen, a few blocks to the west of Laughlin Park. For much more on the love triangle of Lloyd Wright, Helen Taggart and her first husband Reginald Pole see my "SWMZW." By 1923 architect Carleton Winslow had also designed his personal residence at 11 Laughlin Park Dr. .
De Mille Compound, 2000 De Mille Dr., Laughlin Park, ca. 1921. From Hollywoodphotographs.com.
Despite certainly having high hopes for commissions from clients wealthy enough to purchase lots in Laughlin Park, Gill's aspirations would go unrealized. Ironically Lloyd would gain much more out of the Laughlin Park connection via his landscaping commissions from Dodd, set design work for Garbutt's and De Mille's Paramount Pictures and the associated connections this provided to spur his budding career. (See for example my "Tina Modotti, Lloyd Wright and Otto Bollman Connections,1920").
Concurrent to the Laughlin Park landscape design work in the spring of 1912, as mentioned previously Gill was selected to be the chief architect for Jared Torrance's Dominguez Land Company's new Industrial City of Torrance as described in Gill's 1913 Press Reference Library bio below.
"In the early part of 1912 Mr. Gill was chosen by the Dominguez Land Company, a great California corporation, to design and supervise the construction of a model industrial city. This town, known as Torrance, lies near Los Angeles, California, and will be made up of factories of various description, administration buildings and all that goes to make an ideal manufacturing or industrial city, in one division, while another is set aside as the residence section and will be made up of the homes, schools, library, parks, children's playgrounds; the whole having paved streets and every modern facility, which will add to the convenience, beauty and sanitation of the place.
Mr. Gill has devoted himself to this work to the exclusion of practically everything else, although he conducts his offices in San Diego and holds commissions for many important structures in various parts of Southern California." ("Irving Gill," Press Reference Library, Notables of the West, Vol. I, International News Service, 1913, p. 571 (PRL)).
"Firm to Handle Vast Properties: Will be Selling Agents for Torrance," LAT, September 1, 1912, p. VI-5.
"Irving J. Gill, the architect in charge is using concrete mission types in the construction and plans a white city for the residence and business portions of the "tailor made town.” ("Torrance "Tailor Made Town" Nearly Ready," LAH, August 31, 1912, p. 1).
El Roi Tan Hotel and
Pacific Electric Railway Depot flanked by the El Roi Tan Hotel and Murray Hotels. Depot still exists in altered state.
Irving Gill buildings, Torrance, From Bennett, Ralph, "The Industrial City of Torrance, California," Southwest Contractor and Manufacturer, October 30, 1913, p. 871.
Torrance Elementary School, 1824 Cabrillo Ave., 1913. Still exists in altered state. From Kamerling, p.
Thomas Campbell Real Estate Office and El Roi Tan Hotel, 1912. Both destroyed.
Ca. 1913 postcard depicting Irving Gill's Brighton and Colonial Hotel buildings on Cabrillo Avenue.
Gill's Brighton Hotel Building on the left above at the northwest corner of Cravens and Cabrillo Avenues still exists in an altered state. Continuing north, Gill's Colonial Hotel, located at the southwest corner of Gramercy and Cabrillo, also still exists in a similarly altered state. Off in the distance is Gill's El Roi Tan and/or Murray Hotel (both no longer existing) across Cabrillo from his still existing Pacific Electric Railway Depot not visible on the right.
In a visit to the new city by Jared Torrance's Pasadena cronies, Gill's concrete houses for workingmen "especially attracted their attention." ("Laud Torrance, City Industry," LAT, April 25, 1913, p. II-5).
Concrete houses at Torrance. From Bartlett, Dana W., "An Industrial Garden City," American City, October, 1913, pp. 310-314.
From Bartlett, Dana W., "An Industrial Garden City," American City, October, 1913, pp. 310-314.
Gill's above plot plan intended for one of the new residential blocks compares favorably with his Lewis Court project. Building the houses around the perimeter of the block freed up more communal area in the center for families to co-mingle and their children to play. City Beautiful Movement protagonist Dana Bartlett reported on Lloyd's landscape activity, "The fact that the company has planted 100,000 street trees, eucalyptus, acacia, pepper, and palm will assure the perfect forestation of the city." (Ibid).
From Bartlett, Dana W., "An Industrial Garden City," American City, October, 1913, pp. 310-314.
Southern Pacific Railroad Bridge, Torrance, Ralph Bennett, designer. Erroneously first attributed to Gill by Esther McCoy in Five California Architects.
Hendrie Rubber Company Plant. From Kamerling, p. 93.
Irving Gill's Pacific Electric Railway Depot, Fuller Shoe Company Plant and Southern Pacific Railroad Bridge, ca. 1914-15 with Lloyd Wright's maturing landscaping. Photo apparently taken from the roof of Gill's Bank of Torrance building. From Hines, p.
"Glimpses of Modern Industrial City of Torrance," LAT, December 21, 1913, pp. VI-2.
Gill turned selected Torrance landscaping projects over to Lloyd. The beautification of the city was described in an article in a December 21, 1913 Los Angeles Times piece (see above). Incorporating what he had learned from the Olmsteds in Boston, San Diego and Torrance and from Nathan Barrett's and Gill's Laughlin Park work, Lloyd eagerly involved himself with the design and planting of thousands of flowering shrubs and shade trees along the fledgling city's streets, a central park and eucalyptus tree wind breaks along the south and west ends of the city (see article above and photo below). ("Glimpses of Modern Industrial City of Torrance," LAT, December 21, 1913, pp. VI-2, "Torrance to Be one of the Most Beautiful Cities in World," Torrance Herald, February 6, 1914, p. 1, and Hines, Thomas S., "The Blessing and the Curse" The Achievement of Lloyd Wright," in Lloyd Wright: The Architecture of Frank Lloyd Wright, Jr. produced and photographed by Allen Weintraub, Abrams, 1998, p. 15. Author's note: In a 1958 interview with Esther McCoy Lloyd reminisced that his time with the Olmsteds in San Diego and Gill in Torrance was a "perfect education." Box 28, folder 29, Esther McCoy Papers, Archives of American Art).).
Aerial photo of Torrance ca. 1920.
"Spreckels Brothers Commercial Co., Agents: Riverside Portland Cement," SWCM, June 1, 1912.
"Spreckels Brothers Commercial Co., Agents: Riverside Portland Cement," SWCM, August 5, 1911, p. 37.
By 1911-12 Harrison Albright's client John D. Spreckels and his brother Adolph and their Spreckels Brothers Commercial Co. were acting as agents for the Riverside Portland Cement Co. (see above). This possibly provided the connection for Gill to obtain the commission for barracks for the company's workers around May or June of 1912.
Rendering for the Riverside Portland Cement workers barracks by Lloyd Wright, ca. July 1912.
This was an extremely busy time for Gill as the work at Torrance had by mid-1912 ramped up to a peak. He was also frantically trying to incorporate and organize his Concrete Building and Investment Company. Evidenced by Lloyd Wright's above rendering for Gill's original design for the Riverside worker's barracks, he had envisioned using his newly purchased Aiken System equipment to construct side-by-side connected, flat-roofed, concrete compounds, the sides of which would form continuous rectangular walls,enclosing central communal gardens reminiscent of his Lewis Court project in Sierra Madre.
Riverside Portland Cement Worker's Barracks, Crestmore, 1912, Irving Gill, architect. Lloyd Wright, landscape architect. From Kamerling, p. 98.
Likely due to not being able to organize his equipment in timely fashion and also the company seemingly wanting to reduce costs, Gill quickly redesigned the project to a more utilitarian pitched roof wooden compound with a shaded pavilion in the central garden, again along the lines of Lewis Court (see above and below). Gill's first Aiken System project would not come to fruition until early the following year. (Gill-Aiken).
Riverside Portland Cement Worker's Barracks, Garden Pavilion, Crestmore, 1912, Irving Gill, architect. Lloyd Wright, landscape architect. From Kamerling, p. 99.
In addition to the Torrance, Laughlin Park, and Riverside projects Gill also put Lloyd to work on the landscape drawings for the Alice Lee and Katherine Teats houses at Albatross and Upas Streets just three blocks directly south of his Robinson Mews cottages (see below).
Alice Lee Property Landscape Plan drawn by Lloyd Wright, landscape architect, July 1912. Courtesy UC-Santa Barbara Architecture and Design Collections, Irving Gill Collection.
Alice Lee Property Landscape Elevation drawn by Lloyd Wright, landscape architect, July 27, 1912. Courtesy UC-Santa Barbara Architecture and Design Collections, Irving Gill Collection.
Katherine Teats Cottage, Albatross, Irving Gill, architect, 1913. Rendering by Lloyd Wright. Courtesy UC-Santa Barbara Architecture and Design Collections, Irving Gill Collection.
Lloyd's rendering for the Teats cottage (see above) was clearly inspired by Marion Mahony's Wasmuth Portfolio rendering for FLW's 1905 Hardy Residence in Racine, Wisconsin (see below). (Author's note: Mahony's future husband Walter Burley Griffin likely designed the landscape, the plans for which Lloyd would soon be studying after his brief return to Chicago with brother John in late 1913 and early 1914. Barry Byrne had also returned to Chicago in February 1914 to take over Walter Burley Griffin's practice and would have permitted Lloyd to study the Griffin's projects.). (Alofsin, Appendix A: Chronology, 19 September 1913 - Staff at Wright's Chicago Office: sons John and Lloyd, and Harry Robinson. Offices at 600-610 Orchestra Hall).
Hardy House, Racine, Wisconsin, 1905. From Wasmuth Portfolio, Plate XV(c).
Katherine Teats Cottage and mature landscape, Albatross Street and Upas, Irving Gill, architect, Lloyd Wright, landscape architect, 1913. Courtesy UC-Santa Barbara Architecture and Design Collections, Irving Gill Collection.
Alice Lee and Katherine Teats Cottages, Albatross Street, Irving Gill, architect, 1913. Photo ca. 1913-14. From San Diego History Center.
During this period Lloyd also worked on the unbuilt O'Kelley project and produced the below rendering. (As cited in Lloyd Wright, Architect by David Gebhard and Hariette Von Breton, UC-Santa Barbara Art Galleries, 1971, p. 70).
O'Kelly House, 1st and Olive, San Diego, unbuilt, Irving Gill, architect, 1912. Rendering by Lloyd Wright ca. 1912. Courtesy UC-Santa Barbara Architecture and Design Collections, Irving Gill Collection.
Grace Fuller Residence, Glencoe, Illinois, 1906. From Plate XL, Wasmuth Portfolio, scanned from Frank Lloyd Wright: Drawings and Plans of Frank Lloyd Wright: The Early Period (1983-1909), Dover, 1983. Rendering attributed to Marion Mahony Griffin by H. Allen Brooks in his "Frank Lloyd Wright and the Wasmuth Drawings," Art Bulletin, June 1966, p. 202.
It was sometime in the spring of 1912 that Albright entrusted the eager John with a residential commission for Mrs. M. J. Wood in Escondido. Albright usually did not take on such menial commissions but with Mrs. Wood's permission turned over the assignment to his eager apprentice. (My Father, p. 66). For his inspiration John used his father's design for the Grace Fuller Residence in Glencoe, Illinois which was included in the Wasmuth Portfolio certainly then in the brother's possession. Lloyd also possibly assisted in producing he watercolor presentation drawing for the project (see below).
Mrs. M. J. Wood House, 455 E. 5th St., Escondido, Harrison Albright, architect, John Lloyd Wright, designer, 1912. (Van Zanten, Ann, p. 45).
Exhilarated by every aspect of the experience of designing and building his first project John committed to a career in architecture and began beseeching his father for an apprenticeship. On July 4, 1912 he wrote:
"Now that I have charge of Harrison Albright's San Diego office - I will ask you, probably for the last time, for a position with you.Writing again to his seemingly uninterested father on July 19th he possibly piqued his interest with:
1st, Because you are my father.
2nd, I admire your architecture.
3rd, Because I am and will be able to help you." (Frank Lloyd Wright, Louis Sullivan and the Skyscraper by Donald Hoffmann, Dover, 1998, p. 48).
"Mr. Albright has over a million dollars worth of work under construction in San Diego at the present time and his Theater Bldg., 6 stories high, covering nearly a square block, will be finished by the middle of month. His work is reinforced concrete and he takes nothing under $100,000. I am sending a few pictures of our little house. (Mr. Gill's work)." (Ibid).
Caroline Severance and Ella Giles Ruddy, ca. 1906.
Gill and Lloyd were extremely busy with the Torrance project through the rest of 1912 and early 1913. In November of 1912 Gill obtained another commission through his Laughlin-Albright pipeline, a house for feminist activist and socialite Ella Giles Ruddy (see above) and her husband George. Ruddy traveled in the same women's club circles as Homer Laughlin, Jr.'s wife Ada and lived right around the corner from Harrison Albright across the street from Sunset (now Lafayette) Park. (For much more on this Gill commission see my "Ella Giles Ruddy House, 241 N. Western Ave., Irving Gill,Architect, 1913."
Bungalow Home of Mrs. George D. Ruddy, 241 N. Western Ave., Los Angeles. Irving J. Gill, Architect, 1913. (Ibid). (Author's note: I have not as yet been able to determine whether the landscaping for this project was by Lloyd Wright.).
The Ruddys most likely met Gill through Homer and Ada Laughlin and/or through Laughlin Bldg. Annex designer and tenant Harrison Albright. Ada was a fellow prominent club woman and both of the Ruddys at times had offices in the Laughlin Building. George had a real estate brokerage office in the building as did Ella while she was secretary of the Humane Animal League of Los Angeles. (Gill-Laughlin, Part I).
"The Studio-Home of Frank Lloyd Wright," Architectural Record, January 1913, pp. 45-54.
Before leaving for Japan with Mamah Borthwick in January 1913 Wright was able to place a 10-page spread of their love nest Taliesin in the Architectural Record which would have been studied in architectural offices across the country. Gill and Albright would certainly have discussed the work at great length with Lloyd and John. The brothers would seemingly have had mixed feelings, great pride in their father's stunning masterpiece which they would see in person later that year and a feeling of loss knowing that a reconciliation of their parents was now highly unlikely.
Left, Sarah B. Clark Residence, 7231 Hillside Ave., and right, Myra N. Brochon Residence, 7235 Hillside Ave., Hollywood, 1913. Irving Gill, architect. Landscape design likely by Lloyd Wright. "Pre-Cast Walls for the Concrete House," Keith's Magazine, October 1917, pp. 223-225.
The same month Wright left for Japan Gill received commissions to design two adjacent residences on Hillside Dr. in Hollywood for Sarah B. Clark and Myra N. Brochon. The Clark Residence would be the first to be built with Gill's his recently acquired Aiken System "tilt-slab" equipment. Ground was broken on both houses in February and both were completed in late May. ("Gill-Aiken").
In the meantime feeling snubbed by his father over his apprenticeship request, the eager John appealed to one of Gill's European idols Otto Wagner for a spot in his Viennese atelier about the same time his father's Wasmuth Portfolio was being discovered by Wagner, Adolf Loos and their students and followers including R. M. Schindler and Richard Neutra. (Alofsin, n. 142, p. 339).
John excitedly wrote:
"Mr. Otto Wagner, Architect
Vienna, Austria
Most Honorable Sir,
Your esteemed address I received from my father Frank Lloyd Wright, and allow me at this time to ask you if you have a position open in your highly respected house.
I am 21 years old, have a few years of practical experience in architecture and would gladly be prepared to send you drawing(s) or photographs, which will give you a sense of my abilities.
Respectfully yours,John fondly remembered Wagner's prompt reply "... come on..." Buoyed by Wagner's acceptance he proudly sent his father photos of the Wood House and Workingmen's Hotel rendering and asked for help in buying a ticket to Vienna. Wright telegraphed back from Japan: "Meet me in Los Angeles in two weeks ... I'd like to know what Otto Wagner can do for you that your own father can't do!" (My Father, p. 67).
John Lloyd Wright
March 30, 1913" (Alofsin, n. 141, p. 339).
Barry Byrne, ca. 1913, possibly in Los Angeles.
During this exciting formative period in their lives the Wright brothers were were joined by their father's former Oak Park apprentice Barry Byrne in February 1913. Since leaving Wright's studio in 1908 Byrne had spent a year in fellow former Wright employee Walter Burley Griffin's Steinway Hall office. The next three years he was in partnership with another fellow Wright apprentice Andrew Willatzen in Seattle producing Wright-inspired Prairie Style residential architecture. Perhaps John had connected with the duo in the Northwest before joining Lloyd in San Diego in the fall of 1911.
Los Angeles Trust and Savings Building, 6th and Spring Sts., Parkinson and Bergstrom, 1911. From Los Angeles Public Library Photo Collection.
By the time Byrne arrived in Southern California the Wright Brothers and Gill were spending much more time in Los Angeles than San Diego. Barry decided to try his luck in Los Angeles and opened an office in Room 807 of Parkinson and Bergstrom's Trust and Savings Building (see above). His office was next door to the architectural office of the brothers Ross and Mott Montgomery whom quickly became fast friends with Byrne and the Wrights. (Author's note: Mott Montgomery would serve as Lloyd's best man during his November 1916 wedding to Kirah Markham. (SWMZW)).
Jean Hotel, 840 S. Flower St. From Los Angeles Public Library Photo Collection.
Byrne found an apartment in the Jean Hotel about a block away from Gill's new office-residence. (Los Angeles City Directory 1913). John and/or Lloyd possibly roomed with him for much of their time in Los Angeles. The fun-loving trio began spending a lot of time at the nearby Orpheum Theater where they were destined to meet young designer and graphic artist Alfonso Iannelli (see below). Iannelli was commissioned to design the transom window over the main entrance at 633 S. Broadway (see two below).
Orpheum Theater, 633 S. Broadway, G. Albert Landsburgh, architect, Carl Leonardt, contractor, 1910-11. Los Angeles Public Library Photo Collection.
Main entrance transom window, Alfonso Iannelli, 1912. Jameson, p. 14. Also included in Yearbook: Los Angeles Architectural Club: Fourth Exhibition, 1913.
Construction progress was closely followed by the local press during 1911. Theater manager Clarence Drown (see above) carefully orchestrated the Orpheum's move from its old location at 227 S. Spring St. into its magnificent new building. ("Drown Genius of New Orpheum," LAT, June 11, 1911, p. III-1). The old building then became the site of the Lyceum Theatre (see below) also under Drown's management. Drown was one of the charter members of the Gamut Club of which Gill around this time also became a member. ("Where Melody Abounds," Pacific Outlook, October 27, 1906, pp. 13-16). PRL, p. 571.
Lyceum Theater (formerly the Los Angeles Theater and the Orpheum), 227 S. Broadway. F. J. Capitain and J. Lee Burton, architects, 1888. Interior remodeled by John Parkinson, 1903.
Coincidentally and possibly through Drown's largess, Iannelli moved his studio from 257 S. Broadway into the Lyceum Building sometime in 1912 shortly before he met Byrne and the Wrights (see above and below). Iannelli was then living at 715 S. Hope St. about a block away from Byrne's apartment and two blocks from Gill. (1913 Los Angeles City Directory).
Iannelli Studios business card, Jameson, p. 50.
James Frederick Rudy, Iannelli's first partner, in the Iannelli Studios at 221 1/2 S. Spring St. Jameson, p. 50.
Orpheum Theater lobby with Iannelli posters on display, 1912. Jameson, p. 12.
The Wrights and Byrne were immediately drawn to the modernist posters of Vaudeville performers Drown commissioned Iannelli to design for the Orpheum lobby showcases (see above and below). John and Lloyd would soon introduce their Oak Park Studio friend Barry and new friend Iannelli and to Gill who would also mentor the rapidly blooming designers.
Sarah Bernhardt, Orpheum Theater, March 1913. Jameson, p. 17.
Hamburger Department Store, 8th and Broadway, 1909. Alfred F. Rosenheim, architect. Los Angeles Public Library Photo Collection.
The same month Byrne arrived in Los Angeles the Los Angeles Architectural Club was holding its annual exhibition on the fourth floor of the Hamburger Department Store Building at 8th and Broadway (see above). The then largest department store west of the Mississippi was designed by Alfred F. Rosenheim who was also past president of the Los Angeles Architectural Club, the Fine Arts League of Los Angeles and the Architectural League of the Pacific Coast. The prize-winning poster for the exhibition was designed by Iannelli's partner James Frederick Rudy (see below).
Exhibition Poster designed by James Frederick Rudy, Yearbook: Los Angeles Architectural Club: Fourth Exhibition, 1913.
A selection of Iannelli's Orpheum posters and sculpture were on display and his sculpture was also included in the exhibition catalog (see below). An active member and previous exhibitor, Gill also had work on display as did Albright, Hebbard and Byrne's and Lloyd's soon-to-be friends the Montgomery brothers. Gill would certainly have attended the exhibition, possibly accompanied by his new group of followers.
"A Fountain by Iannelli," Yearbook: Los Angeles Architectural Club: Fourth Exhibition, 1913.
Young John may have seen something in the show that sparked inspiration for the new project J. D. Spreckels had just commissioned Albright to begin work on, i. e., his Workingmen's Hotel in downtown San Diego. Parkinson and Bergstrom's rendering for a commercial building in Los Angeles bears a striking resemblance (see below) to the project Albright entrusted John to begin work on about this time.
Commercial Building, Spring Street, Parkinson and Bergstrom, architects. Yearbook: Los Angeles Architectural Club: Fourth Exhibition, 1913.
El Roi Tan and Murray Hotels flanking the Pacific Electric Railway Depot, February 9, 1913. Irving Gill, architect. Courtesy of Torrance, Torrance Historical Society.
John was also likely aided in this effort by brother Lloyd's access to Gill's plans for the concrete hotel buildings he had recently completed for the industrial City of Torrance which he had also closely observed during trips to Los Angeles with Lloyd. The below rendering which appeared in the June 21st issue of SWCM includes at the upper corners the sculptural elements designed Iannelli. (See also Jameson, p. 58).
Workingmen's Hotel, 720 4th Ave., San Diego, 1913. Harrison Albright, architect, John Lloyd Wright, designer. "The Proposed Workingmen's Hotel in San Diego," SWCM, June 21, 1913, pp. 8-9).
The above rendering indicates that Iannelli and John were close enough friends and familiar enough with each other's work to enable this art and architectural collaboration. John had to have also convinced Albright of Iannelli's talent if he had not seen his work at the February Architectural Club exhibition. Iannelli recalled his intoduction to John Wright when he called on Albright to inquire about a possible commission for some sculptural work, likely for the Spreckels Organ Pavilion at the Panama California Exposition (see below). (Jameson, p. 51. For the best version of the Wright-Byrne-Iannelli meeting see Barry Byrne, John Lloyd Wright: Architecture and Design by Sally Kitt Chappell and Ann Van Zanten, Chicago Historical Society, 1982, pp. 11, 43-44. For much more on Iannelli see my "100 Years Ago Today: Robert Henri, Alice Klauber and Irving Gill Connections, April 25, 1915".
Spreckels Organ Pavilion, Harrison Albright, architect, sculptural elements by Alfonso Iannelli, 1914.
John D. Spreckels, ca. 1912-13. Photographer unknown. From San Francisco: Its Builders Past and Present, Chicago, 1913.
Iannelli worked on a bust of Spreckels (see above) when he was in Los Angeles conferring with Albright. During the sessions,
"Mr. Albright and Mr. Spreckels would be discussing the new projects on which they were working, and also as to whether they would be successful venture and their guide was the timing of these new buildings to the astrological positions of the stars. The constellation Leo seemed to be a good time to start, and the work would probably be finished the next year at the time of Virgo. I listened in amazement that these two grown up men could discuss such projects and such large expenditures of money and having astrology guide their moves." (Jameson, p. 53).Byrne also received his first and only known Los Angeles commission around the same time John began work on the the Workingmen's Hotel. Presaging his numerous future projects for the Catholic Church, the project was for the design of a three building compound for the Church-affiliated Brownson House Settlement Association on Church property between Pleasant and Pennsylvania Avenues near Brooklyn Ave. in Boyle Heights. (Ibid).
"Noble Philanthropy Now Taking Shape, LAT, May 18, 1913, p. VI-4.
The site had been recently acquired for the settlement house compound by Bishop Conaty whom fellow Irishman Byrne would likely have met. A period article described the compound:
"Francis Barry Byrne, 807 Trust & Savings Bldg., is preparing plans for a group of three social settlement buildings to be erected on Pleasant Ave., near Brooklyn Ave., for the Brownson House Association. The main building will be l-story with high basement and will contain a chapel, an auditorium seating about 300, club rooms, bowling alley and shower baths. Dimensions 35x15 ft. There will be a 2-story residence for settlement workers containing twelve rooms and bathroom; dimensions 38x60 ft. The priest's residence will be 1-story and will contain six rooms and bath. The building will be frame construction with exterior plastered on metal lath, shingle roofs, pine trim, hardwood and pine floors, furnace heat in each building, automatic water heaters, electric wiring. Contractors to bid on work selected." ("Social Settlement Buildings," Southwest Contractor and Manufacturer, May 17, 1913, p. 14. For more on this see my "Brownson House Settlement Association Compound, BoyleHeights, Francis Barry Byrne, Architect, 1913").Around this time Frank Lloyd Wright and Mamah Borthwick arrived in Los Angeles to catch up with Lloyd and John and discuss their possible apprenticeships back in Chicago. The boys reconnected their father with the then very busy Gill and Albright and gave him tours of their projects in Los Angeles and San Diego. Lloyd and Gill would certainly have shown them Homer Laughlin's house, the Miltimore Residence, the Torrance projects, the just completed Clark and Brochon Houses and Albright's neighbor Ella Giles Ruddy's new house. It seems very likely that Homer Laughlin and Albright would have arranged some social events for Wright and Borthwick and
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