Opening Hours
Daily: 10 A.M.–5 P.M.
Closed on Tuesdays
1151 Oxford Road
San Marino, CA 91108
Visual Materials
Visual Materials
Daily: 10 A.M.–5 P.M.
Closed on Tuesdays
1151 Oxford Road
San Marino, CA 91108
Image not available
Visual Materials
The collection consists of 3511 photographs, negatives and ephemeral items circa 1850s-1982 covering a wide breadth of subject matter. The collection includes images of Los Angeles streets and city views; neighborhoods (including Olvera Street, the Plaza, and Chinatown); Los Angeles office buildings and blocks, municipal buildings and facilities (including city halls, court houses, federal buildings, and postal facilities); Los Angeles County communities (including Culver City; Beverly Hills; Watts; Compton; the Hollywood/Cahuenga area; Mt. Washington; Redondo Beach; Hermosa Beach; Venice Beach; Santa Monica; San Pedro; Wilmington; Long Beach; Burbank; Glendale and the San Fernando Valley; Pasadena and the San Gabriel Valley; Avalon and Santa Catalina Island); San Gabriel and San Bernardino Mountains; San Diego, Orange, Riverside, San Bernardino, and San Francisco Counties; Los Angeles County homes, residential buildings, and gardens; Los Angeles parks; Los Angeles, Orange, and Riverside County schools, colleges and universities; Los Angeles County churches and synagogues; Los Angeles area country clubs; hotels and theaters in Los Angeles, Riverside, San Diego, San Bernardino Counties, and the city of San Francisco; and Los Angeles County department stores, newspaper buildings, storefronts, and restaurants. General subjects represented in the collections include industry and manufacturing (including iron and steelworks; brick and terracotta; the motion picture industry; and the clothing trade); agriculture; mining and other extractive industries; infrastructure (including dams and roads, and photographs taken for Caltrans documenting the construction of the Pasadena Freeway, also known as the Arroyo Seco Historic Parkway); water and power (including photographs depicting the irrigation of the San Fernando Valley in the 1910s); transportation; sports and leisure activities (including images depicting the 1932 Olympics in Los Angeles); fairs and expositions (including trade and industrial fairs; the Panama Pacific Exposition; the California Pacific International Exposition; the Lewis and Clark Centennial Exposition; and the Alaska-Yukon-Pacific Exposition); fiestas and parades (including the Fiesta de Los Angeles, the Fiesta de las Flores, and the Pasadena Tournament of Roses), circuses and circus wagons; missions in California, the Southwest United States, and Mexico; and California adobes and ranchos. Miscellaneous images include national and state parks; the California Gold Rush and mining towns; the armed forces in California; native and indigenous culture; local flora, including trees; unidentified people; unidentified scenery; documents; maps; and a small grouping of ephemera pertaining to the Wilshire Boulevard Miracle Mile. The collection includes photographs produced by 141 identified photographic studios, photographers, and publishers including Blanchard; Cromwell and Westervelt; Frasher's Studio; Garden City Foto; Harold W. Grieve, T.E. Hecht; William Henry Hill; Keystone Photo Service; Luckhaus; Charles F. Lummis; F.H. Maude; Harold Parker; Putnam Studios; F.H. Rogers; Julius Shulman; Spence Airplane Photos; Stagg; A. Sturtevant; Carleton Watkins; and "Dick" Whittington Studio. There are also photographs made by or for companies including American Trona Corporation; Douglas Aircraft; Estelle Mines Corporation; Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer; Paramount Pictures; Selznick International Pictures; Studebaker Corporation; Union Pacific Railroad; and United Artists. Images produced and compiled by the Federal Writers' Project Southern and Northern California branches include photographs by Viroque Baker, Horace Bristol, Burton Burt, Fred William Carter, Fred R. Dapprich, Luckhaus Studios, Julius Shulman, and Art Streib.
photCL 400 volume 1
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Visual Materials
photCL 400 volume 2 & volume 3
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Visual Materials
A collection of approximately 1,500 photographs and various ephemera and publications of California missions, collected by Southern California educator Connie Rothstein, with an emphasis on the San Gabriel Mission, the history of the city of San Gabriel, and the production of "The Mission Play" by John Steven McGroarty. The collection also includes late-19th and early-20th century photographs of Los Angeles and Southern California, and postcards and ephemera related to the Southern California region. Notable in the collection are 391 stereographs of missions and Los Angeles, including some by photographers William Godfrey and H. T. Payne, A. C. Varela, and Carleton Watkins. All of the California Missions are represented in the collection, plus the "sub-missions" or Asistencias of California. The mission photographs include many unusual views and details, and are a mixture of snapshots made by tourists and commercial photographs. There are many views in and around Southern California, most dating from 1880s-1920s, by various photographers. Specific topics emphasized in and around Los Angeles are: Olvera Street, Chinatown, La Fiesta de Los Angeles celebration; and the Mount Lowe Railway. There are many cabinet cards and stereographs, and six large panoramic photographs of the Los Angeles area. The ephemera include hundreds of postcards and photographic postcards, scrapbooks, and many small publications on the history of the missions and California, as well as ephemera related to "The Mission Play." Other topics in the collection are: photographs and ephemera of Monterey, California; Oregon and the Columbia River Highway; and a group of photographs of cowboys and Western culture (mid-20th century).
photCL 496
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Visual Materials
The 424 photographs document events and activities of the Southern California Division of the California Centennials Commission that commemorate California's centennial, 1948 to 1950. Included are images of parades, such as the centennials of Beverly Hills and Long Beach; the 1948 Tournament of Roses Parade that included centennial-themed floats; and Gold Rush and pioneer-related parades such as those held in Paso Robles, San Bernardino, Redlands, San Luis Obispo, and Santa Monica. Photographs that document celebrations commemorating historic events and places include the Fort Moore celebration held at the Hollywood Bowl and images of the Portola Trek reenactment. The collection also includes a large number of images of the dedication of the Commission's Historical Caravan, held at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum. Speaking at that event was Lieutenant Governor Goodwin J. Knight. Other images of the Historical Caravan include pictures of the exhibits inside the van and the van on location in Sycamore Grove (the Highland Park area of Los Angeles), at the Pio Pico Adobe in Whittier, and at China Lake. The collection contains photographs of the Centennial Commission float at the Hollywood High School premiere of "California's Golden Beginnings"; and at the unveiling of a plaque commemorating the centennial of Los Angeles's first post office. Notable figures in California politics and culture appear in the photographs. These include Eldred L. Meyer, past Grand President of Native Sons of the Golden West and Walter N. Bailey, Grand President of the Native Sons of the Golden West at the opening of the gold mining exhibit in Pershing Square; Goodwin J. Knight, Lloyd D. Mitchell, Manager of the Southern California Division, and Governor Earl Warren. The collection contains photographs by Otto Rothschild, Coy Watson, J. Allen Hawkins, David F. Stevens, Lew Nichols, Louis, Gerhardt, Dick Whittington Studio, Inman Company, Woro Studios, Randolph Studios, Pacific Press Photos, Merriman Photo Art, Junis & Pearson Photo, and Frashers Inc.
photCL 400 volume 28
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Visual Materials
Boxes 10 and 11 contain 41 photographs of parade activities. Images include people in traditional costumes, dancers, banners, the dragon dance performance, and crowds of onlookers. Some businesses in Old Chinatown are seen in the backgrounds. Twelve plates are marked: Yee Photo, L.A., Cal., and one is dated 1902.
photCL 624