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L.A. Stories: Community Spotlight

Individuals

Los Angeles is a mosaic. This section, just like the one prior, reflects and celebrates the differences among those who have impacted and continue to impact this city. This exhibit features many unique and accomplished Angelenos. Not surprisingly, given LA’s primacy as a center of entertainment, many of the noteworthy people featured here include artists, creative souls, and people in the movie industry. Additionally, librarians, educators, activists, environmentalists, scientists, and sports personalities from diverse backgrounds are represented in this exhibit. These Angelenos include immigrants, locals, people from numerous cultures, and many women.

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1. Communities Los Angeles has long been multicultural, with peoples of different backgrounds finding a home and a place to create community. The stories told here spotlight communities little featured in traditional narratives of the city and county history. They include activism by the Chumash people, who predate California as a state, seeking to ensure the continuity and visibility of their history in Malibu. It also includes stories of African-American communities, Japanese-American communities, and activists defending the rights of day-laborers and street-vendors.
2. Individuals Los Angeles is a mosaic. This section, just like the one prior, reflects and celebrates the differences among those who have impacted and continue to impact this city. This exhibit features many unique and accomplished Angelenos. Not surprisingly, given LA’s primacy as a center of entertainment, many of the noteworthy people featured here include artists, creative souls, and people in the movie industry. Additionally, librarians, educators, activists, environmentalists, scientists, and sports personalities from diverse backgrounds are represented in this exhibit. These Angelenos include immigrants, locals, people from numerous cultures, and many women.

Contents of this path:

Neal and Molly Brockmeyer have known each other since they were in the same kindergarten class at La Cañada Elementary School. They grew up, settled down, and raised a family, all while dedicating themselves to the community of La Cañada Flintridge. Here, the Brockmeyers receive Kiwanis service awards at La Cañada Junior High in 1954. These item helps to capture the spirit of community and family that is so cherished in La Cañada Flintridge.
Neal and Molly Brockmeyer have continued to devote their lives together serving their community. They have played significant roles in numerous organizations, including the PTA, the La Cañada Flintridge Educational Foundation, the Assistance League of Flintridge, the Lanterman House, St. George’s Episcopal Church, and the La Cañada Trails Council, the YMCA of the Foothills. This image commemorates them receiving the “La Cañadans of the Year” award from the La Cañada Kiwanis Club in 1994.
On November 5, 1911, Calbraith Perry Rodgers (right) landed his bi-plane nicknamed the “Vin Fiz” in Pasadena's Tournament Park before a crowd of approximately 20,000 people, successfully completing the first U.S. transcontinental flight. Taking off from Sheepshead Bay, New York, on September 17, Rodgers landed in Long Beach on December 10—a trip that required 70 landings and took 84 days. The "Vin Fiz" was later donated to the Smithsonian Institution.
In November 2007, long time member Fred Patten wrote this history of the Los Angeles Science Fantasy Society, charting its emergence from the beginnings of science fiction fandom. Patten helped bring anime to the US in the 1970s by founding the Cartoon/Fantasy Organization and, with Richard Kyle, opening the Graphic Story Bookshop. He was also a foundational figure of furry fandom. A fellow librarian, Patten obtained a master’s in library science from UCLA in 1963.
Two catalogs showing the types of ceramics produced at Ylyne Studio and Decora Ceramics. Smith Russell (1895-1979) began his career in ceramics in 1946 by purchasing Ylyne Studio in Los Angeles. In May 1947, Smith’s youngest son, Wilfred “Bill” Russell, purchased Palm Garden Pottery located in Inglewood. Smith and Bill became partners and Ylyne Studio moved to the Inglewood location. In May 1949, the partners incorporated under the name Decora Ceramics.
Smith Russell created new original products and glazes. The products were identified with the trade name “Florencita,” after Smith’s wife, Florence Midred (Dodge) Russell. These designs are watercolors of some of the earliest products in the Smithware and Florencita lines. Decora Ceramics enjoyed popularity nationwide, but my mid-1952 Japanese copies of their products, identical in design, precisely copied, and priced below Decora’s production costs, began to flood the market.
Decora Ceramics promotional flyer depicting the plant located on Ash Avenue in Inglewood, personnel, owners, and production facilities and equipment. Products were hand-painted mostly by women artisans. The company created decorative household ceramic items such as ashtrays and wall plaques. Unable to compete with Japanese pottery manufacturers, the owners sold production equipment to others in the industry; other assets were auctioned off, the property was leased, and Decora Ceramics closed in the summer of 1953.
Lois Weber produced, directed, wrote and acted in films starting in the early 1900s, with one- and two-reelers at Universal and Hobart Bosworth Productions. She is credited as being the first woman director of an American feature film, THE MERCHANT OF VENICE (1914), and was the first woman elected to the Motion Picture Directors Association in 1916. During this time, Weber was one of the highest paid filmmakers in America and often made films with controversial topics, such as THE HAND THAT ROCKS THE CRADLE (1917), which promoted legalizing birth control.
Born in Martinique, Euzhan Palcy went to school in France and made her first film, the short THE MESSENGER (1975), when she was just 17 years old. She went on to work as an assistant director in Paris where she met François Truffaut, who helped her raise money to produce her first feature-length film, SUGAR CANE ALLEY (1983). Her next film, A DRY WHITE SEASON (1989), was financed by MGM and was the first Hollywood feature film directed by a Black woman.
Milicent Patrick began her artistic career as one of the first female animators at Walt Disney Studios, eventually working on FANTASIA (1940). She contributed to four sequences, including “Night on Bald Mountain,” for which she painted the monster Chernabog. In 1952, Patrick was hired as a makeup designer for the B picture that became CREATURE FROM THE BLACK LAGOON (1954). Though Patrick herself has been largely forgotten, the monsters that she created continue to haunt the cultural imagination.
The La Cañada Valley was extremely dry and had few sources of water when the Lanterman family, one of the founders of La Cañada, arrived in the 1870s. This is the contract of sale that lays out the conditions of purchase of the Pickens Canyon water rights between Ammoretta Lanterman and Theodor Pickens. Ammoretta’s grandson, California State Assemblyman Frank D. Lanterman, would go on to fight for water rights for unincorporated communities in the state.
Circa 1970, the City of Los Angeles planned to widen scenic, two-lane Mulholland Drive, opening the Santa Monica Mountains for massive development. Three women—Margot Feuer of Malibu, Sue Nelson of Brentwood, and Jill Swift of Tarzana—organized opposition, including 5,000 marching in protest in 1971. The Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area, approved in November 1978 is the world's largest urban national park and the most heavily used National Park facility in the nation.
Gladys Brown Edwards was a noted equine artist who also researched and wrote books about horses and, in particular, the Arabian horse breed. Her books include Anatomy and Conformation of the Horse and The Arabian: War Horse to Show Horse. As an artist, Gladys Brown Edwards produced sculptures, paintings, etchings, wood carvings, and drawings. In this undated image, Edwards is sculpting with a live horse model.
Fong Foo Sec (1869-1938) was Pomona College’s first Asian student, studying from 1897-1902. After completing four years in the preparatory department and one year of regular collegiate enrollment, Fong transferred to the University of California, Berkeley, where he graduated with honors in 1905, before going on to earn dual master's degrees at Columbia University. In 1922, Fong received an honorary Doctor of Laws degree from Pomona College, the third awarded in the College’s history.
Emigrating from Trinidad at the age of 19, Mervyn M. Dymally (1926 -2012), became the first Black Lt. Governor of California (1975-1979) after serving in both the California State Assembly (1963-1966, 2002-2008), State Senate (1967-1975). Before he began his political career he was an educator for the LAUSD in the early 1950s. Dymally supported bilingual education, the inclusion of African and Black Americans in history textbooks, and equity for women in higher education.
James "Slick" Stocks was considered USC's best ball carrier. Pasadena StarNews sports editor Roger Murray said that he did not receive the exposure that Jackie Robinson did 10 years alter at UCLA. Stocks served on the Trojans’ scout squad, helping to prepare the varsity defense and went on to a career in education and the US Post Office. When Stocks died in 1984, Murray wrote that Stocks must head the list of great athletes along with Jackie Robinson.