1938 (1936) (1937) (1939) (1930-1940) (1940-1950) Table of Contents
Donald M. Cleland A History of the Santa Monica Schools 1876-1951, Santa Monica Unified School District, February 1952 (Copied for the Santa Monica Library, July 22, 1963). 140 pp., 1939, 1938 See Text
Charles Harris (Brick) Garrigues published Why Didn't Somebody Tell Somebody? in 1938 and republished it in 1939. This is an abridgment from that pamphlet. 1939, 1938, 1933, 1925, 1916, See Text
Edward Levinson Labor on the March, ILR Press: Ithaca, NY, 1995 (1938), pp. 172, 173, 1938, 1937, 1936 See Text
James W. Lunsford The Ocean and the Sunset, The Hills and the Clouds: Looking at Santa Monica, illustrated by Alice N. Lunsford, 1983, 1958, 1938 See Text
Santa Monica Planning
Division Santa Monica Landmarks Tour,
2003.
34. Santa Monica City Hall, 1938
35. Barnum Hall, 1938 See
Text
Amanda Schacter (ed.)
Santa Monica Landmarks Santa Monica Landmarks Commission,
1990.
15 City Hall See
Text
Jeffrey Stanton Venice of America: 'Coney Island of the Pacific,' Donahue Publishing: Los Angeles, CA, 1987. 176 pp., 1941, 1938, 1935, 1934, 1933, 1932, 1931, 1929, 1923, See Text
Kevin Starr Embattled Dreams California in War and Peace 1940-1950, Oxford University Press: Oxford, UK, 2002, 386 pp., 1938, See Text
Les Storrs Santa Monica Portrait of a City Yesterday and Today, Santa Monica Bank: Santa Monica, CA, 1974, 67 pp., 1938, 1930s See Text
Tide studies: Looking south to the Waverly Club (formerly Breakers) 1725 Ocean Front; Jonathan Club (formerly Edgewater) the Del Mar Club and Ocean Park Pier. Shoreward markers indicate 1921 high tide line. Tide 0.3 feet, 3: 05 PM, September 23, 1938 -Maurice M. King, City Engineer See Text
Betty Lou Young and Randy Young Santa Monica Canyon: A Walk Through History Casa Vieja Press: Pacific Palisades, CA, 1997, 182pp., 1938, 1937, 1936 See Text
Documents
Donald M. Cleland A History of the Santa Monica Schools 1876-1951, Santa Monica Unified School District, February 1952 (Copied for the Santa Monica Library, July 22, 1963). 140 pp., 1939, 1938
Two years later, 1938-1939, [at the Sixteenth and Pearl John Adams Junior High campus] it became necessary to add a unit of eight classrooms and three larger rooms, one for mechanical drawing, one for domestic science, and one for janitorial use and building supplies. Another provided locker and shower facilities for the boys' physical education classes, a corrective room, offices, and toilets. [25. Pearl, op. cit., p. 75.]
" . . .
The entire group of buildings, including the newly added auditorium, gymnasium, and art wing, brought about the real completion of the high school campus. The dream of years had been realized in the new auditorium that was opened in September, 1938. Since that time, it has served as a most adequate facility for all of the high school functions and has been the only auditorium of its size and appointment for all large civic affairs.
The foyer of Barnum Hall displays a handsome tile mosaic, fifteen by seventeen feet in size, called The Vikings. The mosaic, together with a mural on asbestos stage curtain, were the work of a Federal Art Project during the W.P.A. days. The work was directed by an eminent Santa Monica artist, S. Macdonald Wright, who used the Viking theme to emulate the name chose many years before by the student body as the name of its athletic teams.
" . . .
In 1938, the Evening Technical High School was opened and operates today as a part of the Technical School rather than as a unit of the adult education program. Since 1939, there has been a growing trend toward closer cooperation between the Evening High School, City College, and the Technical School. [61. Personal interview with Elmer M. Krehbiel, May 28, 1951; Santa Monica, California.]
Charles Harris (Brick) Garrigues published Why Didn't Somebody Tell Somebody? in 1938 and republished it in 1939. This is an abridgment from that pamphlet.
"The Santa Barbara earthquake of 1925 lasted forty seconds, the Los Angeles quake of 1933 lasted about eighty seconds. The Saint Francis Dam disaster was over in seven hours. The Santa Monica Bay disaster has lasted twenty years and will last another twenty unless steps are taken to stop it.
"Sand is an interesting thing. Each week between May and September approximately a million residents of Los Angeles County drive or ride from five to fifty miles to spend an hour or two or three lying upon it or in the water. Nobody ever thinks of where it came from or where it is going. It is just there. And then some season they find that their favorite beach is gone.
"In the mountains and steep cliffs to the north of Santa Monica Bay the sand is made. Each winter, tons of it are carried down from the canyons between Topanga and Point Mugu. Day after day, night after night, the waves shift the sand southward, an inch at a time, past Santa Monica, past Ocean Park, past Venice, Del Rey, the South Bay Cities, until it is dragged into a huge subterranean chasm off the coast at Redondo.
"Watch the waves rolling in, at a forty-five degree angle, but they roll out perpendicularly. As a wave strikes the beach, it stirs up the sand, holding it for a few minutes in suspension. During those few seconds, the entire mass of water has moved an inch or two southward; when the sand is deposited again, it has moved infinitesimally down the coast.
"Not many remember the magnificence of the Playa Del Rey of thirty years ago&endash;the pavilion built on the sea, the long, broad lagoon, protected by locks, where the 'smart set' of the day came (driving down in carriages) for boating, canoeing, and swimming.
"That pavilion, with its piling and its jetties, started the destruction of the Del Rey beach. For the piers created a 'dead area' in the surf&endash;an area the waves did not empty. And so the sand began to pile up north of the pier, and the beach to the south began to suffer a 'sand famine' as its own supply was swept southward.
"Not many, for that matter, remember the Venice of a few years later&endash;the model city of the day, laid out by that strange old romantic realist, Abbot Kinney, in an attempt to incorporate into one American town the best, the most colorful, the most glamorous&endash;and perhaps the worst&endash;of half a dozen of the most colorful cities of the New World.
"Upon the completion of Venice, something happened to the Venice beach, exactly the same thing that had happened in Playa Del Rey: The construction of the Kinney pier and breakwater cut off the supply of sand south of the pier. For two miles, waves gouged at the narrow sand bar which is the city of Venice, biting further and further inland.
"In 1916 the first disaster came. Twenty-eight houses were swept into the sea. Thousands of feet of beach were destroyed. The physical disaster of Venice had begun&endash;a disaster without loss of life but surely destroying a city. For Venice is not built upon solid earth, but upon a sand bar. Let that bar be eaten away and the sea will sweep in, pouring into the lagoons and canals below sea level and backing up the swamps half a dozen miles toward Culver City.
"In 1933 another major step in the tragedy: Santa Monica built a yacht harbor. A long backwater was thrown into the sea three miles north of Venice. A new dead area was created at the Venice beach, a vast sand trap sufficient to hold all the sand moving down the coast for fifty years to come.
"Such is the slow destruction of Venice. About Venice future generations will not ask "Why didn't somebody tell somebody?" but "Why didn't somebody do something"
"And the answer to that, of course, is Greed.
"If Venice had been a wealthy city like Santa Monica, it is probable that somebody might have done something. But the mistake of Abbot Kinney, the failure to foresee the effects of the automobile, took its toll. Cut off from the rest of the world, with no better highway than a twenty-foot alley, Venice became a city of Poverty.
"Unlike Santa Monica or Santa Barbara, it did not have scores of wealthy influential citizens ready to battle for its future. The hundreds of thousands who came weekly to bathe on its beach did not live in or own property there. And so Venice slipped backward while its people vainly attempted to find some way of blasting a road through the city.
"Here. too, they were defeated by Greed. But it was their own, dog-in-the-manger sort of Greed.
"Everybody was agreed it should be built on on of three routes:
+Along the Trolleyway where the interurban railway ran.
+Along the narrow alley (known with official humor as the 'Speedway').
+Or in the middle of the block between the two.
"The problem was that from 415 to 432 parcels of private property would have to be condemned&endash;and paid for&endash;if one of these routes were chosen.
"The city and the county of Los Angeles joined to study the problem. The federal government weighed in. They came up with an answer:
+Run the road right down the ocean front, along public property.
+Between Santa Monica and Del Rey, build a series of groynes (narrow, semi-submerged piers) into the sea, to prevent the sand from being washed away.
+From the dunes south of Del Rey, where Uncle Sam was dumping four million cubic yards of sand into the sea to construct a sewage treatment plant, pump enough sand to fill out Venice Beach to the desired width.
"The entire project could be completed by this method for two million dollars less than it would cost to get a highway, plus beach protection, by any other route.
"The money was provided in the county budget. And then, from a new quarter, there bobbed up our old friend, Greed.
"The years had bought to Venice a different atmosphere. Sideshows and ten-cent amusements had given way to a new industry&endash;the tango business. (Tango is one of those amusements on the borderline of the law&endash;sometimes legal, sometimes illegal, depending on the interpretation of the statues.)
"Into the plan to protect Venice was injected a war between those who controlled Venice-the tango operators-and the heirs of Abbot Kinney.
"The Los Angeles City playground department wanted the city of the Venice pier for a major recreational area, with baths, solariums and concert halls. The Abbot Kinney Company wanted to sell to the city.
"But that would have meant the destruction of the tango kings determined to keep their pier.
"John Harrah, former mayor of Venice when it was an independent city, was one of the top tango operators. He knew how public officials can be controlled. He knew that Supervisor John Anson Ford, a bitter foe of the tango kings, couldn't be touched by threats or promises. But he had a plan.
"Very quietly he retained an attorney named Gilchrist who happened to be a relative by marriage of District Attorney Burton Fitts. Harrah promised him a fee of ten thousand dollars if he succeeded in blocking the program.
"And so&endash;
"The county grand jury, always under the influence of the district attorney, suddenly announced an investigation of the proposed sale.
"But it was never begun. It didn't need to be, The announcement alone was enough to convince Supervisor Ford that something was wrong. He announced that he would oppose the entire program and indicated that anybody voting for it was probably working for the "corrupt interests which control Venice."
"His announcement was enough to swing Supervisor Herbert C. Legg also into the opposition. Legg was running for governor and could not afford to take a chance.
"Supervisor Gordon McDonough, who gets the jitters every time the grand jury is mentioned, slipped out of town on one of his junkets just before the purchase was to be consummated.
"The pier purchase was permitted to die-and with it there died the whole Venice protection program.
"It was not until several months later that the real method by which the tango business was perpetuated began to come into the open.
"For Harrah refused to pay Gilchrist his promised fee. Gilchrist went to court and sued the tango king. Harrah based his defense on the claim that the fee was to have been for the improper 'influencing' of public officials and was consequently illegal.
"The case is still being fought in the courts, and the testimony is revealing the whole story of how Greed blocked the protection of Venice.
"And the Vanishing of Venice continues. Only when it is too late will the cry go up: "Why didn't somebody tell somebody?""
Historic Santa Monica City Hall ( A guide to), Santa Monica and the Getty Trust, 2004
The Overview
"With a nautical quality befitting its seaside locale, Santa Monica City Hall reflects the character of its surroundings, making it a civic building truly connected to its constituency. Designed by two prominent Los Angeles architects, it is recognized as an outstanding example of the Public Works Administration (PWA) Moderne stye of architecture popularized by Depression-era architects. With orginal Gladding, McBean ceramic tiles found around the west entrance doorway and throughout the building, and historic Stanton Macdonald-Wright murals in the entry foyer that document the city's and the state's history, the building's architecture has earned it a place in the California Register of Historical Resources (1996), designation as a city landmark and eligibility for listing in the federal Register of Historic Places.
"At the time of its formal dedication on November 24, 1939, speakers at the ceremony touched on the building's social importance by emphazing its symbolism of democracy, citizenship and civic responsibility. Its completion represented the collective efforts of residents, city leaders and the federal government to overcome the effects of the Great Depression. That this building has served as the center of the city's civic life for more than 60 years, with much of its original character and architectural integrity still intact, is testament to its broad architectural, social and cultural significance.
"Based on the date of original contruction and National Register requirements, Santa Monica City Hall's period of significance is defined ast 1938 - 1951. Only those spaces and features that fall within the period of significance and retain their original integrity are considered significant and character-defining. As such, the orginal building's exterior is significant, as are numerous interior spaces and features.
PWA Moderne Architecture
"This style of architecture was most widely used in buildings constructed between 1933 and 1944 by the federal Public Works Administration. The PWA Moderne style utilized characteristics of both the Art Deco and Art Moderne styles. From Art Deco, it borrowed geometric and angular ornamentation in low relief, vertical projections and a sense of symmetry. From Art Moderne, it took faceted corners, a flat roof, continuous ribbons of windows and a focus on horizontality. PWA Moderne became a uniquely distinguished stle because of this design mix, but also because it was most often used in projects financed by the federal goverment.
"The primary historic interior areas are the grand entry lobby with high walls, grand stairways and artworks. Character-defining features located on the first floor include the decorative tile wainscots, art murals, metal grilles, terrazzo floors, steel-framed windows, metal lighting fixtures and wood furnishings. Significant interior spaces on the second floor include the Council Chamber at the southwest corner, the original jail cells at the northeast corner and the city manager's office on the east side. Character-defining features here include wood wall paneling, ceramic lavatories, tile floors and wood veneer doors with metal locksets.
The Architects
"As a young architect, Donald B. Parkinson collaborated first with his father, John Parkinson and , later, with Joseph M. Estep, to design many of Los Angeles' most enduring landmarks. Counted among them: the original campus of the University of Southern California (1919 - 39), the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum (1923 and 1930 - 31), Los Angeles City Hall (1928), Bullocks - Wilshire (1929) and Union Station (1939). Parkinson and Estep were responsible for the design of Santa Monica City Hall, on which construction was begun in 1938 and completed in 1939.
Changes
"The first change to the original City Hall occurred when a rose garden was planted in front of the entrance as a memorial to local men killed in war. Dedicated on Armistice Day, 1951, the rose garden still provides a space for remembrance and reflection.
"In 1958, a three-story concrete and brick masonry addition was attached to the rear of City Hall. This new building provided space for a police department, an office for the traffic engineer and offices for the recreation department. Since the opening in 2003 of a new public safety facility and relocation of staff, this non-original addition to the historic building has been slated for demolition.
"A renovation of the Council Chamber in 1999 - 2000 added technical upgrades and design changes to enhance meeting participation, but did not disturb the existing, historic finishes of the chamber. Of particular design interest is the crenulated wood detail added to the front of the Council dais which mimics a similar detail found at the exterior roofline of City Hall.
Restoration and Preservation
"Simultaneous with the completion of a Historic Structure Report, conservation work on the murals in the lobby was completed over a period of several weeks in 2003 by the firm of Rainer, Stavroudis & Zebala. Their work was directed by the city's Cultural Affairs Division as part of a comprehensive project to survey and restore thirteen murals in the city.
The Murals
"The murals on the north and south walls of the foyer were painted by the renowned American artist Stanton Macdonald-Wright, who spent much of his life in Santa Monica. Using a method he pioneered and called "Petrachrome," Macdonald-Wright painted the murals with a liquid mixture of materials including crushed tile, marble and granite, then let the work dry before polishing it. The technique soon became popular with local muralists and was nationally recognized as an important contribution to the evolution of the medium.
"The mural extending from the west wall onto the north wall depicts a group of five figures meeting on a beach rimmed by mountains, with rocks in the waves at the shoreline. A Spanish conquistador stands with a padre in a Franciscan robe holding a walking stick. They face two Native Americans, kneeling and sitting at a stream, drinking with their hands. Behind them is a standing, bearded figure who wears a blue hat and cloak, and behind him are two bridled horses. A waterfall is seen in the middle distance, the source of the stream. A bird soars in the sky. A timeline accompanying the mural indicates dates of historic significance for both the city and the state.
"The mural extending from the west wall to the south portrays Santa Monica in the 1930s: the cliff-side coastal landscape, with people engaged in recreational pursuits evocative of the locale. A road race, sailboats and airplanes are seen behind large foreground figures, including two polo players (one mounted), a boy kneeling with a model airplane, a pair of tennis players and a dog.
"The city seal, measuring 79 inches in diameter was created with the same "Petrachrome" method and a palette of colors, textures and elements similar to those used in the Macdonald-Wright murals. Encircled by the words, "City of Santa Monica, California. Founded 1875," the seal features a mermaid and Spanish galleon on the bay, with the sun, mountains, clouds and airplanes behind. A ribbon near the base of the seal carries the city's motto, Populus Felix en Urbe Felice, translated from the Latin as "Fortunate people in a fortunate land." The seal is inlaid in the center of the foyer floor, surrounded by color tiles that run along the east - west axis of the foyer and halls. A serrated pattern of yellow triangles running against a brown field, bordered by black stripes, echoes the chevron pattern on the tiled wainscoting found nearby.
The Tiles
"The brilliantly colored tiles that surround the exterior of the front entrance to City Hall and decorate its interior were crafted by the California-based Gladding, McBean Tile Company, now the only remaingin major manufacturer of hand-sculpted, ornamental terra cotta in the United States. In continuous operation since 1875, Gladding McBean's reputation for quality craftmanship was such that, in the early 20th century, its terra cotta ornamentation and wall tiles were integrated into numerous major public buildings, including the Wrigley Building in Chicago, the Warner Theater in Washington, D.C., Carnegie Hall in New York City, and the Bullock's - Wilshire Department Store, Union Station and Los Angeles City Hall.
"At the time of the tile installation at Santa Monica City Hall, Gladding, McBean was based here, although it is believed that the tiles themselves were actually made at the Gladding, McBean plant in Glendale.
"The tiles are variously glazed in multiple colors, including black, beige, ochre, blue, brown, cream and reddish brown, to form either a single field of color or a bold geometric design. Their presence adds to the character and significance of the building by providing rare and unique elements of artistic creation - and they are tangible pieces of a renowned company that shaped the modern ceramics industry."
Edward Levinson Labor on the March, ILR Press: Ithaca, NY, 1995 (1938), pp. 172, 173, 1938, 1937, 1936
"The January [1936] sit-downs, involving 43,910 workers, most of them in the automobile industry . . .
" . . .
"Several hundred strikers left the plant of the Douglas Aircraft Corporation at Santa Monica, California [1937], on a promise that their grievances would be heard at once by the National Labor Relations Board. They walked out into the arms of deputy sheriffs, who arrested them for forcible entry. . . . "
James W. Lunsford The Ocean and the Sunset, The Hills and the Clouds: Looking at Santa Monica, illustrated by Alice N. Lunsford, 1983, 1958, 1938
"6. Santa Monica City Hall, 1685 Main Street, 1938. Designed by architects Donald B. Parkinson and Joseph M. Estep, it was built as a Federal Emergency Public Works project. The colored tiles around the front door are Hermosa tiles made in Santa Monica by The Gladding - McBean Company, once one of the city's largest industries. Since its construction there have been two major additions - the Police Department in 1958, and a third-story attorney's office.
"7. City Hall Lobby. The two-story entrance lobby features brushed-bronze doors, railings, and chandelier, custom-designed by Parkinson and Estep. Other distinctive highlights are the decorative tile floors and walls, a terrazzo City Seal set into the lobby floor, and two large murals depicting significant events in Santa Monica's history and life."
Santa Monica Planning Division Santa Monica Landmarks Tour, 2003.
34. Santa Monica City Hall, 1938
1685 Main Street
Architects: Donald Parkinson & Joseph M. Estep
Designation: 16 October 1979
"The Art Deco style City Hall was partially financed by the federal Public Works Administration. The building is a concrete structure in the Classical Moderne style, popular in the 1930s and 1940s. It carries a nautical tone to suit this oceanside community.
"The entrance is decorated with colorful tile work by the local Gladding, McBean Tile Company. The lobby murals were designed by Stanton Macdonald-Wright*, and installed under the auspices of the Federal Arts Project. The building provided jobs and pride to the community during the Great Depression; it is a standing tribute to cooperation among residents, city officials and the federal government."
35. Barnum Hall, 1938
601 Pico Boulevard
Architects: Marsh, Smith & Powell
Designation: 9 December 2002
"This Streamline Moderne auditorium on the Santa Monica High School campus has long been an architectural and cultural focal point. It was one of the few Works Progress Administration (WPA) relief projects completed in Santa Monica during the 1930s. Internationally recognized local artist Stanton Macdonald-Wright* created the large mosaic in the lobby and the fire curtain mural on the stage as part of the WPA and Federal Arts Project.
"The primary facade contains a large glazed grid and a geometric motif in the concrete bas-relief. The auditorium was recently extensively renovated through the efforts of the "Save Barnum Hall!" parents' organization."
Amanda Schacter (ed.) Santa Monica Landmarks Santa Monica Landmarks Commission, 1990.
15 City Hall
1685 Main Street
Built: 1938
Architects: Donald B. Parkinson; J.M. Estep
Designated 10 October 1979
"City Hall was built in 1938 under the Federal Emergency Administration of the Public Works Program. The building, designed by Donald B. Parkinson and J.M. Estep, is built of concrete in the Classical/ Moderne style, popular in the 1930's and 1940's.
"Donald Parkinson was a prominent Southern California architect who, with his father John Parkinson, designed many of Los Angeles' well-known buildings including the Bullocks Wilshire Department Store, numerous buildings on the University of Southern California campus, and with Albert C. Martin and John C. Austin, Los Angeles City Hall.
"Inside, colorful tile work decorates the main entrance. The lobby murals, depicting the history of Santa Monica, were designed by Stanton McDonald-Wright*, and installed under the Works Progress Administration Federal Arts Project."
Jeffrey Stanton Venice of America: 'Coney Island of the Pacific,' Donahue Publishing: Los Angeles, CA, 1987. 176 pp., 1941, 1938, 1935, 1934, 1933, 1932, 1931, 1929, 1923,
"In 1938 Tony Cornero converted a 41year old brigantine into a gambling ship. It had a superstructure especially designed as a luxury gambling casino. His investment, rumored to be $600,000, was financed by Bugsy Siegel and George Raft. He towed his boat exactly 3.1 miles offshore, and announced by radio and newspaper advertisements that he was open for business. He offered a challenge, a $100,000 reward to anyone who could show that any game on the Rex was rigged.
"It was a first class operation with good food, top name dance bands, unwatered booze and honest games. Gamblers had a choice of playing craps, roulette, blackjack, chuck-a-luck, high spade, wheel of fortune, Chinese lottery, stud poker and faro. There were Tango layouts between decks and 150 "one armed bandits" lined the casino walls. The operation was a success and netted Tony $300,000 per month.
"The Rex and the other gambling boats were a thorn in the side of anti-gambling forces. The local authorities could do nothing because they operated just beyond their jurisdiction. Police often harassed the water taxi service, but their efforts were struck down in court. Finally California Attorney General Earl Warren decided to take action. He armed himself with nuisance abatement warrants and went after the gambling fleet.
"He had no difficulty shutting down two boats in Long Beach and the Texas off Venice, but the Rex didn't give in easily. Cornero got wind of the operation when seventeen unarmed plainclothes officers tried to sneak aboard the ship with the other customers. Bouncers spotted them easily and escorted them off the ship.
"Warren rounded up a flotilla of State and Game boats, manned them with deputies and ordered them out to the Rex. Cornero was ready and repelled the invasion with high pressure hoses. The authorities laid siege for nine tense days while Cornero's men stood guard with sub-machine guns. His attorneys filed suit after suit charging Warren with everything from harassment to piracy.
"Then Tony Cornero unexpectedly surrendered on August 9, 1938. The war moved to the courts. The high court finally ruled a year later that the three mile limit in the Santa Monica Bay extended from an imaginary line connecting Point Dume to Point Vicente. Tony had to pay fines and court costs."
Kevin Starr Embattled Dreams California in War and Peace 1940-1950, Oxford University Press: Oxford, UK, 2002, 386 pp., 1938
"[Earl Warren] He made his political reputation as a hard-charging, showboating crime-fighting prosecutor, giving no quarter, for whom the slamming shut of prison doors on convicted felons sounded better than the marching band . . .
[p. 251] "Politically ambitious, Earl Warren never lost an opportunity to get favorable press . . . In 1938 when State Attorney Ulyssess S. Webb announced that he would not run for reelection, Warren filed and was elected. As his first act in office, he prosecuted Mark Megladddery, the nephew and secretary of the outgoing governor, Frank Merriam, for taking a bribe to secure a pardon for a convicted murderer. Megladdery had been scheduled to take a seat on the Superior Court, Alameda County, [instead he went to San Quentin]. Warren next went after a statewide bookmaking network, breaking it through indictments and convictions and by getting its telephone service disconnected through a court order. In the most flamboyant raid of his already flamboyant career, Warren went after the gambling ships Rex, Texas, Tango and Showboat owned by bootlegger Tony Cornero, anchored off Santa Monica and Long Beach."
" . . .
Les Storrs Santa Monica Portrait of a City Yesterday and Today, Santa Monica Bank: Santa Monica, CA, 1974, 67 pp., 1938, 1930s
" . . . the Depression period . . .
" . . . the [U.S.] government [funded] various projects . . . some worthwhile . . . some boondoggling . . . welfare disguised as work.
"Truly constructive works came under the jurisdiction of the Public Works Administration, the others . . . the WPA (Works Progress Adminstration.)
"Santa Monica had its share of both, and even set up a municipal office to coordinate the activities.
"Most significant of the various federally funded projects was the construction of the city hall at its present location.
"The old building, which had stood since 1906 at the corner of Fouth and Santa Monica Boulevard, was obsolete and in need of enlargement to meet the needs of a growing community.
"The city had already acquired the necessary site from the Southern Pacific Railway Co., and the new building was completed in 1938, the Main Street elevation then being identical with that of 1974.
"The same was not true of the Fourth Street side.
"Fire department headquarters and Engine Co. No. 1 were housed in the south wing, the police department and jail in the north wing. The present police department offices had not been built.
"The city was . . . still operating under the commission form of government, and it was evident that the three commissioners sought some compensation for . . . their limited salaries . . .
"They set themselves up in luxurious walnut panelled offices . . .
" . . .
"And . . . the present city government is housed in a building which is ill-suited to current needs and which makes it very difficult to effect desirable change which would streamline government."
Tide studies: Looking south to the Waverly Club (formerly Breakers) 1725 Ocean Front; Jonathan Club (formerly Edgewater) the Del Mar Club and Ocean Park Pier. Shoreward markers indicate 1921 high tide line. Tide 0.3 feet, 3: 05 PM, September 23, 1938 -Maurice M. King, City Engineer (City of Santa Monica)
http://www.smpl.org/archive/4417/IMG0032.JPG
Betty Lou Young and Randy Young Santa Monica Canyon: A Walk Through History Casa Vieja Press: Pacific Palisades, CA, 1997, 182pp., 1938, 1937, 1936
"The Santa Monica Canyon Chamber of Commerce, formed in 1938 . . ."
" . . ."
"[1938], Susan Moultrie French exhibited her flowers in water color; Ethelwyn Conrey, etchings; George and Olive Barker of Huntington Palisades, their oils and water colors . . .
