by Paul R. Spitzzeri
In the highly competitive world of retail department stores in early 20th century Los Angeles, none was as successful and distinctive as The Broadway, which arose in 1895, during an economic downtown, from the ashes of a failed business, J.A. Williams and Company, under the guidance of Arthur Letts. Hailing from Northampton, England, Letts lived and worked in Toronto and Seattle before migrating to the Angel City.
With the third major boom in Los Angeles bursting forth as the 20th century dawned and rising in sales and importance from there, The Broadway expanded with a new structure, opened in August 1914, at the southwest corner of Broadway and 4th Street where the store began nearly two decades prior, with the building reaching west to Hill Street. Moreover, Letts set up a protégé, John Bullock, with a department store under the latter’s name and this, too, became a highly successful business.
Letts not only built a lucrative business based on novel ideas like fixed pricing marked for visitors to see, credit for items shoppers returned and giving exact change for each transactions, but he had a knack for merging publicity with philanthropy as part of The Broadway’s operations, while he was also innovative in how we dealt with his employees.
His workers were part of the Arthur Letts Employee Association, which published a journal called The Broadway World, and Letts worked with the city’s Board of Education to provide “Continuation School” classes for teen workers, gave half-day summer holidays, and ended the work day a half-hour earlier than usual.
He also paid full wages to employees who served in the military and gave pensions to the families of workers who died during the Spanish-American and First World wars and established a mutual benefit association to help sick employees. Letts also provided entertainment and social opportunities for workers at The Broadway and encouraged employees to be active in clubs and community organizations.
On the philanthropy side, Letts was a vice-president of the Boy Scouts of America and integral in the operations of the local Y.M.C.A., serving as its president. One of his public service roles was a trustee of the state Normal School for teacher education, long based where the Central Public Library is now and which evolved into U.C.L.A. In fact, his business activity extended to banking and real estate, including the ownership of land at Westwood and Holmby Hills, the latter a name also used by Letts for his extensive Los Feliz estate, Holmby House, where his lush gardens were widely known.
A blog post with a good deal of information about Letts and his store quoted his biographer, William H.B. Kilner, whose 1927 memorial tribute is something we will highlight in a future post, as noting that, when it came to Christmas, the merchant “was right there with an ad inviting the children to come to The Broadway and see a ‘real live Santa Claus.’ Santa was to be loaded with presents, and he would give a bag of candy free to every little boy and girl who came to see him.”
For this “Selling the Holiday” edition of “The Evolution of Christmas” series of posts, we are featuring, from the Homestead’s holdings, the 1922 edition of “Gifts for Everyone,” the holiday catalog issued by The Broadway. Before we delve into the pages of the publication, it is worth noting some of the newsworthy items in the local press related to the store.
For example, in her column, “What’s Doing in Bookland,” Mary Larrimer in the 3 December edition of the Los Angeles Times learned from a Miss Jones of the book department of The Broadway that there was a slew of works popular as the holidays approached. These included This Freedom from British author A.S.M. Hutchinson, whose If Winter Comes was said to be the best-selling book in the U.S. the prior year; Sinclair Lewis’ Babbitt, an ironical look at American middle class conformity and emptiness and which is said to have contributed heavily to his receiving a Pulitzer Prize in 1930; and the Pulitzer winner for 1923, One of Ours, by Willa Cather, whose 1918 novel My Antonia made her famous.
Several days later, The Broadway was mentioned as partnering with the National Soldiers Home at Sawtelle, just west of Letts’ Westwood holdings, to provide, during recent months, “several entertainments and taken carloads of jellies, cigarets and other ‘extras’ to the men there.” It was added that the shows were given by professional theater actors, while “the food was donated in small lots by employes [sic].” With the residents not having much money, Percy W. Jones, president of the Arthur Letts Employee Association, told the Los Angeles Record of the 8th,
People seem to have forgotten now that three [four] years ago there was a war, and as a result there are hundreds of men in Southern California for whom this will be the last Christmas. And I think it does us as much good as it does the boys. Those fellows are so grateful, so appreciative, that their eyes shine. It certainly makes you feel fine to know that you have helped a little to give so much happiness.
The Hollywood Citizen of the following day added that “Christmas at Sawtelle is to be made a jolly affair, judging from the keen interest in the disabled veterans there,” with Mrs. J.E. Ware leading an effort from people in that community, including women in the wardrobe department of the Lasky film studio and The Broadway employees who “are arranging to send at least one gift of clothing to each veteran.”
The store’s café also was a venue for meetings, including, as reported in the Record of the 9th, a gathering of locals who supported a losing effort to pass a water and power act in the recent election and who felt it worth celebrating their ability to garner some 250,000 votes for the measure. The featured speaker was Rudolph Spreckels, son of the famous “Sugar King,” Claus Speckels but who acted independently of his family in business and politics, as he was a strong progressive and reformer, and whose topic was “The Recent Skirmish and the Coming Battle” amount continuing efforts to develop water and power resources in the Golden State.
Another gathering at the store was that of the local chapter of the Soroptimist Club, formed under a year ago as a business and professional organization for women and which, stated that Times of the 12th, was the only such entity of its kind in Los Angeles and “has now attained distinction in numbers and prestige.”
Led by one of the few women attorneys in the city, Oda Faulconer, who was admitted to the bar in 1919 and was involved in other women’s organizations, the Soroptimists met at the French Room for a lunch and it was reported that it was not only established for business but for “patriotism, civic movements, [and] the social and personal life of members,” who could feel the dignity of “an opportunity to serve society.”
The Times of the 10th reported that the Personnel Woman’s Club recently met, with one of the speakers by Mae Carvell, who was a charter member of the Soroptimists and a leading figure of that club and the head of systems at The Broadway and who “told the guests of the evening the purpose of the Personnel Club and its desire to know and enlist the interest of all women in Personnel Work.” Others addressing the organization were the personnel director of the Ville-Dyas Company, which operated the Ville de Paris, renamed the B.H. Dyas Company in 1919, at 7th and Olive streets, and the salesmanship supervisor of Los Angeles city schools, who was also president of the club.
The Los Angeles Express of the 12th reported on another effort by The Broadway to provide Christmas spirit to those in need, in this case children, with assistance from sailors from the Navy on board the U.S.S. California. The paper noted that,
A real Christmas tree laden with presents and a big turkey dinner with all the trimmings ‘n’ everything—all on the water—is in store for 150 kiddies on Christmas day . . .
[the prior Friday] 150 youngsters were on hand at the Broadway Department Store to be measured for various articles of clothing. Each one is to receive a sweater, pair of stockings and shoes, tie, cap and a suit of undergarments.
Then the clothing, tied up in 150 neat packages, will be taken on board the California to be distributed on Christmas Day, when the kiddies will be treated to a turkey dinner served by the sailors. The Christmas tree celebration will top the day, when the kiddies will receive their packages of clothing.
Another example of the unusual aspects of the Arthur Letts Employee Association came on the 18th when almost 1,000 of the staff at The Broadway were taken to Sid Grauman’s recently opened Egyptian Theatre, now owned and recently remodeled by Netflix, in Hollywood to see megastar Douglas Fairbanks’ latest picture, Robin Hood (the copyrighted title was actually Douglas Fairbanks in Robin Hood), which was the first film to have a Hollywood premiere when it opened in October. The Record of the 14th observed that other local businesses were to have “theater parties” at the venue to see the movie, while noting “schools and colleges in and about Los Angeles are urging their students to attend a performance” of Robin Hood, though it was not stated what the presumed educational value was.
Speaking of blockbusters, the following day, the Express and the Times reported that Harry G.R. Philp, Letts’ brother-in-law and general manager of The Broadway, announced that, in spring 1923, the store was to be expanded with the acquisition of the Sherman Hotel on 4th Street and the construction of a half-million dollar addition. The new structure was expected to add 12,000 square feet of floor space, including a basement and sub-basement, while Philp added that the store held a 99-year lease to a property to the south on Broadway, toward 5th Street, and was looking into another building for further expansion.
The Times noted that children’s and women’s wear, furniture, draperies, household goods, and music items would be relocated, as well as offices and a cafeteria for workers, to the addition, which was designed by the well-known architectural firm of Parkinson and Parkinson. After mentioning future plans for the property on Broadway, which, though, went unrealized, Philp told the paper,
Our trade has been increasing steadily during the last few years. Even during the post-war depression it did not slacken, and in the last two years it has grown by leaps and bounds. We have outgrown our present store and find that we must have additional space. Business in 1922 has been the best ever, but we are confidently looking forward to even better years in the future.
On the holiday music front, the Times of the 17th briefly reported that “a program of music appropriate to the Christmas season” was to be performed for the aforementioned Soroptimist meeting. The program was developed by Constance Balfour, who has been featured here in a previous post, and with duets and solos by tenor Raymond Harmon and contralto Florence Middaugh.
Just prior to holiday, stated the paper on the 23rd, the Broadway Department Store Chorus, another employee group, “opened the era of Christmas caroling by giving a long concert for disabled veterans at Sawtelle, 300 patients composing the audience.” This was part of a citywide slate of events of holiday music performances organized under the auspices of the powerful Los Angeles Chamber of Commerce. That organization told the Times that it received “scores of letters from cripples, shut-ins and hospital patients begging that a chorus will be sure to visit them.”
As to the catalog, it is filled with goods, at the “popular prices,” as one common period phrase expressed it, that helped make The Broadway such a dominant department store during the era. Sections for clothing for women, men and children; household goods; toys galore; candy “made in our own factory;” stationery; books like those mentioned above and for children; “practical gifts” of many kinds; “acceptable gifts for men;” and artificial Christmas trees and holiday decorations are among the varied offerings. Another store promotion was that “We Pay for Delivery.”
Newspaper ads of the season also promoted such elements as the Mah Jongg craze that swept America at the time and the fact that “the ancient, honorable royal game of China . . . should be the most welcome of gifts!” Pointing out that the game was “as new—and as popular . . . as radio,” which began broadcasting just two years prior, an ad proclaimed that “folks are leaving their bridge tables to play enthralling Mah-Jongg.” Moreover, there was attraction aesthetically from “quaint, gay-colored Chinese characters and symbols,” as well as “the names of these pieces!” These included the four directional winds, “Red Dragon,” and “Bamboo” with sets available at The Broadway, as well as Bullock’s, Dyas, Hamburger’s (soon sold to May Company, Robinson’s and others.
Naturally, as Christmas Day neared, The Broadway, like all of its rivals, played up its after-holiday sales, including a “pre-inventory disposal” with more than 430 women’s clothing items, including coats and capes, dresses and suits, to be offered at half-price starting on the 26th, while men’s and boys’ articles were to be discounted by 25%. On the 23rd, the store followed its usual Saturday practice of closing at 1 p.m. and then was closed on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day. On the 25th, the store took out an ad to wish readers a Merry Christmas “during this festival that appeals to everyone because everyone can understand it.”
Letts was known for keeping a punishing schedule with very long hours at the store and all the pressures and stresses of managing the successful enterprises along with his myriad of community projects and commitments. In March 1923, he suffered a nervous breakdown, requiring a leave of absence, and, it was thought he was sufficiently recovered so that he could return to work.
Another problem was that his long marriage of over 35 years to Florence Philp ended when, he alleged in a divorce filing of 12 May, she left their home in April 1922 and relocated to San Francisco. The petition stated that the estranged couple worked out a mutually satisfactory division of property. Yet, just days after he filed for dissolution of the marriage, Letts came down with double pneumonia and died on the 18th, about a month shy of his 61st birthday.
His son, Arthur, Jr., took over the presidency of The Broadway, which opened its 4th Street addition in November 1924, but, more interested in the development of Westwood and Holmby Hills with his brother-in-law, developer Harold Janss, sold it to a group of store executives led by another brother-in-law, Malcolm McNaghten, who had been responsible for the business’s finances. After Letts Sr.’s death, John Bullock purchased his namesake enterprise, as well.
The store was officially renamed Broadway Department Store, Inc., took over Dyas’ bankrupt business in 1932, and stayed in its downtown Los Angeles location until 1973. As noted here before, the massive structure remained empty and decayed significantly for some two decades until acquired by the State of California, which remodeled it for offices under the name of the Junipero Serra Building.
In March 1927, Janss purchased the 30-acre Holmby House estate, razed the house, removed most of the garden, and developed the Franklin (Avenue) Square tract. That year, Letts, Jr. embarked on the construction of a mansion, with some of his father’s garden relocated, at Holmby Hills that has become (in)famous the last half-century as the Playboy Mansion.
The current owner, formerly co-owner of the Hostess snack brand and co-CEO of Pabst beer, bought it for $100 million in 2016, but a renovation, including an expansion, has continued ever since, though there is an agreement, struck five years ago, with the City of Los Angeles for a “permanent protection covenant” that shelved a landmark status effort, but called for preservation of certain elements of the structure.
A century after the publication of this catalog, we are well into another era of Christmas shopping that has evolved significantly from the days when The Broadway was a prominent part of holiday gift shopping. One source forecast that 2023 holiday shopping at “non-ecommerce” business would drop another 3%, while “ecommerce” purchases would jump by more than 11%, though it has also been suggested that many people are eager to get back to stores after the worst of the COVID-19 pandemic.