by Paul R. Spitzzeri
The 2017 donation by Barbara and John Clonts of some 1,500 documents pertaining to the early history of North Whittier (Hacienda) Heights, gathered by sales agent Grover T. Russell, whose house the Clonts’ purchased in the mid-1960s, has yielded material for several prior posts on this blog and there’ll be plenty more to come as we explore how these artifacts help us better understand our neighboring community.
This post features, from the Clonts donation, an 8 November 1919 letter to Russell and his real estate partner, Gurney D. Maple that, while it doesn’t pertain to the North Whittier Heights development, launched a half-dozen years earlier, is interesting because of its reference to an adjacent project, but even more so because of the sender, Joe Toplizky, who would soon go on to become one of the top realtors and financial figures in a burgeoning Los Angeles—until, that is, the Great Depression.
First, the letter directly relates to a request by Russell and Maple, whose office was in downtown Whittier for about five years and which opened earlier in the year, for pricing on lots in the Cross Land Tract or La Fortuna Farms. This, like North Whittier Heights, was once part of William Workman’s half of Rancho La Puente, but was lost to Elias J. “Lucky” Baldwin after he foreclosed at the end of the 1870s on a loan to the Temple and Workman bank.
Baldwin died in 1909 and his business manager and trustee, Hiram A. Unruh, seeking to maximize the estate for the benefit of Baldwin’s daughters and heirs, Anita and Clara, sold a great deal of the massive property, much of it secured in the Temple and Workman loan foreclosure, amassed over some thirty-five years.
The Cross Land Company, led by the well-known Jewish financiers Marco and Irving Hellman, whose father Herman, was also a banker of prominence and the brother of Isaias, the first banking partner of Workman and F.P.F. Temple and who was a powerful figure in Los Angeles and California finance, acquired the La Fortuna Farms property in 1911, just before the Whittier Extension Company, led by Edwin G. Hart, purchased the North Whittier Heights property immediately adjacent to the south.
La Fortuna, comprising 2,066 acres, extended from Tenth Avenue, today’s Turnbull Canyon Road, at the west end of the 75-acre Workman Homestead, west to First Avenue, now Workman Mill Road, and south from Valley Boulevard to the San Pedro, Los Angeles and Salt Lake Railroad, currently the Santa Fe line, with some portions south of the tracks. Around the time that the letter was sent, perhaps shortly afterward, Toplitzky became president of Cross Land Company, though it is not known how long he retained that position.
HIs letter to Russell & Maple indicated that “the following [list of prices] is given to you subject to raise without notice, subject to prior sale, also subject to withdrawal at any time” and involved several dozen lots on nine blocks in La Fortuna, with these parcels spread throughout the tract. Lot prices ranged from $475 to $600 and the writer, who wrote by hand that the south half of a lot was also for sale, concluded the brief missive by stating that “if the above is not all the information you desire, kindly communicate with me.”
The career of Joseph Toplitzky (1890-1935) is truly a remarkable one, so we’ll spend the remainder of the post talking about him. He was born in New Haven, Connecticut to Russian Jewish emigres, tailor Meyer Toplitzky and Ida Nemerovsky, who appear to have both been from Ukraine. When he was a child, Joe and his family relocated to St. Paul, Minnesota and remained there until about 1902, when a move was made to Los Angeles.
In the 1910 census, Meyer was listed as a “clothing store tailor” and this may have been at Hamburger’s department store, long a prominent retailer in the Angel City, and where his sons Joseph and Frank were employed earlier in the decade as young teens as “cash boys.” These were usually young boys and girls who ferried money from sales counters to and from a centralized cash desk in the store.
By 1910, however, the brothers and their sibling Harry were all listed in the census as working in a theater, with the latter and Frank working in the box office, while Joe was employed in the ticket office, which appears to have been a higher position. The venue in question was Mason’s Opera House, which was one of the better-known theaters in the Angel City and operated for years by Henry C. Wyatt, who had a long career operating theaters in town.
That same census, however, showed that Wyatt, age 59, resided near Westlake (now MacArthur) Park, with his 27-year old wife Elsie as well as two servants and that the May-December couple had been married for eight years. Yet, in 1906, a news account indicated that Miss Elsie Crossley attended a horse show in town with Wyatt’s son William, who was his father’s assistant in operating the Mason venue and was seven years Elsie’s elder.
Complicating the matter was that, after Henry Wyatt died in July 1910, just a few months after the census was taken, his will left the lease of the Mason to Elsie Crossley. In July 1911, the situation caused a bit of a stir as reported by the Los Angeles Times of the 11th, which observed that Elsie “was the fiancée and for many years confidential secretary of the late H.C. Wyatt” while it added that “Wyatt and Miss Crossley were to have married last September,” a couple of months after his death. Clearly, the couple were living in a sort of common-law marriage, though claiming in the census to have been wedded since 1902!
What the Times was most keen on letting its visitors know that
Quite without preconsideration, Miss Elsie Crossley and Joseph Toplitzky decided to marry yesterday afternoon. Without notifying even their respective families, they procured a license and went before Justice Summerfield, where, without the presence of friends or relatives, they became husband and wife . . .
A very interesting theatrical situation now presents itself. Who is to control the destinies of the syndicate attractions [formerly under Wyatt’s management] next year?
It was further recorded that “young Toplitzky had been Wyatt’s clerk and general assistant about the Mason, and for a good part of the time a member of his household,” as, of course, was Elsie. Another notable element, however, was that the younger Wyatt headed to New York City once he heard of the marriage and sought counsel from the powerful theatrical management team of Abraham L. Erlanger and Marc Klaw, whose association lasted some three decades.
The Times commented that the duo were almost certain to support William Wyatt in the dispute with Elsie Toplitzky, as Klaw was not long before in the Angel City and told a reporter for the paper “that faithfulness is the one policy of the syndicate toward its individual managers; and that since the late H.C. Wyatt had been a pillar of the syndicate in its early days in the Southwest, he considered its duty to stand by his son.
As for Elsie, she was quoted as saying, shortly after her secret nuptials were revealed,
Will is his father’s son, and out of reverence for his memory, I am sure that I should let Will remain the house manager as long as he wished. But the lease is mine, and I shall resent ever effort to take it from me, you may be assured.
For his part, Toplitzky was contacted as he and his bride were on a brief honeymoon in San Francisco and “earnest assured all his friends last night that he is not really on his way to New York,” apparently to intercede on behalf of his wife with Klaw and Erlanger, and stated that he was coming back to the Angel City within a couple of days.
On the 24th, the junior Wyatt, stated the Times, was expected to file a court case to challenge the legitimacy of his father’s will, which, it was recorded, included leaving Elsie his palatial residence, a beach house, another home in the city and two automobiles worth $5,000 each, while the Mason Opera House lease, which had thirteen more years on it and was determined to be valued at about $100,000. As for William, he was said to have been left all of $10,000.
As expected, Klaw and Erlanger put into writing their declaration of support for the younger Wyatt to have their franchise for all of the syndicate’s attractions in southern California, while he had a couple more weeks to see the breaking the will, having wanted to secure the franchise first. It was added that, as a backup plan, he went to the corporation co-owned by Oliver Morosco, another prominent local theater operator, to have Klaw and Erlanger productions staged at the Majestic Theatre, located in the Hamburger estate building.
As for the other property left to Elsie in the will, the paper commented that William Wyatt sought to secure all of that, as well, and the force of his argument about the Mason lease was that the document stipulated that it could only go to an heir, whereas Elsie was a legatee. He added that he possessed many letters from his father stating his intention to train the younger Wyatt the ins and outs of the theater business “so that he might be a proper heir and successor.”
Adding to the drama, it was reported that Henry Wyatt suffered from a brain abscess for some two years before his death and that, for months prior, “his family had noticed slight aberrations and lapses of memory.” Because the will was created just about forty days before death, it was claimed that the elder Wyatt “had no proper conception of his action.” It was further claimed that the $10,000 legacy was not to William, but as a gift to one of his children.
It was also revealed that the terms of the lease were that no rent was to be collected unless attractions were playing at the Mason and, moreover, “there is a considerable mortgage on the theater.” Finally, the Times remarked that “though ostensibly in the hands of Mrs. Toplitzky during the past year,” the theater was managed by William Wyatt and he “has made no report to her” regarding its operations.
The 9 August edition of the paper reported that the deadline for the junior Wyatt to file his contest of his father’s will passed with no action, while Elsie’s lawyer, William E. Dunn, of the well-known firm of many years, Dunn and Crutcher, requested an order from a probate judge “allowing him to dispose of all the [Wyatt] property, including the Mason Operahouse [sic] lease.”
It was also rumored that Klaw and Erlanger were to assume the Mason lease, once the dispute was settled, something the pair were doing in earnest with theaters across the country as their competition with the Shubert brothers intensified, as many of the venues the two men contracted with defected to the latter. Jud Rush, William Wyatt’s legal representative, told the Times that the dispute with Elsie Toplitzky “will be clear in a few days.” On the 10th, the Los Angeles Express briefly reported that the Klaw and Erlanger lease, for a dozen years, was finalized and William Wyatt was appointed their regional representative including, of course, at the Mason. The $20,000 involved went to Elsie, who kept the other property left to her in the will.
While Joe Toplitzky had been working in the automobile business as of late, it seems very likely that his wife’s ample windfall from the Henry Wyatt estate provided the seed money for his next endeavor. This, of course, was the opening of the realty and investment brokerage business that started off as fairly modest and, by 1919, included Toplitzky’s office being in the Herman W. Hellman Building (which is still with us) and his relationship with the Hellman sons, Marco and Irving, leading him to involvement at La Fortuna Farms.
Notably, Toplitzky would also join forces with Erlanger on a major theater project during the great boom of the early 1920s when the realtor and broker rose rapidly to the top of his profession. For that, we’ll defer to part two of this post, coming soon.
I appreciate the legal insights in this post, which underscore the importance of legality taking precedence over family affections, partner ties, assumed distributions, or promises. Under the theater franchise agreement, only a legal heir could inherit the theater’s management rights upon the original franchisee’s death. As such, William Wyatt became the rightful successor to the theatrical syndicate without the need for a court judgment, while Miss Elsie, despite having lived with William’s father for many years, did not automatically qualify as a legal “heir” due to her unmarried status and remained only a potential “beneficiary.”
I have a small question about the post’s note that Joe Toplitzky was employed in the ticket office, which seems to suggest he held a higher position than his siblings, who worked in the box office. Aren’t the ticket office and box office the same department?
Hi Larry, there was a distinction made in the 1910 census listings and it was reported subsequently that Joe had a trusted role in Wyatt’s Mason Opera House and his household, so it was assumed that there were separate parts of the theater, one that issued tickets and the other that sold them.