by Paul R. Spitzzeri
When Jonathan Temple, the first of the Workman and Temple extended family, settled in the Mexican pueblo of Los Angeles in 1828, he quickly acquired property a short distance south of the Plaza, the center of the town, along Calle Principal, or Main Street. On large lot on the west side along the base of Fort Moore Hill, Temple established a residence and store, the latter being the first in the Angel City.
Later, he acquired a triangular shaped lot where Calle Principal and Calle Primavera (Spring Street) converged, though this was changed in the 1920s so that Spring followed the old route of New High Street to continued to the north (notably, to the south just past 8th Street, Main and Spring come together at a point).
This became known as the Temple Block, on which Jonathan constructed a two-story adobe building at the the north end, while at the southern side he built, in 1857, one of the town’s first two-story brick commercial structures. In an open area below the Block, Temple, in 1859, erected the Market House, somewhat after the fashion of Boston’s Fanueil Hall, though this quickly became the County Courthouse. Several years prior, he petitioned the Common (City) Council for permission to build a short, one block long, street to the west called Temple and which gradually extended in that direction through the hills.
Temple died in San Francisco, where he’d recently relocated, at the end of May 1866 and, not long afterward, former Governor John G. Downey, long a druggist and real estate investor and developer, built his Downey Block, some of the history of which we’ve covered in a prior post on this blog. This structure was built around the time that Temple’s brother, F.P.F., who acquired the Temple Block property in 1867, began making improvements to that section.
The result was that the Downey and Temple blocks were, as Los Angeles underwent its first boom period in the late Sixties through the mid-Seventies, the heart of the rapidly expanding commercial portion of downtown. Inevitably, they were eclipsed within the next two decades or so by larger and grander business buildings, such as the Baker Block, located across Main and slightly to the north (where U.S. 101 slices through downtown now), and the Phillips Block, among others.
By the early 20th century, with another massive boom underway, the expansion of downtown was irresistible, while the decision to raze older structures to build taller and more ornate ones was nearly universal. While the Temple Block, the subject of frequent discussion about its demise, eluded destruction until 1926-1927 when the City Hall project was undertaken, the Downey Block fell to the blow of the building wreckers when less than four decades old.
That brings us to this post and its featured artifact from the Museum’s collection, a press photograph from 19 February 1927 showing a portion of the former Downey Block site, then occupied by the Federal Building, comprising courts, offices and the Post Office, and taken from the at or near the Temple Block location, which as just noted, was in the midst of its transformation.
With cars and trucks plying Main and some pedestrians navigating across the busy thoroughfare, it is also interesting to see electric streetcar powerlines, curving from Main westward onto Temple Street and a pair of signs reading “POWER OFF” connected to them. A set of tracks continued north on Main toward the Plaza, as well. At the lower right portion of the photo are a couple of older buildings on the west side of Main, including the venerable St. Elmo Hotel, with the name painted on the north wall and advertising signs for Coca-Cola and Boss Overalls located there, as well.
The St. Elmo, on which was formerly the adobe residence of the Spanish-born Eulogio de Célis, began life in the 1850s as the Lafayette, which was rechristened at the end of the 1870s by Henry Hammel and Andrew H. Denker as the Cosmopolitan. The hotel lasted some three quarters of a century and, not unlike the commercial buildings of earlier days, it became outmoded and was surpassed by later hostelries of greater size and grandeur, including by the early 20th century such desirable caravansaries like the Alexandria, the Rosslyn and a host of others. We’ll return to the end of the building with part two of this post.
What we’ll focus on with the remainder of the first part is the fate of the Downey Block, which only survived some 35 years before it gave way to the Federal Building. A prior post here looked at some of the early history of the edifice. In the 1 August 1904 edition of the Los Angeles Express, an article by “M.M.B.” titled “STORIES OF OLD CALIFORNIA” began with,
Preliminaries are about completed, the public is informed through the daily press, for the transfer of the Downey block to the United States authorities as a site for the proposed new postoffice building. Time speeds with flying feet and it will not seem long until the work of demolition begins on what was one of the most pretentious structures of the new Los Angeles, which began, say those who know, about 1868.
The piece noted that, following a terrible period of drought in the mid-Sixties, good years of rainfall followed that helped the region rebound from “the most potent force in the impoverishment of men and families, both Californian and American, who recently had been the owners of princely domains.” Another factor not mentioned was the migration of people to greater Los Angeles from areas, especially the Southern states, devastated by the Civil War.
“M.M.B.” continued that,
When the Downey block was begun in 1871, the town was emerging from its day of small things into the beginnings of a modern American city, and the erection of this pretentious business structure by the late Governor John G. Downey was a shadow cast before the coming of larger and greater events.
The author then cited articles from the Los Angeles News concerning the building of the Block and added that it was the largest commercial edifice in town prior to the erection of the Baker Block, while the Boom of the 1880s contributed largely to the further shift of building activity to the south and west. It was also recorded that, as F.P.F. Temple did with the Temple Block property (spending $10,000), Downey purchased the land for his structure from the Jonathan Temple estate, paying $16,000, considered a bargain.
“M.M.B.” continued that Temple built a long one-story building there in 1830 for his store, with pepper trees added for shade, and quoted Judge Benjamin I. Hayes, who collected a great deal of early American-era Los Angeles history, as remarking “it had a few one-story adobe rooms, with a wide gateway in the middle, opening into a corral.” There, Hayes, who was District Court magistrate from 1852-1864 when the City of Angels had spates of violence that blatantly belied its name, noted that there were lynchings from a gate leading to the corral—this on the Temple Street side.
The article provided some biographical information about Temple and cited another knowledgeable figure, Henry D. Barrows, who was paraphrased as stating that Temple was “a genial, affable, companionable man, easily accessible, and while shrewd in business affairs was not easily deceived or flattered.” “M.M.B.” noted confusion about what actually was the Temple Block and then opined that there actually three, but did so in a way that is hardly clear.
He wrote that the first on the Downey Block site, while the second “was a two-story adobe that stood on the site of the present building of that name facing on Main street,” though this would actually refer to the aforementioned edifice at the north end of the Temple Block at the intersection of Main, Spring and Temple streets.
The account noted that “the upper story was occupied as residences and the lower floor by Samuel Hellman, Alexander & Mellus as a book and general merchandise stores [meaning that Hellman’s book and stationery store was distinct from the general store of David W. Alexander and Francis Mellus].” Moreover, it was recorded that City Treasurer (and former mayor, as well as nephew of Homestead founders William Workman and Nicolasa Urioste, F.P.F. Temple’s in-laws) William Henry Workman obtained his first job with Alexander and Mellus—the former being a close friend of William Workman—in the 1850s.
Further confusion came when it was stated that, in 1861, Barrows, the local federal marshal, leased seven rooms for offices and a court room for the federal district court judge, this being followed by the statement that after Jonathan Temple died “the building and ground to the north corner were sold to Don Ygnacio García for $10,000, and afterward purchased by Francisco [F.P.F.] Temple, who built the middle section and north end as it stands.”
This is clearly the Temple Block that included the two-story adobe structure at the north end, but the federal courthouse was either at the south end, built by Jonathan in 1857, or in the converted Market House in the open space below that. As to the purchase of the Temple Block, that as for $10,000, but was directly to F.P.F. Temple from his brother’s estate, as represented by Augustus F. Hinchman, who also sold the nearby property to Downey.
Ygnacio Garcia, who worked in Jonathan’s store and was long his agent in business dealings, may well have been involved, but the seller was Jonathan’s widow, Rafaela Cota de Temple, with “M.M.B.” concluding that she sold the Los Angeles property at a sacrifice because she moved to Paris after her husband’s death so she could live her her only child, daughter Francisca Temple de Ajuria and her family.
In its 15 January 1905 number, the Los Angeles Times editorialized about the “Passing of an Old Landmark,” remarking that “the demolition of one of the old landmarks of Los Angeles, the Downey block, is proceeding and in a few days it will be no more, to make way for the new post office.” When the ex-governor constructed it, the account noted, it “was then regarded as a great improvement” in the city’s landscape and among its commercial buildings.
In the mid-1880s, moreover, the Times maintained its headquarters in the Downey Block, while “still earlier the postoffice was located in the Temple Block across the way,” in one of the additions constructed by F.P.F. Temple in 1870. It added that Downey paid for his building with money derived from interest on a $500 [it was actually $5,000] loan that had a monthly interest rate of 12.5% compounded monthly and which ballooned to $100,000.
Downey foreclosed on the loan (made in 1852 with his partner, James P. McFarland, and foreclosed upon seven years later) and took possession of the Rancho Santa Gertrudes, used as collateral and on which was built the city of Downey. The paper concluded that ranch’s former owner killed himself because of the tragedy—this was Lemuel (or Samuel) Carpenter, who bought the ranch in 1843 from his wife’s aunt. This tragedy is similar to what happened to William Workman and his Rancho La Puente (and other holdings) following his Temple and Workman bank failure in 1876.
The Los Angeles Herald of 26 March also devoted editorial space to the “Disappearance of an Old Landmark,” commenting that the razing of the Downey Block was nearly finished, while its destruction left a large open area “which it is hoped the [federal] government will quickly fill up.” The piece went on that,
Great memories cluster around this old edifice. When it was first put up it was regarded as the most elegant business block in Southern California, its only competitor, the Temple block, having been built in three sections and at different removes of time. Next came the Baker block, which far eclipsed the Downey block, and thereafter a great succession of business palaces which leave Los Angeles behind no city of its size in the United States in architectural pretensions.
The 15 May number of the paper ran a feature under the heading of “POSTOFFICE SITE ALMOST CLEARED,” with a subheading of “DOWNEY BLOCK DEMOLITION [A] LITTLE SLOW.” The article informed readers that the glacial pace of destruction was such that another month to six weeks was needed to complete the job and before work on the federal building, authorized by Congress in its most recent session and given as a gift from local business figures who created a fund for the site’s purchase, could begin.
The piece, which observed that surrounding real estate prices were on the rise because of the federal building project, continued that the edifice, built by former Governor “George A.” Downey, was a landmark that once was the site of Jonathan Temple’s large adobe structure, which was accounted “a great building in its day, being one of the largest and most substantial of its kind in this section.” It added that one tenant was the Workman Brothers saddlery, though that business was situated in the Temple Block, as noted above, before moving to the Lanfranco Building on the east side of Main Street by 1870.
In its 6 June edition, the Herald remarked that “following closely the demolition of the Downey block to clear a site for the million dollar federal building is the attack begun yesterday on the old Hazard pavilion to make way for the more than half million dollar Temple [Baptist Church] Auditorium,” this latter off the north side of Central Park, renamed Pershing Square in 1919. The account then commented,
It is with some feeling of sadness that the “old timers” of Los Angeles see these leading landmarks of the city crowded out by the inexorable demand for greater and more costly structures. But there is ample compensation for any sad feeling in the knowledge that from the debris of these landmarks will arise great modern edifices typical of the city that leads all other American cities in substantial growth and prosperity.
The Express of 17 June published a photo of the Downey Block before its destruction and then added reminiscences of Henry T. Hazard, an attorney and former mayor, as well as builder of the aforementioned Pavilion. The paper reported that the 61-year-old Hazard “had been looking over the site of the new postoffice, and was unable to find a vestige of the old Downey block, which has been swept out of existence to accommodate the government structure.”
Hazard told an Express representative, “We had good times in that old Downey building. Wasn’t I there for twenty-seven years and didn’t we see life in those early days? Well!” Actually, Hazard, early in his law career, kept his office in the Temple Block, though he went on to recall the violent days of the Angel City, remarking, “I guess the Downey block or the neighborhood of it has been the scene of as interesting happenings as a man would care to witness.”
One such example, taking place in broad daylight in the street in front of the Downey Block was the 1870 killing of Marshal (before there were police chiefs) William C. Warren by his deputy, Job Dye. After Hazard recounted the story, which involved a reward offered for the return of a Chinese woman kidnapped by some countrymen, the article concluded,
Mr. Hazard is glad Uncle Sam has decided to give Los Angeles a new postoffice, even if the window of his memory will insist occasionally upon opening for a view of pioneer days with their spice of frontier life. He is one of the few remaining links between two periods not far removed, in point of time, but differing as widely in social conditions as if they dealt with entirely separate countries.
The 9 July edition of the Times ran an article on building demolition companies, noting that “few people realize the important part in a city’s growth and progress that is played by the ordinary building wrecker,” this being those who removed “the old ramshackles to make room for the new and improved structures that are suitable for our use in these modern days.”
With the third great boom underway since 1901, it was recorded that,
During the last five years, or three perhaps, no city in the United States has undergone so great a change in the way of structural improvement, the general construction of new buildings, and consequently the tearing down of the old ones, as has Los Angeles, and indeed, the destruction of old-time edifices has become so common a things that a gang of workmen razing an old building excited but little comment from the ever-hustling, seething mass of humanity that passes hurriedly through our streets.
The piece discussed some of the process of demolition and commented that “notable among the buildings which, through the medium of the wrecker, have passed out of existence, to make possible the twentieth-century monument to the subtle hand of the architect, is the Downey block.” Deemed “once a stately pile, pointed at with pride by the early inhabitants of our thriving metropolis,” the vanished edifice was “another earmark of early days [that] has been relegated to memory’s handbook on ‘Looking Backward.'”
Perry Whiting of his namesake wrecking company remarked that the Downey “had all kinds of odds and ends in it, but there was nothing of any value” other than its material, while he added that it “was probably one of the most solidly constructed buildings in the city” and he noted that,
The walls of the first floor were built out of old Spanish brick and their durability was shown by the excellent state of preservation they were in when taken from the walls. These brick are sixteen inches long, eight inches wides [sic] and two inches thick, and nearly 50,000 of them were taken out in good condition. Over 1,000,000 brick were sold from the entire building, to say nothing of the other materials which were disposed of.
Given the reference to “Spanish brick” and their size, much larger than “red” brick, it seems very likely that part of the Downey Block retained some of the adobe walls of the earlier Temple building. If so, those materials, based on their “excellent state of preservation,” demonstrate that adobe could be durable, provided they were well maintained, for many years, despite common negative comments about them.
Although a previous post here covered the long construction of the federal building as well as its October 1910 completion and grand opening, we’ll return with a part two of this entry and add some new material (!) about the structure, as well as look at some later history, including the razing of the St. Elmo Hotel, related to the current version of the federal building that was completed in 1939, so check back for that!