Some More History of the Federal Building, Los Angeles, 1910-1939

by Paul R. Spitzzeri

The last post here looked at the 1905 demolition of the Downey Block, situated on the northwest corner of Main and Temple streets and formerly the location of Jonathan Temple’s adobe buildings including his store and residence, after the site was purchased by Los Angeles business figures and donated to the federal government for a combined courthouse and post office.

The timing of this was notable given the rising role in the region, and elsewhere throughout the nation, of the federal government during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. This is not a place to argue the pros and cons of the “administrative state,” which has engendered heated debate since, but it is worth observing that the presence of federal authorities in greater Los Angeles was significant and growing.

One prominent example is the Free Harbor Fight of the 1890s, in which it was decided in Washington, D.C., that San Pedro/Wilmington, where the rudimentary Port of Los Angeles, as it has long been known, began receiving federal appropriations in the early 1870s, was to be the harbor of choice, rather than Santa Monica, championed by the Southern Pacific, which took over the wharf of the Los Angeles and Independence Railroad (F.P.F. Temple was its first president and then treasurer in 1874-1875) there.

With federal involvement in the port would also come a greater investment of the military, including the development of Army and Navy installations in the 1910s. This was part of a growing strategy concerning America’s imperial presence in the Pacific, most notably reflected in the 1890s by the seizing of the Philippines during the Spanish-American War and the annexation of Hawaii after Americans led the overthrow of the island kingdom’s monarchy.

There’s much more to the federal government’s increasing presence than these few examples, but they help establish a context for the Federal Building project, though it took the remainder of the first decade of the 20th century to get the structure constructed. A previous post here went into some detail about that process, so this one will look further at some of the main aspects of the October 1910 dedication, while jumping ahead about a quarter-century later at a movement to replace that edifice with a much larger one, reflecting the city’s relentless growth and also involving the further razing of historic downtown commercial buildings in the process.

A significant context in early 20th century Los Angeles, and America broadly, was the rise of radical politics coming from the Gilded Age of the last few decades of the prior century and anger at the massive concentration of wealth, the plight of working-class Americans, bitter clashes over unionism, the question of how Progressive-era ideas addressed concerns and much more. Remarkably, Socialist Job Harriman was in serious contention to win the Angel City’s mayoral contest in 1911, which was reflective of the growing divide in what had been a reliably conservative city to date.

We’ll look more at Harriman’s life and the mayoral campaign this fall, but his rising fortunes definitely concerned the conservatives in Los Angeles, including the powerful publisher of the Los Angeles Times, Harrison Gray Otis, who butted heads with Harriman when the latter, a lawyer (as well as an ordained minister), defended the leftist Mexican figure, Ricardo Flores Magón, against criminal charges, and many who were charged with violating an anti-picketing ordinance designed to squelch striking workers.

Harriman’s star was rising and rankling the likes of Otis and others when a terrible tragedy struck on 1 October 1910. There were 21 persons were killed in a massive explosion and fire at the Times headquarters on the northeast corner of Broadway and 1st Street. Immediately, the paper ascribed the devastation to radical unions, while leftists decried the rush to judgment and asserted the incident was due to gas leaks.

Meanwhile, the Federal Building was at long last completed and a deferred dedication set for the 5th. In its edition of the 3rd, the most liberal of Los Angeles papers, the Record reported that, “out of sympathy with the families of those killed in the Times disaster the celebration of the opening of the new federal building has been postponed till the evening of Oct. 15.” The next day’s Los Angeles Herald echoed this in its observation that because “feeling that the city’s grief is too poignant at this time, as a result of the destruction in the Times building,” a delay was necessary.

Elsewhere in that paper was a report that “a letter warning Postmaster [William H.] Harrison that the new postoffice and federal building might be blown up at any minute was received yesterday” and that “it is the fourth letter of similar tenor to reach the postmaster since the Times explosion.” Federal Marshal Leo Youngsworth consulted with Harrison and, while they were “inclined to believe that the letters are the work of a deranged mind,” it was added that “yesterday secret service men lounged around the exterior of the building and kept a close watch at the entrances.”

In its coverage, the Times, also of the 4th, remarked,

They convey no definite information as to what the plot to destroy the structure consists of, and are thought by the Postmaster to have been instigated by some crank, or a person who desired to seize upon the moment of disaster to seek cause to worry . . .

There is little danger that any harm will be done to the new building. It would require a large quantity of dynamite to destroy the structure, so solidly has it been built.

The Express of the 4th remarked that “the excitement caused by the explosion is now bringing its aftermath of idiotic practical jokers, persons of defective mentality and hysterics,” including the planting of a fake detonating device at the Llewellyn Iron Works. The paper added that “threatening letters, too, evidently written by ‘border-liners,’ have been sent to Postmaster W.H. Harrison, warning him of an alleged plot to blow up the new federal building,” while two electric utilities also received similar missives. In 1911, it was revealed the two union activist brothers, John and James McNamara conducted the domestic terrorism bombings, which shocked their attorneys, including Harriman, who was tarnished by his association and lost the mayoral election badly, after finishing first in the primary.

On the 3rd, Harrison issued a statement of thanks to his employees, in which he stated that “words are inadequate to express my deep sense of appreciation and obligation to the employes [sic] of this office for the assistance given and efforts made by them in so promptly moving the postoffice from its old location.” Clerks worked up to 14 hours a day in recent days and some even pulled 24-hour shifts in the effort.

A Herald editorial on the 4th commented that,

The removal of the postoffice to its fine quarters in the new federal building with so little interruption of the regular routine was a feat for which Postmaster Harrison and his large force are entitled to congratulations . . . and [to] do it with such small friction either for the force or the public is a big achievement . . .

The new home of the postal family is handsome and commodious, and if it does not increase the efficiency will greatly facilitate the ease with which the work is done, and it is a pleasure to know it in view of the difficulties under which the office has labored with inadequate machinery. Postmaster Harrison and his men have good reason to celebrate with bands.

On the 12th, the Express quoted J. Mills Davies, a native of Liverpool, England, secretary of the celebration planning committee and a long-time resident who long worked for the Times, including as an editorial writer, before becoming a key staffer with the Express and later published Greater Los Angeles and The Northwest News. He told the paper that “in 1880, when I first came to this city” from Minnesota “the postoffice was located at First and Spring streets in the [local chapter of the fraternal society, the International Order of] Odd Fellows’ Building.”

In 1886, during the Boom of the Eighties, it moved to Main and Republic streets,” this latter now an alley next to LA Plaza Cultura de Artes and near the Plaza, and remained there for several years. Davies remembered that a donation of land about 1892 led to a move to Main and Winston streets, this latter between 4th and 5th streets, though this first federal building, upon completion, “was found to be too small and it was called the pepper box.”

Another move was made to the Armory Building, also known as the Copeland, at the northwest corner Spring and 8th streets (Walter P. Temple, owner of the Homestead in the 1920s, and associates built the Great Republic Life Building at the northeast corner), with the most recent location, from about 1904, at the southwest corner of Grand Avenue and 7th Street, formerly the site of the Los Angeles Cable Railway depot, and where the Robinson Department Store building now stands.

The dedication on the 15th featured an invocation, speeches by Mayor George Alexander (running for reelection against Harriman), former state senator Reginaldo del Valle and such notable Angelenos as banker Motley Flint, attorney Will D. Gould (whose office for more than a half-century was in the Temple Block), building site committee chair Joseph Mesmer, John G. Mott and construction superintendent O.J. Muchmore.

The Times characterized the festivities as one in which they involved “Uncle Sam as Host, The Public As Guest,” with some five thousand visitors touring the building and hearing the orations, while an interesting combination of decorations included the red, white and blue of the American flag and Japanese lanterns (only three years before a “gentlemen’s agreement” between the United States and Japan limited immigration from the latter, while three years later, an Alien Land Act in California forbade ownership of land by Japanese residents).

Another notable touch reported by the Times of that day was that “during the evening stereopticon views,” this being dual photographs on a card seen through a viewer providing a single 3-D image, “will be thrown from the west side of the Temple Block and St. Charles Hotel,” this latter on the east side of Main Street being the old Bella Union, dating back to the 1830s.

The Record of the 17th added an interesting historical tidbit, informing readers that, along with the fact that “a patriotic throng of 5,000 persons participated in the formal dedication” and that “the air was filled with patriotic songs, shouts, speeches and music,” that, in an earlier era before Davies’ arrival,

An interesting comparison is made in regard to the building from the fact that some 50 years ago the postoffice was located on the same grounds. It was then 16×20 feet in size and one man was employed. The service now consists of 910 men.

As noted in the previous post on the opening of the structure, Mayor Alexander bemoaned the fact that the city was growing so rapidly that its public buildings were quickly found to be inadequate to meet the demands of its accelerating citizenry. Still, the edifice managed to survive for a little more than a quarter century before succumbing to a much larger structure—this reflective of the massive growth of the administrative state during the New Deal as it was launched during the Great Depression.

Part of this bigger footprint was the decision of the feds to acquire more property to the north. The 10 February 1933 issue of the Times reported that, as demolition of the current federal building was to be initiated,

Fourteen structures [in all] are to be razed, six of them being located on the west side of Main street northward from Commercial street to the proposed relocation of Temple street [this latter did not happen, however, and U.S. 101 later was built through downtown in that area]. These latter structures include some of the most notable in pioneer history such as the old time First National Bank Bank Building [formerly the Farmers’ and Merchants’ Bank Building], the Cosmopolitan Hotel, later the St. Elmo, and the pioneer business building erected for Dotter & Bradley, founders of the Los Angeles Furniture Company.

It was added that the section of New High Street, extending north from Temple Street through the site and existing there since at least 1858, was to be removed. The St. Elmo (formerly the Cosmopolitan and originally the Lafayette since about 1856) was briefly discussed in part one because the structure was shown in the 1927 photograph of a large portion of the then-existing federal building.

Two days later, the Times published a photo of those three buildings, while two others earmarked for destruction in the proposed but aborted Temple Street realignment included an 1880s edifice, now in the U.S. 101 pathway, and the Vickery-Brunswig Building, which is still with us as the home of LA Plaza Cultura y Artes. An inset map showed the section in question.

In its 8 March number, the paper provided an architectural rendering by John C. Austin, Frederic M. Ashley and the brothers Donald and John Parkinson of the new federal building, said to cost north of $5.2 million, while it was observed that the three venerable structures, including the St. Elmo, were gone. It was added by Austin that the existing federal building would remain until at least bids were opened for its replacement.

A surprising tangent was reported upon in the 3 May issue of the Times as the federal property custodian in town told the paper that there was a clause in the wrecking contract that “any live and healthy trees on the site should be protected,” apparently because an official in Washington, D.C. “had in mind that there might be parkways and that they might contain trees.” Consequently, recorded the paper,

The lemon tree and the palm [to be saved] were planted many years ago in the patio at the rear of the famous old St. Elmo Hotel. Where at first they received daily watering and attention, they now stand decrepit and lonely, probably living over the past and wondering and mourning for the companionship of the dons and senoritas and pioneers of the days when the St. Elmo was lively and gay with wine, women and song.

Demolition of the 1910 Federal Building was finally undertaken in June and July 1937, with the wrecking contractor telling the Times on the last day of the latter month that “the way that building was erected it could have lasted another 200 years” as using cables attached to walls failed and a massive iron ball of 3,600 pounds was used for 15 minutes to pound them into submission against “stubborn defiance.” It was added that the facade of the main corner entrance of the edifice topped the day before “with a deep, almost mournful groan.”

On 23 January 1939, a little more than four months before another modern landmark, Union Station (built where the former Chinatown was situated), opened, the new Federal Building, at a cost of around $7 million, was dedicated. The Times reported that the post office was in its 21st space since the first, the location of which was a mystery, was inaugurated on 9 April 1850. It was remarked that the first known site, from 1853, was in an adobe building on Los Angeles Street between Commercial and Arcadia streets.

The following year it moved to the Salazar Adobe on Main Street, on what later became part of the Downey Block and Federal Building, as well as adjacent on the south to the Lafayette/Cosmopolitan/St. Elmo hotel. In 1855 it was back on Los Angeles Street and future moves were to the Temple Block area, near the Plaza and, apparently, in Temple’s adobe buildings where the Downey Block was later built. Two moves in the 1860s followed in that area along Main and then, in 1867, in the southern portion of the Temple Block in a brick structure built a decade before.

After two more moves, including in a new building by F.P.F. Temple within the Temple Block, the office was relocated to Spring near First, though it was said here that the Knights of Pythias, rather than the Odd Fellows, owned the building. Another site was “out in the sticks” on Fort Street, later Broadway, between 6th and 7th streets and it was not until 1893 that a federal building, including the post office, was purpose built on Main and Winston, though it was added that some citizens wanted to give the feds a block called St. Vincent’s Square between Broadway and Hill and 6th and 7th streets, but his was rejected.

The further history has been related above, but this information was provided by retiring Postmaster Charles S. Anderson, an employee since 1889 and required to end his tenure on his 70th birthday. He came to the city in 1883 and found in records that the first mail carrier was hired in 1885—prior to that, residents had to go to the office to get their mail—in 1939, there were 1,500 carriers.

There is more history beyond this, including the May 1940 opening of the Terminal Annex central processing facility and the 1989 move to a larger facility on 31 acres on the west side of Central Avenue between Gage and Florence avenues. This brief look at the history of the post office and federal building, however, shows the dramatic changes in Los Angeles and in the role of the federal government there during the first decades of the 20th century.