by Paul R. Spitzzeri
As the Sesquicentennial International Exposition, held at Philadelphia from 31 May to the end of the year in 1926, as well as the Pageant of Liberty, conducted at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum on 5 July, were moving further along in the planning, media coverage in Angel City newspapers had some very notable and interesting commentary and reporting about both festivities as winter turned to spring.
Problems in Philly were starting to become manifest, including a report from 2 March in the Los Angeles Times that Britain decided against participating in the exposition, though there were later reports of some involvement. In the sports section of the paper, it was noted that Mayor W. Freeland Kendrick, who essentially took over planning for the event after director-general David C. Collier resigned in fall 1925, was unhappy with plans for a world heavyweight boxing championship bout between reigning title-holder Jack Dempsey and Harry Wills at the new exposition stadium (later John F. Kennedy Stadium) because the fight “would attract too much attention and detract from the primary purpose for which the structure was built—a program of events arranged purely for the entertainment of sesquicentennial visitors.”
An interesting bit of sesquicentennial trivia appeared in the Los Angeles Express of the 9th regarding actor David Ward (real name: Drexel M. Truitt) who in the Angel City to make a movie about George Washington and which was to premiere at the Philadelphia expo on the 1st of July. The actor assigned jealousy for the reason that detractors questioned the accuracy of who Washington really was and added that he was raised in Virginia and conducted considerable research on the “Father of Our Country.” The film apparently did not get made, though Ward was selected to be the model for the likeness of Washington for the quarter first issued in 1932. Meanwhile, our 250th year brought the recent release of Young Washington, which a Times critic found to be “the dullest in history lessons.”
The Express, which, as noted earlier in this post editorialized about the need for sesquicentennial patriotism to counter destructive political influences, only vaguely referred to, ran the feature because it was holding a “George Washington Patriotic Essay Contest.” The first prize was $500 offered by the brother bankers Marco and Irving Hellman, members of a distinguished Jewish family with nearly 75 years of residence in Los Angeles, while the runner-up was to receive a silver loving cup, courtesy of the paper.
For students, there were six categories based on grade level, with prizes ranging from clothing and shoes, a dictionary, a photo session and a “Certificate of Loyalty” from the Express. For the teacher of the first prize student winner, there was to be a “Trip via the Panama Canal to [the] Sesqui-Centennial celebration in Philadelphia,” courtesy of the Panama-Pacific Steamship Company. For the individual classes, the instructors of the students taking first place in those categories were to get trips to Glacier National Park in Montana. A special teachers’ prize of an oil portrait by the Witzel photo studio was to be awarded to “the Americanization teacher from whose classes come the best essay from a foreign-born mother,” with this woman to be given a cash prize.
With all of the attention given to the Philadelphia exposition and the interpretation of American history that was largely devoted to such aspects as the Founding Fathers like Washington, as well as Thomas Jefferson who was the subject of a full-page spread in the Times on the 28th involving “A Sesqui Centennial Year Pilgrimage” involving the Declaration author’s “home and haunts,” it is remarkable to see a brief 12 March article in the Black-owned California Eagle, which related a report from Boston from the beginning the month stating,
Coincident with the 156th Anniversary of the martyrdom of Crispus Attucks, March 5th comes the announcement by the National Equal Rights League that the free race historical leaflets for the 150th Anniversary of the Declaration of Independence are now ready. The federal and every state government are participating in the Sesquicentennial Celebration at Philadelphia, ignoring the manhood rights principles of the document and the claim of Colored America to full possession of these rights. The leaflet is published to inform the race of the part if actually took in the whole movement and war which established the independence of the U.S.A. and makes it secure.
There were also several reports from local papers about an invitation extended to a well-known local African-American dancer and her colleagues, with the Los Angeles Record of 31 March informing readers that,
Wanted as part of the big Dixieland exhibit which the southern states plan to have at the Sesquicentennial exposition . . . Carolynne Snowden and other members of the “Black Bird Revue of 1926,” now playing at the Club Alabam’, have received overtures from Alabama capitalists to go there and star in a darktown cabaret, featuring songs and dances of the old plantations. Their present contract with [club owner] Mike Lyman makes it necessary for them to refuse the offer unless Lyman should himself decide to sponsor the expedition east.
The invitation was not accepted and, by the time the Philadelphia expo was in its later stages, Snowden was a featured performer at another renowned local entertainment venue, Frank Sebastian’s Cotton Club Cafe, located on Washington Boulevard in Culver City. It is notable to compare this “Dixieland” concept with the Los Angeles Chamber of Commerce’s exhibit at the event with a California Mission replica, representation from Santa Ana dancer Faustina Lucero and music from the José Arias orchestra in terms of ethnicity and race were presented.
With respect to the Chamber’s efforts, there were local media reports of the involvement of locations like Long Beach and Hollywood, specifically the creation of pamphlets advertising these communities, and these efforts would ramp up in succeeding weeks as the Chamber worked on finalizing the content and construction of its substantial exhibit in Philadelphia. Speaking of displays, it is interesting to see photos published in regional papers about the buildings being constructed for the expo as well as a strange new women’s hairstyle called the “Sesqui-Centennial bob” with a photo of a young woman sporting the look not especially flattering and which also includes a rather bizarre Liberty Bell beauty mark!
Also intriguing was the injection of the nation’s 150th anniversary into local politics, specifically the campaign of House of Representatives member Walter F. Lineberger, who represented California’s Ninth District from 1921 to 1927, as he sought the Republican Party nomination for a United States Senate seat. Lineberger, ultimately unsuccessful in his effort, focused on three issues, his opposition to America’s membership in the League of Nations, more enforcement of Prohibition and political corruption. Regarding the latter, he told the media,
The state of California should celebrate the Sesquicentennial Anniversary of our National Independence, by declaring its independence of crooked politicians in high office.
Concerning the Los Angeles event, the Times of 22 March reported that Los Angeles Chamber of Commerce President Arthur S. Bent sent a letter to Mayor George E. Cryer with a request “to call together the various organizations interested in the proposed sesquicentennial celebration here on July 4 in order that the various plans for the festival may be co-ordinated.” The issue, Bent pointed out, was that “plans for the festival differ” among groups who were in support for an event as the Chamber was discussing ideas with Hollywood’s 233 Club and the Sons and Daughters of the American Revolution.
The idea, the article observed, was that “the various ideas advanced by the different organizations be co-ordinated under the direction of one committee so that the celebration, if arranged, will be truly representative of the Southland,” this a change in previous articles referring to the event as statewide. Bent concluded in his missive that, if this approach was taken, the Chamber would be involved “whole-heartedly in the project.”
Four days later, the Hollywood Citizen informed readers that,
Officially endorsing the sesquicentennial independence day celebration sponsored by the 233 Club of Hollywood, the city council has promised the use of the [Los Angeles Memorial] coliseum for the pageant and has elected [its] President Boyle Workman, Councilman Robert M. Allan of Hollywood, and Councilman [Robert S.] Sparks [whose 5th District included the venue] as its representatives on the executive committee.
Workman, the great-nephew of Homestead founders William Workman and Nicolasa Urioste, was a member and president of the municipality’s governing body for much of the Roaring Twenties and, as we’ll see, his wife, Frances Widney, also took an important role in the event’s planning. It was earlier mentioned in this post that the original venue was to be the Hollywood Bowl, but the scale and scope called for a move to the much larger Coliseum.
In its 7 April edition, the Times reported on progress made with the local commemoration, informing readers that,
A special pageant committee of the united organizations body sponsoring the Independence Day celebration last might declared itself in favor of “The Pageant of Liberty” with a descriptive secondary title of “150 Years of American History in Review,” as the title for the Coliseum event on July 5.
It was added that the committee determined that the event would concern “vital phases of American history” including the Revolutionary era from the first Continental Congress to the Declaration of Independence and Washington’s inauguration as the first president; the Civil War period, embracing the slavery question, their liberation and keeping the Union together; the “Evolutionary period” dealing with the growth of California and the West; the “Rooseveltian period” involving “liberty for Cuba, Porto [sic] Rico and the Philippines; and the era of the First World War.
The Times of the 25th observed that “during the past two weeks eighty-eight organizations representing civic, patriotic, fraternal and business interests, have been pledged to the committee.” A special committee of Workman and two others named Marco Hellman, mentioned above, as treasurer, Jack Coogan, father of child film star Jackie Coogan, as secretary and the Council president as head of a civic committee “to invite a leading national political figure to the celebration.” Ten sub-committees were to be formed “to atend [sic] [to] various details of a commemorative program.”
A list of “ORGANIZATIONS AIDING” included the American Legion, American Red Cross, Better American Foundation, Camp Fire Girls, Catholic Motion-Picture Guild, Los Angeles City Schools, Daughters of the Confederacy, Daughters of Disabled Veterans of the Civil War, Disabled Veterans of the World War, the Friday Morning Club, the Grand Army of the Republic [Union veterans of the Civil War], Mayflower Descendants Society, Motion Picture Relief Fund, Society of Colonial Wars, Los Angeles City Teachers Club, Theater of Stars, United Spanish War Veterans, Volunteers of America, Los Angeles Federation of Women’s Clubs, and Women’s Relief Corps, along with fraternal and social clubs and many others.
With respect to the Philadelphia exposition, however, news was relatively slight for April. Early in the month, it was remarked that the California Federation of Women’s Clubs was to ensure that “California is to be represented by a doll in the display of historic dolls,” which did not give the appearance of a particularly significant investment in effort. Later in the month, a report was that “in connection with the plans to auspiciously celebrate the 2500th performance of the Mission Play at old San Gabriel on May 7, a striking exhibit of portrait photographs of Mission Players [actors, musicians and dancers has been unveiled at the state building in Exposition Park” but it was added that “the exhibition . . . will be taken to the Sesqui-Centennial Exposition at Philadelphia” as well as to London and Paris art galleries.
Among those images to be shown at the various venues were of star performer R.D. McLean as Father Junipero Serra, Violet Schram as Señora Josefa Yorba, William Harrison (a Cherokee Indian denoted as Chief Luxoshy) as a local indigenous person, and Juan and Juanita Zorraquinos, the “famous California dancers.” Juanita, whose maiden name was Vigare and who grew up just a few hundred yards south of the Mission, was a niece of the late Laura González Temple, whose husband, Homestead owner Walter, was a major supporter of the highly romantic and historically imaginative performance and, with collector and capitalist Henry E. Huntington, was the largest donor to the new Mission Playhouse, which opened in 1927. With the Los Angeles Chamber of Commerce exhibit based on Mission stylistic elements, the photo exhibit seemed to fit right in.
There were, however, continuing issues coming to light about the Philadelphia expo, including from a serial published in the Times from a memoir of Major General Smedley Butler, a colorful Marine Corps officer who was hired to be the director of safety for the City of Brotherly Love, but whose tenure in 1924 and 1925 was marked by controversy as well as kudos for his efforts to more strictly enforce Prohibition and deal with the city’s swamp of corruption and crime.
While Mayor Kendrick was eager to end Butler’s service after an initial one-year term, large public support forced the chief executive to approve a second year. A leave from the Marine Corps, however, was not approved by President Calvin Coolidge and Kendrick talked openly of firing Butler, who then announced he would remain through his second year, though he ended up resigning. His serial mentioned that, when it came to his successor, George W. Elliott,
Unless frustrated by the decent majority [of Philadelphians], “Bill” Vare [the powerful South Philly member of Congress who stood to financially benefit handsomely from real estate values if the expo was a success] will frighten the Mayor into dismissing Elliott before the opening of the Sesquicentennial in June, when the city must be open wide [presumably for illicit drinking and other activity?] to attract and make successful the Mayor’s exposition.
Again, while reports of people of color relative to the expo are very rare, the Eagle of the 16th shared a report from Philadelphia of how “colored housewives” in the western portion of the city “are being fooled out of many hundreds of dollars by a white man, who advises them that they will make a lot of money from visitors to this city during the Sesqui-Centennial . . . by registering with him and the paying of Two Dollars.” Apparently, the grifter convinced the women that they could receive as much as $10 per couple for expo visitors and it was remarked that the victims did not report the con to the police “and he is reaping a harvest from those who believe what a white man says is the truth.”
We’ll return later with part four carrying this post into May, with some notable commentary about issues in Philadelphia, as well as continued efforts for the Pageant of Liberty at Los Angeles, so keep a look out for that.