04c 601 Halderman Rd - Uplifters Club - William J Dodd (E)

Los Angeles Historic Cultural Monument No. 663, Added August 10, 1999

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Uplifters Club, 1923

William J Dodd

Halderman Rd and Latimer Rd (601 Haldeman Rd)

 

The watered-down Spanish-Colonial Revival of the clubhouse is certainly not as interesting as the club itself. In the early teens the members of a splinter group of the Los Angeles Athletic Club devoted themselves to High Jinx, and in the early twenties under the leadership of Harry Marston Halderman, a local executive of the Crane Plumbig Company, and L. Frank Baum, the author of the Wizard of Oz books, the club bought property on Latimer Road (named for one of its members) and set out a sort of retreat, not to be confused with the later settlement of high-minded Methodists on the highlands above. Architecturally this means the building of cottages (often log cabins) and later more elaborate houses. While not really important individually, as a group they compose a fascinating complex, a significant reflection of the change in taste occurrig in the late teens and early twenties.

 

Architecture in Los Angeles: A Compleat Guide

David Gebhard and Robert Winter

Pacific Palisades, South, No. 13.

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Rustic Canyon

 

During the early 20th century, the Uplifters, an offshoot of the prominent Los Angeles Athletic Club, established a social club and ranch in the canyon, and built many ranch and cabin style houses as second homes for weekend and annual retreats. The Uplifters later developed a relationship with Will Rogers, whose ranch and estate lay on the other side of Sunset, and built a polo field in the canyon. During the Prohibition era, the Uplifters were known as a high-class drinking club, of which many prominent local politicians and wealthy residents of the city were members. The relative isolation of the area provided an ideal retreat for the wealthy and powerful members of the club, who lived primarily in the upscale areas (of the time) near downtown and in Pasadena, to indulge their appetites without undue notice. To this day, a sign reading "Uplifters Ranch" hangs over Latimer Road near the site of the Uplifters former clubhouse. Following the Depression, the club began to sell off the homes and other holdings in the area, and finally disbanded in 1947. The clubhouse and ranch and their appointments, including a swimming pool, baseball diamond and tennis courts were donated to the city in the early 1950s and developed into the Rustic Canyon Recreation Center and park. Perhaps following on the Uplifters' example, the neighborhood has long been known as a home for many of a bohemian leaning desiring privacy along with relative convenience.

 

Wikipedia: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rustic_Canyon

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