Van Fleet Apartments – 230 South Flower Street

Here was the Van Fleet, a three-story frame apartment house built in 1911 by Garrett & Bixby for citrus man Nelson Van Fleet. The 29 apartments were split between two- and three-room models, and it was in one of them on March 22, 1912, that Marie Higginson, 40-ish "and quite prepossessing," having failed to shoot herself in San Pedro last week, gassed herself in the kitchen. Her groans alerted Mrs. Francis Passmore across the hall. Found unconscious on a blanket on the kitchen floor with the oven door removed,  Marie’s purse revealed the gun and a copy of Walter Malone’s poem "Opportunity"–a popular verse among self annihilators, for Joseph N. Vincent recently blew his brains out on Silverwood Hill with the last stanzas in his pocket.

Marie, though, did not die, and on awakening, confessed that in San Pedro her hand had shaken so that she had missed her mark. "I didn’t shoot a second time because I feared I might not hit a vital spot and would die a lingering death." The cause of it all was her unhappiness with the mining man who was her companion, so she was trying to remove herself from the equation while he was away in Maricopa. Her miner returned to news that Marie was going before the lunacy commission, but we do not know how she fared there.

An L.A. Times article surveying the freakishly high cost of rents (up as much as 400% in four years) and the difficulty in finding a place that would accept children noted that a two-room apartment with a bath and kitchenette at the Van Fleet would set you back $75 a month in October 1920.

On New Years Eve 1932, 28-year-old entertainer Matthew Tormino left his apartment at the Van Fleet for a booking at the Verdugo Trout Club Lodge in Verdugo Hills. At some point while Tormino, James W. Curtis and Inez Stewart were amusing the guests, a large man became incensed and the talent made a dash for the door. Tormino was the last one out, and took a bullet to the hip. When questioned by police, all anyone could say was that the shooter was "a big guy." Tormino was expected to recover, but we suggest he work on his act.

Hotel Northern – 420 West Second Street


Above photo borrowed from the "A Visit to Old Los Angeles" website

January 13, 1913 was opening day for the Northern Hotel, a fireproof, 10-story establishment of 200 rooms with baths, built by F.W. Braun (wealthy president of the Braun corporation, dealers in assay and chemical lab equipment) and designed by his favorite architect W.J. Saunders.

It stood on the site of the old 3-story Carling Hotel, which the thrifty Mr. Braun ordered moved to the rear of a lot on the west side of Flower Street, just south of Court Street; Saunders was also reported working on a 3-story addition to the front of the old building to give it a modern face onto Flower.

During the early days of the year long construction (estimated cost $100,000), the Northern was reported to have been leased for a period of ten years for a rental of $200,000. This prompted one L.A. Times reporter to muse "the project is of especial interest as showing the sterling value of downtown frontage north of Fourth Street, revealing as it does the confidence of a leading capitalist in this older section of the city."

But things change quickly, even on old Bunker Hill, and by opening day leasee James Kincheloe was nowhere to be seen, with management undertaken by Frank L. and Blanche L. Crampton. The Cramptons were 20 year hoteliers, formerly of Seattle and Alaska. They most recently managed the Seminole Hotel on Flower Street. Sadly, their time at the Northern rang the final bell for their concord, for on Hallowe’en Eve 1916, Blanche peered through a transom and spotted Frank in the arms of another… a lady dentist! (Maybe she was just checking his bridge.) Blanche sued for divorce, noting that she had for some time been engaging detectives to follow Frank, but that she’d finally solved the case herself. After obtaining suitable visual evidence for the divorce, spry Blanche broke out the glass in the transom and climbed down into the dentist’s room, ordered her to put on her street clothes and marched the homewrecker right out of the hotel.

Conveniently located at the intersection of Second and Clay, the Northern was a reinforced concrete structure curiously designed with Bunker Hill’s eventual demise in mind. Its foundations, you see, ran thirty feet down, to permit the addition of two extra floors of rooms should the hill ever be shaved away. Other innovations included running ice water in every room, a central vacuum system, steam heat, hydraulic elevators for passengers and freight, telephones, and a French parlor for the ladies on the fifth floor.

Entrance to the hotel was made though the Second Street lobby, a fantasia in Italian marble, bronze, mahogany and tilework. The Mission furnishings were of red leather. From Clay Street, one could reach the dining room and grill, also fitted out in the Mission style, as well as the laundry and work rooms.

The Northern was not a year old when it found its first unquiet spirit. Anna, wife of Butte, Montana capitalist Jacob Osenbrook, came to Los Angeles with her husband and son Arthur to spend Christmas in the city. She had been suffering depression for several months, and it was hoped a change of scene and altitude would ease her worries. The family had just checked into their suite, and Jacob and Anna were standing at the sixth floor window, amusing themselves by comparing the number of passing motorcars to horses. Anna was a horse fan, and exclaimed loudly whenever one entered the scene. In the midst of the conversation, Jacob went to the next room to get a glass of water. When he returned, the curtains were outside the window… and when he looked outside, he saw that Anna had joined the horses below.

By May 1919, the Northern was under new ownership, having passed from the Union Realty Company to the Los Angeles and Santa Monica Beach Company. A news report curiously describes the building as a 9-story structure, but they may not have been counting the service basements.


Above: Hotel Northern from Second and Hill, 1920, photo from the collection of the LA Public Library

In July 1920 a bizarre incident unfolded at the Northern, when two little girls from Little Rock — Laura Cash and Margaret Martin ”“ arrived in Los Angeles and encountered a strange, ticked off lady who tossed a note addressed to Miss Martin into the room she shared with Miss Cash. It read: "Margaret Martin, it will not pay you to keep on with Levee. A word to the wise is sufficient. Mrs. Levee."


Above, Matilda Levee in repose

Baffled by this message, Miss Martin went off to take a stroll. It was then that Matilda, long estranged wife of attorney Frederick R. Levee, entered the Hotel Northern and returned to the room where she’d left the note, encountering there Miss Cash. Assuming Cash was Martin, as she had previously assumed Martin was messing with her hubby (later it was asserted that Martin’s visiting card was on Levee’s desk because his law partner knew her), Mrs. Levee brandished a cowhide whip and slashed Miss Clark five or six times across the face. Cash shrieked, of course, and her assailant fled. Where’s Eugene Corey when you need him?


Above, Matilda Levee in action

Mrs. Levee, formerly of 1001 South Union Avenue, was at the time suing her husband for divorce and maintenance, and had previously whipped at least two other women who she believed to be involved with Frederick, who had long since abandoned her. Previous victims include Mrs. Emma K. Doyle of Chicago, whipped at the Hotel Clark in December 1918, and Mrs. Inez M. Farnham, a cabaret singer from the Philippines, whipped in a hotel dining room and chased down Broadway while Frederick watched. Police quickly located Matilda in Santa Monica and held her pending civil charges which went unfiled, as the Arkansans had suffered sufficient embarrassment. (Inez never sued either.) Matilda was, however, brought up before the Lunacy Commission at the behest of Frederick, found to be "not absolutely normal, but not insane" (this is the new slogan of On Bunker Hill), and freed.

Frederick Levee meanwhile checked the wind and fled the state, abandoning his car in El Paso and continuing east by rail. He was arrested in New Orleans by agents of the Nick Harris detective agency in March 1921 and was to be returned to Los Angeles to face judge Walton J. Wood, who had just ruled in Matilda’s favor on their divorce and the $200 monthly alimony she sought, and who was not amused that Frederick had missed the court date. At this hearing, Matilda testified that they had failed to live happily as husband and wife, and that she had finally told him to "hit the ties and keep going" or she would "get" him. Previously, Frederick had protested "Why, she even shot a hole through my coat" to which the sassy Matilda snapped "Well, didn’t I buy you the coat?!" She’d also once visited him in his law office and shot him in the arm.

Somehow–maybe he told them what his home life was like?–Frederick gave the detectives the slip. By late April, the Levees were both in New Orleans, Matilda seeking to hasten Frederick’s extradition. On arrival, she discovered that he had established a law office in the Maison Blanche Building in Canal Street, and had obtained one of those sneaky Louisiana divorces without her knowledge. She fumed and stalked him.

Finally on May 7 she lurked near the St. Charles Hotel until he came out and saw her. They spoke briefly, and as he turned away she… what, do you think, whipped the heck out of him? Oh no, whips are for women. Husbands get the gun. Before hundreds of witnesses Matilda shot Frederick in the back, causing his death. Clapped in jail yelling that she had done it to save other women the pain she had suffered, Matilda pled not guilty, and later filed an injunction against Lucius H. Levy, administrator of Frederick’s estate, to stop him from disposing of any property.

In March 1922, Matilda was sent to the East Louisiana hospital for the insane at Jackson. (We reckon that they have a slightly freer definition of madness in the south than in the Southland.) Released as cured in June 1923, last reports have her seeking control of her late husband’s extensive property holdings in Texas and California.


But we are far from the Hotel Northern and Bunker Hill now, with a tale of love scorned ending up in a Louisiana madhouse. What of architect W.J. Saunders, a reinforced concrete specialist who made his name building the downtown lofts and warehouses which garnered deep fire insurance discounts for his clients? Among his notable projects were a charming Mission Style auto sales and service shop on Orange Street (1921, see drawing above), the remodeled Lynn Theater in Laguna Beach (1930, still in operation, and variously described as being French-Norman and Mayan) and a supermarket at Wilshire and Camden Drive (1933) built for screenwriter Louis D. Lighton ("Wings," "It"). Among his surviving commercial structures is the massive five-story New Method Laundry Company plant on the northeast corner of Sixth and San Julian (1910, see below), featuring rows of novel windows that began at five feet above the ground and reached to the ceiling. It still makes a striking facade, despite a wretched paint job and a couple of missing floors.

But for his most unusual structure, Saunders served as his own client. This was the "spite house," erected in 1907 at 2691 San Marino Street flush up against the property line of Saunders’ neighbor Adolph Lowinsky, orchestra leader at the Angelus Hotel. This oddity was two stories high but only one room deep, with its staircase on the outside wall and no windows on the west side.

Lowinsky sputtered that this abomination existed purely to deprive his home of any natural light on the east side, and to block the view from his porch; other homeowners shared his revulsion at the bizarre addition to their block. Saunders countered "I planned that house long before I ever knew Mr. Lowinsky. That is a flat building, and I believe it will prove lucrative!" And anyway, Lowinsky had started it by pelting the Saunders children with stones and building an unsightly wall. Lowinsky further claimed that he and his day-sleeping wife had long been tortured by the Saunders brats, who rolled past the house on the sidewalk on noisy wagons, banged tin pans under their windows and yelled "Sheeny" whenever Lowinsky mowed his lawn. Saunders complained that Lowinsky pelted his children with pebbles, cursed at his wife and finally pointed a shotgun at him and threatened to blow his brains out. These battling neighbors aired their grubby laundry in a series of newspaper articles, but seem never to have actually sued or slain each other.. no doubt much to the disappointment of you, gentle reader.

You can today walk in Saunders’ footsteps by joining his and the missus’ club, the Ruskin Art Club (founded 1888 and still active). But please be kinder to the guy next door.

Introducing Eddie Quette, Bunker Hill’s behavior baron

Greetings! My name is Eddie Quette, and the powers that be here at the Bunker Hill blog have requested that I write about proper behavior. Every week, hundreds of letters pour into the blog, asking about table manners, social refinement, polite human interactions, good taste, and the like. My job is to extract from this pile the most tasteful, insightful, and intelligent letters. Then I throw those away and attempt to respond to the rest.

So, without further ado, let’s dip into the ol’ mailbag and read our first letter. This comes to us from a
longtime resident of Highland Park.

Q. Hello, I’m from Highland Park….

A. We KNOW that, numbskull! It was in the intro!

A. Oh, sorry. Anyway, I’ve oft put off or bowed out of a ganking, as I struggle with what I imagine are common questions: is a pearl-handled
firearm gauche before dusk? Are they "not done" after Labor Day? Is an automatic more appropriate when holding up dinner parties than a revolver? Can I wear a blued nickel piece with brown shoes? Please advise!

A. I can see you are a man of taste and breeding. Offhand, my answers to your questions would be yes, yes, no, and yes, unless they’re Oxford brogans, in which case a mauve nickel piece would look more dashing. Also, keep in mind that High Society seems to be entering a "Green" phase, in which environmental consciousness has seeped into every social clique, even the Gangster set. Thus, whereas only last season the byword was that steel-jacketed tracer shells were "de rigeur," now the most fashionable shootists are employing recycled graphite shells, as they use less energy and don’t pollute landfills. (I know, a bullet is such a SMALL thing, but just think, if we ALL switched over, think how much of our country’s precious natural resources we could save!)

Q. I’ve just dumped a limbless torso on Norton Avenue in the Crenshaw district, and I need a cab ride out of town PRONTO! My question is, how much should I tip the taxi driver?

A. The standard answer is of course 15%, but there are some additional factors in your case. Remember you will be asking this hapless fellow to ignore all speed limit signs on the way out of town, so that should add at least another 10%. Plus, you will want to teach him to repeat the phrase "I ain’t seen nothin’" at least 5000 times to bumbling LAPD detectives and reporter Jack Smith, so that’s worth another 5%. Also, you didn’t mention whether the limbs from the body are dripping liquid evidence on the cabbie’s floor; if so, it would be both gallant and prudent to tip him with a bottle of New Improved Borateen Blood & Gore Remover.

Q. My name is Phineas J. Marsak. Recently certain rogues and scalawags have been spreading tasteless rumors about my alleged activities with animals at the pet store on 3rd and Flower. How can I convince my Whist and Billiards partners at the Jonathan and California Clubs that these innuendoes are utterly baseless, and originate from persons of low degree? You know how those sheep lie!

A. Mr. Marsak, I must urge you in the strongest possible terms to refrain from reproducing your kind, whether with human females or ruminants. Were the Marsak line to continue, there is no telling what horrors would befall our planet!

Q. I’ve been interested for quite a while in some of the more adventurous social encounters available in the Bunker Hill area, and recently I was invited to a rendezvous on a lane near Pershing Square called Vaseline Alley. My query is, is it proper to R.S.V.P. with a hand-written note? Or a phone call? Or via a liveried messenger boy, perhaps wearing short tight spandex bicycle pants? Also, my City Directory doesn’t list a Zip Code for Vaseline Alley. Please advise.

A. Well, they certainly have a "Zipper code." Namely, when you see the cops rounding the corner, zip up your zipper!

Well, that’s all the advice Eddie can dish out this time. Tune in regularly for further installments of his column, and should you find yourself in need of a little guidance as only Mr. Quette can provide, simply email your inquiry, or send it by carrier pigeon to On Bunker Hill, Clay Street, Old Los Angeles.

A Tough Kid

Location: 336 South Flower Street
Date: January 28, 1932

Raymond Seccord, a 15-year-old Vancouver runaway, flipped out in City Hall’s juvenile court today after being busted in front of the above address. Refusing to answer any questions, he upended tables, lobbed an inkwell out the window and bit and scratched four detectives as they tried to tackle him. Seccord sneered "I’m plenty tough. I’ll probably hang for killing a copper." Suitably impressed, Judge Blake sent him to County Jail instead of Juvenile Hall, and we will hear no more of this plucky fellow.

Suspects, Briefly

Location: 330 South Flower Street
Date: February 26, 1938

Police investigating the bold slaying of Hollywood nightclub proprietor Harold A. Thompson, shot and robbed of $105 while behind his crowded bar at 1015 Western Avenue two nights ago, scared up some of the usual suspects, including Anthony Smith, 23, and Edward Burns, 36, both of this address. But after thorough questioning the pair was released, and in October ex-cons Joseph Lariscy and Lyle Woollomes would be convicted of the killing.

Brother Can You Spare…?

Location: 330 South Flower Street
Date: September 21, 1937

Arrested on charges of stabbing J.T. Murray, 27-year-old laborer, as he stepped from a cafe at 234 East Fifth Street, was Charles Parsons, 19, of this address, captured with Victor Burk, 20, at Fifth and Spring Streets. Earlier, Murray had argued with two beggars who dunned him for a nickel, and a fistfight broke out. One of the beggars pulled a knife and stabbed Murray, who was taken to General Hospital with a belly wound that was expected to prove fatal. When frisked, Parsons’ pockets revealed a bloody knife.

A Masher Mashed

Location: 330 South Flower Street
Date: September 1, 1930

A young woman named Natalie residing at 1212 Wilshire Boulevard was menaced by a masher who followed her for several blocks in the early morning hours before finally succumbing to his urges and making a grab. Natalie defended herself, bashing her assailant over the head with a sack of grapes and then slashing his face with her keys. Hearing screams (it’s unclear who was screaming), neighbors called police, and at the above address they found Roy Roberts, 24, a transient, with bloody scratches all over his puss. He was arrested on suspicion, not of mashery, but of robbery. Perhaps he snatched the grapes?

Mrs. Kent’s Complaint

Location: 330 South Flower Street
Date: January 26, 1907

Baby stealing? That, and spousal cruelty, are the charges leveled against labor organizer Edward W. Kent, arrested while in the act of packing to flee Los Angeles. His wife, residing at this address, says she has been confined to her bed for months, and a week ago Kent gave their son to a Mrs. F. Borgel, who came to Mrs. Kent’s bed and tore the babe from her arms. It was at this point that the mother filed charges. She claims that her husband, a member of the Musicians Union and one-time candidate for San Francisco Supervisor, had become unkind to her around the time she learned that his reputation in their former home, Chicago, was less than pristine. He had hit her, pulled her hair and ears, made fiendish faces and screamed that he hoped she would die until she checked into a sanitarium on Hill Street. It was at which point her son was taken. An investigation is being opened, and when Mrs. Kent is well enough to appear in court, charges may be pursued against her husband at her discretion.

Boy Burglar Nabbed

Location: 330 South Flower Street
Date: December 22, 1904

Above, Hoyt Brown in 1910

Arrested at this lodging house in the act of burgling was the dapper, notorious Hoyt Brown (aka Frank Carlson), recently sprung from the Reform School at Whittier, but still rotten.

He was about 17 or 18 when, two Augusts back, while working as a bellboy at the Hotel Lillie at 534 Hill Street, Brown he was charged with having liberated valuables from rooms there, earning notice from detectives as "a sneak thief a grade above amateur at least" and "bearing the unenviable reputation of having made the biggest hauls of any local boy burglar in years."

Previously he’d been employed at the Hotel Savoy, and he confessed he’d made off with a watch and chain. But his biggest likely score was the Dice diamond robbery: he allegedly rifled the locked room of Mrs. F.H. Dice at the Berkeley Flats at Ninth and Main, stealing six still-warm diamond rings worth upwards of $1200 and numerous other gems while their owner chatted with a friend down the hall. Hoping to avoid publicity, Mrs. Dice hired her own detectives, and while a few baubles turned up in a local pawn shop, most of the rings were never found. Pawn broker I.J. Smith was himself convicted of a misdemeanor for buying two rings and sentenced to 50 days on the chain gang or a $50 fine. Smith doggedly gave the old gang a try, but came up with the cash after a few uncomfortable hours.

On the 1904 occasion, Flower Street residents had previously noticed Hoyt Brown hanging around suspiciously, and today he was found in the act of entering someone’s room. Arrested by Officer Hunter and frisked, his pockets revealed a variety of jewelry, including a wedding ring engraved within "John to Deed. May 1, 1890. Dec. 15, 1901" which no one in the house recognized.

Hoyt Brown will go on to spend his twenties robbing homes from San Francisco to San Diego, between stints in San Quentin and Folsom prisons. He next appears in the local record in June 1910, when he’s discovered lurking in the closet of Mrs. A. Maurice Low, a visitor from Washington D.C. who’s stopping at the Stratford Apartments at Sixth and Burlington. Chased from the room by the shrieking Mrs. Low, Brown became an object of interest to the neighborhood. The noise drew the attention of Leon Godshall, a skilled sprinter who was playing lawn tennis nearby. He tossed his racket aside and chased Brown for several blocks, then tackled and held him until police arrived. Brown would unsuccessfully plead insanity over this last pinch, but was almost certainly sent back to prison.

Last Shore Leave

Location: 350 Clay Street
Date: June 3, 1946

In the not-quite-twelve hours since John M. Kelly was discharged from the Marine Corps, he somehow took up with Henry Ehlert, 44, and Dwight C. Lester, 23, of this address and John Graham, 43, a Naval chief petty officer stationed in San Diego.

Kelly’s first night as a civilian was a notable one: he and his pals drew the attention of Traffic Officer F.J. Rees, investigating reports of a holdup in an alley between Main and Spring, and when Kelly made a funny move when ordered to put ’em up, Rees shot half his face off.

Kelly survived long enough to be booked on robbery charges in the prison ward of General Hospital, while his pals cooled their heels in County Jail. But the lack of any follow up to this story makes one wonder if Rees had an itchy finger, and the arrests were meant to cover up an accidental shooting of an innocent man.

The previous November 10, hapless Dwight C. Lester, then residing at 300 S. Olive Street, somehow lost his footing, fell under the up-bound Angels Flight car and was dragged about 60 feet before engineer Elmer Miller heard him hollering and braked. He escaped with friction burns and lacerations. Below, a photograph of his rescue.