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Title
Gate to Girard
Alternative Title
Los Angeles Photographers Photo Collection;
Creator
Schultheis, Herman
Contributor
Made accessible through a grant from the John Randolph Haynes and Dora Haynes Foundation
Date Created and/or Issued
Circa 1937
Contributing Institution
Los Angeles Public Library
Collection
Los Angeles Public Library Photo Collection
Rights Information
Images available for reproduction and use. Please see the Ordering & Use page at http://tessa.lapl.org/OrderingUse.html for additional information.
Description
Title supplied by cataloger.; Herman J. Schultheis was born in Aachen, Germany in 1900, and immigrated to the United States in the mid-1920s after obtaining a Ph.D. in mechanical and electrical engineering. He married Ethel Wisloh in 1936, and the pair moved to Los Angeles the following year. He worked in the film industry from the late 1930s to the mid-1940s, most notably on the animated features Fantasia and Pinocchio. His detailed notebook, documenting the special effects for Fantasia, is the subject of a 14-minute short-subject included on the film's DVD. In 1949, he started employment with Librascope as a patent engineer. Schultheis was an avid amateur photographer who traveled the world with his cameras. It was on one of these photographic exhibitions in 1955 that he disappeared in the jungles of Guatemala. His remains were discovered 18 months later. The digitized portion of this collection represents the images Schultheis took of Los Angeles and its surrounding communities after he relocated to the area in 1937.
In 1924 Victor Girard (1880-1954) opened a real estate office on what is now Topanga Canyon and Ventura Boulevard and built a mosque-like gate to his 2886-acre subdivision named Girard. He graded the streets, set aside land for parks and schools, and planted thousands of trees. In 1941 the community's name was changed to Woodland Hills.
A bulb light sign built on scaffolding lets every one know they have arrived to Girard. The gate certainly does resemble a mosque, complete with minaret, rooftop dome, and tiled arched doorway.
Type
Image
Format
1 photographic print :b&w ;15 x 11 cm.
Photographic prints
Identifier
00097091
Herman J Schultheis Collection; Los Angeles Photographers Collection;
N-006-878 8x10
CARL0005070332
http://173.196.26.125/cdm/ref/collection/photos/id/36875
Subject
Planned communities--California--Woodland Hills (Los Angeles)
Real estate development--California--Woodland Hills (Los Angeles)
Gatehouses--California--Woodland Hills (Los Angeles)
Architecture--California--Woodland Hills (Los Angeles)--Islamic influences
Lost architecture--California--Woodland Hills (Los Angeles)
Woodland Hills (Los Angeles, Calif.)
Schultheis Collection photographs

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