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Title
St. Mary Magdalen Chapel
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.
Adolfo Camarillo's younger brother, Juan (1867-1935) donated land for St. Mary Magdalen Chapel, which has been Camarillo's best-known landmark since its completion in 1914. Juan commissioned architect Albert C. Martin to design the Camarillo church along the same lines of a mission-style church that caught his eye while traveling near his father's birthplace of Mexico City. He brought people from Mexico City to build St. Mary Magdalen Church, in honor of his father Don Juan Camarillo, and his mother, Martina Herna´ndez; it was named for Juan and Adolfo's oldest sister, Magdalena. The first service was performed at the new church on November 11, 1914 and it was the marriage ceremony of Sen~orita Rosa Camarillo, the daughter of Don Adolfo and Sen~ora Isabel Menchaca, to a young man named Alfred Petit. In 1940, four years after the death of Juan Camarillo, the family chapel of St. Mary Magdalen was given to the Los Angeles Archdiocese to use as a parish church. For the past 93 years, the rugged hilltop chapel has withstood the ravages of earthquakes, fire, and time.
A view of St. Mary Magdalen Chapel, located at 2532 Ventura Boulevard in Camarillo, California, framed by large shrubs and trees.
Type
Image
Format
1 photographic print :b&w ;11 x 15 cm.
Photographic prints
Identifier
00071232
Herman J Schultheis Collection; Los Angeles Photographers Collection;
N-006-566 8x10
CARL0005127051
http://173.196.26.125/cdm/ref/collection/photos/id/35079
Subject
St. Mary Magdalen Catholic Church (Camarillo, Calif.)
Catholic churches--California--Camarillo
Church buildings--California--Camarillo
Architecture--California--Camarillo--Spanish influences
Shrubs--California--Camarillo
Trees--California--Camarillo
Camarillo (Calif.)
Schultheis Collection photographs
Martin, Albert C.,1879-1960

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