This collection includes approximately 40,000 photographs by commercial photographer Ralph Morris, who worked in the Los Angeles area from 1939-1981. His advertising and industrial clients included department stores, restaurants, the automobile and petroleum industries as well as business executives. Also included is the Luckhaus Studio collection of architecture, fashion, the movie industry, sports and street scenes, images which Morris obtained in 1939. The Jonathan Club, consistently rated as one of the most prestigious social clubs in the United States, is said to have been founded in September 1895 by a group of men who had been active in a Los Angeles marching society. In 1905 the club was headquartered in the Pacific Electric Building at 610 S. Main Street - at the time, the transportation hub for Southern California. The top three floors of that building housed the Jonathan Club, which was one of the city's most exclusive private clubs even back then. In 1924, a contract was drawn-up for a "magnificent new home", and a 12-story Italian Renaissance style brick building was built at 545 South Figueroa and 6th Street by New York architects, Schultze and Weaver; it has remained at this location for the past 85 years. In 1927 a second club, The Jonathan Beach Club, opened in Santa Monica at 850 Palisades Beach Road. The beach club is nestled at the foot of the bluffs in Santa Monica, fronting the beach and the Pacific Ocean; that portion of the beach is off limits to all but club members, their families, and their guests. Membership into this private and extremely exclusive club (reportedly strictly limited to USC Alumni) is by invitation only and was once open solely to men, but since 1987 it has allowed membership for women. Today, the Jonathan Club stands as a Los Angeles landmark in the heart of the Downtown business district. Sunbathers, beach volleyball players, and umbrellas crowd the beach in front of The Jonathan Beach Club, the private and highly exclusive club located at 850 Palisades Beach Road in Santa Monica. The Beachfront Restaurant, with oversized windows that offers a view of the powerful coastline of the Pacific Ocean, can be seen on the middle left of the structure and the Beach Terrace is visible on the extreme right.
Type
Image
Format
1 photographic print :b&w ;21 x 26 cm. Photographic prints
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