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Our Forefathers and Foremothers 35
DOWNTOWN
When I was a girl, everything was in downtown Los Angeles. There was not much between Santa Monica and Los Angeles. The big department stores, City Hall, the Biltmore Hotel and the Shrine Auditorium, which offered musicals and plays that came from New York, were all downtown.
My father was the manager of a chain of stores called Yorktown Shirt Shops. Eventually, he opened his own men’s store on Broadway between Fifth and Sixth Street. The shop was next to a movie theatre, where my dad took photos from films that had played and brought them to me. There was also an arcade with small shops and a billiard parlor.
During vacations I would help in my dad’s store. Once, I was sorting ties, and I remarked that several ties were ugly. He took me aside and said, “Listen carefully. We do not have any ugly ties in this store! Every tie is beautiful! You have to believe it or you won’t be able to sell any tie! Remember this — you must love the merchandise — and then you can sell it!”
When my mother and I visited my dad, we would often find him playing pool. He was an expert pool shooter. He also gambled a lot. There were poker games on Santa Monica Boulevard, and my dad used to frequent them.
Above
A typical men’s haberdashery of the times in downtown Los Angeles.
Opposite
Beverly Hills looking north in 1922, and the same view, 1952.
Below
My father and my mother on one of their annual summer vacations on Catalina Island, circa 1925.