Pasadena Architecture and CW Buchanan

If you spend any time in Pasadena, you will discover that we are pretty proud of our historic neighborhoods. The city was founded in 1874 which is a mere 127 years ago. Looking around today, you would be hard pressed to see the orange and olive orchards, vineyards or the poppyfields of the foothills but you will see many of the houses, especially of the craftsman style, which were built in the early 1900s. The Gamble House built by Greene and Greene is one of our most treasured places but you will also see homes by Frank Lloyd Wright, Wallace Neff, Marston, Van Pelt & Maybury, Roland Coate, and Myron Hunt among others advertised in the real estate section of the newspaper. It wasn't until I looked at the 1900 census, that I found there was another prolific architect working in the early days of Pasadena by the name of CW (Charles Wesley) Buchanan. One may suggest that I only had to take a ride down to old town and I would find 2 plaques mentioning him a few blocks apart. After doing a little research, I decided that a field trip was in order.

Charles was born in Indiana in 1852 and came to Pasadena for his health in 1889 according to Western Architect and Engineer, Volume 12 , although other sources have differing dates. His father, JA Buchanan and family were also in Pasadena and he, among other things, was instrumental in the design of the Mt. Wilson trail.

One of the homes designed by CW, was interesting to me for a different reason. This is the home of Reuben Simons. According to zillow.com, the house was built in 1911. By 1913, Reuben's wife Melissa is listed in the 1913 City Directory as his widow.




 

 Reuben Simons house on S Madison Ave, Pasadena 11/3/2013

It is appropriate that the house is made of brick as the Simons family were in the brick business. One of their brickyards was a 20 acre parcel in Pasadena in the Oak Knoll area of Lake and Glenarm. Doing any gardening in my own yard, I can see how the earth would be good for the brick making process. Sometimes it seems as if the water can't penetrate the thick clay soil. 



The wall above is said to be made of Simons brick.

Below is detail from a driveway on Rose Villa Ave in Pasadena
.

 

The Simons family sold the Pasadena brickyard in 1917 to the W. R. Staats Co for development into residential lots. The Simons brick business continued with other brickyards in Santa Monica and a company town called Simons in the Boyle Heights area. You can read all about the brick business at http://calbricks.netfirms.com/brick.simonspasadenabm.html. There is also an historical novel called The Brick People by Alejandro Morales that I may have to look into. Another interesting source is Pasadena, California, Historical and Personal: ...by J.W. Wood.

The mystery of my found album is still unsolved. Will it be tied to CW? I am not sure but will post some more of his homes in the coming days.



Fashions

Well as mentioned in my last post, I thought we might have the numbers on the index page figured out with the ages of James and Mary Buchanan's family. I thought maybe they might match up to some of the family photos in the album. Unfortunately the photos that feature the family which I will post here don't seem to match up but at least you will see some of the fashions from the era.

One of the main draws for the people from Indiana who came to Pasadena was the weather. I can't imagine trading in my t-shirts and sundresses for these multilayer creations especially when we have those lovely Santa Ana winds heating things up!

The Index Page

When my sons would come home from school, two of the most dreaded words that I heard were "group project".  This often meant juggling four kids' already overbooked schedules and as usual one or two did most of the work. The end result wasn't always the best and in my opinion, they often only learned part of what the research was about. The same can be said for genealogical work with one big difference. For the most part, people who are doing genealogical research or working on a family tree are interested in and excited about their work. They enjoy sharing the details, especially since most likely the eyes of those around them glaze over when they start talking about their ancestors. It takes a certain person to take these projects on and sometimes there is only one per generation.
I have received many hints on where my tree is going from ancestry.com members and I am grateful for the time saved. I do have to be careful because often times a mistake can be carried forward and spread among many trees. The fun part about this current project of the mystery album has been connecting with other people.

The index page is the only evidence for the names of any of the people in the album. Unfortunately, none of the photos have any names written on them. The names are followed by some numbers that appear to refer to the year 1885.

They are:

• Bertha Buchanan 9.1885
• Walter Buchanan 3.1885
• Mary Buchanan 31.1885
• James Buchanan 35.1885
• Hatty Buchanan 34.1885
• Bertha F Buchanan 9.1885

 

At first glance, I thought that the number notations were birth dates but having three in March 1885 seems a little weird and I don't see any evidence of triplets in the book.

 

Thanks to Rick Bisker (a fellow ancestry contributor) who found all of the names listed on the 1880 census in Marion, Grant County, Indianapolis. Using the information from the 1880 and 1900 censuses, I was able to construct a tree for this family. In this family, James and Mary are married and Bertha and James Walter are their children. Hatty (Harriett) is James' sister. Another ancestry contributor that I contacted, Laura Mackail theorized that the numbers are the ages of the people in 1885. This works for Bertha who was born in 1876, Walter in 1882, and James in 1850. Mary (Thompson) was born in on 24 Dec 1853 so would be 31 for most of 1885. Harriet however was born in 1845 so would have been 40 in 1885. I think we will have to call that close enough as most of us don't want to admit we are 40. Also the person writing this index may have been guessing as to her age.

 

Through some Google magic, I was able to find that this family was one of the founding families in Grant County, Indiana and were written up in the Centennial History of Grant County Indiana 1812-1912. The Lewis Publishing Co., 1914 http://www.usgennet.org/usa/in/county/grant/Biographies/buchanan_family.htm 

 

Alexander Buchanan (1818-1902) was James and Harriett's father. He was a talented guy, having been a cabinet maker (1850 census), merchant (1860 census), soldier, sheriff (1870 census) and owner of Buchanan & Son (with James) Undertaker and Marble Yard (1880 census). He enlisted as a first lieutenant of Company I of the Twelfth Regiment Indiana Volunteer Infantry in 1861 and was promoted to Captain during the Civil War. There is a mention of Sheriff James Buchanan in a write up of first hand accounts of the Underground Railroad in Marion. Although Alexander's son is listed as a sheriff's deputy on the 1870 census, he would have been too young in this account. They may have been referring to Alexander. http://www.usgennet.org/usa/in/county/grant/Histories/underground_railroad.htm

 

You would think that for having some pretty high profile jobs, that there might be a photo of Alexander or his descendants, but I have been unable to locate one as yet. I had no luck when contacting the Marion Historical Society.

 

That's all for today.

 



 

 

Clues

There are several clues that may lead to the identities of my members of the Clan Buchanan.

• The album has a patent date of 1865.
• There is an index page with the names Bertha, Walter, Mary, James, Hatty and Bertha F Buchanan.
• The index page also includes some numbers which appear to refer to the year1885.
• The album contains tintypes and portraits that appear to be from the that time frame.
• Some of the portraits have the photographer's name and place printed on them.
• The portraits which have places are from Indiana and Illinois.
• Pasadena was founded by a group of settlers from Indiana.

The first clue that I decided to follow was 2 photos that were taken in the studios of A F Wise's Photograph & Fine Art Gallery, South Side, Maint St. Crawfordsville, Indiana. I googled Mr. Wise and found him listed on a page of Montgomery County Photographers by Karen Zach. http://indianagenweb.com/inmontgomery/photos/photographers.htm
Karen stated that Mr. Wise was married in 1968 and  is listed on the 1870 census as a photographer with his wife and baby son.  I discovered a possible listing for his death on Find A Grave in 1871.
http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GSln=WIS&GSpartial=1&GSbyrel=all&GSst=17&GScntry=4&GSsr=121&GRid=95740436

 

Therefore, it seems likely that these photos may have been taken before 1871 but I still don't know who they are.

Who are they?

The Case of the Lost Buchanans

 

We are intrigued by mystery. The sheer number of current shows on TV attests to this fact. Whether fans of Castle, the Mentalist, Law & Order, NCIS, or any of the others of similar storyline, we are glued to the set trying to figure out what clue is going to lead to the bad guy’s undoing. Of course I loved Nancy Drew as well. Well, now I have my own mystery to solve. It’s not anything nearly as dangerous as dealing with bad guys or trying to figure out a medical diagnosis like House, but it is keeping me glued to my computer and occupying my mind.

 The story begins in 1960 something. My in-laws were out house hunting in Pasadena, California. While visiting one of the homes, the owners upon hearing that their name was Buchanan, said that they had a photo album which had been left in the house when they bought it. One of the pages listed several Buchanans. Before all was said and done, my in-laws went home with the album which was shared with other members of the family. There didn’t appear to be any relation and the book sat on the shelves of several houses before it was presented to me a couple of weeks ago. My father-in-law knew I had been working on the family tree over the past few years with the help of ancestry.com.

 
It is amazing to me that the album which is 148 years old has survived several moves and has been waiting on a shelf for the past 50 years for someone to discover its secret. Honestly, if it had been given to me 10 or even 5 years ago, I probably wouldn’t have been interested. But it seems as if this is the time and the place to unravel the mystery. I am using this blog as a place to organize my research as well as share the information with anyone who might be interested.

I have already gone down several avenues through google searches, advice from fellow ancestry users, and trips to the Pasadena Family History Center of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. I will discuss these over the next few posts. Since this is my first attempt at writing a blog, we will just have to see how it goes.