USA > California > Los Angeles County > Los Angeles > Los Angeles from the mountains to the sea : with selected biography of actors and witnesses to the period of growth and achievement, Volume II > Part 15
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Edgar S. Dulin attended school in San Diego until 1899, later in San Francisco for two years, was in a private school one year, and then in the grammar and high school of Los Angeles until 1912. For two years he was a student in the University of California. Since leaving college Mr. Dulin has been almost continuously associated with the Blankenhorn-Hunter Company, at first as salesman in the bond de- partment at Pasadena. In 1915 he was made secretary and treasurer of the corporation, and has been largely responsible for the large busi- ness developed by this firm in the handling of high-class bonds and other securities. In September, 1918, Mr. Dulin left business affairs to enter the naval aviation station at Seattle, Washington, and remained there until honorably discharged in December, 1918. He then returned to Pasadena as vice president of the Blankenhorn-Hunter Company, and on March 1, 1919, the Blankenhorn-Hunter-Dulin Company was formed for the purpose of taking over the bond and stock business of the older organization. Offices are maintained in Los Angeles, Pasa- dena and San Francisco. Mr. Dulin is now vice president and a director of both companies.
He is also well known in social affairs, being a member of the California Club, Los Angeles Athletic Club, Midwick Country Club, Overland Club, the last two being in Pasadena; is a member of the college fraternity, Delta Kappa Epsilon, and of the high school fra- ternity, Gamma Eta Kappa. Mr. Dulin is a republican voter. In Los Angeles, November 10, 1915, he married Sneadele Miles. Her father is J. H. Miles, a well-known middle west banker. They have one daughter, Marjorie Jane.
THE HOOVER ART COMPANY originated in Hollywood in 1913. Two men well versed in the technical and artistic phases of their business, Mr. Hoover and Mr. Sartov, established it as an art exhibition and for the reproduction of oil and water paintings. Gradually the business was specialized as exclusive photography until now the company is without question first and foremost in this line on the Pacific Coast, and no other organization can compare with their facilities and the experience and skill represented by the technical organization.
Mr. Hoover sold his interest in the business in May, 1918, and in the same month the Hoover Art Company was incorporated, with Mr.
E. S. Dulin
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Hendrick Sartov as president, and William P. Harmon secretary and treasurer.
Mr. Sartov, whose experience in photography and the allied arts has brought him well-earned international fame, is the professional head of the studios. The work of these studios has been exhibited at the American Photographers Association's exhibitions, at the Pittsburg Salon of Pictorial Photography, and also at the London Salon of the Royal Photographic Society. Many awards and honors have been paid the work.
Hendrick Sartov was born in Denmark March 18, 1885, son of M. E. and Nelsine Sartov. When he was two years old his parents moved to Kolding, Denmark, where he attended the public schools to the age of fourteen. Following that came a five years' course of apprentice- ship to learn the photographic art. During the next three years he had charge of a photographic studio and was then in charge of a studio at Copenhagen, Denmark, three years. Another year was spent in the em- ploy of a large photographic studio at Kiel, Germany. He then re- sumed his work at Copenhagen and from there came to America, spend- ing the first six months in Minneapolis in the studio of Sweet Brothers, photographers. He then went into business for himself, and at the end of three years sold out and moved west to Hollywood, where he became associated with Mr. Hoover.
Mr. William P. Harmon, secretary and treasurer of the company, and in charge of its business details, was born at Princeton, Wisconsin, March 31, 1865, son of H. H. Harmon. He attended public school and for three years worked as an apprentice printer in the office of the Princeton Republican. Going from there to Milwaukee he was em- ployed in various capacities with the Evening Wisconsin for five years, after which he was a printer in Minneapolis until 1894. In that year he returned to Princeton, Wisconsin, and bought the Princeton Repub- lican, publishing it for two years. Returning to Minneapolis he formed the partnership of Hahn & Harmon, printers, and sold out his business there in February, 1918, to come to Los Angeles. Here in May of the same year he bought an interest in the Hoover Art Company.
LOUIS SENTOUS, JR., French consul at Los Angeles, has spent nearly all his life in this city, and is a member of a prominent old French family of southern California.
His father, Jean Sentous, was born in the Department of Haute Garonne, France, January 1, 1837. He was schooled there and was employed in his father's general store to the age of eighteen. Coming to the United States after a long voyage on a sailing vessel around Cape Horn, he arrived at San Francisco. He was six months on the ocean. He went to the mines in Tuolumne county, but in 1860 came to Los An- geles and established a dairy on West Jefferson street near Western avenue. In 1874 he moved to a stock farm at Calabasas in Los An- geles County. He moved his family back to Los Angeles in 1877, but retained his farm until 1884, when he sold out and thereafter lived re- tired at his home on Olive street between Fifth and Sixth streets, op- posite Central Park. He died April 28, 1903. His wife was a native of Costa Rica and died May 26, 1918. This well-known old couple had seven children: Narcisse, of Los Angeles; Louis; Frank, who is re- tired and lives at Newhall, California; Camille, who is associated with his brother Louis in business; Mrs. Heloise B. Lewis ; Emely, deceased ; and Mrs. Adele Truitt, of Glendale, California.
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The late Jean Sentous was president of the French Benevolent So- ciety for many years. He was a democrat in politics and a member of the Catholic Church.
Louis Sentous, Jr., was born in Los Angeles September 25, 1869. He was liberally educated both in California and abroad. His early training was the product of the public schools and St. Vincent's College. In 1880 his father sent him to France, back to the old home in Haute Garonne, where he attended the Seminary of Polignan and the Govern- ment College at St. Gaudens. After five years of foreign residence he returned to Los Angeles in 1885 and re-entered St. Vincent College, where he graduated in 1887.
Mr. Sentous has been a Los Angeles business man for thirty years. He was first bookkeeper with his uncle Louis Sentous, Sr., proprietor of the New Orleans Market for three years. He then acquired a part- nership in the firm of T. Vache and Company, wholesale wine mer- chants. Ten years later he sold his interests there and entered the wholesale produce business with his brother Camille. In 1904 the Sen- tous brothers sold that business and formed the Sentous Realty Com- pany, of which Louis is president. They have a large business in loans, insurance and real estate.
Mr. Sentous was also president of the Franco-American Baking Company and president of the French Benevolent Society, having filled that office in that organization altogether thirteen years. During his presidency the society more than doubled its membership. He was treas- urer of the society at one time and was its vice president in 1898-99. In 1910 Stephen Pichon, minister of Foreign Affairs of France, named Mr. Sentous as French consul of Los Angeles, and he has ably discharged the duties of that office ever since. He was decorated officer of the French Academy in 1912 by the French government for faithful serv- ices. Mr. Sentous is a Catholic and a republican.
In Los Angeles January 7, 1895, he married Louise Amestoy. Their only son, Jean Emile, born in Los Angeles October 23, 1895, is a graduate of the Los Angeles High School, was with his father in business for a time, but during the present war has been in the United States army with the 85th Spruce Squadron.
ALBERT CLAY BILICKE. The toll exacted by one of the outstanding tragedies of the great war, the sinking of the Lusitania, on May 7, 1915, demanded as one of its sacrifices a prominent Los Angeles business man and capitalist, Albert Clay Bilicke, whose work and influence have more than won enduring monuments in the Los Angeles business district.
Mr. Bilicke spent most of his life in California. He was born in Coos County, Oregon, June 22, 1861, and in 1868 his parents removed to San Francisco. He was a son of Carl Gustavus and Caroline (Sigis- mund) Bilicke. At San Francisco he attended public schools until 1876, and followed that with a course in the Heald's Business College.
Then, forty years ago, when he was seventeen years of age, Mr. Bilicke entered upon his active career as manager of the Cosmopolitan Hotel at Florence, Arizona. It was as a hotel manager and proprietor that he laid the foundation of his substantial fortune. After two years he took the management of the Cosmopolitan Hotel at Tombstone, Ari- zona, and was also superintendent of the Pedro Consolidated Mining Company. On returning to California, in 1885, Mr. Bilicke became proprietor of the Ross House at Modesto, and in 1891 became pro- prietor of the Pacific Ocean House at Santa Cruz, one of the most noted high-class resorts of that time.
a-CBilico.
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However, the institution with which his name is most familiarly associated by the thousands who have lived in California temporarily or permanently is the noted Hollenbeck Hotel of Los Angeles. Mr. Bilicke became proprietor of this hotel in 1893, and it was under his manage- ment as president of the owning company that it attained the height of its popularity and in point of service outrivaled all other similar institutions for a number of years.
Along with hotel management he accumulated a vast amount of property as an investor and was foremost in developing this property by permanent improvements. In 1903 he organized the Bilicke-Rowan Fireproof Building Company, and the first great fruit of this organiza- tion was the palatial Hotel Alexandria, erected in 1905, and at the time the most luxurious hotel in its accommodations in Los Angeles. He was president of the hotel company until his death. He was also president of the Bilicke-Rowan Annex Company and the Century Build- ing Company, organized in 1906; of the Central Fireproof Building Company, and of the Chester Fireproof Building Company. The last named erected the Title Insurance Building at Fifth and Spring streets, the Security Building and the Citizens Bank Building, the latter having been completed about the time of his death. Mr. Bilicke foresaw the spread of the Los Angeles business district south along Broadway and Spring street, and showed his faith in that district by investing heavily in many tracts.
Mr. Bilicke was one of the most prominent of Los Angeles busi- ness men and had business and social connections that were practically world wide. He was a member of the Jonathan Club, the Los Angeles Country Club, Annandale Golf Club, the Valley Hunt Club of Pasadena, and the Los Angeles Athletic Club. On September 10, 1900, at Niagara Falls, he married Gladys Huff. Mrs. Bilicke was a passenger on the Lusitania with her husband, but was one of those saved from that memorable sea disaster. She now resides in South Pasadena. She is the mother of three children, Albert Constant, Nancy Caroline and Carl Archibald.
MELVILLE TORRANCE WHITAKER has been one of the best known in- surance men in this city for the last thirty years. He has been prominent in the organization and management of the local Board of Underwriters, and is president of M. T. Whitaker & Company (Inc.) of this city.
Mr. Whitaker represents an old New York State family. He was born in Penn Yan, Yates county, New York, April 26, 1851, and is the son of Alexander F. and Louise Torrance Whitaker. His family has played a notable part in the affairs of that section from earliest times. His great-grandfather, Stephen Whitaker, was one of the first settlers. coming from Albany in 1799 with oxen teams, after trading a tract of land near Passaic, New Jersey, for farming land in the new country. Some of that land is still in the possession of the Whitaker family. Another ancestor, Nathaniel Whitaker, returned to England in 1756 to interest the Earl of Dartmouth in founding an Indian school, which after- ward became Dartmouth College. The portrait of another, Alexander Whitaker, baptizing Pocahontus, hangs in the rotunda of the Capitol at Washington. Mr. Whitaker's parents came to California in 1884 and made their home with their daughter Helen, the wife of Albert Brigden, at that time a prominent rancher of Los Angeles county. They are both buried in the Mountain View Cemetery in Altadena.
Melville T. Whitaker received his education in the Oakfield Military Academy, an Episcopal school near Batavia, New York, and began his
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business career as an employe in the Baldwin's Bank, a private institu- tion in Penn Yan. He was there four years, then became associated with the National Life Insurance Company of United States of America. When the offices of the company were removed from Philadelphia to Chicago he went with them and became the cashier of the company in its home office in Chicago. In 1887 he resigned after fourteen years connection with the company and came to Los Angeles to assume the management of a real estate syndicate formed by his brother-in-law, J. F. Crank, who will be remembered as the builder of the Los Angeles cable roads and also the railroad now used by the Santa Fe as far east as Monrovia. A few years after he was associated with the late John W. Hinton in the real estate business. As Hinton & Whitaker they enjoyed an important share in the real estate transactions of Los Angeles during the years following the big boom and the early revival of business. After Mr. Hinton's death, Mr. Whitaker dropped the real estate business and continued a general insurance agency. The firm of M. T. Whitaker & Company was incorporated in 1909, with M. T. Whitaker as president and W. P. Battelle as secretary. Mr. Whitaker has been president of the Sierra Madre Vintage Company for over twenty-five years. Their winery and vineyards are at La Manda Park, where they have been grow- ing grapes for wine making for nearly half a century.
Mr. Whitaker and his family reside at 815 West Eighteen street, this city. He married Miss Carrie Brigden, of Penn Yan, New York, and they have four daughters, Edith C., Pansy Louise, Belle Brigden, wife of R. M. Galbreth, a Los Angeles lawyer, and Agnes Helen, wife of Clyde Martin, of this city.
Mr. Whitaker is a republican in politics, and his own career is fully in accord with the thorough American traditions of his family. He is a member of the Jonathan Club and a trustee of the First Presbyterian church of this city. Mrs. Whitaker is a member of the Ebell Club.
REV. JOSEPH McMANUS was born in Ireland June 8, 1881, attended the National schools to the age of fourteen, and then began training for the priesthood in St. Patrick's College at Cavan, taking the classical course for five years. He studied psychology and theology at the college and seminary at Carlow, Ireland, and was ordained a priest in 1905. Sent to America, he became assistant pastor of the Cathedral at Los Angeles and in 1910 was made pastor of St. Mary's church. He entered upon his present duties as pastor of the Church of the Holy Cross in 1918.
This parish was formed by the late Bishop Thomas J. Conaty. The cornerstone of the present church edifice was laid June 23, 1912. The first Mass of the Parish was said in December, 1906, in the small Chapel now adjoining the church, by Rev. Thomas F. Fahey. Father Fahey continued as pastor until 1916, and Rev. Francis D. Benson served as administrator of the parish until 1918.
Father McManus is a member of the Knights of Columbus, the Ancient Order of Hibernians, the Young Men's Institute and the Catholic Order of Foresters.
FRANCIS EUGENE BACON is one of the many men of mature business achievements who have sought and found in Los Angeles an ideal home for their retirement and years of comparative leisure. For a period of about thirty years Mr. Bacon was one of the foremost merchants of New York state, and the city of Syracuse regards him and his activities as constituting one of its most notable factors of progress and achieve- ment.
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Mr. Bacon was born at Fulton, New York, August 12, 1851, son of Dr. Charles G. and Mary M. (Whitaker) Bacon. He is of English ancestry, the Bacons having been in New England from colonial times. His great-grandfather was wounded in the battle of Bunker Hill. In the different generations many of the name have been leaders in the medical profession, and it was the wish of his father that Francis E. Bacon should follow that line, but he wisely decided that his talents and inclinations were along lines of practical commerce. His father, Dr. Charles G. Bacon, died in 1906, at the age of ninety-two, and at that time was the oldest resident of Fulton. He was one of the founders of the Falley Seminary at Fulton, had served as president of the Oswego County Medical Society, and was probably the only physician in America who had attended every semi-annual meeting of a medical society for fifty years. So high a place did he occupy at Fulton that at the time of his death all business houses were closed.
When about fourteen years old Francis E. Bacon apprenticed him- self to a merchant at Fulton. Eighteen months later, on the advice of his father, he gave up that work and entered Falley Seminary, where he completed the regular course. For a term he taught school, but after that steadily gave all his time and study to business affairs. He resumed his business career as clerk in the store of B. J. Dyer & Company at Fulton. Within less than two years he had mastered all the details of the business and was regarded as an expert in many departments. After his services had been ultilized by another store at Fulton he returned to the Dyer establishment as part owner and subsequently bought the store where he had worked as clerk a few years before, and under the name Francis E. Bacon & Company made this one of the most flourishing commercial houses of the town. He gave it all his time and attention after the withdrawing from B. J. Dyer & Company. Through overwork his health became impaired and he had to give up the management of the store in 1894.
In the meantime, however, he had acquired many other interests in Fulton. He was interested in the leather and lumber business, was also president of the Fulton Machine Works and vice-president of the First National Bank of that city. After a period of recuperation Mr. Bacon established a department store at the city of Syracuse. With a former partner, Mr. Chappell, he organized the firm Bacon, Chappell & Com- pany. While the amount of capital at the outset was not large and the firm was content with modest quarters, the business expanded and pros- pered until eventually it became one of the largest and most complete stores of its kind in western New York. Mr. Bacon continued his financial interests in this store until the summer of 1912, when he sold out. The purchaser was, by an interesting coincidence, a man named Dyer, though he was in no way related to the first employer of Mr. Bacon.
In the meantime, on account of ill health and long continued activity, Mr. Bacon had given up his personal supervision of business affairs in Syracuse in 1910 and had come to Los Angeles, where he had visited several years previously. Los Angeles has since been his home, though he has sought here no outlet for his business energies.
Mr. Bacon became a resident of Syracuse in 1895. He forthwith became a constructive factor in developing a city which when he went there had only two paved streets. As president of the Syracuse Chamber of Commerce he led in many movements for municipal improvement and the increase of its commercial importance. During the five years he was
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president of the Chamber there was a continual campaign in the interest of Syracuse, and that city became the home of many manufacturing in- stitutions and today it is one of the big industrial centers of the east. Mr. Bacon headed the delegation of local citizens who went to Washington and secured the appropriation of money for a new Federal building. Through his administration the Syracuse Chamber of Commerce became one of the most effective institutions of its kind in the country. For four years he was its representative at the annual meetings of the National Board of Trade and was a member of the Council of the latter organi- zation. As a prominent merchant and citizen of Syracuse he entertained at his home many distinguished visitors, including Presidents McKinley and Roosevelt, and a number of men only less well known in the country's history. Mr. Bacon brought about the organization of the Associated Charities of Syracuse, was its president and was also president of the Syracuse Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children. He twice declined the nomination for mayor of Syracuse. While a resident of Fulton he was for fifteen years a member of its Board of Education and for eight years president, and also served two years as president of the Oswego County Sunday School Association. He was very active as a trustee and builder of the First Methodist Episcopal church of Fulton and also led the campaigns for building funds for the church at Syracuse. Mr. Bacon is a member of the Citizens Club of Syracuse, is affiliated with the Masonic Order and belongs to the Los Angeles Athletic Club, and to the Sons of the American Revolution.
In 1872, at Lyons, New York, he married Miss Gertrude P. Andrews. On July 3, 1902, at Clifton Springs, New York, he married Miss Cora May Hiscox. Mr. Bacon is now living in Berkely Square, Los Angeles.
JOHN JOSEPH HAGGARTY is the creator and author of one of the most conspicuous successes in Los Angeles commercial life. Many wealthy men have come to the city and increased their holdings by judicious business operations, and others have become wealthy in the speculative field. John J. Haggarty came equipped not so much with capital as with a thorough knowledge of business, particularly the ladies' garment busi- ness, and his subsequent success has been almost entirely due to the rapid development of a great mercantile service.
A native of England, he was born in London May 25, 1864, son of John and Elizabeth Ann (Atkinson) Haggarty. As a youth he was given a good education in the public schools of London and a private boarding school at Richmond in Yorkshire. Leaving school at the age of nineteen, he sought an opportunity to develop as a specialist in busi- ness. In 1883 he apprenticed himself to William Bryer & Company, a leading dry goods establishment in King William street, London. The four years he spent there were exceptionally busy ones and had much to do with the solid foundation of experience that was the basis of his later career. Having completed his apprentice term he sailed for Ameri- ca in 1887, and going to St. Louis found employment with the Nigent Brothers, dry goods merchants. He was with them about four years, chiefly as a buyer in the garment department. It was in this work that he had specialized, and largely as a buyer he has made his mark in the commercial world. For another two years he was assistant buyer for Scruggs, Vandervourt & Barney of St. Louis, and in 1893 went to Du- luth, Minnesota, to become buyer for the Silverstein & Bondy Company.
Ifagparty
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He was a resident of that northern city nine years, and firmly estab- lished himself as a factor in its business affairs.
Mr. Haggarty came to Los Angeles in 1902 and for three and a half years was buyer and manager in the garment department of Jacoby Brothers. He proved a valuable man to that house, building up a tre- mendous business in his special line, and on resigning he took the money he had saved to start on a small scale as an independent merchant. While he had limited capital he had unlimited enterprise, faith in the future, and it was not difficult for a man of his ability to get liberal back- ing from the big wholesale and jobbing houses. His first store he named the New York Cloak and Suit House, an incorporated company, of which he was president and chief stockholder. Due to the personality of the man at its head the business never occupied an obscure place in the Los Angeles business district, and in a short time its sales aggre- gated over a million dollars a year. The success of this store led Mr. Haggarty to extend its activities and acquire the controlling interest of another large house known as the Paris Cloak and Suit House. This has been equally successful with the original store.
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