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 III > Part 15
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In 1909 Miss Woodward founded a novel and unique institution called "The California School of Artistic Whistling." After coming from the East to Los Angeles she occupied her time teaching privately and continuing her studies along constructive lines, specializing on bird notes. From both parents came her unusual musical ability.
Miss Woodward was graduated from the schools of Tecumseh, Michigan, and the Thomas Normal Training School of Music of Detroit. She also spent two years in vocal training and vocal sight reading at the Detroit Conservatory. of Music. She has whistled since she was thirteen, but did not take special training along this line until after she had been a student at the Detroit Conservatory. For some time her · work was directed by an instructor who taught whistling in plain tones, staccato scales, etc. However, this artist's talent is largely native and self-developed, and particularly her bird tones, which she has learned from the birds of California singing to her from the tree tops. Her finest notes are derived from the songs of the mocking bird and the meadow lark .. She has acquired many trills and warbles which she has reproduced and adapted to musical selections. Each piece of music is
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especially marked by her with characters and appropriate names, a few of them being here noted: Chirps, reverses, hewies, whitchas, hedalas, cudalees, echews, lupees, thrupees, quittas, quitchaquias, etc.
Miss Woodward has the only whistling school in America and the only whistling chorus. Both are original ideas, and the latter has proven a star attraction at many conventions and entertainments. Her school enrolls pupils from nearly every state in the Union, and from Canada and far-off New Zealand.
In 1912 was held at Los Angeles "The Land Show Beautiful of America," which lasted two weeks. Miss Woodward, with her chorus of forty young ladies, was one of the leading features. Creatore's Band and a large chorus trained by Thomas Taylor Drill were the other musical attractions. At the close of the show Miss Woodward was presented with a gold medal by the Realty Board of Los Angeles.
The Los Angeles Times has said of her: "Miss Woodward is a past master of the art of whistling and gave some delicately pretty numbers." The well-known Pacific Coast Impresario Behymer (to quote only one other of the many press notices) said: "As an exponent of the art of whistling, I consider Miss Agnes Woodward one of the finest in the country. Her pupils whistle with brilliancy, sweetness and artistic finish. It is a privilege to recommend her as a teacher and her pupils as competent to appear on any program."
PERCY VERNON HAMMON is a Los Angeles lawyer of established practice and influential connections and has been a resident of Cali- fornia since 1895.
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He was born at Spring Hill, Iowa, August 28, 1873, son of John Calhoun and Emma E. (Studley) Hammon. When he was a boy his parents moved to Kansas and he acquired his education in the public schools of that State. He graduated from the Topeka High School with the class of 1895, and in the same year came to California. After some varied experiences, and some active participation in local pol tics, Mr. Hammon took up the study of law, and graduated in 1907 with the degree LL.B. from the University of Southern California. He was admitted to the California bar by the District Court of Appeals for the Second District of Los Angeles in 1906, and to the United States Circuit and District Courts for the Southern District of California the same year. From 1907 he has been professor of criminal law and criminal procedure in the State University of Southern California Law School.
Mr. Hammon served as a member of the Board of Education of Los Angeles from 1903 to 1905, as a member of the City Council from 1905 to 1907, and represented the seventy-fifth district in the State Assembly from 1907 to 1910. In 1907 he was appointed deputy district attorney of Los Angeles County. He is now engaged in the general practice of law with offices in the Investment Building.
Mr. Hammon is affiliated with the Masons, Lodge No. 99, of the Elks, Knights of Pythias, Modern Woodmen of America, and is a member of the City Club, Los Angeles County Bar Association and Cali- fornia State Bar Association. In politics he is a republican, April 22, 1908, he married Miss Mabel Lenore Adams.
HERMAN HEINSCH was a really notable figure in Los Angeles business circles in the pioneer period of the city. He 'came to Los Angeles in 1857, when there was little here except the foundation laid
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during the Spanish and Mexican regime. He was a good business man, was prosperous in his affairs, did much to develop the city in a building way, and had many traits and characteristics that made him fast friends among the old timers.
He was born in Launberg, Prussia, in 1834, and left Germany when about nineteen years of age to escape the burdens of military con- scription and service. He lived in London several months before com- ing to the United States. He landed at New York and when he came to Los Angeles he came by the way of Panama.
While in his native land he had become proficient in music and the languages, and throughout his business career he was known as a man of broad culture. At Los Angeles he engaged in the harness and saddlery business, an industry continued after his death by one of his sons.
In 1869 he erected the Heinsch Building at the corner of Com- mercial and Los Angeles streets. As late as 1876 this was in the shop- ping district. The old building is still standing after half a century, though no longer owned by the Heinsch heirs. Herman Heinsch and Dr. Joseph Kurtz also erected the brick building opposite the Baker block on South Main street, and this property has since been sold by the family. He owned several other valuable pieces of property in Los Angeles.
After a prosperous career Mr. Heinsch passed away at Los Angeles, January 13, 1883, at the age of forty-nine. He married in Los Angeles, March 8, 1863, Miss Mary Happ. She died April 14, 1907, aged sixty- three. Mr. Heinsch was a member of the old California Club when the club rooms were in the Baker Block on South Main street.
He was the father of four children: Herman W., who died in New York City in October, 1906, at the age of forty-three, having been born in that city in 1863, and having succeeded his father in the saddlery and harness business. Theresa M. Dorris, wife of Charles W. Dorris, of San Francisco; R. C. Heinsch, a sketch of whose career follows; and Martha F., wife of G. H. Wigmore, of Los Angeles.
RUDOLPH CHARLES HEINSCH is son of the late Herman Heinsch, one of the interesting pioneers and business builders of Los Angeles, whose career is sketched above. A native of Los Angeles, Rudolph Charles Heinsch has had an active business career of more than thirty years, and is now head of the R. C. Heinsch & Company, general insur- ance, with offices in the Haas Building at Los Angeles.
He was born August 5, 1867, graduated from the Los Angeles High School in 1884, and also took the mining course at the University of Nevada. He entered business as an employe of Wells Fargo & Com- pany, express, and was with that corporation nearly twenty years in Nevada and San Francisco. For some years he had charge of the express messengers on the road, and eventually became Wells Fargo agent at Virginia City, Nevada. His business required his residence at San Francisco from 1896 to 1899, and from the latter date until 1907 he was in Nevada.
Returning to Los Angeles in 1907, Mr. Heinsch engaged in busi- ness as an insurance man. From 1909 to 1911 he was associated with the late Sidney A. Butler, and after that was president of the Heinsch- Butler Company until. 1914. Since the latter year his business has been conducted as R. C. Heinsch & Company, of which he is manager and proprietor. He has an organization with splendid facilities for
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service for fire, automobile, burglary, accident and other lines of insur- ance, and fidelity and contractors' bonds.
Mr. Heinsch is a republican voter, a Royal Arch Mason and an Elk.
August 31, 1896, at San Francisco, he married Marie Chonita Martin, daughter of Robert and Margaret A. Martin. Her father came to California in 1849, and for many years was a rancher. Her mother who came to this state in 1853 is still living, a resident of Los Angeles. Mr. and Mrs. Heinsch have one son, Rupert Lloyd Heinsch, who is associated with his father in the general insurance business. He was born at San Francisco and was educated in the Los Angeles High School and the Leland Stanford University. In July, 1915, he married Esther Runyan Stevens, daughter of Henry J. and Florence Runyon Stevens. They have one daughter, Virginia, born in Los Angeles.
BRADNER WELLS LEE. While he has never sought nor held an elective or remunerative public office during his residence in California for forty years, there are few of the larger and more important move- ments in the life and affairs of Los Angeles and this part of the state with which Bradner Wells Lee has not been identified in some character- istically forceful and influential manner. He long since attained an impregnable position as a lawyer and his time and talents have been generously bestowed upon many phases of the public welfare.
Mr. Lee was born at East Groveland, New York, May 4, 1850, son of David Richard and Elizabeth Northrum (Wells) Lee. His great- grandfather, Thomas Lee, served with the rank of captain in the Fifth New York Continental Line during the war of the Revolution.
Educated in public schools and by private study in his native town, Mr. Lee prepared himself for the bar under the direction of his noted uncle, Colonel G. Wiley Wells, one of the most prominent lawyers in the South and long a leader in the bar of Los Angeles. Colonel Wells was for two terms United States district attorney for the Northern District of Mississippi, represented the Second Mississippi District in the Forty-fourth Congress, and was United States consul general at Shanghai, China. Mr. Lee pursued his studies in his uncle's office at Holly Springs, Mississippi, and was admitted to the bar in that state in 1871, and shortly afterwards was appointed assistant United States dis- trict attorney for Northern Mississippi. He held that office until 1879. In 1875, by direction of the United States attorney general, he was also acting United States district attorney, and in the same year was ad- mitted to the bar of the Supreme Court, District of Columbia.
Mr. Lee came to Los Angeles in March, 1879. He was admitted to practice in the State Supreme Court on the 30th of April in that year. For a time he was managing clerk in the law office of Brunson & Wells. In 1883 he became a member of the firm of Brunson, Wells & Lee, which two years later was changed to Wells, VanDyke & Lee. Successive changes in the membership made the firm Wells, Guthrie & Lee, Wells, Monroe & Lee, Wells & Lee, and it became Wells, Works & Lee in 1896 upon the entry of Judge John D. Works, late United States senator from California. Ill health compelled the retirement of Colonel Wells in 1896, after which the firm was Works & Lee, and in 1901 it became Works, Lee & Works. In 1908 Mr. Lee withdrew to practice alone, but in 1912 associated with himself his two sons, Bradner W. Jr. and Kenyon F. Lee.
During all these years Mr. Lee has been associated with and actively participated in much of the important litigation involving water rights, corporations and other matters of a civil nature. He served as attorney
Braquer. MLee
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for the executor of the estate of E. J. (Lucky) Baldwin, who died in 1909, until the final settlement of the estate, one of the largest ever probated in California. The estate was settled in 1913. Mr. Lee was a director and general counsel of the City and County Bank of Los Angeles from its organization in 1908 to 1913. He was a director and vice president of the Murphy Oil Company for several years and has been its general counsel since organization. In 1887 he was admitted to the United States Circuit Court, and the following year to the United States District Court, and in 1914 to the United States Supreme Court. In 1895 he declined an offer from Governor Pardee to appoint him to the Superior bench of Los Angeles County. Mr. Lee owns the largest pri- vate law library in the Southwest, known as the Wells Law Library of over six thousand volumes, formerly the property of his uncle, to which he has made many accessions.
As a member of the Chamber of Commerce since 1894, Mr. Lee served for many years on its Law and its Harbor Committee, from 1910 to 1915 he was director and chairman of the Law Committee, and its second vice president in 1916.
In 1911 he was chairman of the Citizens Committee, composed of a hundred business and professional men, and led the campaign of that year which defeated the attempt of the Socialist party to gain control of the city government. He was a member of the Municipal Conference Committee and Executive Committee in the mayoralty campaign of 1913; also member of the Republican State Central Committee from 1916 to 1920.
Despite his aversion to office holding, Mr. Lee has long been reckoned as one of the most prominent republicans in California. He served as a delegate to the various republican state, county and city conventions from 1888 to 1910. He served as chairman of the Republican County Central Committee from 1896 to 1910; from 1902 to 1904 was member of the Executive Committee and the Campaign Committee of the Re- publican State Central Committee; in 1906 was chairman of the Los Angeles County Republican Convention, and in 1916 was elected and served as an alternate delegate to the National Republican Convention in Chicago.
Mr. Lee served continuously as a trustee of the California State Library from 1897 to 1917. In 1900 he was a delegate to the National Forestry and Irrigation Convention at Chicago. As a member of the American Bar Association he served on its General Council 1916-17, on its Local Council 1917-19, and as vice president from California 1919-20, and as a member of the National Conference of Commissioners on Uni- form State Laws 1916-20. He served on the Executive Committee 1917- 19, and was elected president for 1919-20 of the California State Bar Association. He is a member of the Los Angeles Bar Association, the Southwestern Society of the Archaeological Institute of America, the California Society Sons of the Revolution, which he served as director and treasurer 1894-1912, director and vice president 1912-13, and as president in 1913-15. He is a member of the New York Society of Southern California. A charter member of the California Commandery Order of Foreign Wars since 1896, he served as its judge advocate and also vice commander for several terms, and again as judge advocate in 1919. Mr. Lee is a charter member of the California Society of Colonial Wars, which he served as director, first historian, chairman of member- ship committee, chancellor from 1895, and as deputy governor in 1914-15, and as governor 1916-18. He is a member of the California Club, the
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Wiltshire Country Club, a member and former director of the Jonathan Club of Los Angeles, and a member of the Union League Club. He is a Knight Templar Mason, and Shriner, and a member of the Presby- terian Church.
At Philadelphia, October 16, 1883, he married Helena Farrar. Her father, Colonel William Humphrey Farrar, was descended from one of the oldest colonial families in Massachusetts, many of whose members achieved distinction in colonial and revolutionary affairs, at the bar, upon the bench, and as college professors. Colonel Farrar, who enjoyed a front rank among the bar of Washington city, received his legal train- ing under the distinguished lawyer and statesman, Hon. Daniel Webster and Hon. Caleb Cushing, former attorney general of the United States.
The two sons and only children of Mr. and Mrs. Lee have already been named. Both were educated at Harvard Military School, Stan- ford University and the University of Southern California Law School, and were admitted to the bar in 1912. At that time they became asso- ciated with their father in practice.
Bradner W. Lee Jr., immediately after the declaration of war with Germany, enrolled in the Naval Militia of California, receiving a com- mission as ensign, and with that organization was ordered into active service with the United States Navy, departing for San Francisco during the first week in April, 1917. There he was enrolled in the navy as a National Naval Volunteer officer, and immediately detached from his command and assigned to duty as an ensign on the Destroyer Paul Jones, which proceeded to sea and through the Panama Canal, joining the Atlantic fleet in July following. This destroyer was actively engaged in convoy and patrol duty in Atlantic waters throughout the war. By act of Congress, the National Naval Volunteers were transferred to the Naval Reserves, Class 2. He was promoted to lieutenant (junior grade) with rank from July 1. 1918, serving on the same ship twenty- seven months until July 1, 1919, when he was released to inactive duty, being then executive officer, in which capacity he had served for several months. He returned to his home, resuming his professional duties in the firm, but is still an officer in the United States Naval Reserve, subject to call whenever needed.
WALTER R. STEVENSON. The entire Los Angeles bar felt a sense of loss at the death of Walter R. Stevenson, who in a few brief years had formed splendid connections with the professional and civic life of the city and had earned some of the more substantial honors of the law.
He was born at Omaha, Nebraska, November 8, 1892, son of George W. and Agnes (Elstro) Stevenson. George W. Stevenson was born in Wayne county, Indiana, March 1, 1858. He represented an old and prominent family of eastern Indiana. His ancestry went back to George Stevenson, who was born in 1757, and with five of his brothers served in one company in the war of the revolution. George Stevenson located in Wayne County, Indiana, in 1807, when that was part of the extreme western frontier. He was the great-grandfather of George W. Steven- son, father of the Los Angeles lawyer. George W. Stevenson after a public school education learned the carpenter's trade and also engaged in farming. In 1903 he came to Los Angeles and followed his trade in this city until 1917, when he removed to Riverside, where he has since continued farming. He and his wife had seven children.
Walter H. Stevenson first attended school in Wayne County, Indi- ana, and was eleven years of age when brought to Los Angeles by his
Feira a. Crister.
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parents. He graduated from high school in 1913 and then entered the University of Southern California, graduating LL. B. in June, 1916. He entered active practice and in April, 1917, formed an association with Judge Waldo York. Mr. Stevenson was attorney for the Children's Home Society and secretary of the City Club; a member of the Uni- versity Club and the Union League Club; a progressive republican and a member of the Baptist church of Hollywood.
December 26, 1914, at Los Angeles, he married Henriette Gill, daughter of Thomas H. Gill, who came to Los Angeles in 1880, and for nearly forty years has been a successful building contractor. Mr .. and Mrs. Stevenson have two children, Robert, born in 1916, and Carl, born in 1918.
MONROE H. CONLEE is a native son of California, is widely known ‹ as a successful court reporter and as an instructor in the art of short- hand reporting.
Mr. Conlee was born at Santa Ana, California, April 12, 1878, son of James R. and Hattie E. (Straw) Conlee. His father came to Cali- fornia in 1871 as a Methodist minister. In 1884 he resigned his pas- torate and engaged in newspaper work, in which he remained until he retired in 1913.
At the very beginning of his school career, Monroe H. Conlee attended the Los Angeles public schools. After three years' of high school work he entered the Polytechnic High School. From Polytechnic he was engaged by the Official Reporters of the Superior Court as an amanuensis, and soon developed such proficiency in the art of phonog- raphy that he has made it his life profession. For two years (1900-01) he served under Civil Service in the United States Navy Department at Mare Island. Subsequently (December 1, 1902) he was appointed official reporter of the Superior Court of Los Angeles County by Judge Waldo M. York, which position he still holds.
Obviously twenty years of work and experience constitute Mr. Con- lee an authority on many branches of commercial practice, especially in the technique of shorthand writing and verbatim reporting. From Mr. Conlee's private instruction classes have come many expert law stenog- raphers, successful amanu.nses in state and county service, and several shorthand reporters. His private instruction classes are conducted at the Modern Business College, Rooms 308-320 Byrne Building, corner of Third and Broadway, Tuesday and Friday evenings.
Mr. Conle is a member of Sunset Lodge, F. & A. M., of Ramona Parlor, Native Sons of the Golden West, Knights of the Maccabees, California Shorthand Reporters Association, of which he is a past presi- dent, and National Shorthand Reporters Association. He is also a mem- ber of the Union League Club, and is a republican in politics.
August 4, 1903, at Los Angeles, he married Miss Mabel Stone. They have four children: Waldo Monroe, born in 1906; Keith Stone, born in 1909, both of these sons being students in the public schools of South Pasadena; and Catherine and Jeanette, twins, born November 20, 1916.
LEWIS ALLEN CRISLER SR. came to the West from Cincinnati, Ohio, in 1899, and to Los Angeles, California, in 1901. Engaging in the stock and bond business in 1906, he became a member of the Los Angeles- Nevada Stock Exchange. In 1909 this stock exchange was dissolved and he then became a member of the Los Angeles Stock Exchange, on whose Board of Governors he has served for a number of years.
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Mr. Crisler is a descendant of a large number of the first families of Culpeper County, Dominion of Virginia, also of some of the oldest and most prominent New England colonial families, amongst whom the following were some of the founders: William Leverich, who received the degrees of A. B. and A. M. at Emanuel College, Cambridge, Eng- land, in 1625-1629, coming from London to Salem, Massachusetts, in the ship James, October 10, 1633. Joseph Reeder I, who came from London, England, to Newton Township, Long Island, in 1650. Hugh Tingle, who came in the ship "Supply" from Whitby, England, to Somer- set County, Maryland, in 1668. Francis Gano (Ganeaux), who came from France to New Rochelle, New York, in 1686, and Captain Nathaniel Britton (Colonial Wars), who was in Richmond County, Staten Island, in 1679, from England, and also Lieutenant Christopher Zimmerman (Colonial Wars), who came from Alsace to the Dominion of Virginia in 1717. All of Mr. Crisler's immigrant ancestors came to America some years prior to the Revolutionary war.
He was born in Morris, Grundy County, Illinois, August 29, 1878, later moving with his parents to Chicago, Illinois, and then to Cincin- nati, Ohio.
The Crisler family is now in the seventh generation in America. The first generation was represented by Deobold Christler (Colonial Wars), who came to the Dominion of Virginia from Saxony about 1717, and died in Culpeper County, Virginia, in 1776. He married Rosina Gaar, born in Bavaria, August 11, 1713. She came to the Dominion of Virginia in 1732 with her parents, Andreas Gar, a weaver (born June 14, 1685), and Eve Seidelmann.
The second generation: Leonard Christler (Revolutionary war) was born in Virginia and ched in Boone County, Kentucky, in 1824. He married Margaret Clore in Virginia. She was the daughter of John Clore and Dorothy Cafer.
Third generation: Lewis Crisler was born in Madison County, Virginia, June 1, 1773, and died in Shelby County, Indiana, May 19, 1843. He married his second wife, Mary (Polly) Zimmerman, August 18, 1806, in Boone County, Kentucky. She was born April 4, 1778, in Culpeper County, Virginia, and was the daughter of Christopher Zim- merman III (Revolutionary war) and Mary Tanner.
Benjamin Allen Crisler of the fourth generation was born in Boone County, Kentucky, February 21, 1815, and died in Chicago, Illinois, October 18, 1896. He married Elizabeth Anne French, in Shelby County, Indiana, October 18, 1835. She was the daughter of Daniel French (born August 9, 1791, in New Jersey, and married February 25, 1819) and Amy Tingle (born May 10, 1798, in Warren County, Ohio), and was born in Lebanon, Ohio, April 18, 1820, and died at Chicago, Illinois, November 6, 1899.
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