Cross Country American Photograph Album: Oak Bar, Castello, Yrkea, Los Angeles (California) Withrop (Massachusetts) Detroit (Michigan), St. Louis, Augusta and Kirkwood (Missouri), 1903 - 1905

Los Angeles: No Publisher, 1903. 8" x 6" Photograph Album. Perfect bound black cloth over stiff boards; intact glycine sheets separate each of the grey craft-paper leaves. 48 black and white sepia toned photos. (Not included in that number is one page of miniature photo proofs cut in strips pasted in; as well as several smaller sections of proofs laid in). Many of the album pages include the notation of dates and place names. This album seems to document a family on its travels over a period of time dating from July 4, 1903 to August 1905, from New England to St. Louis and California, visiting family and friends on more than one occasion. Locations include: Winthrop MA, a beach community and popular vacation destination at the turn of the century. It is interesting to note that the Winthrop Yacht Club was established in 1902, only one year before the dated photographs; at the time of these photographs, the Yacht Club had 291 members – and is in existence to this day. Waterworks Park, Detroit (the family likely traveled by way of Detroit on its way to St. Louis) Missouri: St. Louis, Augusta, and Kirkwood Missouri (including photographs taken at Meramec Highlands, a turn of the century health spa and resort on the bluffs of the Meramec River west of Kirkwood, Missouri). Various locations in California include: Oak Bar, Castello, Yreka (a gold rush boomtown established in 1851), and Los Angeles. Photographs of Los Angeles include: Westlake Park (now MacArthur Park) built in the 1880s; As well as several photographs taken on the grounds of the estate of Paul de Longpré; a French artist known for his floating floral paintings. de Longpré established his reputation as a painter after moving to New York in the 1890s. In 1899 de Longpré created a sensation when he relocated to Los Angeles and, in 1901, built a landmark Mission Revival style residence on his three-acre estate. The house included an art gallery to sell prints of his paintings, and was surrounded by the expansive "Le Roi de Fleur" flower gardens. Tours of the Paul de Longpré estate became a popular tourist destination and the Paul de Longpré estate is credited as being Hollywood's first tourist attraction. (INQUIRE ABOUT ADDITIONAL PICTURES)