[Californiana] Manuscript Letter by Sarah "Ada" Hall-Bacon-Jackson re the Long Beach, California Earthquake

Pasadena, California, 1933. Very Good. [Californiana] Manuscript Letter by Sarah "Ada" Hall-Bacon-Jackson re the Long Beach, California Earthquake, Pasadena, California, 1933, 8.5 x 11 inches, 5 pp.

Five pages of onion skin paper; ink bright and legible; light to moderate toning; minor edge wear. Overall very good condition.

One-of-a-kind manuscript letter written by Sarah "Ada" (or "Ida") Hall-Bacon-Jackson, the daughter of Captain William Henry Harrison Hall, from a collection of photographs, letters, and ephemera from the prominent Hall and Bacon families of Chelsea, Vermont. This manuscript is not signed; however, the handwriting matches that of S. Ada Hall-Bacon-Jackson's manuscript autograph found on the reverse of a photo of her, contained in the collection.

A unique item for any California collector, this letter contains a wealth of information on the 133 Long Beach, California earthquake. S. Ada Hall-Bacon-Jackson was living in Pasadena at the time, and describes her own experience of the quake, including what she heard on the radio. From the manuscript: "At six o'clock on the afternoon of Friday, March 10, there came to Pasadena, the sharpest earthquake shock many of us had ever experienced in this city...beyond being somewhat startlingly surprised, we thought not much of it until news began to come over the radio that buildings in Los Angeles had been damaged and... that San Pedro was more damaged, had two dead, the place was under martial law." This vivid firsthand account of the 1933 earthquake and its aftermath continues throughout the letter. Hall-Bacon-Jackson goes on to write that "in Long Beach the most damage was done. Many buildings were demolished, people were made homeless and fires were raging in a way to remind the radio reporter who was in San Francisco at the time of the fire that followed its earthquake in 1906, of that fire, although the latter was worse than this one... We were told that the hospitals were working to capacity, that some of the walls of one had fallen, leaving the patients exposed to view and to the chilling night air...".