Banning House

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Banning House in August 2008

The Banning House or General Phineas Banning Residence Museum is a historic home of the Greek revival in the district of Wilmington in Los Angeles , California . Built in 1863 by Phineas Banning , it remained in the possession of the Banning family until 1925 and has belonged to the City of Los Angeles since 1927. The house, the stable and the gardens are now operated as a museum. The property has been designated a city, state, and national historic landmark.

History and architecture

The Banning House was designed by Phineas Banning. It originally had 30 rooms, some of which were later merged, so that the house now has 24 rooms and has been cited as one of the best examples of Greek Revival architecture in the West. Banning recruited shipbuilders, blacksmiths, carpenters, and artisans to build clippers calling at Wilmington Harbor. Banning patronized the ship's captains while they were in Wilmington, encouraging them to stay in port and seal leaks in the ships with La Brea tar . Banning repeated the warnings about leaky hulls over and over again - until his property was completed after three years in 1864.

The house marked a departure from the adobe-built haciendas that had dominated Southern California until then and became a much-visited place. During Banning's life, parties - Banning called them "festive entertainment" - were held here, attended by senators, congressmen, governors, dignitaries of foreign nations, ship captains, army officers and business leaders. The curator of today's museum notes in his collection of the history of the house that Banning's residence “no other residence in all of California more fully represented the horse-drawn era than the Banning Manson, where for decades Phineas entertained the elite of the social, economic and political world ".

Banning arrived in Los Angeles in 1851 and built a successful transportation company operating ships, railroads, and stagecoach services from Wilmington to Los Angeles, San Bernardino , and Fort Yuma . He founded Wilmington in 1858, which he named after his hometown Wilmington (in Delaware) and built the first railroad in Los Angeles, the Los Angeles and San Pedro Railroad, in 1858. Banning pushed through the construction of a breakwater in the port of Los Angeles and is generally considered to be its spiritual father. Banning often watched the ships arriving with goods from the fourth floor of his house. In 1867 and 1869 he was elected to the state assembly in California. Banning lived in his home for over twenty years until he suddenly died in 1885 at the age of only 53 when he was run over by a carriage while visiting San Francisco .

Museum operation

After Phineas Banning's death, Hancock Banning maintained the house until 1894; it remained in the family until 1925. In 1927 the City of Los Angeles bought the property and house to create a park for the residents of Wilmington. In 1934 the Los Angeles Board of Park Commissioners proposed that the house be restored and the Banning family donated much of the earlier furniture and fittings. By film studios such as Twentieth-Century Fox, Warner Brothers and Paramount wallpapers were donated, the appearance of which corresponded to the time of the Civil War . After restoration, the house was formally inaugurated in 1936 in the presence of Governor Frank Merriam , Senator William Gibbs McAdoo and Mayor Frank L. Shaw , and opened to the public in 1938. When the United States entered World War II , the house was closed in 1941 and only reopened in 1952.

The museum operates as the General Phineas Banning Residence Museum. In addition to the furniture, the museum has a photo exhibition in the basement that shows the life of the Banning family and the history of the harbor and Wilmington. In the former stable there is a comprehensive exhibition of 19th century stagecoaches. Eucalyptus trees grow in the gardens , which are said to have been the first of their kind planted in California, and wisteria planted in the late 19th century .

Monument protection

The park with the Banning House and the stable was raised to California Historic Landmark # 147 in 1935 . After the Los Angeles Cultural Heritage Commission was established in 1962 , the property was one of the first to be designated a Historic Cultural Monument in October 1963 (HCM # 25). On May 6, 1971, it was the sixth property in Los Angeles to be entered as a monument on the National Register of Historic Places .

See also

Individual evidence

  1. ^ A b c Mary Lou Loper: A Fixer-Upper With a Past, Future (English) , Los Angeles Times. January 29, 1976. 
  2. ^ Camilla Snyder: Banning Residence Restored: Living with History (English) , Los Angeles Herald-Examiner. April 18, 1977. " the house is one of the best examples of Greek Revival architecture in the west " 
  3. ↑ General Banning House Museum ( English ) University of Southern California. Archived from the original on January 21, 2013. Retrieved August 31, 2008: " the finest extant example of Greek revival style in Southern California "
  4. ↑ a b c The General Phineas Banning Residence Museum ( English , PDF; 240 kB) Los Angeles City Recreation and Parks Department. Retrieved August 31, 2008: " The House is built in the Greek Revival style and is considered the best extant nineteenth century in Southern California "
  5. ↑ a b Beverly Bubar: The Banning Mansion (English) , The Shoreline. May 1977. 
  6. ↑ Gen. Phineas Banning: Death of a Pioneer of Los Angeles County (English) , Los Angeles Times. March 10, 1885. 
  7. ^ A b c Juana Neal Levy: California History: Dedication Planned for Banning Home: Antique Structure to Serve as Museum for Storing Memories of Days of Western Pioneers (English) , Los Angeles Times. May 31, 1936. 
  8. ↑ Banning Project lauded: Proposal to Restore Old Homestead at Wilmington Acclaimed by Many at State (English) , Los Angeles Times. February 22, 1934. 
  9. ↑ Early Home to Be Shrine: Historic Dwelling to Become Depository for Heirlooms of Southland (English) , Los Angeles Times. January 26, 1936. 
  10. ↑ a b Landmark Plan Made: Ceremony on June 6 Will Be Attended by High Officials of State (English) , Los Angeles Times. May 7, 1936. 
  11. ↑ Historic Home Opens Today: Reception and Tea in Banning House Planned by Women (English) , Los Angeles Times. June 11, 1938. 
  12. ↑ Old Banning Home Reopens in Wilmington (English) , Los Angeles Times. March 31, 1952. 
  13. ^ A b Historic Banning Home Named State Monument: 99-year-old Home of Wilmington Founder Long Served for Civic, Business Gatherings (English) , Los Angeles Times. October 21, 1963. 
  14. ↑ Banning Park Historic Landmark (English) , State of California Office of Historic Preservation. Archived from the original on May 27, 2011. Retrieved February 16, 2011. 
  15. ↑ Entry in the National Register Information System . National Park Service , accessed May 20, 2016

Web links

Commons : Banning House  - collection of pictures, videos and audio files

Coordinates: 33 ° 47 ′ 25 "  N , 118 ° 15 ′ 26"  W.