2601 Dalton Avenue


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  • Built in 1907 on Lot 15 in Block 4 of the Charles Victor Hall Tract by real estate dealer William H. Young as his own home
  • Architect: Frank M. Tyler, who was in his early 20s when he began designing and who would go on to create numerous frame residences in Los Angeles during the first four decades of the 1900s, many of them significant and still standing. He practiced both independently and in connection with Tyler & Company, a family real estate development firm in which investor Marcus S. Tyler was partnered with his sons Walter, Bernard, Frank, and, in time, his youngest son, Arthur
  • William Young's 1907 house was not the first to sit on the northerly end of Lot 15 in Block 4 of the Charles Victor Hall Tract; the first appears to have been built by real estate investor Emma G. Gillingham between late 1903 and September 1904, when, after the two-week ownership of an interim party, Young acquired its lot in the name of his wife Stella C. Young. Young proceeded to subdivide the original lot—150 feet along Dalton Avenue with 50 feet of Adams Street frontage—and, instead of building on the lot's new southerly 50-by-60 site, moved the earlier house on to it


The 1907 Sanborn fire insurance map, compiled just as the lot holding 2601 Dalton Avenue was being
reconfigured, depicts the first house on the site having been moved south on the property; the
new residence is depicted at the northerly end with the designation 2605 despite this
being out of sequence (house numbering in Los Angeles was divided north/
south at First Street, east/west at Main Street). By the end of the
year the new building was given the number 2601
Dalton, the relocated house 2611.


  • On October 20, 1906, the Department of Buildings issued W. H. Young a permit to relocate the first 2601 Dalton Avenue, with Arthur Pefley cited as the contractor in charge of the re-siting; this became 2611 Dalton Avenue and was soon purchased by Amanda Leonard and her daughter Ida, a speech teacher at the Cumnock School of Expression. Mrs. Leonard died in 1915; Ida Leonard remained in the house until 1942, when she moved to another relocated house at 311 South Irving Boulevard in Windsor Square. 2611 Dalton Avenue remains standing, if altered, as seen here below
  • On December 2, 1906, the Los Angeles Herald reported that Frank M. Tyler was preparing plans for Mrs. W. H. Young for a new seven-room house on the northerly 80 feet of Lot 15 in Block 4 of the Charles Victor Hall Tract
  • On January 2, 1907, the Department of Buildings issued Stella C. Young a permit for a new house on the site of 2601 Dalton Avenue under the temporary designation of 2605, despite the building being to the north of the relocated residence. The document does not mention Frank M. Tyler by name—it should be noted that building department permits were filled out by hand for decades and were often incomplete—but cites Arthur Pefley as the contractor
  • On August 3, 1921, the Department of Buildings issued William H. Young a permit to build a 10-by-18-foot garage on the property; this document was issued using the address 1836 West Adams Street
  • The Youngs stayed at 2601 Dalton Avenue until 1923, when they bought a newly built house at 249 South Arden Boulevard in the Windsor Heights addition to Windsor Square (the house's initial address was 249 South Vine, that street between Third Street and Melrose being renamed by 1924; it was demolished by the Marlborough School in 1999)
  • The family of William H. Young, who died in 1938, appears to have retained ownership of 2601 Dalton Avenue as income property until 1947; Stella Young herself appears on 1946 voter rolls at the address. After a brief rental in 1924 to August J. Hartfield, president of the Pacific Gas Radiator Company, 2601 would be occupied long-term from 1926 by piano teacher Glenn Rouse Waterman and his wife Adelaide, as well as, until her death in January 1933, her mother Nancy Smith. Waterman appears to have had his piano studio in the house, with access from Adams Boulevard. The Watermans remained at 2601 until 1943, when they moved to an apartment on Gramercy Place in the Wilshire District
  • On May 8, 1947, the Department of Building and Safety issued the new owner of 2601 Dalton Avenue, Stanley Smith, a permit to re-side the house
  • On July 22, 1953, the Department of Building and Safety issued the new owner of 2601 Dalton Avenue, Minnie M. Glover, a permit for changes to the Adams Boulevard elevation of the house. The document called for the removal of two original bay windows (depicted on the 1907 Sanborn insurance map) for replacement by a new concrete stoop and steps (as well as for repairs to the brick foundation under the front porch). It appears that the two Adams-side exterior doors existing today, entrances to professional offices such as Glenn Waterman's piano studio, were already in place. The house does not ever seem to have been classed as a multi-unit dwelling
  • Minnie M. Glover remained at 2601 Dalton Avenue until 1960, with various parties being associated with the address into the 1970s
  • On November 13, 1975, the Department of Building and Safety issued the Jer-Merl Investment Corporation, an entity founded in 1959 by Jerry and Merle Hodges, a permit to stucco the exterior of 2601 Dalton Avenue
  • The family of Lloyd H. Williams Jr. has owned 2601 Dalton Avenue in recent decades; an apparent family member, Lisa C. Green, was issued a permit by the Department of Building and Safety on June 19, 2017, for the installation of a new roof




The Adams Boulevard façade of 2601 Dalton Avenue was
redesigned to provide entrances to professional offices. The first
house addressed 2601 Dalton was moved south on its lot in 1906, where it
remains today addressed 2611, as seen below. It is unclear as to why W. H.
Young chose to go to the trouble of relocating the building rather than
erecting his new house on the southerly portion of the parcel.




Illustrations: Private Collection; LOC