133 S. Main St. Los Angeles, CA 90012 | map |
Opened: Mott's Hall was opened in 1886 by Thomas D. Mott on the west side of
the street between 1st and 2nd. The address used before street renumbering was 31 S. Main. It
was located over Mott's Market and there were reports of customers complaining of smells drifting up from below.
This postcard view looks south from 1st with the Natick House hotel on the corner on the right. Mott's is the building with
the three arched windows just behind the front of the streetcar. The Grand Opera House is the building on the left of the card flying the flag. Thanks to Brent Dickerson for
including the card in the Main St. Part 1 chapter of his epic "A Visit to Old Los Angeles."
Seating: About 500. It was a flat-floored hall with a stage at
one end that could be used for exhibitions and other events as well as
theatrical presentations. A shallow balcony wrapped around three sides
of the hall.
Many famous performers appeared here. In 1887 Charles Dickens Jr. gave a reading from his father's books. Noted soprano Adelina Patti performed, also in 1887. The space was also known as Armory Hall.
A detail from an 1888 Sanborn map in the Los Angeles Public Library
collection showing the second floor space as Armory Hall with the
building using 27-29-31 S. Main addresses.
The 1889 Agricultural Fair at Mott's Hall. Note the proscenium on the left of the image and the wrap-around balcony. It's a photo taken by Dewey,
147 S. Main St. Thanks to Noirish Los Angeles contributor Ethereal
Reality for spotting the photo on eBay and including it with his Noirish post #46893. In the post he also discusses an earlier Horticultural Hall. For more about the Horticultural Hall see Flying Wedge's Noirish post #46807.
Rented to the Chamber of Commerce: The Chamber took over the space in March 1890 and stayed until 1894. Mott's is discussed beginning on page 87 of Charles Dwight Willard's 1899 book "
A History of the Chamber of Commerce of Los Angeles..." The pages are included in the book's preview on Google Books. The book also has several photos of exhibits at the hall. Willard notes that the second floor that was taken over for a rent of $150 a month in addition to the main hall also included a smaller meeting room seating about 100 and offices, store rooms and packing rooms, seven in all. The first big show by the Chamber, also in March, was the Southern California Citrus Fair.
The Chamber of Commerce, founded in 1888, initially was on N. Main St.,
then at 1st and Fort (Broadway) as well as on Fort between 6th and 7th. After leaving Mott's in 1894 they moved to the Mason Building
on the southeast corner of Broadway and 4th. From 1903 until 1925 they
were in the Southwest Building at 138 S. Broadway.
An 1894 Sanborn map detail showing the hall's stage and wrap-around
balcony. Note the use of the newer addresses 129-131-133. Thanks to
Noirish Los Angeles contributor Flying Wedge for including the maps in his
Noirish post #46903.
Becoming a vaudeville house: In 1894 it got a remodel and became a vaudeville venue called the Imperial Theatre under the management of Jake Gottlob, Martin Lehman and Alfred Ellinghouse. Lehman went on to become part owner of the Orpheum circuit. Gottlob ended up as a noted theatre operator in San Francisco.
This article about the project appeared in the column "The Stage: Gossip in the
Wings" in the L.A. Times on September 16, 1894:
This additional news about the Imperial appeared in "The Stage: Gossip
in the Wings" column in the L.A. Times on September 23, 1894. Or, as they called it: the Imperial Music Hall:
"Imperial - The Society Vaudeville Theater." This was the opening day ad in the Times on September 23, 1894:
A review of the opening that appeared in the L.A. Times on September 25:
A review of the Imperial's second week program that was in the Times "At the Playhouses" column on October 2:
"An Immense Success From The Start." This is the ad that appeared in the Times on October 4, 1894:
Closing: It was evidently a short run. The Imperial isn't listed in the 1895 or 1896 city directories.
Later use: It's unknown what happened to the space immediately following its theatre use. By 1905 or so the upstairs had become the Hotel Monterey.
Status: The building was around at least until the mid 1930s but the
demolition date is unknown. The Police Department headquarters building
is now on the site.
The Mott Block and Market show as 129-133-133 on this detail from plate 003 of the 1921 Baist Real Estate Survey from Historic Map Works. That's 2nd at the bottom of the image and 1st across the middle. The theatre toward the upper left on 1st was the Princess.
Other theatrical action on the west side of the block included the Happy Hour Theatre at 125, in a storefront of the hotel building just north of Mott's. There was a Tally's Phonograph and Vitascope Parlor location at 137 S. Main, in the north storefront of the hotel building just south of Mott's. The map clearly shows the Grand Opera House on the east side of the street at 110. Also on that side was the Novelty Theatre at 136 S. Main, in the Hotel Forster Block.
The building in the movies in 1923: The Mott Building is at the top
of the frame in this shot from a chase across the roof near the end
of Harold Lloyd's "Safety Last!" (Hal Roach Studios / Pathé). Thanks to John Bengtson for the screenshot. His detective work figuring out the location is chronicled in the Silent Locations post "The nearly last - Safety Last - joke."
On the roof are Noah Young, playing a policeman, chasing
Bill Strother, who plays Lloyd's brother in the film. The intertitle
reads "I'll be right back -- Soon as I ditch this cop." John notes that
the camera was on the Higgins Building at the southwest corner of 2nd
and Main. See the
Historic L.A. Theatres in Movies post about "Safety Last!" for shots of other theatre buildings seen in the film.
A detail from a 1928 photo in Marc Wanamaker's
Bison Archives collection. Center left note the little stagehouse of Mott Hall sticking up at the back of the building. Thanks to John Bengtson for including the image in his Silent
Locations post "
The nearly last - Safety Last - joke." The Natick Hotel is in the upper left.
A c.1930 California Historical Society photo that appears on the
USC Digital Library website. We're looking north across 2nd St. The Mott building is down the block just beyond the center of the image. Thanks to John Bengtson for finding this in the USC collection.
The three arches of the Mott building are in the center of this detail from the previous photo. The building with the bay windows once had a
Tally's Phonograph and Vitascope Parlor location in its north storefront, 137 S. Main St. In 1899 they had a film fire with about 50 people in the house. The building beyond Mott's had once housed the
Happy Hour Theatre, 125 S. Main, in one of its four storefronts.
The Mott Building seems to be gone in this c.1937 shot taken by Herman Schultheis. It's in the
Los Angeles Public Library collection. We're looking north from 2nd.
Definitely gone. The lot where Mott's had been was parking, plus a couple small buildings, by the time of this c.1939 Dick Whittington Studio shot that's in the
USC Digital Library collection.
A fine June 1954 look at the parking lot where Mott's had been. It's from a slide by Palmer Connor in
the
Huntington Library collection. In the background on the left it's the Higgins Building on the southwest corner of 2nd & Main.
Looking north c.1956 after more demolition on the block. It's a Palmer Connor photo in the
Huntington Library collection. Thanks to John Bengtson for finding this.
The west side of the 100 block of S. Main where Mott's Hall once was is now occupied by the Los Angeles Police Department headquarters building. On the left that's the Higgins Building at 2nd and Main. Photo: Bill Counter - 2019
See also a mention of vaudeville in Mott's in 1895 on p. 215 of "The Businessman in the Amusement World" by Robert Grau. "Sixty Years in Southern California" by Harris Newmark also mentions Mott's. All these titles are on Google Books.
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