NEWS FROM THE GREENE & GREENE ARCHIVES
by Ann Scheid
Recent Gifts:
Filmmaker Paul Bockhorst donated materials used in the production of the documentary Greene & Greene: The Art of Architecture from 2003. Includes production logs, videocassettes and audiocassettes with interviews (raw data for the film), transcripts, script and final DVDs. Paul plans to also donate the materials related to other documentaries by him on Arts and Crafts architecture in northern and Southern California and on Bernard Maybeck. This major gift in an entirely new format has brought the Greene and Greene Archives into the digital age and spurred me to work with Dino Everett from USC’s Hugh Hefner Cinema Archives to transfer Gamble and Greene family films in our collection to digital formats. So far, we have transferred 10 reels of 16 mm film and 6 reels of 8 mm film. Greene and Gamble family members will be contacted to help identify some of the people appearing in the films, which we hope to show to docents and friends.
Next, we hope to transfer Jon Wilkman’s video cassettes documenting the Gamble House Preservation project. These will be especially valuable for future researchers because they document in detail the work done on the House in 2008.
We also recently received Architect Dennis Kailey’s drawings and records of his work on the restoration and remodeling of the Mary Ranney house in the mid-1980s. Yet another valuable tool for future research and conservation.
Esther McCoy Collection:
The McCoy Collection has been successfully cleaned and is now awaiting cataloguing by the Huntington’s library staff. Esther McCoy’s books, many of which contain important notes by her, will be housed in special custom boxes as a separate collection for researchers. Esther McCoy, one of the most important writers on architecture in the mid-twentieth century, introduced California architecture (including the Greenes) to a world-wide audience and had many international contacts, mounting exhibits and writing catalogues on Italian and Mexican architects and architecture as well.
Greene Tool Collection:
The collection of some 80 tools of Charles and Henry Greene has now been fully catalogued. I am now cataloging a related collection of artifacts owned by the Greenes, including Henry Greene’s penknife and childhood silver cup, Emeline Greene’s ebony and gold ring and 4 coin-silver teaspoons, Charles Greene’s T-square and architectural rule and Henry’s set of drafting tools (all three items were formerly on display in the attic). These items give insight into the personal lives of the Greenes and with the addition of family photos, scrapbooks and drawings from the Archives, will make an interesting display someday.
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