Beverly Grove
Updated on Apr 29 2024 2:43pm
In 1919, Douglas Fairbanks and Mary Pickford spearheaded this trend by purchasing an existing hunting lodge and having it transformed into their magnificent mansion, Pickfair. This was soon followed by other prominent figures in the entertainment industry such as Gloria Swanson, Will Rogers, Thomas Ince, Charlie Chaplin, Tom Mix, Carl Laemmle, Ronald Coleman, King Vidor, John Barrymore, Buster Keaton, Harold Lloyd, Jack Warner, Clara Bow, Marion Davies, Harry Cohn, and Rudolph Valentino, all of whom built their own stylish abodes in the area.
During the exuberant Roaring Twenties, the construction of a massive, banked wooden racetrack further amplified the city's appeal, dominating much of the southern section of Beverly Hills. Radio broadcasts of races at the speedway, which were on par with today's Indy 500, helped to cement the city's place in the popular imagination of America. The speedway was also occasionally used as a hub for another national craze, aviation.
In 1923, the very existence of Beverly Hills was threatened by a proposal to annex the city to Los Angeles, which proponents argued would provide a constant source of clean water for growth. However, residents, including Will Rogers and Mary Pickford, rallied against the plan and successfully mobilized local voters. Despite the opposition's underhanded tactics, such as leaving bottles of sulfurous water on doorsteps with the label "Warning. Drink sparingly of this water as it has laxative qualities," the annexation was defeated by a margin of 507-337.
This "war of independence" marked the first instance of the union of show business and politics in national life. Will Rogers, a wise-cracking political humorist, became the city's first honorary mayor and played a crucial role in the development of Beverly Hills by facilitating the construction of a new City Hall in 1932 and the establishment of a U.S. Post Office in 1934.
As Beverly Hills continued to grow, promotional materials from the period touted it as the "center of the next million." To mitigate the effects of growth, public improvements on a human scale were implemented, such as the renaming of Santa Monica Park to Beverly Gardens and its expansion to cover the entire length of the city, as well as the installation of the famous Electric Fountain, featuring a finely modeled sculpture of a Tongva in prayer, paying homage to the city's heritage as a source of fertility and abundance.