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Stock# 91938
Description

San Diego in the Early Days. Curtiss Planes, Irving Houses, and the Hotel Del.

Fantastic collection of 55 antique photographs showing La Jolla, Pacific Beach, Coronado, and Point Loma during the late 1910s or early '20s using a rare and early panoramic camera.

The images show a variety of San Diego themes, mostly centered around the beach. Boat trips, the San Diego & Pacific Beach Railway, and coastal views are shown throughout. The photographs are marvelously conceived, in a style reminiscent of the wonder that appears in Jacques Henri Lartigue's early photographs, which capture idyllic coastal and family scenes that today seem long-gone in developed San Diego.

The images show hallmarks of the late 1910s and early 1920s. A Curtiss seaplane dates the views to no earlier than 1917, and a handwritten note on the verso of one of the images reads "Mother and I visit Mrs. James (?), 1922." There is a noticeable lack of development in Pacific Beach and La Jolla.

The photos were all taken with an early panoramic camera. The first American panoramic camera was produced in 1898 by the Multiscope & Film Company and termed the Al-Vista. In 1899, the Kodak Panorama was introduced, and several other competitors followed suit. However, these early models all had 180-degree view fields, which none of the images in the collection seem to display. As such, it is most likely that this was taken by the Conley Panoramic, sold by Sears Robuck between 1911 and 1918, which had a 140-degree field of view.

Irving Gill's Bailey House

One of the best works of the visionary California modernist architect Irving Gill is visible in two of these photographs. The Bailey Residence, on Princess Street in La Jolla Shores, is a two-story Arts and Crafts initially constructed in 1907 with some additions dating to 1932.

In the images, the house stands alone on a bluff with only another house nearby. While development in the Shores had started in the 1920s, this is obscured from the angle of the photograph, most likely somewhere along present-day Torrey Pines Drive. 

Irving Gill is noted as one of the pioneers of the modern movement in architecture and his work features a more linear approach than the ornate designs of the late-19th-century. He also pioneered the aesthetic use of concrete. 1907 was a turning point in his career when his previous partnership fell apart due to his unauthorized work on a sewer line that caused a clog. Subsequently, he began experimenting with the forms that would lead to his most famous work from the 1910s, including the La Jolla Woman's Club and The Bishop's School.

Gill's work faded from prominence with the advent of the Art Deco movement of the 1920s, but his firm belief in the importance of the social impact of architecture led to his work being revived in the 1960s. He is today recognized as one of the major figures in the modern movement.

Curtiss Planes

As mentioned, in the distance of one of the images taken from the beach on Coronado, a Curtiss seaplane is visible. It appears to be a variant on the Model MF, with the biplane components raised above the fuselage and unequal wingspans. Curtiss's ailerons (used to bank and the subject of his legal battle with the Wright Brothers) are visible just above the wings, and the engine is seen as the dark spot in the center.

The standard Model F, first flown in 1912, had a recognizable hook-shaped tail with a horizontal stabilizer as well as an equal wingspan. The MF, developed around 1917, had several updates including an asymmetric wingspan and a more modern tail shape, while retaining the elevated stabilizers. However, the standard MF tail model had a square, and not rounded, top as seen in the photograph. Interestingly, the model shown closely matches the British Felixstowe F.2 (a 1917 variant on the MF) and the aircraft may represent an American emulation of the Felixstowe adaptation.

The standard MF was widely used by the US Navy as a training aircraft because it was particularly stall resistant. Throughout the First World War, standard Model F's had been used by many Allied armies and was the first aircraft both to be flown under automatic control and the first aircraft to be launched from a warship by catapult.

Glen Curtiss's ties to Coronado and San Diego ran deep, as is still visible in his lasting legacy on the city. He had moved to San Diego in 1910 to establish a winter flying school which he ran on North Island until the start of the First World War. Curtiss spent several years there and also trained the first Japanese Aviators. Curtiss's planes appear in several early Coronado photographs.

Condition Description
Set of 55 11 1/2" panoramic photographs. Minor later manuscript on verso. Occasionally trimmed at edges.