NELA People: Charles Lummis

Journalist, poet, traveler, outdoorsman, newspaper and magazine editor, historian, archaeologist, folklorist, photographer, American Indian rights activist, librarian, preservationist, museum founder, and prodigious lover of dozens of women, Charles Fletcher Lummis is celebrated as one of Northeast L.A.'s most colorful founding fathers.

In 1884, at the age of 25, Charles Fletcher Lummis was working for a newspaper in Cincinnati when he was offered a job with the Los Angeles Times.

Lummis decided to make the 3,507 mile journey from Cincinnati to Los Angeles on foot.  He set out from Cincinnati in September wearing knickerbockers and a duck coat.  The journey took 143 days, and all the while Lummis sent weekly dispatches to The Los Angeles Times chronicling his trip.  His writing gained a national following and in 1892, his chronicle of the journey was published as a book, A Tramp Across the Continent.

In 1897 Lummis began construction of his home, near the banks of the Arroyo Seco, in the Northeast L. A. community now referred to as Sycamore Grove.  Lummis named the home "El Alisal " ("Place of the Sycamore"). The house with built with his own hands, from stone and boulders he collected out of the Arroyo Seco, and was finally completed in 1910.  Lummis stated his home was built to "last for a thousand years." 

Charles Lummis died in 1928.  El Alisal was declared an Historical Monument and is now owned by the Department of Recreation and Parks of the City of Los Angeles.  It is administered in partnership with the Historical Society of Southern California.

http://www.charleslummis.com/biography.htm

http://www.garymkatz.com/OnTheRoad/Lummis.htm

http://homepage.mac.com/muirpower/california/PhotoAlbum20.html

http://www.socalhistory.org/Socalhistory.org%20_mainfolder/Lummishome%20and%20garden/LummisHome.htm