Trip to OC, Pt. 2

Another day at the Stanley Ranch Museum! Our tour included two vintage homes that had been moved to the Ranch. The first was the Schnitger home, a Craftsman-style home from 1916. The photo below shows the home in its original setting before it was relocated.



In this home, the furnishings were not necessarily original to this home, but were authentic to the home period and appropriately assembled. We were told that the piano had belonged to a local theatre before it was donated to the ranch.



This kiddos of today would have a hard time believing that the main source of entertainment back then would be a radio. No visuals, no scrolling…you just sat and listened. What a concept.



The dining room:



On the table was a display of dishes and info about the Greenbrier Inn, a sanitarium from 1941 which mainly catered to Hollywood celebrities who needed to “dry out” without being under public scrutiny.



 Allegedly, Judy Garland was a patron. It was replaced by a mixed-use complex in the 1980s. Shocking! Vintage postcard views and a matchbook are provided below:



The kitchen - I covet that range!



The last stop on the tour was the Ware-Stanley House, built in 1893 or 1897, depending on whether you choose to believe the historic plaque or an article on socallandmarks.com.



Part of a 40 acre ranch, our guide told us that many of the items inside were original to the home. I loved the details; you just don’t find craftsmanship like this today. Does that make me old for saying that? Probably.





The contraption at right in the living room is not a radio, but an early record player which used cylinders.



How about that wacky tile on the fireplace?



The kitchen was a little low-tech for me. I preferred the one at the Schnitger home.



The bedroom for the kiddies. Sorry, no wifi.



At the back of the house is Garden Grove’s “last outhouse.” No, we didn’t get to go inside.



This beautiful pink rose was at the gate as we exited.



By the time the tour was over, the Going To Guides market was in full swing. If you aren’t aware of Shannon and Going To Guides, you might want to reconsider calling yourself a fan of Disney.



She writes and designs THE most creative and informative guides for Disneyland, DCA, and WDW, sprinkled with photos from yours truly. Get your own copy at Shannon’s website.



Her Etsy shop has many cool items, but my fave are the fandanas. If you think you want a particular one, buy it. Don’t wait. They sell quickly.



Janey (aka Atomic Redhead), legendary pop culture and Disney blogger was there, too. What a great surprise!



Through Janey, I met another creative force, Melissa (aka Amuseboosh), another legend in the Disney community. They pretty much talked me into going to the Anaheim Halloween Parade. I checked with Willis and it looks like he wants to go to.



Thanks to Shannon for putting all of this together! The final installment of this Orange County series will be posted tomorrow. With Disneyland around the corner, did I end my nine-year absence from the Park? You’ll have to return to find out.

See more Stanley Ranch photos at my main website.

Trip to OC, Pt. 1

A recent trip north found me in Orange County, thanks to one of my fave peeps, Shannon (Going to Guides). She notified me that she was going to have a little market/fair situation at the Stanley Ranch Museum in Garden Grove. If Shannon’s involved, count me in. She is one of the most creative and kind people I know.



I could not believe I’d never heard of let alone visited this place before, but since one would probably not notice it just driving by, I guess it’s not a total surprise.



Built in 1893, the Ware-Stanley house is situated at the entrance, with the historical village just down the street.



As you wander down the tiny street, it feels like you have stepped back in time, as the historic buildings that have been moved/repurposed here seem as if they are just waiting for your patronage



My friend Kevin, who has the dubious distinction of being the last person I visited Disneyland with (in 2016) accompanied me on the trip.



During our tour, we got to see the interiors of many of these buildings which include historic artifacts and furnishings appropriate to the business once located within.



No town is complete without a fire department…especially in California.



Our Tour Guide was wonderful, dishing fun little tidbits of Garden Grove historic gossip while relaying the history of each building.



I alerted OC friends Lori and Paul (who share both my Disneyland AND Shirley Temple obsessions) so that they could attend the tour, too. Despite being OC residents, they had never visited this hidden gem, either.



The village also includes the Robert Disney Garage, circa 1923. You may not know Robert, but his nephew, Walt, rented the garage and created his first animated film here. The garage was removed from its Hollywood location in 1981 and was moved to its current Garden Grove location.



A photo of the original property is inside the garage.



Lots of Disney memorabilia can be found inside.



The village also includes a post office:



…and a schoolhouse (red, naturally!):



Lori, a teacher, got to ring the bell.



Any apples for Lori?



The rules from 1872 still apply today (right, Melissa?).



Would the desks of yesteryear suffice for the tech-savvy kids of today?



Kevin is also a photographer, and he captured me in action. Step one: identify the shot.



Focus and shoot:



Voila!



Come back for part two!

See more Stanley Ranch Museum photos at my main website.

Temple Tuesday: Photoplay Fluff, February 1938

Fluff media is nothing new; back in the 1930s, instead of browsing websites, people thumbed through the monthly movie magazines to find out what was going on in Holly-weird. In the February 1938 issue of Photoplay, Shirley Temple was shown in a two-page photo spread titled “Shirley kneads the dough” attempting to make biscuits in the kitchen of her family’s Brentwood home.



With her usual verve and vitality little Miss T. tackles the higher complications of the culinary arts.



She gets flour in her eyes, but that doesn’t floor her for there’s Pekingese Ching-Ching, her all-time friend, to blink in absolute approval. Determination, self-reliance, persistence giver her, in the kitchen as before the camera—perfection.



Just in case you wanted to see the exterior of Shirley’s quaint residence…



Elsewhere in the issue was a slightly more substantial article about “high finances” in Tinseltown by writer and pop culture analyst Gilbert Seldes.



A short time ago the script on which Shirley Temple was working called for a pony. In Hollywood you can get a pony at least as easily as a rhinoceros, but the director was in a hurry—and there was a pony on the set. Miss Temple’s own pony. And she let him use her pony—at ten cents a day. That’s pleasing thing to know and gives you a warm feeling about the little girl. Older — but not necessarily better — actors and actresses earn larger sums in other ways, sometimes without showing as much business sense as Miss Temple did. They earn their pin money—diamond pin money—in a thousand enterprises. There is hardly a business, from canned goods to the prize ring, in which some player is not represented. In fact, when you see how much money they make when they are not working, you sometimes wonder why moving-picture stars trouble to act at all. This is not an invitation to any nasty remark that most of them can’t act. You, and I, and the gentlemen in the Income Tax Bureau know that Shirley Temple earns about fifteen times as much money on by-products as she gets from Twentieth Century-Fox…Yet, without the movies, little Miss Temple might have put her name on the manna from heaven, or on the original waters of the Fountain of Youth for a face lotion, and she would not have received a cent in return. And this goes for all the others.…For myself, I still think that Miss Temple’s ten cents is the best money in the world. It was earnred by straight business methods (the little girl is a rugged individualist) and she probably would be a great executive if she weren’t so busy being an actress. The other money on the side is velvet—her dime for the pony is earned—and, I hope, well spent.
 
See more photos of Shirley Temple at home at my main website.