30 Years Ago: West Baden Springs Hotel Arch Lighting

Recently on the French Lick Resort X/Twitter account, they posted some photos from the ice cream social/arch lighting ceremony at the West Baden Springs Hotel, which occurred thirty years ago on July 12, 1996. Yours truly was there. Above is a photo of the Hotel’s arch after its 1902 installation. The name “Carlsbad of America” was in reference to the hotel’s mineral waters which had guests flocking by train to experience their magical healing powers. The water that bubbled from those sulfur springs smelled like rotten eggs, but no less…the guests came. Below is how the arch looked in 2005, after Historic Landmarks Foundation of Indiana (HLFI, now simply Indiana Landmarks) and Cook, Incorporated began restoring the hotel. The little sprite in the center disk was named Sprudel, and he acted as the hotel’s mascot. The bottled mineral water that was sold here and sold all over was called Sprudel water. Yes…it was nasty.



Below is how the arch looked in 1995, when I first stumbled upon this incredible property. The Sprudel logo was gone from the center disk and as you can see, the entrance was in dire need of a makeover.



In 1996, Cook and HLFI joined forces to restore the West Baden Springs Hotel back to its former glory. While the Hotel itself was in much worse shape, it was decided to focus efforts on the entrance arch, to let the world know that this architectural wonder was coming back to life.



The building at the right of the arch is the original Hotel’s bank:



It had been decades since the electric lights had worked on the arch, so to honor the occasion, the Cooks held an ice cream social to commemorate the occasion. The townspeople flocked to it, and not just for the ice cream.



For years, the Hotel had served as the economic and social hub of the area. It had transitioned into a Jesuit college in 1934, and then was retitled Northwood Institute from 1968-1983, serving as a private coed college. After that, a number of failed attempts to convert the property back into a thriving hotel failed, so until HLFI and Cook took over in 1996, the place had literally crumbled into ruins.



The arch had been cleaned, rewired, and given a fresh coat of paint for the ceremony. Sprudel was not returned yet. He was still being worked on.



Below right is Jeff Lane, a local from nearby French Lick who was one of the main volunteers during the restoration efforts. He is still in the area, and pretty much serves as the Hotel’s most knowledgable historian.



As the sun began to set, the crowds increased. To say that the community was excited about the return of the Hotel would be a gross understatement.



Although I was a volunteer (giving tours of the property EVERY weekend), I wore my street clothes for the event. Sean and Christy were two of my closest friends at the time; each weekend we met at the hotel before the tour program started, we would run amok on the property, checking out the progress of the construction crews from the previous week. The cute gal in yellow was Esther, a local, who recalled the Hotel when it was open and had many wonderful memories of it. Getting to meet people like Esther made the volunteering a sheer joy, listening to these aged residents recall a different and grander time when this Hotel gave the little town of West Baden so much vitality.



Steve Ferguson, who worked for Cook Group, was heavily involved in the restoration process. Before the arch was lit, he gave a little speech. Sorry, but the flash on my little film camera at the time could only do so much!



And then the magical moment when the power was turned on and the arches looked magical once more.



My friend Pam from Bloomington accompanied me to this festive event.



Norma Brock was a French Lick local; her father ran the Elite Club, a nearby Casino. She was also full of great stories about the gambling establishments that once dotted the area as well as the West Baden Springs Hotel itself. She was a feisty character and I adored her. She used to love to say that the bugs loved her silver hair!



A few more images of the arches:



Sure beats another set of golden arches you might be familiar with.



The last time I visited the Hotel was in 2012; it still looked magnificent.



I had the distinction of volunteering more hours than any of the other tour guides. It was a gift of service that replenished me and brought me a wealth of treasured memories. Here I am in action on New Year’s Day, 1998. I was a bit hungover, so the Ray-Bans were a necessity.



I designed a few photo sheets, to give my groups an idea of what the place once looked like. That’s right - only with D-Tours!



As a thank you for my volunteer efforts as a tour guide, I was given this commemorative brick, which was once part of the property. 



See more West Baden Springs Hotel photos at my main website.

Marilyn's Manse: To Save Or Not To Save

More than sixty years after her death, actress Marilyn Monroe is still making headlines. The one residence that she owned (and where she passed) at 12305 Fifth Helena Drive in Brentwood, California was destined for demolition by its current owners. The one-story, 2,900 square foot Hacienda-style home was built in 1929, three years after Marilyn was born.



According to Architectural Digest:

The 2,900-square-foot, one-story, L-shaped, Spanish colonial-style home had adobe walls and a red-tile roof and was protected by a high wall. It had two bedrooms, a small guesthouse, an oval swimming pool and a large garden. The interior had white stucco walls, white carpeting, cathedral beam ceilings and tiled fireplaces in both the living room and master bedroom. Monroe bought some essential furnishings on shopping trips to Tijuana and Mexico City: tiles for the kitchen, tin masks and mirrors for the walls, and textiles depicting Aztec figures. But the house was sparsely furnished, and her phonograph remained on the floor.



She called it “a cute little Mexican-style house with eight rooms” and regretfully added, “I live alone and I hate it!” She loved animals and had always been fond of pets, who soothed her loneliness. Frank Sinatra gave her a white poodle called Maf (short for Mafia), whose name referenced his mob connections. Proud of the house and the improvements she made, she keenly showed visitors around and called it a “fortress where I can feel safe from the world.”

In an eerie case of foreshadowing, the tiles on the front doorstep say, “Cursum Perficio,” which translates to “I have completed my journey.”



From Curbed LA, April 20, 2017, when the house was put up for sale:

Before her death, a reporter with Life magazine spent a day with Monroe in the home, telling him, “Anybody who likes my house, I am sure I will get along with.” She had “[thrown] herself into making a home for herself. She planted an herb garden and in early 1962 traveled to Mexico to purchase authentic furniture, art and tapestries for her new home,” according to Variety. Listing agent Lisa Optican said it, “retains many of the design elements selected by Monroe.” “When you walk the house and grounds, you’re immediately struck by its serenity and warmth,” she said. “Every owner who has called this property home has been drawn to the same character ... The property is romantic, intimate and private.”

The now defunct Mercervine brokerage website (due to bankruptcy), reported the sale on June 23, 2017:

Mercer Vine’s Lisa Optican has sold 12305 5th Helena Drive in Los Angeles’ Brentwood neighborhood for over asking price at $7.25 million.
 
Considering Marilyn bought the house for $77,500, that would have been quite an investment for her!



Set back from the road enough to make it difficult to view, Marilyn’s house was still a place where fans would do their “looky-loo” thing to the annoyance of the owners and neighbors. And then the unthinkable happened — the threat of demolition. Edited from the Robb Report on September 6, 2023:

It’s another sad day for fans of historic architecture and Old Hollywood lore alike. As first reported by the New York Post, the house located at 12305 Fifth Helena Drive in L.A.’s Brentwood neighborhood, a 1920s Spanish hacienda-style structure, may soon be demolished by its new owner. Despite its modest scale and unpretentious nature, the 2,600-square-foot bungalow gained worldwide fame in 1962 as the location of Marilyn Monroe’s sudden death. The walled and gated property was also the only house ever owned by the legendary actress, and in the six decades since the half-acre estate has become one of the city’s most famous local landmarks.…While the home’s exterior architecture remains incredibly alike how it appeared in 1962, the interiors have been significantly altered. Most notably, the kitchen and bathrooms have been modernized, and the estate’s formerly detached guest casita has been merged into the main house. Still, numerous original features — casement windows, terracotta tile floors, wood-beamed ceilings — happily hark back to Golden Age times. Out back, a brick patio spills out to a notably large swimming pool; beyond that, a grassy lawn is surrounded by mature trees, tall hedges and a citrus orchard. Out front, bountiful bunches of bougainvillea arch their way across the home’s façade, and there’s a two-car garage. Teardowns have become increasingly commonplace in the area surrounding Monroe’s former home, as soaring property values and record-breaking sales entice developers to build ever bigger and fancier. That this particular property survived intact is a testament to the hacienda’s enduring charm, and to Monroe’s legendary status, of course. Back in 2014, Emerald Lake hedge fund manager Dan Lukas and his wife Anne Jarmain paid $7.3 million for the Monroe estate, and have lived at the property in the years since. Six months ago, however, the couple paid $13 million for a larger home in the same neighborhood. Last month, Lukas and Jarmain quietly sold the Monroe house to a buyer who has not yet been publicly identified. That person paid nearly $8.4 million for the property, in cash, and almost immediately applied for a demolition permit. The L.A. Department of Building and Safety recently approved the request for a “plan check” of the proposed work, though an official permit has not yet been issued. But if similar situations in the recent past are any indicator of this property’s future, it seems likely that the Monroe hacienda will soon be added to a long list of historical real estate treasures that continue to be lost.

Shortly after the news broke, a Change.org petition started, requesting that the City convert the house to a museum:

This house should become a museum in memory of Marilyn Monroe for visitors, tourists and fans. Like they did with Elvis Presley’s house named “Graceland,” who has been transformed into a museum in his memory.

The news even made it to Vanity Fair. Edited from their September 9, 2023 article:

…[I]t’s a building that a shadowy and nameless owner almost destroyed until the Los Angeles City Council stepped in to stop it. News that the owner of 12305 Fifth Helena Drive wanted to destroy the home spread quickly this week after the New York Post reported that it was in “the initial stages of the demolition process.” The four-bedroom, three-bath Spanish Colonial hacienda, which Monroe bought for $75,000 as her third marriage, with playwright Arthur Miller, came to its end, had been evaluated for landmark status in 2013, but that process stalled, despite it being—as movie producer and neighbor Rodney Liber put it to the LA Times—“one of the most famous houses in the world.” That famous house was sold in 2017 to an LLC called Glory of the Snow for $7.25 million; in July, it was sold to the similarly named Glory of the Snow Trust for $8.35 million, the LAT reports. However, the actual humans behind the company names are unclear. The LLC was managed by Emerald Lake hedge fund manager Dan Lukas and his wife Anne Jarmain. The trust names a person called “Andrew Sahure” as its trustee, but that's a moniker which boasts no Google or public records results beyond this matter. (Gardners will note, however, that “glory of the snow” is the common name for chionodoxa luciliae, a spring-blooming perennial known for its purple flowers. Do with that what you may.) It’s unclear if anyone currently lives in the house, or why its owners want to destroy it, but as news spread of the plan, neighbors and preservationists sprang into action. A spokesperson for LA Councilwoman Traci Park says that their office received “hundreds of calls” asking her to step in, Reuters reports. And step in she did, introducing a council motion Friday asking the city’s Cultural Heritage Commission (CHC) to consider the home for inclusion in LA’s list of historic cultural monuments. The motion was approved unanimously, giving the CHC 75 days to evaluate and approve the house as a landmark.



In response, LA’s Board of Building and Safety Commissioners paused any potential work at the site, saying in a letter to the owners that the preliminary approval for demolition was “issued in error.” “Under the Cultural Heritage Ordinance, this action immediately triggers a temporary stay on all building permits while the matter is under consideration by the Cultural Heritage Commission and City Council,“ KTLA reports the letter as reading. “Also, the property, regardless of whether a permit exists or does not exist, shall not be demolished, substantially altered or removed.”“This will be the first step in ensuring that we can protect this home against demolition,” Park told ABC 7. “The overwhelming sentiment here is clear. This home must be preserved as a crucial piece of Hollywood’s and the city of Los Angeles’ history, culture and legacy.”

Nearly a year later on June 26, 2024, Variety reported an update on the situation:

Marilyn Monroe‘s house in Los Angeles’ Brentwood neighborhood was approved in its historical cultural monument nomination by the Los Angeles City Council on Wednesday, a designation which is intended to help protect the landmark from demolition. “The Marilyn Monroe Residence in Brentwood is now a Historic-Cultural Monument! Today, L.A. City Council unanimously approved the nomination for Marilyn Monroe’s final home. Thanks to all who voiced their support and a HUGE thanks to Councilwoman Traci Park & team!,” wrote the L.A. Conservancy on X. …Owners Brinah Milstein and her husband, reality TV producer Roy Bank, bought the house last year for $8.35 million and planned to demolish it to expand their property next door. They waged a year-long battle to stop the historical designation, which they said would lead to more nuisance visitors. The owners have sued the city, accusing officials of “backroom machinations,” and the case is due to get a trial date on Aug. 13. In the suit, the owners say that the house has been substantially altered and that there is no evidence remaining from the time when Monroe lived there, so they contend it does not meet the criteria for a historic cultural monument.



The suit also says that several neighborhood groups and the Monroe estate did not support the historic designation. The council’s vote was 12 to 0 in favor of adding the house to properties of historical significance. The decision was backed by the City Council’s land use management subcommittee and the Cultural Heritage Commission. While the designation doesn’t completely stop a property from being demolished, the status subjects it to a stringent review process if demolition were proposed. L.A. City Council member Traci Park said before the vote, “We have an opportunity to do something today that should’ve been done 60 years ago. There’s no other person or place in the city of Los Angeles as iconic as Marilyn Monroe and her Brentwood home.” In response to the vote, Milstein’s attorney Peter C. Sheridan, who also represents the owner’s Glory of the Snow 1031 Trust and Roy Bank, released the following statement. Council Member Traci Park, in bringing a motion to designate the former home of Marilyn Monroe as a Historic Cultural Monument, said she has “worked closely” with the owners “throughout this process” to relocate this house to allow for public access. This is not true. Neither she nor her staff have worked closely with the owners, throughout this process or anytime else, to relocate the house to allow for public access. In fact, the opposite is true. The owners have made countless attempts to work with Ms. Park and her staff to find a solution that would work for everyone, only to be met with non-responsiveness by Ms. Park and her staff. Ms. Park has ignored the fact that her constituents — civic and homeowner’s groups in the community — are adamantly against the designation of the home. Ms. Park has also ignored that the City granted dozens of permits to over 14 different prior owners to change the home through numerous remodels, resulting in there being nothing left reflecting Ms. Monroe’s brief time there 60 years ago. The designation today was yet another step in an admittedly biased, unconstitutional and rigged process, as set forth in the owners’ lawsuit. Traci Park’s actions today and throughout the process, disregarding the interests of her constituents and the facts and merits, demonstrate that no one’s home or investment is safe.



Although there was an online celebration about the landmark status being achieved, it would seem that the home is far from being safe. I have mixed feelings about the whole thing. Marilyn doesn’t live there anymore, and based on photos and what I have read, a lot of work would need to be done to return the home back to the state it was in when Marilyn lived there for six short months. The quiet neighborhood would not be an ideal place for a museum, where traffic and tourists would be a constant annoyance. If the home is to be moved elsewhere, then it loses the geographic significance that attracted Marilyn in the first place. Even if a group was able to buy the home, would they also have the money to keep it going?

Time will tell, and within a month we should all know more.

See more Marilyn photos at my main website.

Neon at the Hotel Churchill

While visiting a friend at his downtown condo, I looked out his balcony and saw a perfect view of this vintage neon sign - STILL AGLOW!! Of course I came back with my camera and my 600mm lens to capture this shot at sunset. I had passed the Hotel Churchill many times on the way to work when I used to catch the bus from downtown. It looked fairly seedy, as if it had seen better days. Apparently it has been repurposed as an affordable housing project. Just in case you wanted a closer look at the neon tubes:

Here’s a vintage postcard of the Hotel back in its heyday, most likely not long after its 1914 opening. The neon does not appear to have been installed yet:

A vintage postcard showing the lobby:

…and the dining room, which must be where that “famous food” was served:

Got a match?

This 1960s era postcard shows the neon sign:

See more San Diego photos at my main website.

Architecture: Preservation, Restoration, and Renovation

The fire that destroyed parts of the Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris sparked much more than just the historic structure’s roof; it also set off a bit of a debate over the importance of an iconic structure vs. humanity. Do we value buildings more than people?



I don’t want to get into that portion of the debate, but rather another one...what makes a building a building? While it appears that more than enough money has quickly appeared in the coffers to return Notre Dame to its former glory, will it still be the same building? The only photos I have of Notre Dame are from my one visit to Paris back in 1982 when I played violin in an orchestra comprised of high school youth who toured Europe. I was pretty amazed to actually have the opportunity not only to see the Cathedral, but to play within its walls.



To this day, I’m not quite sure how the people behind AMA (American Music Abroad) pulled off that little coup for us. The first two shots were from the little Instamatic slide camera I borrowed from Mom to take on the trip. The next 3 photos were shot by my Dad, who happened to meet me in Paris for a few days.



Don’t ask me how, but I managed to make 2nd chair violinist of the group. Still baffled on that one, too.



But back to the point of my post, as it really is not intended to be “Oh I was here and look at my photos that prove I was there.” Rather, it is a tale of my experience with historic buildings. The terms historic preservation, restoration, and renovation are often used interchangeably, and not necessarily correctly. Depending upon who you talk to, the definitions of the terms themselves can vary greatly. In an example of what I would call a “renovation,” Valley Forge Park in Pennsylvania went to the trouble of re-creating cabins that Washington’s troops stayed in during that very cold winter of 1777. Is this what they looked like? No idea. Photographs don’t exist from that time period, and all the people who re-built them had to go on might have been a foundation in the ground, perhaps a sketch, or a complete guess based on historic knowledge...and a little personal bias.



The uniforms are also re-creations. There is no way today’s world could perfectly reproduce what was worn back in the 18th century, as fabrics, dyes, and sewing techniques have changed a great deal. Are these good enough for the modern tourist? Most likely. Do they help illustrate what happened during that Winter of 77/78? Sure.



Moving over to a restoration/renovation project in which I personally took part in as a tour guide, the West Baden Springs Hotel was like something out of Great Expectations; overgrown, decaying, and somewhat creepy:



After a lot of money and blood, sweat, and tears, you would barely recognize the same building today:



The hotel was just about ready to cave-in from years of neglect and diverse weather conditions. One entire wall did collapse as can be seen here:



Today, that portion of the building has been perfectly put back together, repainted, and updated:



An interior shot of the atrium before it had been “restored”:



And after:



While the building looks incredible and practically brand-spanking new, is it the same building that opened at the beginning of the 20th Century? Or is the version I saw back in 1996 more authentic? I would almost argue that the 1996 structure has more stories to tell, whereas what guests see today is a very luxurious resort hotel. I felt more connected to the history when I could see through the layers of paint and wallpaper that hung off the decaying walls. Maybe I’m just sick and twisted that way after too many Tim Burton movies.

Over in Charleston, South Carolina, you can visit Drayton Hall, which is advertised as a “preservation.” They have not attempted to repaint, refurnish, or make this historic home look brand new. Instead, they have gone to a great deal of trouble to keep it in the state that it’s in. I greatly respect that choice, as it’s not necessarily one that most tourists would understand.



Sometimes a little peeling paint or a scuffed floor are okay in my book. You might see a famous handprint or footprint.



While I am happy that Notre Dame is getting a lot of attention and will most likely be fixed so that it can be seen for centuries to come, the fire is also part of its history. Should what was burned be put back to the way it was (which is technically impossible), or should it be covered and protected and become part of the story?

See more Daveland photos at my main website.