The Long Beach Art Museum building
is located at 2300 East Ocean Boulevard, the Long Beach Museum
of Art was built in 1912 as a summer home by Elizabeth Milbank Anderson,
a wealthy philanthropist and heir to Jeremiah Milbank, who was a financier,
a co-founder of the Borden Company, and a founder of the Chicago, Milwaukee
and St. Paul Railroad (in 1863, later extended to the Pacific Coast).
Long Beach Museum of Art is
located on a bluff-top overlooking Long Beach Harbor and the Pacific
Ocean along the elegant Ocean Avenue. The museum includes a "campus"
with the historic Elizabeth Milbank Anderson house and carriage house
(built in 1912), used as administrative offices, the Museum Store and
Café. Oceanfront gardens and a pavilion with two floors of
expansive gallery space for changing exhibitions are open to the public
for viewing current exhibitions and renting meeting space for special
events. In addition to changing exhibitions, the Museum offers
extensive educational programs for children and adults, musical
programs, festivals, and other special events.
According
to Fortune magazine, "A number of Milbanks have been considerable figures
in the industrial history of the U.S. and the family has also left its
mark on the educational and medical institutions of the country." (May
1959) Elizabeth Milbank Anderson (1850-1921) was an energetic, strong-minded
woman with a wide range of interests. She was a successful businesswoman,
a philanthropist, and an art collector who traveled frequently to Europe.
She established Milbank Memorial Fund in 1905, which gave grants to various
medical and educational projects; this fund is still in existence. She
donated a library to Greenwich, Connecticut, and gave three blocks of choice
New York City land to Barnard College, upon which was built Milbank Hall.
She built public facilities for the poor, such as a sports arena and public
baths, and established a program of free school lunches. Her husband, Abram
A. Anderson, was a well-known portrait painter and friend of Teddy Roosevelt.
This large house was built on the
bluff to take advantage of one of the City's prime assets - the ocean view.
The house is a splendid and imposing example of the Craftsman Bungalow,
a style popular in the period 1905 - 1915. It is similar to others of that
style built around the same time near the ocean bluff along Ocean Boulevard
and First and Second Streets in what is now the Bluff Park Historic District,
and thus represents an early stage in the residential development of Long
Beach. Later, in 1926, the home became the Club California Casa Real, an
important social institution of Long Beach. It was owned from 1929 - 1944
by Thomas A. O'Donnell, a pioneer oil industrialist. During the Second
World War, it was used by the Navy as the Chief Petty Officers' Club. In
1950, it was purchased by the City for a Municipal Art Center and was renamed
in 1957 as the Long Beach Museum of Art. Thus, its succession of uses has
mirrored important stages in the history of the City.
The building is a classic example
of the California Craftsman Bungalow, using the natural materials and rugged
texture of wood shingles and clinker brick. The prominent gables, projecting
rafter beams and horizontally are all typical of the style. The exterior
of the main house and carriage house retain their original integrity and
have not been altered. This style is echoed by several similar homes nearby
in the Bluff Park Historic District.
The Milwaukee Building Company was
an influential architectural firm which did other work for the Milbank
family and associates. Isaac Milbank, a co-founder of the Borden Milk Company
and an oil investor, had a magnificent Craftsman summer home constructed
for him in 1911 by the Milwaukee Building Company on a bluff overlooking
the ocean in Santa Monica. At the same time, the Milwaukee Building Company
constructed a similar home on the same street in Santa Monica for retired
hotel proprietor Henry Weaver, who owned several Midwest hotels.
The Milwaukee Building Company later
became the Los Angeles firm of Meyer & Holler, an eminent firm which
constructed numerous landmark buildings. Their most famous designs were
the Chinese and Egyptian Theaters in Hollywood. In Long Beach, they designed
the Ocean Center Building, Walkers Department Store and the Fox West Coast
Theater (demolished). Source: City of Long Beach http://www.ci.long-beach.ca.us/
Museum of Latin American Art
628 Alamitos Ave., Long Beach 90802 Info: 562/437-1689
Long Beach Museum of Art
2300 E. Ocean Blvd., Long Beach 90803 Info: 562/439-2119.
Long Beach Museum of Art Video Annex
5373 E. Second St., Long Beach 90803 Info: 562/439-0751.
University Art Museum
California State University Long Beach, North Campus, 1250 Bellflower
Blvd., Long Beach 90840. Telephone: 562-985-5761. web site: http://www.csulb.edu/uam
