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PASADENA: CALIFORNIA'S SMALL |
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| The Pasadena Museum of History on West Walnut Street exhibits a world of information on the
development of Pasadena and its one-time fascinating hotels. The Alpine
Tavern and Echo Mountain House Hotel, built in 1895 above Altadena
as the Mt. Lowe hotels, were famous throughout the West. For example
in 1911, 70 trains a day ran from LA to Pasadena to pick up the scary-looking
mountain trolley cars that completed the journey to "the most
famous, longest year-round, tourist attraction of its time. "In
41 years 3.1 million visitors came to the 4400 foot-high Alpine Tavern. |
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Often the first visitors came from
Chicago-to escape winter. The social life blossomed around the hotels
and later the hotel cottages. The Santa Fe and Southern Pacific sought
passengers enough to offer a ticket from the Midwest to the Coast
(Indiana to California) for $5 and the immigrants poured in, attracted
by the area's balmy climate and its developing orange groves. |
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The growth of the city is well displayed at the this museum which is housed itself in another interesting part of the past: the Fenyes Mansion, built in 1906 and at one time the Finnish Consulate in Los Angeles. Mrs. Eva Scott Fenyes, an artist married first a general in the U.S. Marine Corps then a titled Hungarian neurologist. The house contains all the original furniture except for the grandfather clock which came from the old Raymond Hotel. The rocking chair in the children's bedroom was used by three generations. Other items of interest include a 1613 German carved chest cabinet, a 17th Century tapestry from Brussels and two pianos both played on by their neighbor, Jean Sibelius himself.
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