#Maltman Avenue

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E. Schelling Contractor (Photo taken by Scott Fajack on March 27, 2023 at Valentine St. near Cerro Gordo St. in the Elysian Heights neighborhood of Los Angeles, CA)

In 1909, Schelling was awarded the contract for improving "Manzanita St," including grading and graveling, cement curb, and cement gutter, vitrified block gutter; at the same time he was also awarded the contract for a portion of Cerro Gordo St. so that may be this sighting. In the same year, he submitted a bed for constructing Section 3 of South Los Angeles Main Sewer (Southwest Contractor and Manufacturer, Volume 3, Engineers and Architects Association of Southern California, 1909)!

In 1916, Schelling "abandoned the contract before full performance thereof" for the construction of a street improvement in Vancouver (The Pacific Reporter, Volume 154, West Publishing Company, 1916). How scandalous!

In the same year, he was noted as being in Burbank, CA, where he was awarded the contract for improving Glendale avenue in Glendale, between First street and Verdugo road (Contractor, Volume 23, McGraw Publishing Company, 1916).

By the following year, E. Schelling was located at 4316 South Figueroa street in the South Figueroa Corridor neighborhood of Los Angeles, CA. Almost all the info I found was in 1917, so get ready for a lot from Southwest Builder and Contractor, Volume 50 (F. W. Dodge Company, 1917).

He submitted bids to the Los Angeles "board of public works for grading and oiling Burns avenue between Virgil and Vermont avenues" including "grading to finished surface," ...cultivating, tamping, and oiling, ... Class A cement curb, ... cement walk, ... (and) concrete gutter;" "for constructing cement curbs and sidewalks on Echo Park avenue between Vestal avenue and Donaldson street;" "for the improvement of Effie street between Micheltorena street and Maltman avenue" including "rough grading, … finish grade and oil, … curb, …side walk, …concrete gutter, … (and) storm drain;" "for improving Myra street from santa Monica boulevard to Hoover street" including bitulithic paving including grading, rough grading to grade, finishing grading, oiling and rolling, cement curb, cement sidewalk, concrete gutter, storm drain, and remodeling sanitary sewer manhole; for "improving Bates avenue from Effie street to Sunset boulevard," including asphalt paving, rough grading, finishing grade and oil, curb, sidewalk, concrete gutter, brick gutter, and storm drain; "for grading and oiling Eagle street between Ezra street and Concord street" including rough grading, finish grade and oil, curb, sidewalk, and concrete gutter; "for rough grading and grading to finish grade at Lemoyne and Baxter streets;" "for grading and oiling and constructing cement curbs, sidewalks and gutters on Grafton street between Lucretia avenue and Lemoyne street;" "for grading an oiling and constructing cement curb, sidewalk and gutter and storm drain in Preston avenue between Husted street and Avalon street;" "for grading and oiling and constructing concrete pavement, cement curb, sidewalk and gutter in Twenty-fifth street between Nevin and Compton avenues." He pretty much seems to have done most of Echo Park!

He submitted a bid "for constructing a concrete retaining wall 1185 ft. long on south side of Brooklyn avenue east of Evergreen avenue."

In 1918, Schelling was still on Figueroa and was awarded the "contract for grading and oiling Preston Ave." and "for the improvement of Myra St. between Santa Monica Blvd. and Hoover St.," which had been submitted in the year prior (Engineering and Contracting: Buildings, General Contracting, Structures and Civil Engineering, Volume 49, Myron C. Clark Publishing Company, 1918).

In October of 1920, Schelling had a $20k "paving and sidewalk contract in a new sub-division in the north part of Los Angeles near Eagle Rock." In November of 1920, Schelling was listed as being located in Venice and being "low bidder of improvements on the South Mountain Road near Santa Paula, Ventura County." Plus, Russel and Whitney noted that "Mr. Schelling has been very busy of late and is very anxious to start his new 30-B Bucyrus shovel which was recently shipped to him" (Russell, I.T. and C. W. Whitney. "Notes from the Pacific Coast," Excavating Contractor, Volumes 13-14, A.B. Morse Company, 1916). [Obviously Google Books is wrong here because the edition is from 1920, so the volume cannot be from 1916.]

The only E. Schelling I found in the Los Angeles area around this time who seems to have something to do with the contractor business is Eugene Schelling. According to the 1940 Census, Eugene was born in 1882 in Switzerland and lived at 920 S Fremont in Los Angeles, California. That is not currently an address. I am guessing it was taken out by the 110 freeway. He died in 1951 and is buried at Angelus Rosedale Cemetery in L.A. (Find a Grave). However, knowing all this, I was able to confirm that Eugene is our E. Schelling, as per the 1917 Los Angeles City Directory, Eugene Schilling or Schelling or Shilling was located at 4316 S. Figueroa and was a contractor (Los Angeles Directory Co., accessed via the Los Angeles Public Library's Historic City and Business & Phone Directories Collection).

This led me to find a bigger job that Eugene did with an Oscar Schelling. ("Road Construction with a Diesel Oil Dragline: California Contractor Handles a Fill Along the Pacific Coast with Remarkably Low Fuel Cost." Contractors and Engineers Monthly, Volume 6, pg. 73, Buttenheim-Dix Publishing Corporation, 1923). For a contract that H.H. Peterson had, Eugene and Oscar did the earth-moving work.

In the 1940 Census, Oscar Schelling, also born in Switzerland around 1877, lived at 427 Orange Grove in Glendale, CA with the Groshong family. He was a graduate of the "scientific course" at Los Angeles High School (Annual Report, Board of Education of the City of Los Angeles, 1897). In 1910, Oscar had a patent for a grapple (?) with A. A. Phillips ("Gas-Appliance Patents," The Natural Gas Journal, Volume 4, Periodicals Publishing Company, 1910). I don't yet know his relationship to Eugene but perhaps they were brothers?

Oscar was also in the construction business. He had a contract for a highway in Seal Beach, California, in which he used a 30-B Bucyrus dragline excavator driving with a Diesel oil engine as pictured here (pg. 122, April 1923, "Pacific Coast News," Excavating Engineer, Volumes 16-17, A.B. Morse Company, 1922). The day shift included Harvey Kramer as engineer and Arthur Schelling (also of unknown relation) as oiler; the night shift had Frank Mayes as engineer and Sam Viluda as oiler (Birkhead P.H., "Pacific Coast News," Excavating Engineer, Volumes 16-17, A.B. Morse Company, 1922).

[ericpoptone]

Nobody Drives in LA -- Street Vacations: When Streets Get Taken Away

Nobody Drives in LA — Street Vacations: When Streets Get Taken Away

About a month ago, following the introduction of a car-free section of Griffith Park Drive in Griffith Park, I wrote a piece celebrating ten Los Angeles streets that have been reclaimed from automobiles over the past century. After that, I wrote about open streets events, like CicLAvia, that have for 20 years provided tantalizing if temporary glimpses of what a less car-centric Los Angeles could…

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Mid-Century Modern Classic in Silver Lake!

Mid-Century Modern Classic in Silver Lake!

1850 MALTMAN AVENUE 2 BEDROOMS – 1 BATH – $1,199,000 Here’s that mid-century modern you’ve been waiting for in Silver Lake! Perched right above Sunset Junction, north of Sunset Boulevard in the Moreno Highlands, this amazing pad is turn-key and ready to enjoy. (more…)