Getty House original decorative detail, 1921

Denver has Cableland, Detroit has Manoogian Mansion, New York City has Gracie Mansion, and Los Angeles has Getty House – the official home of the city’s mayor. The residence is located in the Los Angeles district known as Windsor Square – one of several fashionable neighborhoods resulting from the development of nearby Wilshire Boulevard in the 1900s.

At that time Wilshire Boulevard mirrored the economic prosperity of the city. Once oil fields and dirt roads, the area gave way to a real estate boom of stately homes and luxurious grandly designed office and commercial buildings. Hancock Park and Fremont Place development continued in the early 1900s and eventually became home to families whose names now line the city’ books, including the Jansses, Bannings, Rowans, and Van Nuys.

It was during the heydays of the 1920s that a number of Los Angeles landmarks wer opened, or constructed. These architectural icons included: Watts Towers, the Rose Bowl, Hollywood Bowl, the Los Angeles Memorial Colliseum, the Hollywoodland (now Hollywood) sign, the Shrine Auditorium, and Los Angeles City Hall. This period saw the first “talkie,” The Jazz Singer, the first Mickey Mouse cartoon, Christine Sterling’s initial efforts to save Olivera Street, and the University of California Los Angeles’ move form Vermont Avenue to Westwood Boulevard in Los Angeles’ westside.