Architect Set City’s Style: Riverside Daily Press May 3rd, 1950

I lived on Linwood place in Riverside when I was going to junior high and high school. In those days all the youngsters walked to school, or rode their bikes, unless they lived far enough away, of course to qualify for school bus transportation.

So twice a day, for every school day, I walked up and down Magnolia avenue.

It got so that I knew every hedge and tree by heart. I liked plants even then, especially the irrigating of them because I’ve been fascinated by mud since the age of two. 

(In fact, I held the record on Linwood for years of champion female mud-ball fighter.)

There was one house along the route, on the west side of Magnolia at 5063, in front of which I always lingered.   To me it was a foreign castle plunked down among the unimaginative white frame and boxy stuccos.

The “castle” was topped with a bell tower, for sounding alarms and calling out the king’s warriors.  The entrance streps were gay and romantic with brilliantly colored tiles, so that it made a pleasant adventure just to think about entering through the rich, decorative wrought iron which protected the screen door.

Instead of wooden picket fences there was ornamental iron, just like in the pictures of homes in Spain and Italy. There were picturesque wrought iron window protectors and the mass of the house itself gave the impression of a home that answered the basic human desire for sanctuary and refuge.

The tile roof looked as if it would last for a hundred years (and undoubtedly will) and the roof lines were broken up so that even the top of the house created its own artistic interest.

The landscaping was unusual as compared to most of the hedges and indiscriminate masses of shrubs, each placed with methodical geometric precision.  There was a goldfish pool to break the expanse of lawn and an artistic grouping of exotic plants with tall coral blooms (which now I know are Aloes and love to use with abandon)

A massive rock stood at the front corner of the lawn that to me made a fitting portal for “castle gates.”  I mourned that there wasn’t room for a moat. 

When I asked who lived there, an older girl, who lived nearby and with whom I occasionally walked to school, said the house was the home of Henry L. A. Jekel.

“He has four names,” she said, “and the only other one around here like that is the man across and down Magnolia, – E. H. S. Knapp.  And he lives in an interesting house, too.”  “It also was a Jekel-house.)

LATER I learned that Jekel was an architect. It seemed that every place in town that I really admired, that seemed just right for Riverside’s climate and history, that looked massive and long-lasting with a sort of old world, tropical charm, was planned by H. L. A. Jekel.  

Trees, it has been said around here for years, have made Riverside the City Beautiful. But for the last 30 or 40 years, as far as I am concerned, so has Henry L. A. Jekel.

For years I have eaten in what was once Mape’s Cafeteria on Main street and admired the walls and ceiling, the windows and arches.  I love the “different” exterior and the tiled fountains in the entrance hall.  It was all Jekel’s idea.

In the early thirties when the Woodcraft Home (now the Baptist College) was built, it was like a palace, even to the size. Our Sunday school class always piled on the back of a big truck in the early hours of Christmas morning to sing carols from one end of town to the other. The last stop was down the long, regal drive to the home where, sometimes so covered with smudge on the cold nights we looked as if made up for a minstrel show, we made the rounds to the rooms of the bedridden old folks, singing lustily to cheer them. (At least we woke them up.)  

WHEN I talked to Henry Jekel the other day, he laughed about the impressive entrance drive.  “Mrs. Minnie Hiner was the organizer of the Woodcraft Home,” he said, “and she wanted to put the building right by the street.  The height far back from the street was the only logical setting, to me, but it took some talking.”

The real castle, of course, with more than 17,000 square feet of floor space, is still called “The Castle,” built by Charles Williston Benedict and known as “the show place of the west.”  Much has been written about and thousands have seen “Castilla Isabella” the Spanish-Moorish, moated, towered, turrented dream place on Benedict avenue beyond the Victoria Country Club.  It made headlines when it was built in 1925, and when it was sold in 1949.

It WAS also in the early thirties when I was greatly impressed with the fact that in a short space of time two homes in Riverside received national honors for beautiful gardens. One was the Krinard home on Victoria Hill, the other the E. M. Doyle home on west Seventh.  Both houses are today just as dignified, charming and beautiful as they were then.  And I discovered that much of the original landscaping was suggested or planned by Jekel after he built the houses.  

It’s the same with the mansion built by the late Harry F. Grout at the head of west Seventh (at 3663 Mount Rubidoux Drive) where the house crowns the height of a breathtaking sweep of huge lawn.  

In fact, west Seventh street, which for so long has made the west entrance into town so impressive, owes a great deal to Henry Jekel.  He designed the Arthur Sweet home which is just east of the Doyle’s.  On down the street (at 4447) is the 14-room home built for A.N. Coffin.  They’re just as beautiful today.  

When I called on the Jekels, they were so modest that it took my best brand of persuasion to burrow out the details of his career.  But I hit gold in their collection of old news clippings, many not dated, mostly from the Riverside Daily Press.  It’s as good a way to tell the story as I can figure.  And it will give some idea of the number of projects in which he had a hand.

The story started with an article about a young architect who had come to Riverside to design the Congregational Church tower, now a landmark in the city.

Born in Buffalo, New York, he went to school there and had private tutoring as well.  He started his architectural career with the firm of Thompson Starrett Company, the world’s largest construction company.  In 1902 young Jekel was architect for the famous Pennsylvania Building, which at that time cost over two million dollars.  It was Philadelphia’s first structural steel building and stands just as firmly today, 57 years later.  He built the Westory Building in Washington, D. C., on the most expensive (at that time) parcel of land in the city, across from the famous Willard Hotel.  While in Washington he worked in the Government Architectural Department.

Jekel came out to California a few years later to work with a Mr. Burnum putting up the buildings for the San Diego Fair.  He visited Riverside in 1908, went back to Buffalo and married Amanda M. Zacher, daughter of Col. Zacher of the 74th Regiment, whom he had known since childhood.  They lived in Riverside in 1911 and 1912 while the Congregational Church was being completed.

Returning to Buffalo, the Jekels built a house for themselves but it wasn’t long before he was attracted again to the West, where he designed and landscaped fine homes on a 40-acre tract in the Pasadena area.

The Jekels evidently liked Riverside the best.  When they built their present home on Magnolia avenue, a headline in the Press read: “Noted Architect Plans Erection of Spanish Bungalow.”  The article ended: “Mr. Jekel took the general outline of a sketch (of the church tower) of Myron Hunt and his procedure in making intricate mathematical calculations by which the tower was broken up into several thousand pieces, was regarded as an extraordinary achievement.  Riverside is to be congratulated upon the acquisition of Mr. Jekel to this city.”

In 1938 the Jekels, both of whom have served on the City Beautification Committee, received a prize for the landscaping of their home, with a long description in the Press of the front yard pool, filled with white water lilies and “built up above ground level with odd stones of many kinds.”

Old-timers will appreciate other headlines: “Crowds Throng Hess Building for Auto Show.”  Julius Hess had commissioned Jekel to build 30,000 square feet of building with domed roof supported by steel girders.

“Cafeteria in Gate City Has Mezzanine Salon” – this was the Mape’s building in San Bernardino, opened in 1931.  The imposing front of the old Riverside Daily Press Building on Eighth and Market was designed in 1926.  Upon completion the community was invited to the newspaper’s “open house” celebration.  Jekel also designed (and when I say designed, he also engineered) the buildings of Imperial Valley Daily Press in El Centro and the Rubidoux Printing Company on Fairmount boulevard.

“Residence for A.A Piddington Being Erected on Sightly Knoll” – Houghton opposite Pine Street.

“Mr. and Mrs. H. W. Hammond, owners of beautiful Victoria Hill home, won first prize in garden contest.”

“New Business Block Projected at Seventh and Market” – the Chapman building on the south-west corner, where Jekel envisioned a “street in Spain.”

“Chapman Homestead Being Subdivided” – now Chapman place, where Henry Jekel built homes for W. Stewart Button, Charles C. Norris and Mrs. Louise White.

“Jekel Completes New White Block” – on west side of Main street between Eighth and Ninth, in 1937.

“Osteopathic Structure to be Built Here” – Dr. A. E. Goodan’s office building at 4060 Orange street.

Jekel’s clients sound like the “Who’s who” of the town up until ten years ago.  Here’s only a partial list showing for whom houses were built, with the old addresses:  Charles E. Brouse, 4202 Eighth; Mary Morton Estate, Victoria avenue and Gibson street; E. P Clarke, 5125 Ramona; Fred Stebler, 4532 Sixth; Howard G. Heisler, 5370 Rumsey Dr; J. W. Calvert, 4630 Aurora Dr; Fred Dill and J. B. Cook of McAllister Hill in Arlington; C.H Hollis, 3411 Rubidoux Dr; Dr. Henry J. Quayle, Rubidoux Dr.

Then there was Walter C. Banks 3105 Pine; Myron Millice, 3606 Fairfax; Harry E. Ross, 4475 Fifth; James H. Jordan, 5121 Magnolia; Percy Powell, 4409 Houghton ave; Dr. H. J. Webber and Prof. William T. Horne on University Knoll.

Jekel, who retired ten years ago after 42 years of activity, was responsible for the lovely mausoleum at Olivewood Cemetery; Banks’ Drug Store; the Button Building on Eighth street; the Palm Springs Hotel in that city; the Linden street Keyes Reservoir; the crematory at Evergreen Cemetery; Sears, Roebuck in Riverside and San Bernardino; and many other business buildings and homes.

I strongly suspect that one of his “pets” was the charming little stone place on Orange  Grove and Prospect built for G. A. Hammer.  Everyone who knew the Hammers, it seems, loved them.  A letter to the Jekels from the Hammers closes with: “We do surely appreciate the many efforts put forth by both yourself and your good wife and the monument of the place will always be a reminder to us of your goodness.”

Another admirer of Jekel is Mrs. Isabel Ellis, widow of Judge William H. Ellis.  She had a wonderful story to tell of the remodeling job of the house on Cedar street and Jekel’s kindness.  Wish I were writing a book!

Before this becomes one, let me quote from an old column “The velvet Hammer,” written by one A B. B. about Henry L. A. Jekel: ‘He feels the immaturity that marks our boyish brains as viewed in Illinoisan and contiguous remains.  He gathers clews from Spaniard and Italian, Greek and Moor which hint at poise and principles more likely to endure.  So let us thank the artist and the architect and man who helps us fight the influence of Dallas and Spokane.’

I have nothing against the starkness of modern architecture but whenever I see bright tile-work, a balcony or soft-lined graceful arch, I think of Jekel’s houses.  They’ll all still be beautiful, I have no doubt in the world, as long as they stand.