Elliot, age 2-3 and 3-4?
Wallace, Ruth, Wallace Jr., Kate Elliot, and Kate Elliot Jr.
Ruth was born Nov. 1916, so this must have been taken around 1917-18, close to the time they left Santa Barbara.
This was before the 1925 earthquake, and the current Spanish style did not exist. Elliot probably didn't visit Santa Barbara between her childhood and when her daughter's family moved there in 1967. I imagine it must have been quite a shock, with the look of the downtown area completely changed, and the massive amount of development out to La Cumbre Plaza and beyond. Here I try to reconstruct a bit of the Santa Barbara Elliot lived in.
Santa Barbara in the 1910's
They lived in this house, at 2126 De La Vina (then called Hollister) between Los Olivos and Padre (then called 1st), which at the time was on the outskirts of town. This is the house that Elliot's younger sister Ruth was born in.
Elliot's school was Garfield School, just a few blocks away at the corner of Padre (1st) and Bath. (The building was replaced in the 1935, and is now the Schott Campus of SBCC.) There was also a separate kindergarten building on 1st Street "near Bath," probably right next door, built in 1912. (These pictures are from a 1963 Masters thesis on the history of SB schools.)
Garfield School in 1906.
Garfield School in 1935, just before demolition. Oddly, the ground seems higher up the sides of the building than in the older picture, and the stairs are gone.
Garfield Kindergarten in 1963 (now no longer there).
They attended the Methodist church, of which there were two at the time, so this may or may not have been the one they went to:
The American Film Company (the "Flying A") had its studio in Santa Barbara from 1910 to 1922. It was the biggest movie company in the U.S. at the time, and it was just two blocks from Elliot's house, between State and Chapala, and between Mission and Padre. This shows the side along Mission Street, at the time and today.
A few blocks down on De La Vina (Hollister) at Sola was the Upham Hotel, shown here in 1887, and today:
And still further down, at Anapamu, was the high school, built in 1902, which also housed the junior college established in 1911. Here's a picture of it after the earthquake, I'll be trying to find a better picture:
The current Art Museum was the Post Office at the time:
1915 4th of July Parade down State Street
Note the very utilitarian building behind, where the library now is.
At the site of the current Lobero Theater was the Lobero Opera House, which looked like this:
The pre-earthquake Courthouse looked like this:
Since Santa Barbara was a tourist destination, there were at least two major luxury hotels: the Arlington Hotel at the site of the current Arlington Theater, and the Potter Hotel by the waterfront.
Additional sites I want to include are Alameda Park and Cottage Hospita, when I find photos.
Here are pictures of Elliot and her little brother Wallace Jr. from the Santa Barbara period, presumably before Ruth was born.
