A Bright and Guilty Place: Murder, Corruption, and L.A.'s Scandalous Coming of Age (28 page)

Background is from W. W. Robinson’s
History of Ventura
, and
Me, Detective
. I consulted the Ventura City Directories at the Ventura County Museum, where I also examined the bound back copies of the
Santa Paula Chronicle
for the paper’s stunning coverage of the St. Francis break. Charles Outland’s
Man-Made Disaster
is still the best book on the subject, diligent local history with enormous depth. Marc Reisner’s
Cadillac Desert
(the chapter titled “The Red Queen” deals with L.A. and water) was also very useful, likewise the books on William Mulholland by Margaret Leslie Davis and Catherine Mulholland. The “Joint Citizens’ Report” on the disaster, in a typewritten document held by the Ventura County Museum, and Leslie White’s photographs of the victims form part of that evidence. Bernie Isensee’s panoramic photographs are also at the Ventura County Museum.

U.S. Census records for 1910, 1920, and 1930 furnished background on Dave Clark’s family. The U.S. National Archives provided details of Clark’s Annapolis record, and the British National Archives at Kew hold his Royal Flying Corps record. The transcripts of his two trials,
People v. Dave Clark
, buried in the vaults of the Los Angeles County Hall of Records, also gave invaluable personal detail on Clark. Daniel Beecher’s pamphlet about the District Attorney’s office, essentially a self-boosting device commissioned by Buron Fitts (Beecher was one of Fitts’s top deputies), gives great specifics on how things worked down at the Hall of Justice. For information on the Marco trials, I relied on reports from the
Daily News
, the
Los Angeles Examiner
, and the
Los Angeles Evening Express
, for the dates July 6, 1928, and following, and the trial transcripts at the Hall of Records.

White records his arrival in L.A. in
Me, Detective
and in his diaries, lodged at Boston University. Edmund Wilson’s remarkable essay first appeared in
New Republic
(December 29, 1931) and was later collected in his book
American Earthquake
. Sarah Comstock’s reflections on the city appeared in
Harper’s
(May 1928). The Carey McWilliams material is drawn from
The Education of Carey McWilliams
and
Southern California Country: An Island on the Land
, still the best history of the period. Louis Adamic’s
Laughing in the Jungle
records his own early impressions.

Here I relied on reports from the
Daily News
, the
Examiner
, the
Express
, and the
Times
for the days August 24, 1928, and following, as well as the trial transcript:
People v. Marco. The Leisure Architecture of Wayne McAllister
by Chris Nichols, a lovely book, details the history of the Agua Caliente resort.

Chapter 6: Oil, Law, and Scandal

The history of the Julian Pete was first told by local reporter and civic activist Guy Finney in
The Great Los Angeles Bubble
, published soon after the event and still invaluable. A few years later Lorin Baker published
That Imperiled Freedom
, an early example of conspiracy theory run amok, from which one gleans how far and wide the scandal did indeed spread. Jules Tygiel’s
The Great Los Angeles Swindle
is the definitive study, dense and richly informative—one of the key books on the era. Upton Sinclair’s
Oil!
gives a superb on-the-ground sense of the oil craze, a feeling captured best of all in Albert Atwood’s pieces for the
Saturday Evening Post
, titled “Money from Everywhere” (
Saturday Evening Post
, May 12, 1923), “When the Oil Flood Is On” (
Saturday Evening Post
, July 7, 1923), and “Mad from Oil” (
Saturday Evening Post
, July 14, 1923).

Chapter 7: Our Detective Learns the Ropes

White’s accounts—in his diaries and memoir—were again useful for background on Jake Berman, Tygiel, and Finney; likewise the
Times
and
Examiner
coverage.

The first two-thirds of the story of E. L. Doheny is wonderfully told by journalist James C. Young in a long biographical study entitled “Doheny’s Napoleonic Career” (
New York Times
, February 17, 1924). The biographies by Margaret Leslie Davis (now the standard) and Dan La Botz (more abrasive) were very useful here, as were Roger Ansell’s book and the obituaries that appeared in the
New York Times
and the
Los Angeles Times
(September 9 and 10, 1935). The story of Teapot Dome is excellently told in the books by Burl Noggle, and more recently by Laton McCartney. Frederick Lewis Allen’s classic
Only Yesterday
is great on the oil scandals and gives remarkable period flavor.

Chapter 9: Beverly Hills C.S.I.

White’s memoir and his diaries were invaluable again here. The profile of Lucien Wheeler that appeared in the
Los Angeles Times
(May 23, 1911) is great. To study the coverage of the Doheny murder/suicide that appeared in the
Times
, the
Examiner
, the
Express
, and the
Daily News
in the days immediately following the tragedy is to be enthralled. It’s like stepping into Agatha Christie, but with motives and a blunt use of power that were beyond her ken. For information on the fascinating life of Miriam Lerner, I started with Hurewitz’s
Bohemian Los Angeles
and Lionel Rolfe’s
Literary L.A.

I relied on White’s accounts as well as the
Times
and
Examiner
reports for the two days after the killings—page after page of coverage. Guy Finney and Jules Tygiel are good in their different ways on Buron Fitts, who painted handsome portraits of himself in
Who’s Who in L.A.
(1928, 1929, 1930). In his autobiography Cecil B. DeMille tells the story of how Doheny tried to recruit him as, in effect, a publicist—as if Bill Gates were to try to hire Steven Spielberg to make a biopic.

The Ned Doheny funeral received novelistic coverage in the
Examiner
, the
Times
, the
News
. The history of the brilliantly named Wellborn, Wellborn & Wellborn is recorded in W. W. Robinson’s
Lawyers of Los Angeles
. Robinson, himself an attorney, wrote many books of excellent local history. The report on the LAPD for 1924, commissioned by August Vollmer during his brief tenureship, gives background and interviews. Beverly Davis told her story in the riveting memoir
Call House Madam
.

Good additional information on Lucien Wheeler came from the F.B.I. and White’s diaries. Detail on the Jacobson case is from the
Times
and the
Examiner
. Edmund Wilson is excellent on Bob Shuler.

Alva Johnston’s
Saturday Evening Post
profile of Erle Stanley Gardner (
Saturday Evening Post
, October 5, 12, and 19, 1946) was very useful. The books by William Nolan and Ron Goulart are good on the history of
Black
Mask
and the pulps. White’s first story, “Phoney Evidence,” appeared in
Dragnet
(February 8, 1930).

Chapter 14: Raymond Chandler—Oil Man!

I’ve drawn on Raymond Chandler’s marvelous letters, the Chandler papers held by UCLA Special Collections, and material concerning Joseph Dabney and the Dabney Oil Syndicate at the California Institute of Technology. There’s a lot of great writing about Chandler. Frank MacShane’s biography still remains the standard, and Judith Freeman’s recent book, though much more personal in approach, is a beautiful book. Philip Durham’s early study weaves in a lot of original Chandler material.

Chapter 15: Entrapment of a News Hound

Morris Lavine’s daughter still runs the law firm that bears his name in Los Angeles. She gave me great background on Lavine and the “melee” concerning the $75,000. The rest of this chapter draws largely on White’s various accounts.

The fallout from the lawsuit brought by Joseph Dabney and others is thoroughly charted in the
L.A. Times
. White recorded his version of the Crawford trial. The trial of Edward L. Doheny was a nationwide event. The
New York Times
colorfully evoked the courtroom scene.

Buron Fitts released details of Clark’s promotion to the
Times
. The
New York Times
obituary gave background on James T. Malone and his family. Nancy Clark’s granddaughter gave me an interview—one of those moments when history seemed to reach forward and touch the writer. Herbert Asbury’s writings on Chicago are from his book
Gem of the Prairie
. White’s story of his trip to Chicago is enthralling. For Charlie Crawford’s sudden finding of God: the
Times
, the
Examiner
, the
News
, the
Express
all covered this event with glee.

Guy Finney’s quote is from his muckraking book
Angel City in Turmoil
. For Clara Bow (great fun to write about), I looked to Budd Schulberg, David Stenn’s excellent biography of Bow, F. Scott Fitzgerald, David Thomson, and books by Elizabeth Kendall and Jeanine Basinger. Background to the DeVoe/Bow trial is from the
Times
and the
Examiner
. The James Richardson story is recorded in his autobiography
For the Life of Me
. Great background on W. I. Gilbert, the famed attorney, is to be found in Robinson’s
Lawyers of Los Angeles
.

Details of Dave Clark’s various trips to Agua Caliente emerged later, at his own trial.
People v. DeVoe
received exhaustive and colorful coverage in all the L.A. papers for the days following January 12, 1931. Budd Schulberg is incisive on how his father ruthlessly shrugged off the unwanted baggage that Bow had become.

The
Times
and the
Examiner
recorded the premiere of
City Lights
. Charlie Chaplin’s autobiography is excellent here, likewise Charles Maland’s British Film Institute study. Dorothy Comingore gave her interview to Studs Terkel—it’s in his book
Hard Times
. Gene Coughlin writes about meeting Einstein in his memoir—it’s funny stuff. The statements about the Depression, and the apparent absence thereof, that were habitually made in the
Times
throughout the early 1930s strike us now as an extreme example of the willful sticking of the corporate head in very soggy sand. Leslie White’s son, Skip, remembers how his father told him stories of his L.A. experiences at this time—the almost comical gangland adventures that could have so easily resulted in death.

In writing about the deaths of Charlie Crawford and Herbert Spencer, and the subsequent trials of Dave Clark, I constructed a detailed timeline from the trial transcripts of
People v. David Harris Clark
and from all the newspaper coverage I could lay my hands on (about three thousand pages in all) from the
Times
, the
Examiner
, the
Express
, and the
Daily News
. Gene Coughlin, lured back to the
News
by owner Manchester Boddy, wrote wonderfully about these events.