Sid Gally’s Pasadena history feature in today’s PSN looks at
“If This Be Treason: A Foolish Guide to Pasadena” by Sanford Conn and Datlis C. Smith Jr., a 1929 tome that sounds part John Birch, part snarky comment. Mentioned in the article is Kate Crane Gartz, a Chicago steel heiress who came to live in Altadena and spent her life sponsoring lefty causes. A list of her books are here, and she’s in the Internet Movie Database as a producer for producing Segei Eisenstein’s Mexican Fantasy, among other documentary works in the 1930’s.
Graphic: Gartz’s 1945 Christmas message. Click to enlarge.
michele Zack said…
Kate Gartz was amazing activist and hostess who regularly entertained the likes of Charlie Chaplin, Albert Einstein, Upton Sinclair and other “lefties” at weekly salons, and fought tirelessly for social justice. It is odd that today, if she is mentioned at all, it is usually with a wink and a nod as if she was some inconsequential nut. Good for you Tim, for identifying that very “John Birch, snarky” tone in the Foolish Guide to Pasadena!
Monday, December 15, 2008 at 04:39 PM