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Overview

The San Francisco architect Joseph Cather Newsom practiced briefly in Southern CA during the late 1880s, leaving behind a group of grand Queen Anne Style residences that reflected designs in his popular pattern book, Picturesque and Artistic Homes and Buildings of California(1890).The Sessions House had a plan, photo and interior description illustrated in Picturesque and Artistic Homes and Buildings of California. This two-and-a-half-story residence was for a dairy merchant, Charles H. Sessions. Like the best Queen Anne buildings, it demonstrated a composition bursting with formal, textural and ornamental variety, suggesting the new abundance and vitality of a steam-powered, technological age.

Building History

Dairyman Charles H. Sessions (born 09/14/1850 in Southington, CT-d. 01/14/1936 in Riverside, CA) and his wife, Katherine E. "Kittie" Gould, (born c. 03/1855 in OH-d. 10/25/1931 in Riverside, CA), resided at this address in 1900, with a servant, Augusta Anderson (born c. 10/1872 in Sweden). The Sessions had no children. (See Ancestry.com, Source Citation Year: 1900; Census Place: Los Angeles Ward 2, Los Angeles, California; Roll: 88; Page: 6A; Enumeration District: 0009; FHL microfilm: 1240088, accessed 01/23/2018.) Charles lived in Hartford, CT, in 1870, where he worked as a teamster. (See Ancestry.com, Source Citation Year: 1870; Census Place: Hartford Ward 1, Hartford, Connecticut; Roll: M593_100; Page: 355A; Family History Library Film: 545599, accessed 01/23/2018.) His father, Samuel, was an accountant, and he transitioned into this line of work during the 1870-1880 period. (See Ancestry.com, Source Citation Year: 1860; Census Place: Southington, Hartford, Connecticut; Roll: M653_77; Page: 672; Family History Library Film: 803077, accessed 01/24/2018.)

He wed Katherine in Cuyahoga County, OH, on 05/18/1876. In 1880, they lived in Cleveland, OH, where Charles worked as a bookkeeper and Kittie maintained the household. They had a servant there, too, suggesting that they were financially comfortable before moving to CA. According to the 1870s US Census, her family owned about $4,000 worth of real estate, a relatively large sum at that time. (See Ancestry.com, Source Citation Year: 1870; Census Place: Cleveland Ward 9, Cuyahoga, Ohio; Roll: M593_1191; Page: 334A; Family History Library Film: 552690, accessed 01/24/2018 and Ancestry.com, Source Citation Year: 1880; Census Place: Cleveland, Cuyahoga, Ohio; Roll: 1008; Page: 471C; Enumeration District: 042, accessed 01/23/2018.) They relocated to Los Angeles in either 1886 or 1887 where Charles established himself in the dairy business. The Los Angeles, California, City Directory, 1887,(p. 387) indicated that he worked in the dairy business and lived in the Bellevue Terrace tract in the Bunker Hill area. He must have prospered, as they were able to erect this large dwelling at 1330 Carroll Avenue before the end of the decade.

Charles was listed variously in city directories as President of the Sessions and Co., Dairy (1901, p. 773), an unnamed dairy at 117 E. 23rd Street (1902, p. 989) and Belle-Vernon Farms Company (1903, p. 1122 and 1904, p. 1155). They lived in this house until 1902 or 1903, but moved to an apartment at 401 South Olive Street by 1903. Sessions made a professional transition in the mid-1900s. He and his wife took a long excursion abroad during 1906-1907, and when he returned, he became President of the American Olive Company by 1908. He and Katherine then took up residence in an apartment at 1000 West 7th Street.

The Los Angeles office of the San Francisco architectural firm of Newsom and Newsom designed this residence. As the house appears in a book authored by Joseph C. Newsom, its design has often been attributed specifically to him.