4 days ago
He donated the land that became Griffith Park. Then he shot his wife
Surely you are familiar with the sprawling, rugged glory of Los Angeles' Griffith Park. But do you know about the park's benefactor and namesake, Griffith J. Griffith?
The philanthropist and felon endowed L.A. with what was then the largest urban park in the world and still remains a jewel of the city.
He also shot his wife in the face. She survived; he served two years at San Quentin; they divorced. We'll get to that.
But first, let's rewind back to December 1896.
Los Angeles was a city with great ambitions — a rapidly exploding boomtown that was still in the process of leaving its rancho past behind.
Col. Griffith J. Griffith and his wife Tina were the talk of the town, often spotted at theater openings or the opera. She was from a prominent society family. He was a formerly penniless Welsh immigrant who'd made his fortune in mining and other ventures.
Our paper described Griffith as 'part visionary and part blowhard.' One acquaintance dubbed him as 'midget egomaniac,' another as a 'roly-poly pompous little fellow.' He was, by all accounts, bizarre.
His business card just read: 'G.J. Griffith, capitalist.' He insisted on being called 'Colonel,' though his military title was thought to be entirely phony.
On December 16, 1896, Tina and Griffith donated more than 3,000 acres of hilly splendor to be used as an L.A. public park. The massive, city-altering gift was several times larger than New York's Central Park.
'It must be made a place of rest and relaxation for the masses, a resort for the rank and file, for the plain people,' Griffith demanded at the time.
Griffith was grandiose and eccentric, but he also believed in shaping the fledgling city, according to Mike Eberts, a historian and author of 'Griffith Park: A Centennial History.'
'He was a fellow who wanted to be loved. He wanted to be seen as a great leader. He was also, in his own way, and for his time, something of an idealist,' Eberts said.
Some believed that Griffith's mighty bequest was also angled, in part, to dodge taxes. But for generations of Angelenos who've savored the park, such details are — like Griffith's military title — mere semantics.
The initial gift brought him great acclaim locally. Here's how our paper put it in 1898: 'No need to ask 'Who is G.J. Griffith?' The individuality of the man has impressed itself so deeply and favorably on this community that his name is even as a 'household word.''
While thought to be in a delusional — and potentially drunken — stupor in a room at Santa Monica's Arcadia Hotel, Griffith shot his wife in the face in 1903.
She lost an eye but lived. Our paper breathlessly covered the ensuing trial, which ended with Griffith taking a short trip to San Quentin.
A few years after his release, Griffith (now divorced, according to Eberts) appeared at City Hall once again bearing gifts just before Christmas and hoping to rehabilitate his tarnished image.
'I wish to pay my debt of duty in this way to the community in which I have prospered,' Griffith reportedly told the mayor and City Council as he offered a significant sum of money to build Griffith Observatory.
They accepted, though our paper reported that other citizens and public officials angrily protested the decision.
One prominent community member suggested that the 'bribe' would send an egregious message to the city's youth: 'Are you prepared to say to them that if a man is a millionaire he can commit a crime and then with his wealth bribe the community to receive him back into fellowship?'
The city's parks commission eventually rejected Griffith's gift, our paper reported, and it wasn't until after his death in 1919 that it was accepted as a bequest in his will.
The observatory celebrated its 90th birthday this year.
For Eberts, the takeaway is simple: 'You don't have to be a perfect person to do a great thing.'
Today's great photo is from Times photographer Myung J. Chun, outside the Lucas Museum of Narrative Art, which is set to open next year.
Kevinisha Walker, multiplatform editorAndrew Campa, Sunday writerKarim Doumar, head of newsletters
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