Early Visiting Celebrities Found L.A. a Dreary Place

Perhaps the first celebrity to visit Los Angeles--Sir Francis Drake sailed by without stopping--was a 19-year-old Harvard dropout named Richard Henry Dana.

Dana, later to gain fame as the author of “Two Years Before the Mast,” was a member of a whaling crew in March, 1835, when he first glimpsed San Pedro, which he dismissed as “dreary.”

Nowadays, as Los Angeles awaits the arrival of Pope John Paul II, visits by notables--or by anyone--are, of course, common. Seventy-seven million people dropped in on Southern California last year, according to the Los Angeles Area Chamber of Commerce.

‘Drunkards and Gamblers’

But, barely more than a century ago, it would have seemed inconceivable to journey to the dusty pueblo--that “noted abode of the lowest drunkards and gamblers,” as one traveler, Sir George Simpson of the Hudson’s Bay Co., described it.

“Why would a nyone visit here back then?” says historian John Weaver, author of “Los Angeles: The Enormous Village.” “When New York and Philadelphia and Boston were cultural centers, you still had aborigines eating acorns naked in L.A.”

No President set foot in the town until Rutherford B. Hayes stopped over for a few hours in 1880 and was escorted about town in a buckboard.

However, the very primitive nature of the West has always fascinated Europeans, and occasionally an adventurous noble did brave the wilds of Southern California.

Archduke Stops By

Ludwig Louis Salvator, archduke of Austria, stopped by in 1876, and later wrote that the “hunting around Los Angeles is excellent” though “tarantulas are numerous.”

Samuel Storey, a member of Parliament, expressed amazement over the “advertising dodges” on the streets of 1889 Los Angeles. His favorite: “Pedal teguments artistically lubricated and illuminated for the infinitesimal compensation of 10 cents per operation.” (Translation: 10 cents for a shoeshine.)

While John Paul II will be the first Pope to visit the City of Angels, a saint came here in 1905. Saint Frances Xavier Cabrini expressed delight over the city’s “perfect scheme of electric trains which connect Los Angeles with its suburbs”--the Pacific Electric system that has long since been replaced by the troubled freeway and bus network.

Until the appearance of Democratic candidate William Jennings Bryan in 1896, presidential campaigns were carried out mostly by proxy here. An earlier candidate, Horace Greeley, got as close as the “wonder” of what he called “Yo Semite.”

Presidential Visit

The biggest event of 1903 was the visit of President Theodore Roosevelt, who arrived “unshaven and travel dusty,” according to one account. T. R. gamely made a speech at Central Park (now Pershing Square), then went on “a hurried sight-seeing trip down Figueroa Street,” which had been known only a few years earlier as Grasshopper Street.

The year 1909 brought not only an appearance by President William Howard Taft but a rare visit by a Japanese delegation of merchants, businessmen and legislators who spoke just four words of English: “house,” cocktail” and “thank you.”

By the second decade of the 20th Century, Los Angeles was becoming famous for its own brand of royalty--movie stars such as Douglas Fairbanks and Mary Pickford, the king and queen of Hollywood.

And foreign dignitaries were suddenly thrilled not just to visit, but to be filmed. Comic prince Charlie Chaplin made home movies starring a real prince, Frederick of Denmark, as well as a British politician named Winston Churchill.

Feeling Like a King

Nowadays, Beverly Wilshire Hotel considers itself a throne-away-from-the-throne for world leaders and is accustomed to making them feel kingly and queenly.

George White, president of the hotel, recalled a visit by King Olav of Norway when “we turned the reception room into a boat. We had a boatswain pipe him aboard and we even brought a gangplank from Long Beach.”

And, for Queen Margrethe II of Denmark, nicknamed Daisy because of her love of the flower, “we floated 10,000 daisies from above the driveway.”