L.A. Redux / The City Then and Now

One of the most appealing amenities of Los Angeles’ first hotel was its trees. When it opened in the 1840s, the Bella Union was one of the few places in the dusty pueblo where residents could take a shady siesta. Originally a one-story adobe structure with dirt floors, the Bella Union was the stagecoach stop and attracted every major function in the fledgling city.

The hotel’s original adobe walls and roof tended to crumble during heavy rains, and occupants would find themselves coated with mud. In 1858 a new second story was added, and its completion was cause for a citywide celebration.

The dining room was advertised as “one of the finest in all California.” Residents all over the city knew when it was mealtime because the chef issued a single blast from a giant steam whistle to call all the “regulars.”

Rooms were once occupied by such distinguished guests as Govs. Pio Pico and John G. Downey, Gen. John C. Fremont and William H. Seward, President Abraham Lincoln’s secretary of state.

The Bella Union also had the best bar in town, served as the county’s first courthouse from 1850 to 1852 and became the clearinghouse for business gossip. Tempers often got short in the billiard room, where scores of fights and shootings took place.

During the Civil War, the hotel became such a gathering spot for supporters of the Confederacy that Union soldiers, mostly volunteers in training at Drum Barracks in San Pedro, were forbidden to enter the hotel.

Advertisers of the day often touted the location of their establishments as “opposite” or “near” the Bella Union instead of using street addresses.

Advertisements such as “We have all spring beds at this hotel!” and “The unpleasant odor of gas has entirely disappeared since the building of the new sewer,” appeared in 1874.

The Bella Union occupied the site at 314 N. Main Street for almost a century, near the southeast corner of today’s Aliso and Main streets. The Los Angeles Children’s Museum has taken over the location.

Some time before 1874 the hotel’s name was changed to the Clarendon and later to the St. Charles.

One of its many owners was Dr. Obed Macy, who came to Los Angeles from Nantucket, Mass., and for whom Macy Street is named. The Bella Union was torn down in June, 1940. Today a plaque marks the historic site, paying tribute to the city’s first hotel and the “finest . . . south of San Francisco.”