FOR AN INTRODUCTION TO WINDSOR SQUARE, CLICK HERE

South Lucerne Boulevard
600 block




602 South Lucerne Boulevard


  • Wilshire Heights Tract 1476 addition to Windsor Square; the southerly 65.05' of the westerly 135' of Lot 5
  • Built in 1957; BP for house and attached garage issued 5-3-1957 following demolition of the original house on the lot (see below)
  • Original commissioners: Mr. and Mrs. Louis J. Fuller 
  • Contractor: William A. Lundeberg & Son
  • Original house occupying the entirety of Lot 5 was built circa 1907 at 3301 Wilshire Boulevard. That house's original commissioner was real estate investor and dealer Charles G. Andrews. Acquired by hotel manager George A. Eastman circa 1922; Eastman moved the house and its garage to 602 South Lucerne in 1923 for continued use as his own home. Relocation BPs for house and garage issued 5-28-1923
  • 602 South Lucerne was occupied by real estate developer and financier Thresher Ames Rippey from 1923 until his death in the house on June 16, 1956. Mr. Rippey was an early developer of Palm Springs
  • 602 South Lucerne was  demolished five months after the death of Thresher Rippey; BP for demolition issued 11-15-1956
  • FOR MORE, PLEASE SEE 3301 Wilshire Boulevard


The original house occupying the southeast corner of Lucerne Boulevard and Sixth Street was
relocated to the lot three years before; as seen in the Los Angeles Times on 5-30-1926.







605 South Lucerne Boulevard


  • Wilshire Heights Tract 1476 addition to Windsor Square; northerly 105.36' of Lot 6
  • Built in 1923; BPs for house and garage issued 11-9-1922
  • Original commissioner: real estate investor Walter M. Guedel as, temporarily, his own home
  • Architect: Robert D. Jones in partnership with Sanson M. Cooper acting as contractor


When the Guedel house was placed on the market in 1925 by area real estate broker Burton & Co., the
firm had it photographed for promotional purposes. Engineer George L. Hoxie soon moved in.







606 South Lucerne Boulevard


  • Wilshire Heights Tract 1476 addition to Windsor Square; the northerly 60' of the westerly 135' of Lot 5
  • Built in 1958; BP for house and attached garage issued 2-13-1958
  • Original commissioners: Mr. and Mrs. William A. Lundeberg for resale
  • Contractor: William A. Lundeberg & Son
  • 606 is the third house built by developer William A. Lundeberg on Lot 5, which he bought and subdivided after demolishing the original residence addressed 602 (see above); see also 4518 West Sixth Street 







617 South Lucerne Boulevard


  • Wilshire Heights Tract 1476 addition to Windsor Square; Lot 7 and southerly 10' of Lot 6
  • Built in 1923; BPs for house and garage issued 5-25-1923
  • Original commissioner: The Houston-based Russell Brown Brown Company, recently expanded to Los Angeles and building similar houses in Windsor Square and Fremont Place; as were several of their projects, 617 was built on spec
  • Architect: The De Luxe Building Company
  • Contractor: The Russell Brown Company
  • Before it was sold, The Russell Brown Company expanded the garage to include space for a third car and servants' quarters in 1924; BP issued 1-3-1924
  • The house was sold to James W. Hellman, pioneer Los Angeles hardware merchant and member of the banking clan; he died at 617 on 4-22-1940


While it maintained an office in Los Angeles during the 1920s, the Russell Brown Company ran
various display advertisements in the Los Angeles Times, one of which featured
a rendering of its project at 617 South Lucerne Boulevard.






618 South Lucerne Boulevard


  • Wilshire Heights Tract 1476 addition to Windsor Square; Lot 4
  • Built in 1916 at 620 South St. Andrews Place; BP issued 10-14-1916
  • Original commissioner: builder Sanson M. Cooper on spec
  • Architect: Harry H. Whiteley
  • Contractor: Cooper-Pyle-Clopine (Sanson M. Cooper, Emery C. Pyle, William E. Clopine)
  • Sold by Cooper to Mr. and Mrs. James S. Casey, recently of Butte, Montana, in March 1917
  • Moved to 618 South Lucerne in 1924 by Mr. and Mrs. Casey for continued use as their own home; relocation BP issued 7-9-1924. Driveway relocated to opposite side of house at new location
  • New garage–servants' quarters built in 1924; BP issued 11-8-1924; architect-contractor: Edward H. Haarlammert







629 South Lucerne Boulevard


  • Wilshire Heights Tract 1476 addition to Windsor Square; Lot 8
  • Built in 1918; BPs for house and garage issued 11-6-1917
  • Original commissioner: oil producer Harry C. Keefe
  • Architect and contractor: S. M. Cooper Company
  • Original garage demolished 2005; demolition BP issued 8-5-2005
  • New carport and recreation room built 2005; BP issued 7-28-2005


Hiding behind the shrubbery in this 1991 view of 629 South Lucerne, at the last flight up from the
sidewalk just in front of the porch, are a pair of crouching lions. Perhaps they are original to
the house, or perhaps part of an occupant's collection; the pair at the sidewalk, now
gone missing, appear to have migrated from 449 South Plymouth Boulevard,
one of the very few original Windsor Square houses to be demolished.







630 South Lucerne Boulevard


  • Wilshire Heights Tract 1476 addition to Windsor Square; Lot 3
  • Built in 1912 at 608 South St. Andrews Place; contract for house and garage let in December 1911
  • Original commissioner: Bullock's executive Herbert M. Bigelow
  • Acquired by osteopath Arthur S. Burgess and his wife Freida circa 1918
  • House and garage moved to 630 South Lucerne in 1923 by Mr. and Mrs. Burgess for continued use as their own home; relocation BP for house and garage issued 10-27-1923; Kress House Moving Company in charge
  • As an example of how some owners of even recently built Wilshire District houses contrived to take advantage of the rapidly increasingly value of their property during the city's enormous postwar population rise, seen below is the building that replaced the Burgess house after it was removed from its lot at 608 South St. Andrews Place. The Oxford Apartment Hotel was built in 1925 and remains standing today as the Versailles Apartments









637 South Lucerne Boulevard


  • Wilshire Heights Tract 1476 addition to Windsor Square; Lot 9
  • Built in 1902 at 2619 Wilshire Boulevard
  • Original commissioner: Chicago grain merchant Hiram Higgins; occupied by his family until purchased by interior decorator Howard Verbeck and his wife in 1919
  • Architect: John C. Austin
  • House and garage moved from Wilshire Boulevard to 637 South Lucerne in 1923 by Verbeck for continued use as his own home; relocation BPs issued 4-20-1923. Kress House Moving Company in charge
  • Los Angeles Historic-Cultural Monument #403
  • FOR A COMPLETE HISTORY, PLEASE SEE 2619 Wilshire Boulevard




While Harold Lloyd had moved on from his one-time Windsor Square 
home at 502 South Irving 40 years before, he came home to say goodbye
at the Scottish Rite Temple on Wilshire Boulevard, where his funeral was held on
3-11-1971. The Higgins-Verbeck house looms large across Lucerne Boulevard in the
background and is seen below in a recent rendering from the street. Increasingly,
residents of Windsor Square and Hancock Park try to compete with Beverly
Hills, Bel-Air, and other westerly neighborhoods in privacy landscaping
at odds with the original suburban models of the easterly tracts.




The Higgins-Verbeck house is depicted in an illustration seen in the Los Angeles Times on 8-20-1949




638 South Lucerne Boulevard


  • Wilshire Heights Tract 1476 addition to Windsor Square; Lot 2
  • Built in 1912 at 625 South Western Avenue; BP issued 7-8-1912
  • Original commissioner: builder John V. Peacock as his own home
  • Architect and contractor listed on original BP: John V. Peacock
  • Sold to real estate man Herbert R. Kells for use as his own home; Kells moved to a new residence on South Serrano Street and converted 625 South Western to an office for his firm, Kells & Grant
  • Purchased circa 1923 by real estate investor Otto Thum, who had made a fortune with his brothers as the large-scale manufacturers of their patented version of flypaper
  • House moved by Thum from Western Avenue to 638 South Lucerne for use as his own home; architects Stanton, Reid & Hibbard in charge of renovation at the new location and the construction of a new garage–servants' quarters. Relocation BP for house issued 6-17-1924; BP for new garage issued 8-19-1924
  • House demolished 1960; BP issued 12-18-1959. Replaced by a parking lot for the Scottish Rite Masonic Temple, completed in 1961
  • The photograph above was taken at the house's original location on Western Avenue; the image below appeared in the Los Angeles Times on 9-14-1913 accompanying a report on its sale to Kells








Illustrations: Private Collection; LATUSCDL; LAPL