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423 South Las Palmas Avenue




  • Built in 1927 on Lot 96 in Tract 6388
  • Original commissioner: building contractor Arthur Rear of Huntington Park, apparently on spec
  • Architect: none specified on the original building permit
  • On August 5, 1927, Arthur Rear was issued permits for a two-story, 10-room residence and a one-story, 20-by-27-garage at 423 South Las Palmas Avenue
  • Arthur Rear had recently completed Hancock Park residences at 508 and 546 North McCadden Place
  • Frederick Chauncey Langdon had been practicing dentistry in Oxford, Iowa, before moving to Los Angeles in 1900. After opening a dental office downtown, he decided within two years to also become a dental-supplies wholesaler, setting up in business with his brother-in-law Marshall L. Carter, who'd come west with him. Langdon, his wife Rena, and their three-year-old daughter Lucy and two-year-old son Carter moved into a newly completed house at 941 South Alvarado Street. (A second daughter, Leitha, born in May 1899, had lived three months.) The family, which would include another daughter, Mary Alyce, born in 1902 and apparently adopted from a Langdon cousin in Omaha, would remain on Alvarado Street until moving to Hancock Park. Frederick Langdon was elected to the Los Angeles City Council in December 1911 and would serve until 1923
  • Mary Langdon, who was graduated from Marlborough, had married Stanford man Carroll Hudson, a construction engineer, in October 1925; the Hudsons and their daughter Marilyn, born in May 1928, moved into 423 with her parents. The Langdon family would remain at 423 South Las Palmas Avenue until 1935
  • The Langdons had 423 South Las Palmas Avenue on the market by January 1934, asking $22,500. Fred and Rena were living nearby in half a duplex on Orange Drive by 1936
  • Richard Lorimer Johnston, production manager at Paramount Pictures, was the next owner of 423 South Las Palmas Avenue. Born in Portland on October 22, 1892, Johnston was the son of actor and director Lorimer Johnston, who is credited in some sources with championing serial films, those of more than one reel that had once been thought of as too long to hold audience interest. Richard Johnston went to work for Famous Players–Lasky in 1919, that studio evolving into Paramount; except for a short stint with David O. Selznick, Johnston remain with Paramount until 1953, when he left to pursue television production. He'd married Mildred Bell, a studio worker, in June 1921. Marion arrived in November 1925 and Judith in June 1930. The sisters would grow up attending nearby Marlborough. After Judy married Cyrus Ostrup Jr. at Bethel Lutheran Church at Olympic and Masselin on December 22, 1951, with a reception following at 423 South Las Palmas, and Marion's marriage to Eric Koester at 423 the following February 9, the Johnstons considered downsizing. Selling 423 in 1956, they moved to an apartment on South Curson Avenue
  • Born in Minneapolis on August 6, 1914, plastic surgeon Harold Brian Thale, né Blumenthal, moved into 423 South Las Palmas Avenue in 1956. An alumnus of the University of Minnesota and having trained at the Mayo Clinic and in the Army Medical Corps, Thale had lately been a consultant at County General Hospital. He had married fellow Minneapolis native Hildegarde Miller on August 4, 1941, while stationed at Fort Lewis in Washington State. Moving from Beverlywood, the Thales would occupy 423 with their four children. Harold and Hilda Thale may have remained in the house until 1973, when they divorced. The house was on the market the next year
  • BPs  On August 29, 1956, the Department of Building and Safety issued Dr. and Mrs. Harold Thale a permit to enclose a porch and make a small unspecified addition. The Thales were issued a permit on May 13, 1958, for a 20-by-40-foot swimming pool at the northwest corner of the property 
  • 423 South Las Palmas Avenue was on the market in February 1974 asking $139,000. Central Los Angeles real estate values, already at a low ebb in the wake of the civil unrest of the 1960s and fears of crime after the Manson murders, were also being affected national recession and the Arab oil embargo that had begun in October. Ads in the Times exhorted potential buyers to "Be a patriot and help yourself to eliminate driving. Walk to bus & school." The price was soon reduced to $125,000 and appears to have sold by midsummer 1974
  • 423 South Las Palmas Avenue was on the market in May 1998 asking $1,495,000; the price had been reduced by $100,000 by the fall. On the market again in early 2012, the price was $2,695,000  


Illustration: Private Collection