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  • Built in 1953 on Lot 48 in Tract 5640
  • Original commissioners: Mr. and Mrs. Jacob Charles Swimmer
  • Architect: Ashton & Wilson
  • On June 10, 1953, the Department of Building and Safety issued Mr. And Mrs. J. C. Swimmer a permit for an eight-room residence with attached garage at 301 Rimpau Boulevard
  • Jacob Swimmer—known familiarly as Jack—moved his family and his businesses to Los Angeles from his native Brooklyn in 1940. Swimmer relocated his two corporate entities, the National Lacquer Manufacturing Company and the National Titanium Company, to Vernon, where he engaged in the "reclaiming and reconditioning" of paint, which, according to Federal Trade Commission documents, was formulated from "waste or salvage material resulting from use of a spray gun by manufacturers of automobiles, electric refrigerators, and other metal products, and reclaimed through the adding of solvents and removal of impurities." The recycled product was marketed as "Nitrosol"
  • Jack Swimmer did not have the finest of reputations in the business world at the time of his relocation to Southern California. The F.T.C. had come came after him with charges of using shady sales methods to market his second-hand paint products through mail solicitations. Being so charged early on did not dissuade Swimmer from sending his "false, misleading, and deceptive" come-ons for his retread paint over the next 20 years; with complaints to Better Business Bureaus piling up all over the country, the F.T.C. revisited the blasé Swimmer several times up to and even after his death at Good Samaritan Hospital on New Year's Eve 1958. Henrietta Swimmer and Jacob's sister Tessie Somers, who appear to have been running the business by this time, seem to have been trained to see nothing wrong with the practice. It might be that Swimmer's operational methods had been legitimized in the family's collective thoughts by Jack, whose second career as a "mentalist"—i.e., a mind-reading magician—might have had him thinking himself above mundane convention in business and otherwise. On November 9, 1956, the Times reported on Swimmer's having pledged $5,000 to be given to charity if he missed forcasting the exact vote tallies in the the national, state, and county elections that had taken place three days before. (Whether the money went to charity or back into Swimmer's pocket is unclear but perhaps itself predictable.) Apparently unaware of his run-ins with the F.T.C. and B.B.B., the Times ran a sizable obituary for Jack Swimmer on January 2, 1959, describing him as an "industrialist, philanthropist and mentalist," the reporter appearing to have been distracted from the facts of the first two descriptors by the tantalizing third. At any rate, Henrietta Swimmer would soon be moving out of 301 Rimpau Boulevard
  • On March 12, 1959, the Department of Building and Safety, apparently posthumously, issued J. C. Swimmer a permit for a 16-foot-wide addition extending the the northwest corner of 301 Rimpau Boulevard 42 feet westward. Ashton & Wilson had been recalled to design it
  • Henrietta Swimmer appears to have rented 301 Rimpau Boulevard briefly before its disposition, a Bert G. Barnett being listed at 301 in the 1961 city directory; the house was on the market in the fall of 1962 and by the spring of the next year, the property was being auctioned off
  • A display advertisement in the Times of May 5, 1963, placed by the Milton J. Wershow auction company contained the report that "A week ago yesterday, the lovely corner home at 3rd and Rimpau was purchased at our auction for $90,000 by Mr. and Mrs. Herman S. Motter. He's a builder and real estate developer, and evidently a connoisseur of value."
  • After acquiring 301 Rimpau Boulevard, Herman and Rose Marie Motter made several upgrades to the property. On August 12, 1963, Herman Motter was issued a permit by the Department of Building and Safety for unspecified interior alterations; on December 18 he was issued a permit for a 14-by-35-foot swimming pool at the southwest corner of the lot. On January 7, 1964, a permit was issued to add a bathroom on the south side of the house; on January 21 a permit was issued for an addition extending the 1959 addition another 30 feet
  • While they had the house on the market in the summer of 1967 and into 1968, the Motters appear to have remained at 301 Rimpau into the 1970s
  • 301 Rimpau Boulevard was being advertised for sale in the spring of 1985 with an asking price of $625,000. Moroccan-born menswear designer David Timsit and his television news anchor wife Terry Murphy purchased 301 Rimpau Boulevard soon after
  • In the summer of 1985, David Timsit was issued permits for additions to the rear of 301 Rimpau Boulevard as well as for other interior alterations
  • Timsit had married Murphy in 1983. By the time the couple moved into 301, she had gone to KABC from KCBS; in 1989 she became one of the original hosts of the tabloid television series Hard Copy and would remain there for most of its decade-long run. Timsit and Murphy didn't stay long at 301 Rimpau Boulevard; it was being listed for sale in the spring of 1987 asking $849,000. On April 9, 1989, the Times reported that the couple had bought a seven-bedroom 1950s house in the flats of Beverly Hills 
  • During the 1990s, 301 Rimpau Boulevard was listed annually in the Times as a house to ride by at Christmas, its lavish holiday displays featuring two "giant" nativity scenes along with the usual Santas and sleighs



Illustration: Private Collection