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  • Built in 1923 on Lot 31 in Tract 3819
  • Original commissioner: cardiologist Roy E. Thomas
  • Architect: Marston, Van Pelt & Maybury of Pasadena (Sylvanus Marston, Garrett Van Pelt, and Edgar Maybury)
  • On June 12, 1923, the Department of Buildings issued Dr. Thomas permits for a 14-room house and a 21-by-30-foot, two-story garage
  • Wisconsin-born Roy Thomas was graduated from Pomona College in 1903 and received his M.D. from Rush Medical College in Chicago. He married Georgia Seaver in Pomona in 1907, the couple settling in Phoenix where Dr. Thomas had set up his practice. Three daughters—Patricia, Mary Elizabeth, and Georgia—were born to them by 1918 and the family moved to Los Angeles the next year, renting a house at 2893 Sunset Place, where they would remain until moving into 523 Muirfield Road
  • Mary Elizabeth Thomas was married quietly to Dr. Griffith Page at St. James' Episcopal Church nearby on Wilshire Boulevard on August 8, 1932; their son Seaver was born on April 4 the next year. Georgia Thomas, known for some reason as Jo Dee, married personnel manager Howard C. Hoon at St. James' on June 10, 1939, with a reception following in the garden at 523 Muirfield Road. Patricia was married to radiolologist Donald R. Laing in 1937. The Pages, who were living in a cottage on North Harvard Boulevard, hosted a big Halloween party at her parents' house in 1941
  • On July 21, 1953, the Department of Building and Safety issued Dr. Thomas a permit for an 18-by-36-foot swimming pool at the rear of the property
  • The Thomas family would remain at 523 Muirfield Road for over 50 years, although, per a classified advertisement in the Times on April 13, 1958, it seems they did at one time consider selling the house. They were still at 523 when Dr. Thomas died on October 26, 1966; his service was held at St. James'. Mrs. Thomas appears to have still been living at 523 when she died on September 27, 1976, after which the house was sold
  • Architecture photographer Max Eckert was the next owner of 523 Muirfield Road. Appearing often in social diarists' column in the Times from the '60s to the '80s, Eckert and his partner, interior designer Jack Lowrance, decorated numerous Southern California houses in a high-Houston style. Many were featured in shelter magazines and newspapers, including those they serially bought and decorated themselves and then flipped. After 523 was duly tarted up, they moved to 401 South Windsor Boulevard, on which they repeated the process. On August 16, 1977, the Department of Building and Safety issued Max Eckert a permit for a 15-by-35-foot pool "pavilion" (apparently a higher-style cabana) at 523 Muirfield Road; the document was signed by Lowrance. (Eckert and Lowrance appear to have split up personally and professionally in due course; Eckert married a Virginia woman in 1996 and died in 2010)
  • Dr. Mohinder S. Sohal is the second eminent cardiologist to occupy 523 Muirfield Road; he became the owner by 1982. Dr. Sohal and his wife Judith embarked on a major expansion of the house with a rear two-story addition  for which the Department of Building and Safety issued a permit on September 21, 2000


Illustration: Private Collection