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  • Built in 1923 on Lot 33 in Tract 3446
  • Original commissioner: William E. Warren, a hardware merchant turned real estate investor; the house was apparently a speculative venture for Mr. Warren, who never lived in the house. He instead maintained his residence in a modest bungalow at 1020 West 48th Street in the Vermont Square district, in the development of which he participated during the 1910s 
  • Architect: Robert D. Jones in partnership with Sanson M. Cooper acting as contractor. Together Jones and Cooper built many houses in the Hancock Park and Windsor Square neighborhoods, with some projects financed by themselves and others, such as 435 South Rossmore, with outside capital
  • Permits for an 11-room residence and a 20-by-30-foot garage were issued by the Department of Buildings to W. E. Warren on April 24, 1923
  • Real estate developer Frederick Grant Hoffine and his family were the first occupants of 435 South Rossmore Avenue, in residence by early 1924; they would remain until late 1935. In addition to his projects in Los Angeles, Hoffine, following the lead of other developers, invested heavily in Pacific-coast resort building in Baja California to lure pleasure seekers wishing to escape the repression of Prohibition. By mid 1924, 100 California businessmen, including roofer Sylvester L. Weaver, founded the Ensenada Beach Club with plans to erect an elaborate waterfront hotel. After the project foundered two years later, some club members reorganized themselves into the Club Internationale to continue building tourist facilities. Fred Hoffine became president; another officer was brewer and investor John A. Hauerwass. Club Internationale was registered south of the border as the Ensenada Development Company to grease the wheels with the Mexican government, which was happy to have foreign investment. Sport was the ostensible focus of the development, though the availability of alcohol and gambling were the draws that would bring Californians down on steamers and fledgling airlines to stay at what became known before long as the Playa Ensenada Hotel. Even before the project rose, the Los Angeles Evening Express decided that it would rival Cannes and Deauville, comparisons no doubt fed to an editor by a publicity man. Celebrated boxer Jack Dempsey became the resort's public face in advertising. On February 19, 1935, the Evening Post-Record reported that Hoffine's 17-year-old son Bruce and his Hancock Park friend Charles Gaulden of 644 South June Street had been placed on probation the day before by the court for having shot a bison with a bow and arrow the previous Thanksgiving Day while camping on Catalina. Making light of the incident, the paper referred to Hoffine as "Buffalo Bruce" and Gaulden as "Cheyenne Charlie"


As seen in the Los Angeles Times, June 3, 1926


  • In 1935, Fred Hoffine bought 612 North Las Palmas Avenue in Hancock Park, moving his family there from 435 South Rossmore before the end of the year
  • Clifford A. Bergstrom, his wife Louise, their four children, his sister, and Mrs. Bergstrom's mother were renting 435 South Rossmore by 1936; it is unclear as to whether Fred Hoffine was their landlord or whether the house had passed to a new owner. Somewhat curious is that Bergstrom, partner in a large wholesale lumber concern, preferred to rent rather than build his own house with his best cuts; the Bergstroms' rent in the spring of 1940 was $150 a month ($2,925 in 2021 dollars)
  • Shirt manufacturer Eugene J. Maydeck and his family moved into 435 South Rossmore by 1944. Maydeck was still living there when he died on September 29, 1956; on April 16 of the next year, Mrs. Maydeck was issued a permit by the Department of Building and Safety to add an 18-by-36-foot swimming pool to the property. As an indication of the poor quality of the air of the Los Angeles basin at the time, the stucco of the house was sandblasted at least twice during the 1950s
  • Attorney Sidney A. Moss was occupying 435 South Rossmore by early 1960. Still living there, he died on October 2, 1963; his wife, Mary Jane, died the following January 29
  • Owners of 435 South Rossmore since the 1960s have made several additions to the rear of the house and carried out various remodelings. Even relatively modest Hancock Park houses began to be characterized, in marketing competition with more affluent areas on the Westside, as estates, some of which, for security and traffic reasons—such as busy Rossmore Avenue—began to be fenced. In 2017 a cinderblock-and-ironwork fence was built in front of 435 South Rossmore, with high hedges grown behind, bringing what began as an upper-middle-class residence of the 1920s somewhat uncomfortably into the neighborhood's current era of forced exclusivity 


Illustrations: Private Collection; LAPL; LAT