Fred Hartsook (26 October 1876 – 30 September 1930) was an American
photographer and owner of a
California studio chain described as "the largest photographic business in the world" at the time,
[McGroarty, p. 760.] who counted
Henry Ford,
Charles Lindbergh,
Mary Pickford, and sitting President
Woodrow Wilson among his celebrity clients. He later became the owner of the Hartsook Inn, a resort in
Humboldt County, and two ranches in Southern California on which he reared prized
Holstein cattle. Hartsook was married to Bess Hesby, queen of the
San Francisco Pan-Pacific Exposition of 1915.
Early life and career as photographer
Fred Hartsook was born on 26 October 1876 in
Marion, Indiana
Marion is a city in Grant County, Indiana, United States. The population was 29,948 as of the 2010 United States Census. The city is the county seat of Grant County. It is named for Francis Marion, a brigadier general from South Carolina in the ...
to John Hartsook and Abbie, née Gorham. He was born into a family of photographers and studio owners, his father and two uncles were all successful in the business and his grandfather had been the first photographer to open a studio in
Virginia. According to a 1921 profile by
John S. McGroarty
John Steven McGroarty (August 20, 1862 – August 7, 1944) was a poet, ''Los Angeles Times'' columnist, and author who also served two terms as a Democratic Congressman from California from 1935 to 1939.
__TOC__
Biography
Born at Buck Mount ...
, "the first Hartsooks
ookup the profession when it was in the infancy of development with the old
daguerrotype and the first
wet plate processes."
After graduating from high school at age sixteen Hartsook was apprenticed by his uncle as a
civil engineer
A civil engineer is a person who practices civil engineering – the application of planning, designing, constructing, maintaining, and operating infrastructure while protecting the public and environmental health, as well as improving existing ...
, but spent most of his time in his father's studio. He moved to Salt Lake City, Utah and married Florence Newcomb, 12 September 1901. Flossie came from a family of photographers. She operated her own studio in Vernal, Utah in 1906. Flossie served as Fred's assistant for their traveling photographic studio throughout the Utah territory. They had one daughter; Frances born 25 June 1902. Fred and family then set out to establish themselves in
California, arriving sometime after 1906.
Initially, Hartsook operated as an "itinerant shutterbug,
anderingall over the state, his team of
mule
The mule is a domestic equine hybrid between a donkey and a horse. It is the offspring of a male donkey (a jack) and a female horse (a mare). The horse and the donkey are different species, with different numbers of chromosomes; of the two pos ...
s pulling a homemade
darkroom
A darkroom is used to process photographic film, to make prints and to carry out other associated tasks. It is a room that can be made completely dark to allow the processing of the light-sensitive photographic materials, including film and ph ...
."
[KPCC.] Later he opened two studios, in
Santa Ana and
Santa Barbara, but eventually closed them in order to open a studio on 636
South Broadway in
Los Angeles.
Hartsook's success as a photographer and studio owner allowed him to expand into other cities along the Pacific Coast, including
San Francisco and
Oakland
Oakland is the largest city and the county seat of Alameda County, California, United States. A major West Coast port, Oakland is the largest city in the East Bay region of the San Francisco Bay Area, the third largest city overall in the Bay A ...
. In 1921, McGroarty gives the number of studios as 20 and describes it as the "largest photographic business in the world".
Bill Robertson, director of the Los Angeles Bureau of Street Services, cited by
KPCC in 2009, mentions 30 studios.
Even if the bulk of the business came from everyday studio portraiture, Hartsook gained prominence through his celebrity clients, which included
silent era
A silent film is a film with no synchronized recorded sound (or more generally, no audible dialogue). Though silent films convey narrative and emotion visually, various plot elements (such as a setting or era) or key lines of dialogue may, wh ...
Hollywood
Hollywood usually refers to:
* Hollywood, Los Angeles, a neighborhood in California
* Hollywood, a metonym for the cinema of the United States
Hollywood may also refer to:
Places United States
* Hollywood District (disambiguation)
* Hollywood, ...
actors such as
Mary Pickford,
Lillian Gish
Lillian Diana Gish (October 14, 1893February 27, 1993) was an American actress, director, and screenwriter. Her film-acting career spanned 75 years, from 1912, in silent film shorts, to 1987. Gish was called the "First Lady of American Cinema", ...
, and
Carlyle Blackwell, other celebrities such as pilot
Charles Lindbergh, entrepreneur
Henry Ford, and opera singer
Geraldine Farrar, and politicians like
House
A house is a single-unit residential building. It may range in complexity from a rudimentary hut to a complex structure of wood, masonry, concrete or other material, outfitted with plumbing, electrical, and heating, ventilation, and air condi ...
leaders
Champ Clark and
Joseph Gurney Cannon.
[ Library of Congress Prints & Photographs Division]
online repository
accessed 14 July 2009. McGroarty describes a 40-minute sitting with President
Woodrow Wilson in September 1919 as "the first formal sitting since Mr. Wilson became president."
Also in 1919, Fred Hartsook married Bess Hesby, who in 1915 was "Miss Liberty" at the
Panama-Pacific International Exposition in San Francisco. They honeymooned in a cabin six miles (10 km) south of
Garberville
Garberville is a census-designated place in Humboldt County, California. It is located on the South Fork of the Eel River south-southeast of Eureka, at an elevation of . The population was 913 at the 2010 United States Census. It is approxima ...
in the
redwood forest of
Humboldt County, California
Humboldt County () is a county located in the U.S. state of California. As of the 2020 census, the population was 136,463. The county seat is Eureka.
Humboldt County comprises the Eureka–Arcata–Fortuna, California Micropolitan Statistica ...
.
Later life as rancher and resort owner
The success of his photographic business allowed Fred Hartsook to acquire three properties in California and take up life as a rancher and resort owner. In addition to 3,000 acres (12.1 km
2) of pastureland at the mouth of
Red Rock Canyon in
Kern County, Hartsook also owned a 41-acre (0.16 km
2) "country home and ranch"
[McGroarty, p. 761.] in Lankershim (now
North Hollywood), where he raised prize-winning
purebred Holstein cattle as well as
Toggenburg milk goats and "big type Poland China
hogs".
['' Los Angeles Times'': "Farm and Tractor Sweepstakes Again Goes to Hartsook Herd", 13 August 1922; accessed 14 July 2009.] McGroarty notes that Hartsook's training as a civil engineer helped him develop his properties. Also in keeping with his past as mule driver, "it
asnot uncommon for Mr. Hartsook to pose some of the world's noted people one day and be driving a big mule team on his ranch the next."
In the early 1920s the Hartsooks also purchased their honeymoon cabin and extended it to a resort comprising 37 acres (0.15 km
2) of pristine redwood forests, the Hartsook Inn.
In 1926 the resort received its own post office and Hartsook, California became an official postal designation.
["Postal authorities established Hartsook post office 6.5 miles south of Garberville in 1926 and moved it 0.5-mile north in 1938, when they changed the name to Richardson Grove; the name 'Hartsook' was for a resort operator." – David L. Durham: California's Geographic Names; p. 64. Quill Driver Books, 1998. ] At that time the resort was a major attraction for Hollywood celebrities and counted Mary Pickford and
Bing Crosby
Harry Lillis "Bing" Crosby Jr. (May 3, 1903 – October 14, 1977) was an American singer, musician and actor. The first multimedia star, he was one of the most popular and influential musical artists of the 20th century worldwide. He was a ...
among its guests.
In August 1927 the Hartsook Inn burned down in a forest fire,
['' Los Angeles Times'': "Hartsook Inn Razed by Flames", 10 August 1927; accessed 14 July 2009.] but was rebuilt and reopened shortly thereafter. In Spring 1928, Hartsook's photographic business went into receivership and was sold in an auction in January 1929.
['' Los Angeles Times'': "Notice of the bankrupt auction sale of the Fred Hartsook, Inc.", 20 January 1929; accessed 14 July 2009.] On 30 September 1930, Fred Hartsook died of a heart attack in
Burbank, California
Burbank is a city in the southeastern end of the San Fernando Valley in Los Angeles County, California, United States. Located northwest of downtown Los Angeles, Burbank has a population of 107,337. The city was named after David Burbank, w ...
, shortly before his 54th birthday.
['' Los Angeles Times'': "Hartsook's Last Rites Conducted", p. A3, 5 October 1930; accessed 14 July 2009.]['' Variety'': Fred Hartsook obituary, 8 October 1930.]['' The Van Nuys News'': "Death Summons Fred Hartsook", p. 1, 3 October 1930.] Bess Hartsook outlived her husband by forty-six years and operated the Hartsook Inn until 1938, when it first went into receivership and then burned down again, this time due to a kitchen fire. Fred and Bess Hartsook had three children: Helen, Frederick, and Delyte. Fred Hartsook also had a daughter, Francis, from a previous marriage.
Beyond the short-lived postal designation, the Hartsook name is memorialized in a street in the
San Fernando Valley
The San Fernando Valley, known locally as the Valley, is an urbanized valley in Los Angeles County, California. Located to the north of the Los Angeles Basin, it contains a large portion of the City of Los Angeles, as well as unincorporated ar ...
, running along the former Lankershim property. In close proximity is Hesby Street, named after Bess Hesby Hartsook.
In Humboldt County, Hartsook Creek,
a tributary of the
South Fork Eel River, and a redwood tree called "the Hartsook Giant" remind visitors of the family name.
['' North Coast Journal'': "Hartsook Giant May Tumble", Vol. IX, Issue 1, January 1998]
online version
accessed 14 July 2009. The Hartsook Inn was rebuilt and survived under a succession of owners (and another fire in 1973) until the 1990s, when the last operator sold the property to the
Save the Redwoods League after threatening to log the Giant to stave off bankruptcy.
['' North Coast Journal'': "Hartsook Giant Saved", Vol. IX, Issue 9, 3 September 1998]
online version
accessed 14 July 2009.
Gallery
Photographs copyrighted by Hartsook Photo, S.F.–L.A. (San Francisco & Los Angeles).
File:Carlyle Blackwell by Hartsook Studio cph3b05772u.jpg, Carlyle Blackwell, 1915
File:ChampClark.jpg, Champ Clark, 1915
File:Geraldine Farrar3.jpg, Geraldine Farrar, 1915
File:Lillian_Gish_1.jpg, Lillian Gish
Lillian Diana Gish (October 14, 1893February 27, 1993) was an American actress, director, and screenwriter. Her film-acting career spanned 75 years, from 1912, in silent film shorts, to 1987. Gish was called the "First Lady of American Cinema", ...
, 1915
File:Blanche Sweet by Hartsook, 1915 (LOC cph.3b05769).jpg, Blanche Sweet, 1915
File:Mack Sennett 1916.jpg, Mack Sennett, 1916
Charlotte Burton 1916.jpg, Charlotte Burton, 1916
File:Mary Pickford-Hartsook.jpg, Mary Pickford, 1918
File:Henry ford 1919.jpg, Henry Ford, 1919
File:Charles Lindbergh by Fred Hartsook (LOC cph.3a15443).jpg, Charles Lindbergh, 1927
Notes
References
*
John Steven McGroarty
John Steven McGroarty (August 20, 1862 – August 7, 1944) was a poet, ''Los Angeles Times'' columnist, and author who also served two terms as a United States Democratic Party, Democratic Congressman from California from 1935 to 1939.
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: Los Angeles from the Mountains to the Sea, vol. 3, pp. 760–761; American Historical Society, 1921
Google Books versionaccessed 14 July 2009.
*
KPCC: "Street Stories: Hartsook Street/Hesby Street," broadcast 18 January 2009
online transcriptaccessed 14 July 2009.
{{DEFAULTSORT:Hartsook, Fred
Ranchers from California
1876 births
1930 deaths
People from Marion, Indiana
Photographers from California
Photographers from Indiana
20th-century American photographers