Robert Marsh
"Among Los Angeles business men Robert Marsh has been distinguished by his ability to plan and carry out exceptionally large undertakings, many of them along new and untried lines and in new fields. In the upbuilding and extension of modern Los Angeles within the last twenty years he share high and conspicuous credit."
Los Angeles from the Mountains to the Sea (With Selected Biography of Actors and Witnesses to the Period of Growth and Achievement • Volume 3 by John Steven McGroarty (American Historical Society, 1921) p. 805
Bio in Brief
Born:
January 20, 1874 in Charleston, Illinois
Mother: Martha Jane Atwood
Born: August 23, 1840
Grandmother: Eliza (Noyes) Atwood
Grandfather: Gen. Joshua J. Atwood
Died: May 19, 1907
Father: Joseph E. Marsh
Grandfather: Joseph Marsh (b. 1799, New Hampshire; d. New Hampshire)
Great-Grandfather: John Marsh
Grandmother: Rhoda R. Gage (b. New Hampshire; d. January 10, 1848)
Great-Grandfather: Daniel Gage (b. June 29, 1785; d. 1952)
Great-Grandmother: Hannah Church (1785-1839)
Education:
Little Rock Public Schools
One year of high school in Los Angeles
Marriages:
Cecile Lothrop
Born: January 24, 1874 in Texas
Married: April 12, 1898 in Alhambra, CA
Arthur St. C. Perry acted as best man
Brother In Law or Father: Dr. Milbank Johnson
Children:
Florence L. Marsh [eldest was born January 30, 1899]
Martha J. Marsh
Robert Marsh Jr.
Died: June 30, 1952
Interred: Inglewood Park Cemetary, Los Angeles
Before Los Angeles
Moved with family from Little Rock, Arkansas to San Diego in 1888
Moved with family to Los Angeles in 1891
Lived in New Orleans, Louisiana from 1898-1899
Death:
October 1, 1956 in Los Angeles, CA
Interred: Inglewood Park Cemetary, Los Angeles
Civic, Professional, Business Transactions
Business:
Beginnings
Marsh left high school in 1892 without graduating
Worked in the book store of E.T. Cook from 1892- ~1896
Beginning ~1896, sold men's furnishings
While living in New Orleans, Louisiana from 1898-1899, engaged in wholesale and retail coal
Parry Shirt Company (later, Bumiller & Marsh)
Directors: W.H. Kreiter, A.H. Parry, W.G. Hambright, Robert Marsh and Joseph E. Marsh (all members subscribed for $4,000 except Jospeh E. Marsh, who contributed $100)
Capitalization: $30,000/300 shares ($16,100 subscribed)
Source: Los Angeles Herald (5/6/1896, p. 4)
Location: 123 S. Spring Street
Became Bumiller & McKnight in May, 1899 after Marsh sold his interest to Edgar B. McKnight
Robert Marsh and Company
Civic:
Los Angeles Chamber of Commerce
Appointed: 1908
Los Angeles Realty Board
Vice-President at point in time
Social
Notable Newspaper Mentions
Los Angeles Times, April 7, 1903 (Page 10):
Joins Mayor M.P. Snyder and "about sixty" others for an "excursion" to Loma Linda with an overnight stay at the Loma Linda Hotel.
Los Angeles Times, July 24, 1903 (Page 11):
Joins Automobile Club of Southern California for a "run" in which "[t]he object of the trip was to show the Supervisors, for it is the intention of the board to pass an ordinance this month regulating the speed of autos and their management on country roads, and in order to let the members of the board see how an auto acted away from home, the automobile club acted as host, and the run to Pomona was the result."
"About five miles out from this city Elmer Cole was so unfortunate as to break one of the wheels of his Cadillac, but he repaired the machine in a way and returned to this city."
Cole's vehicle was possibly a Runabout or Tonneau.
Los Angeles Evening Express, November 2, 1903 (Page 6)
Noted for contributing $1.00 for the Sloat Monument Fund
Addresses and Real Estate Transactions
Constructed:
Marsh-Strong Building
Erected: 1913-1914
Address: 112 West Ninth Street (standing, now the "Los Angeles Apparel Mart Building")
Cost: ~$750,000
Officies: 396
Residence:
244 South Hill Street (1898)
121 West Thirty-First Street (1901)
1119 Westchester Place (built ~1906; demolished 1967)
221 Bunker Hill (1940)
603 S. Rampart Blvd. (at time of death in 1956)