Project MUSE®: Southern California Quarterly - Latest Articles
https://muse.jhu.edu/journal/849
Project MUSE®: Latest articles in Southern California Quarterly.daily12026-05-16T00:00:00-05:00text/htmlen-USVol. 101 (2019) through current issueLatest Articles: Southern California QuarterlyTWOProject MUSE®Southern California Quarterly2162-86370038-3929Latest articles in Southern California Quarterly. Feed provided by Project MUSE®Editor's Note
https://muse.jhu.edu/article/974956
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On March 23, 2024, we lost Merry Ovnick, long-time editor of this journal. Merry took the reins from Doyce Nunis in 2005, and, combined, she and Doyce served the Southern California Quarterly for decades. To honor their incomparable legacy, the Historical Society of Southern California established the Merry Ovnick-Doyce Nunis Quarterly Endowment, a permanent fund to provide financial support for the Quarterly's editor and help ensure the journal's continued exploration of the rich, diverse, and complex history of Southern California and the West.Merry's family, friends, and colleagues came together on September 14, 2024, at The Doctor's House in Brand Park in Glendale to celebrate her remarkable life and career.
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Project MUSE®https://muse.jhu.edu/2026-05-16T00:00:00-05:00https://muse.jhu.edu/journal/849/image/coversmallEditor's Note2025-11-21text/htmlen-USEditor's Note2025-11-212025TWOProject MUSE®62262026-05-16T00:00:00-05:002025-11-21Remembering Merry Ovnick
https://muse.jhu.edu/article/974957
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Merry Ovnick received her B.A. from ucla and her M.A. from California State University, Northridge. She started teaching at csun as a lecturer in 1985 while working on her Ph.D., and was hired as an assistant professor in 2000, the same year she was awarded her doctorate from ucla. She taught full-time until 2009 when, facing a diagnosis of terminal cancer, she took early retirement in order to spend more time traveling, which she did with great frequency, energy, and excitement.Merry taught a wide range of courses in U.S., urban, and cultural history. A lifelong Angelino, she is perhaps best remembered at csun for having created the remarkably successful and popular interdisciplinary course, Los Angeles Past
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Project MUSE®https://muse.jhu.edu/2026-05-16T00:00:00-05:00https://muse.jhu.edu/journal/849/image/coversmallRemembering Merry Ovnick2025-11-21text/htmlen-USRemembering Merry Ovnick2025-11-212025TWOProject MUSE®440052026-05-16T00:00:00-05:002025-11-21Chapter XII: Ordinary Dreams
https://muse.jhu.edu/article/974958
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HENRY-RUSSELL HITCHCOCK HAD GOOD REASON for his optimistic assessment of Los Angeles in 1940.1 L.A.'s low-rise profile, low-density, pattern of single-family houses, and its extended suburbs accommodating all social levels had resulted from careful planning. Los Angeles' suburban lifestyle stood as the model for students of city planning elsewhere. L.A. had by far the highest percentage of single-family detached houses of any industrial city in the nation, at comparable cost to less desirable living quarters elsewhere.2 To guarantee the permanence of this ideal lifestyle, planning pioneers had very early on imposed zoning and height restrictions on the city representing a conscious commitment to horizontal growth
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Project MUSE®https://muse.jhu.edu/2026-05-16T00:00:00-05:00https://muse.jhu.edu/journal/849/image/coversmallChapter XII: Ordinary Dreams2025-11-21text/htmlen-USChapter XII: Ordinary Dreams2025-11-212025TWOProject MUSE®574042026-05-16T00:00:00-05:002025-11-21The Mark of Zorro: Silent Film's Impact on 1920s Architecture in Los Angeles
https://muse.jhu.edu/article/974959
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In these fictional presentations (films) the educative influence has been … insidious. The audience opened its mind to the plot and the background made its certain impression—unsought, but effective. The motion picture should be taken seriously.Miniature Spanish haciendas, American Colonial cottages, and Olde English manses from the 1920s stand shoulder-to-shoulder on southern California avenues, with fantasy hideaways and an occasional turreted castle nearby. This is as normal in Los Angeles as the sets on our movie lots and the movie shoots on location in our neighborhoods. Such houses reflect visual lessons learned from Hollywood—not just the replication of historical and fairytale styles but something deeper:
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Project MUSE®https://muse.jhu.edu/2026-05-16T00:00:00-05:00https://muse.jhu.edu/journal/849/image/coversmallThe Mark of Zorro: Silent Film's Impact on 1920s Architecture in Los Angeles2025-11-21text/htmlen-USThe Mark of Zorro: Silent Film's Impact on 1920s Architecture in Los Angeles2025-11-212025TWOProject MUSE®1711482026-05-16T00:00:00-05:002025-11-21Curating History in Southern California and Beyond: An Interview with Merry Ovnick
https://muse.jhu.edu/article/974960
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Editorial Introduction: Midway through volume 100 in its present ordering, Merry Ovnick has overseen tillers of California's historical terrain as Editor of Southern California Quarterly for fourteen years, curating regional historical scholarship for readers eager to learn the shared history of this remarkable place. Published first in 1884 and running for 134 years as the scholarly publication of the Historical Society of Southern California, scq explores "the history of Southern California, California as a whole, and the American West." Ovnick's own expertise, though, is Los Angeles, specifically L.A.'s residential architectural history. Boom Editor Jason Sexton and scq Book Reviews Editor Allison Varzally sat
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Project MUSE®https://muse.jhu.edu/2026-05-16T00:00:00-05:00https://muse.jhu.edu/journal/849/image/coversmallCurating History in Southern California and Beyond: An Interview with Merry Ovnick2025-11-21text/htmlen-USCurating History in Southern California and Beyond: An Interview with Merry Ovnick2025-11-212025TWOProject MUSE®448752026-05-16T00:00:00-05:002025-11-21