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Bolton Hall is a historic American Craftsman era stone building in Tujunga, Los Angeles County, California. Built in 1913, Bolton Hall was originally used as a community center for the Utopian community of Los Terrenitos. From 1920 until 1957, it was used as an American Legion hall, the San Fernando Valley's second public library, Tujunga City Hall, and a jail. In 1957, the building was closed. For more than 20 years, Bolton Hall remained vacant and was the subject of debates over demolition and restoration. Since 1980, the building has been operated by the Little Landers Historical Society as a local history museum. ==Los Terrenitos== In the early 1900s, the area now known as Tujunga was undeveloped land, the former Rancho Tujunga. In 1913, William Ellsworth Smythe, working alongside M.V. Hartranft (they had purchased the land together), formed a Utopian community called Los Terrenitos— Spanish for ''The Little Landers.'' Smythe was the leader of the Utopian Little Landers movement and had already established colonies in Idaho and San Ysidro, California. He advocated the principle that families settling on an acre or two of land could support themselves and create a flourishing community. Town lots in Tujunga were sold to settlers at $800 for an acre of land and a life of independence.〔(Patricia Ward Biederman, "Tujunga's Pioneer Women Lived on the Rocks," ''Los Angeles Times,'' April 9, 1999 )〕 Bolton Hall was built in 1913 by George Harris, a self-described "nature builder," rock mason and stone sculptor.〔〔 He first named it "Bolton Hall Hall," after Bolton Hall (1854–1938), a New York City progressive activist and proponent of the back-to-the-land movement.〔Marlene A. Hitt, ''Sunland and Tujunga: From Village to City,'' Arcadia Publishing (2002). ISBN 0-7385-2377-1.〕 Harris urged that the hall be built solely of native materials, and selected a design that he said borrowed nothing from European architecture.〔 Harris and the Terrenitos community built the hall using granite chunks and stones from nearby fields and hillsides and from the Tujunga Wash.〔〔 Stones were placed in position in the structure based on the positions in which they settled after falling from a cliff.〔 The spacious main room has shiny hardwood floors and a massive rock fireplace in the center. The fireplace is spanned by a mantel fashioned from a single eucalyptus tree.〔〔 Beneath the mantel, Harris inscribed the words "To the Spiritual Life of Soil."〔 The structure was built at a cost of $6,480.〔 When Bolton Hall opened in August 1913, the ''Los Angeles Times'' reported that it marked the "awakening of the Vale of Monte Vista" (the former name of Sunland): First settled nearly thirty years ago, the valley has shown more life in the past six months than in all its previous history. Los Terrenitos, the settlement of "'little-landers," has made wonderful progress since its inception, five months ago, about 200 families having purchased land, not all of whom are yet on the ground. But enough are here to make it a beehive of industry. The dedication of "Bolton Hall" last Saturday aroused much enthusiasm among the "little-landers."〔("Monte Vista Awakens," ''Los Angeles Times,'' August 24, 1913, page V-16 )〕 The ''Times'' also reported that Bolton Hall was "built to stand for ages," and it has survived the 1971 Sylmar and 1994 Northridge earthquakes without a scratch.〔 During the hall's early years, it hosted community meetings patterned after those held in old New England town halls.〔 Over the next decade, it was used for church services, musical performances, lectures, motion picture shows, the Women's Club, dances and pot-luck suppers.〔〔 It also was the site of the San Fernando Valley's second public library.〔 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Bolton Hall (California)」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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