As we enter a new decade, many of Alhambra’s homes and buildings will be celebrating their centennials in the 2020s. Here at Alhambra Preservation Group, we’d like to take this opportunity to look back and highlight many of Alhambra’s 1920’s-era homes, businesses, churches and schools.
Over the next few issues of APG News, we’ll introduce you to the businesses and people who called Alhambra their home in the 1920s. We’ll feature the architects who designed Alhambra’s most noteworthy historical resources. We’ll showcase the architectural styles that were introduced 100 years ago and can still be found in Alhambra. We’ll celebrate the homes, businesses, churches and schools that have stood the test of time and are celebrating their centennial in the 2020s. Join us for a trip into the past – into 1920s Alhambra.
A City of Homes
Here in Alhambra, the “Roaring Twenties” was a time of tremendous growth and change as our young city welcomed a huge influx of new residents and businesses; a decade in which the local population tripled in size. This was the Jazz Age, when “Anything goes!” was the mood and everything seemed possible. Countless Americans – mostly Midwesterners – were reinventing themselves, settling up and setting a course for Southern California, with its promise of new beginnings; new lives. Thanks to the post World War I economic boom, the automobile age and the newly constructed cross-country highways, the 1920s saw the largest internal migration in the history of the 
United States. And, thanks, in part, to a clever marketing campaign by our Chamber of Commerce that promised a garden paradise, a “City of Homes,” where year-round sunshine offered a healthful climate capable of curing any ailment, thousands of these newcomers settled in Alhambra. Their energy and optimism not only fueled Alhambra’s own growth, but contributed to the development of the entire region.
We look forward to exploring 1920s Alhambra with you. If there’s something about 1920s Alhambra at which you’d like us to take a closer look, please feel free to e-mail us at info@alhambrapreservation.org.
Photos courtesy of Alhambra Preservation Group.
The Prose of Preservation 