The Pickwick Corporation

The Pickwick Corporation was a California corporation[1] that historically encompassed a number of related businesses, including the surviving Pickwick Hotel in San Francisco, California.

History

Prior firms, merged to the Pickwick Corporation, had used the Pickwick Theatre, as their departure point.[2] The company was named for its office location, the 1904 San Diego Pickwick Theater, built by Louis J. Wilde, primarily for vaudeville but converted to movies in 1922 and demolished in 1926.[3][4][5][6]

Constituent companies

Pickwick Stage Lines

The Pickwick Stage Lines[2] was one of the major bus companies incorporated into the Greyhound system in its formative years. Pickwick merged with Minnesota-based Northland Transportation in 1929 becoming Pickwick Greyhound.

Pickwick Motor Coach Works

Manufacturer of buses, including a unique sleeper coach called the "Nite Coach".[2] Pickwick's coach factory was located in El Segundo, along what is now Aviation Blvd. just south of Imperial Blvd./Highway. In 1934, this factory was acquired by the Northrup Division of the Douglas Aircraft Co.[7], re-named the El Segundo Division of Douglas Aircraft after John Northrup left the Douglas Co. in 1937.[8] The building remained in use through World War II.

Pickwick Airways

Pickwick Airways[9][10] operated a fleet of Bach 3-CT-6 "air yachts", initially between San Diego and Los Angeles, subsequently between San Francisco and Los Angeles, with service eventually extending as far as Mexico City. In 1929, Rena Vale was director of publicity.[11][12]: 123  Gilpin Airlines emerged from the Depression-related failure of Pickwick Airways.

Pickwick Broadcasting

Pickwick Broadcasting[13] was a network of radio stations in California, including KTAB in San Francisco (now KSFO), KNRC in Los Angeles, KTM[14][15] (became KEHE,[16][17] now KABC (AM)) in Santa Monica, and KGB (now KLSD) in San Diego.

Pickwick Hotels

In 1926, a Pickwick Hotel, was built by the company itself, and located in Anaheim at 225 South Los Angeles (later Anaheim) Blvd. It was initially named the El Torre but was re-named Pickwick in 1929. It suffered some damage in the 1933 Long Beach earthquake, but was repaired. It continued in use under new owners until it was demolished in 1988.[18]

In 1927, the Pickwick Terminal Hotel, opened in San Diego. It was restored and re-named The Sofia Hotel in 2006.

On 22 September 1928, the Pickwick Hotel in San Francisco opened at Fifth and Mission near Union Square. The same building was utilized by the Pickwick Stage Lines as its San Francisco terminal. It was mentioned in the Dashiell Hammett mystery novel “The Maltese Falcon”. The hotel survives under different owners today.

In 1930, a large Pickwick Hotel and bus terminal was built by the company and opened in Kansas City. It was restored in 2015 and re-opened as "East 9 at Pickwick Plaza" in 2016.[19]

In 1930, Pickwick opened another hotel in Salt Lake City.[20]

The Pickwick Hotel in Los Angeles was located at 833 South Grand, adjacent to the Trinity Auditorium Building. The site of the hotel is now a modern parking garage with the address 801 South Grand.

References
  1. "Pickwick Corporation". Ghosts of Wall Street. Retrieved 19 June 2022.
  3. "View of Fourth Street looking north from D Street (Broadway?) in San Diego, ca.1900". calisphere. 1900. Retrieved 19 June 2022.
  4. "Pickwick Theatre, San Diego, CA". Pacific Coast Architecture Database. Retrieved 19 June 2022.
  5. "Pickwick Theatre in San Diego, CA". Cinema Treasures. Retrieved 19 June 2022.
  6. The San Diego Tourist. A.E. Flowers. 1912.
  7. Los Angeles Daily News, Volume 11, Number 129, 31 January 1934, p.7
  8. The Douglas Aircraft Plant, That Became Los Angeles Air Force Base, Robert Mulcahy, 2012
  9. "Pickwick Airways, Inc". Ghosts of Wall Street. Retrieved 19 June 2022.
  10. "Pickwick Airways Inc. - Stock Certificate". www.glabarre.com. Retrieved 19 June 2022.
  11. "Tri-Nation Service Starts; First Plane of Pickwick Latin-America Airways Given Send-Off in Colorful Pageant", Los Angeles Times, August 19, 1929, page A-2
  12. Un-American Activities in California, California Senate Factfinding Subcommittee on Un-American Activities, 1943, pages 122–175 (hathitrust)
  13. Hilliker, Jim. "LA Radio". Broadcast History. Retrieved 19 June 2022. This is a review of the 87 AM radio stations that have operated in the greater Los Angeles area between 1921 and 1998.
  14. Hilliker, Jim (2014). "KGFJ - Los Angeles, The Original 24-Hour Radio Station". History of American Broadcasting. QSL letter to a DXer in New Jersey from KTM-780 in Los Angeles that shows they were on the air at 3:00 a.m. in February of 1931
  15. Radio Division (1930). Commercial and Government Radio Stations of the U.S. United States Dept of Commerce. The Pickwick Broadcasting KTM 780
  16. "KELW Burbank". Radio Heritage Foundation. Retrieved 19 June 2022. By 1935, KTM had become KEHE, named after the Los Angeles Evening Herald Newspaper and was the Los Angeles station for Hearst Radio Inc, part of the Hearst media empire.
  17. Mulrooney, Christopher. "Morgan, Walls & Clements: KEHE (KFI) Radio Building, 1936". Christopher Mulrooney. Retrieved 19 June 2022.
  18. Calisphere photo with caption Wikimapia
  19. East 9 Pickwick Plaza website
  20. Suburbanizing the Masses: Public Transport and Urban Development in Historical Perspective, by Colin Divall, Winstan Bond, 2017, at Google Books
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