Naming the Dead: Chapter 3 in draft, Clay Bodies

Below is an excerpt from Clay Bodies. [Cross posted on Poetry, Prose & Pottery]

Above: A portrait attributed to Mary Ellen Keeler neé Simpson, Rufus Keeler’s mom.

Naming the Dead

2023. Riverside, California.

Some family stories lodge in the brain like a burr. What part of the story is fiction and which is fact? What makes them true is the extent to which they are repeated, but like that telephone game, the more they’re repeated, the more they change.

Who was Great Grandpa Rufus’ mother?

That has been a persistent question for me as I have been researching. Not only have I wanted definitively to know what her name was, but also: Who was she? What was she like? What did she like? Where did she come from?

From the website behindthename.com, the name Mary stems from the ancient Egyptian word mry meaning beloved, or possibly mr, meaning love, later translated into Hebrew as Myriam, Moses’ sister, then Maria, and finally anglicized to Mary. The name Ellen is the Medieval English derivative of the Greek Helen, meaning torch, or possibly even moon. Helen was the daughter of Zeus and Leda. Together, Mary Ellen means something akin to beloved light. The two stories—Moses and Miriam and Zeus and Leda—rub up against one another in my kin, .

I’ve taken my clues as I can find them, and they all lead back to one name, but three different people, all named Mary Ellen.

All three play crucial roles in this story but only one is Rufus’ mother, and another Rufus’ wife. The third, no less important, is more of a walk-on, but still—she is an important figure.

It doesn’t help matters that Rufus’ mother is an enigma. Nobody talked about her. There were whispers. Did she run off? What happened to her?

How to peel apart the different Mary Ellens?

To answer this, I turn to ancestry.com and dig through census data, city directories, marriage records, but instead of answering my questions, they dredge up new clues, like this scandalous piece alleging the “trading of wives.”

The headline reads, “How a New York Capitalist Married a Divorced Woman.”

It appears in the San Francisco Examiner, Monday November 29, 1886, in which it is called “the latest sensation from across the bay” and a “compound complex marriage and divorce arrangement,” the article tells of two men, Charles T. Hickok and B. Keller (sic), their friendship, and the dissolution and subsequent reconstitution of their marriages.

Some true stories have the ring of fiction in the retelling, and so it is with the entanglement of the Hickoks and Keelers and Bleuels and Simpsons, but I believe I’ve unearthed enough facts to corroborate at least a basic outline of the story, in spite of their misspelling of our family name.

Rochester, New York, was a burgeoning modern city, and 1850 was a census year. Charles Theodore Hickok and Bradley Burr Keeler (or Burr Bradley, as he seemed to prefer, B.B. for short) — perhaps new each other as children, both living in Ward 4 during the census taking. Mary Ellen Bleuel’s family lived in Ward 6 in 1860 and then Ward 13 in 1870.

At the time of the census, B.B.’s father, Rufus E., is officially noted as a “farmer” on the census, but to my reading, and based on other information I’ve gleaned, it may and likely does read, “tanner.” He worked in leather, becoming a prominent local businessman and real estate investor before he is the first named Fire Captain, and then later he will spend a year as Mayor of Rochester. At age sixteen, B.B. enrolled in the University of Rochester and studied on the Bachelor of Science track for two years before enlisting in the Union Navy as a landsman on several Naval gunboats for another year. After his discharge 1863, he returned to Rochester and working for his brother-in-law in the tobacco business, and in February of 1875 B.B. marries a hometown girl named Mary Ellen Bleuel, daughter of a Swiss carpenter and French mother, in a Manhattan courthouse wedding. For the first few months of marriage, they live in the Keeler family home on S. St. Paul in Rochester along with B.B.’s mother along with sister Natalie and brother Theodore Valleau “T.V.” and wife Ruby.

Upon his father’s death, and concurrent with his marriage, the newlyweds set off for California in search of the land of milk and honey as written by the eminent journalist and non-fiction author, Charles Nordhoff, grandfather of the other eminent author Charles Nordhoff who authored the classic Mutiny on the Bounty. The elder Nordhoff, author of the railroad-sponsored travel guide, “California: For Health, Pleasure, and Residence,” could be said was almost singlehandedly responsible for the influx of settlers to the west coast, save for the 49ers who had settled in the Gold Rush area. Nordhoff’s depiction of scenic California enticed cold Northerners to make their way to the more temperate California coastline

By now the Bleuel family has relocated to Carpinteria, California, and they are farming. The newlyweds B.B. and Mary Ellen follow. B.B. buys farmland too, and further, he shares title with his wife—an unusual maneuver for the day. The census records note the Keelers, while in Carpinteria, had a Chinese servant named Foo. The next year, B.B. returns to Rochester to retrieve T.V. and Ruby via steamship, and, afterwards, both Keeler households move to Santa Barbara where T.V. opens a furniture shop.

But then a curious thing happens. Within five years, the furniture store goes belly up and T.V. and Ruby move back to Rochester. A news item in the Santa Barbara Daily Press writes,

“Some people who are prone to say mean things intimate sometimes that Mr. Keeler has done more for the town than the town ever did for him, but of course such people are slanderers, in a certain sense. We have Mr. Keeler’s own word for it that he will return here in spirit just as soon as he is killed by lightning, and will have a pleasant word to say to Col. Hollister and Uncle Warren Chase.”

Chase, by the way, was the editor of the newspaper, and Hollister financed the paper, among other ventures.

According to census records, B.B. was by turns a bookkeeper, merchant, farmer, contractor, speculator, and capitalist. Always trying to get ahead, B.B. makes regular trips to Mexico, begins a coconut oil extraction business.

In March of 1882, B.B. makes a land purchase in Santa Barbara that includes a claim to oil, and he is now the vice president of the Santa Barbara Oil Company. During this period, he sells the farm and has gone all-in for commodities - oil, and now a gold mine.

Also, in 1882, he became two-tenths owner of the William Arthur Mines, a goldmine.

In Marysville.

In a parallel story, Charles’ father Benjamin Eldridge Hickok has been running a boarding house that holds thirty-plus other people including women and teenagers, many of whom are young immigrants who either work as laborers or presumably hold positions within the boarding house itself. Charles would have been seven at the time of the 1850 census, the same age as B.B.’s older brother T.V., so it is my best guess that Charles knew B.B. through T.V., although this is pure conjecture. Maybe they played together at school, or on the street; maybe they knew nothing of each other until much later, bonding over a shared hometown finding themselves in a new shared city in a faraway state called California.

Forty miles north of Sacramento is Marysville, the Yuba County seat. An entryway sign reads, “Gateway to the Gold Fields.” Established midway through the 19th century, it is situated in the heart of Gold Country in the vicinity of Sutter’s Mill where the ‘49ers migrated to make their fortunes during the Gold Rush and named for Mary Murphy, one of the surviving members of the Donner Party.

Around the time of the city’s founding, while still in his teens, Charles and his family move to Marysville, where his father buys another motel. Beyond motel keeping, the Hickoks venture into flour milling, purchasing the Golden Rule Flour Mill and move themselves to Oakland.

Now, some might call this a digression, but I’d like to take a moment to tell you a little bit about the Hickoks of Oroville, mostly as a cautionary tale for those of us doing genealogical research.

I’ve been reading a lot about flour.

The (possibly unrelated?) mystery that I’ve been trying to solve for months now is this: Who are the Hickoks of Oroville? Specifically, are they related to the Hickoks of Marysville, a mere 30 miles apart?

In both Marysville and Oroville there is a flour mill.

Both flour mills are owned by men named Charles Hickok.

Same, same?

Not so fast.

One, I discovered, is the afore-mentioned Charles T. who owns and operates the Golden Rule with his father. The other, I learn, is Charles E., who, with his father, owns and operates the Oroville Flour Mill.

It would seem like a logical leap to think that two men with nearly identical names in the same industry towns apart might be related? Maybe?

There’s a lovely obituary for younger Charles Hickock in San Francisco in 1913. Ultimately, he left the flour industry behind and became Water Superintendent for Oroville Water, Light and Power Company.

The beauty of ancestry.com is its searchability. I’ve found both family lines, and in each of them gone back generations to see where they may intersect. I’ve found other family trees that include Charles Hickoks, Benjamin Hickoks, and so on.

If there’s a family connection, I haven’t found it yet.

Meanwhile, back in Marysville—

James M. Simpson, a second generation Scottish immigrant, left Illinois for California with his wife Margaret, an Irish immigrant, and their young son. Along their journey, they stop over in Wisconsin where they have a daughter and another son. Once in Marysville, the couple will have one more daughter along with three more sons.

At first, James operates a cattle ranch, then a ferry across the Yuba River, and finally a bridge which —in an updated form—still stands today on Simpson’s Lane.

The National Democrat on September 8, 1959, tells the story of James Simpson’s death in a revenge killing, not too far afield from what you might expect from an old Western film. Picture the Landis Ranch in Linda, a short distance from Marysville, and a crowd of cowboys forming. One is tossing out accusations, “You killed my brother!” Soon guns are drawn and bullets are flying. Was James responsible? I don’t know. What I do know is that he left his wife and family alone during a period of time where she, Margaret Fitzgerald Simpson, had to petition the court for custody of her own children, and for the family business—namely, the ferry.

The first mention of Simpson’s Ferry I can find. It appears in the Marysville Appeal on April 30, 1860. “Ferry Rope Broke,” begins the news article.

The boat was empty at the time.

It had just ferried across a train of mules.

A horse and buggy were waiting their turn to cross the Yuba River.

The boat floated a ways before it was secured, and I wonder about the chase that ensued, how many men did it take to recapture the wayward ferry? How did they return it to its point of origin?

What could all of this be a metaphor for?

Sometimes things get away from us.

Mary Ellen Simpson is eleven years old when her father dies. Within ten years, her mother Margaret would remarry. The following year, 1870, Mary, too, would marry, beginning her new life at the age of 22 with husband Charles T. Hickok, but in another two years Mary’s mother would be gone.

In the year 1878, Mary Ellen Hickok neé Simpson gives birth to Charles P.

Then, in 1881, she is pregnant again, this time with a girl. Sadly, the child dies.

Here is where the two women's stories cross, like an intricate cat’s cradle passed from hand to hand. It’s taken some untangling but I believe the following to be true.

Cue the wife-swapping headlines.

The Marysville Appeal writes, on May 28, 1885:

“Trading Off.—The following, which we clip from the Examiner, is of local interest here, by reason of one [of] the families having once been residents of this place: ‘An exceeding lovely case of wife swapping occurred in Oakland within the past year, but has just leaked out… The parties to the ‘swap’ are Mr. and Mrs. Keeler and Mr. and Mrs. Hickok, the latter a son of the proprietor of the Golden Rule Flouring Mill…. Mr. Keeler felt a growing infatuation with the wife of Mr. Hickok, which by the appearance of things, was reciprocated. By a singular coincidence Mrs. Keeler was afflicted by an uncontrollable passion of love for Mr. Hickok, and reciprocity to a degree equal to that in the former case developed. All the parties were aware of the changes of heart… The matter was arbitrated by the four, and finally a mutual agreement was arrived at. The husbands were to change wive, and the wives were to change husbands. The parties moved to San Mateo, where were duly divorced, and Mr. Hickok marched off triumphantly with Mrs. Keeler, while Mr. Keeler expressed himself content with the possession of Mrs. Hickok.”

A later article in the San Francisco Examiner confirms these details:

“I cannot imagine why the newspapers want to know anything about my private business,” he said. “My former wife deserted me and I got a divorce from her in the usual form… Yes, my ex-wife married Mr. Keeler and I am sorry that I ever saw him.”

And so the newly-minted Mrs. Keeler neé Simpson and the now-divorced Mrs. Keeler neé Bleuel go their separate ways.

It was further perpetuated by reprinting in several newspapers from San Francisco to Santa Barbara. This, from the Marysville Daily Appeal, taken from the San Francisco Examiner:

“Trading Off.—An exceedingly novel case of wife swapping occurred in Oakland within the past year, but has just leaked out. The parties concerned are of reputable standing in the community and possessed of considerable means.…”

As the story goes, the two couples were taken to socializing together, one being Mr. and Mrs. Hickok and the other being Mr. and Mrs. Keeler.

The article goes on to say that B.B. worked for The Golden Rule, and that that was how the two couples met, though I can find no confirmation. According to the article, both of the Mrs. — Mary E. Keeler and Mary E. Hickok — were purportedly granted a divorce, one supposedly for desertion of her husband and the other for reported mistreatment by husband. Research on divorce in the Victorian era places that luxury squarely in the realm of the affluent, or at minimum desertion had become a practice of couples who sought divorce and needed a valid reason the courts could hang their hat on. The article concludes that the two couples’ situations were settled amicably, with each content with the other’s spouse.

And they all lived… happily? But not for long.

By February of 1885, B.B. and the second Mary E., neé Hickok neé Simpson, were married in Sacramento then made off for Bellingham, Washington, where, by October, she had given birth to a son—my great-grandfather Rufus. If you do the math, either the baby was premature, or she was already pregnant, which would have added another layer of scandal.

The article further claims that Charles T. and Mrs. Mary E. neé Keeler neé Bleuel did marry, but there is no marriage record, and further, voter, census, and newspaper records continue to refer to her as Mrs. B.B. Keeler for the remainder of her life. Articles reference Mrs. B.B. Keeler’s gowns and bathing costumes, apparently newsworthy occasions. Another hiccup in determining which of the Mary E.’s had mothered Rufus. And worse, Mary Ellen Keeler neé Bleuel often went by Marion.

After the divorce scandal, or maybe to get away from it, Charles T. relocated to Portland, Oregon, where again he became a hotel keeper. At first blush it appeared that he never did in fact remarry, but curiously the death certificate listed him as married. Was this a mistake? Could this have been Mary E. neé Bleuel? But no. A quick search of marriage records shows he did, at long last, remarry—about ten years before his death in 1912, to a woman named Catherine Hart.

Meanwhile, B.B. and Mary E. neé Simpson, were living happily in Washington State. Eventually they settle in San Francisco where my great-grandfather is raised alongside his half-brother Charles P.

But happiness isn’t meant to last.

In 1896, Mary E. neé Simpson develops a fatal case of spinal congestion, now commonly known as meningitis, at the age of 48. At the time of her death, the couple was living at 933 Haight Street in San Francisco, just outside of the now-famed Haight-Ashbury neighborhood. The widower B.B., son Rufus, and stepson Charles, would live together as a family unit until the older brother went to work for the Panama Canal.

Rufus, would in time, marry his own Mary Ellen.

This is supposed to be a book about great men.

Still, I keep coming back to the women.

***

Excerpted from a work in progress, Clay Bodies: The Brief Lives and Lasting Legacies of Rufus B. Keeler and Brad Keeler, Father and Son Ceramicists, and copyright the author Cati Porter. This work may not be reproduced in whole or in part without permission of the author except as embodied in critical articles or reviews.

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Crazed Collection

It might seem a little odd, but I eagerly carried this chipped chicken to the checkout counter. It has a little nick on its beak and several on its tail. The stamp on its base was illegible. And yet, when I spotted it sitting on a half-wall between stalls in an antique mall, I knew exactly what it was and where it belonged.

It had no price tag so I snapped a picture of it alongside the booth number.

The photo is reminiscent of one I took some time ago, after another similar find. Why buy nearly identical pieces? I can’t say exactly, except that it has become more of an obsession than anything. My husband and I sometimes spend entire days scouring the antique shops in a drivable radius from our home in Riverside: Orange, Fullerton, Redlands, Pasadena, Escondido, Beaumont, Temecula, etc. Most—most!—of the time we come away empty-handed. This chicken find was near the end of our day. We had already called it a bust when I spotted it. I decided to see if they would make a deal, considering no price sticker and the chips and illegible stamp. No serious collector would be interested, and I would much rather give it a home than see it dumped.

I offered them $15. And now it’s mine.

(Of note, a nearly-identical one is available on eBay for $68.77.)

If I’m being honest, I almost walked away. But then the lines from my poem “Crazed Collection” ran through my head. Because my collection—the act of collecting, as well as the objects themselves—is not about seeking perfection or completion; it’s about reclamation. It’s about finding and bringing home pieces of my family that have been scattered. I want them so I can remember what I have never known.

Crazed Collection

This piece, representing a green cabbage or lettuce leaf, has a bright
red lobster claw to provide interest…There are no chips, cracks, dings,
scratches, etc. There is the usual amount of crazing.. . The backside is
marked Brad Keeler. This super piece... may fill that void in your 
lobsterware collection. —Ad found on E-Bay

Glazed eyes gaze into the infinite distance
on the open shelving in my kitchen.
Earthen elements molded into lobsters and leaves form
a frieze of my dead grandfather's work.

On the open shelving in my kitchen
I've arranged his platters, casseroles, and bowls.
A frieze of my dead grandfather's work,
these crazed green-garnished, blood-threaded dishes.

I've arranged his platters, casseroles, and bowls.
Imperfections longed for: cracks, dings and scratches.
These crazed green-and-garnet glazed dishes
have found a home amid my homely kitchen's

imperfection. Longing for cracks, dings and scratches,
I order imperfect pieces. The damaged
find a home in my home's kitchen.
Crazed collection elevating the forgotten,

I order imperfect pieces-the damaged,
disregarded, fill a void in this
collection, elevating the forgotten
yellowed news-clips, dust-covered photographs.

The discarded fill a void in this
kitchen, remember what I've never known.
Yellowed news-clips, dust-covered photographs,
reveal my mother's father. In this

kitchen remember what I have never known:
earthen elements. Molded into lobsters and leaves, form
reveals my mother’s father. In these 
glazed eyes the infinite distance gazes back.

From Seven Floors Up

 

Cross-posted on Poetry, Prose & Pottery.

The Continuing Mystery of Brad Keeler and Art Bronze

Recently I learned where the John G. Bullock bronze bust wound up: a Macy's in Pasadena which has been kept in its original condition from when it first opened as a Bullock's in 1947. I don't know when, but at some point the Bullock bust moved from the Los Angeles Wilshire Bullock's to this Pasadena on Lake Ave one, where it sits along the wall in a hallway toward the restrooms in the basement.

Now knowing where it is, I couldn't resist the urge to go find it and see it in person. I wasn't sure if I'd be able to see the signature on the back but I figured I could get up close and personal with it, at the very least. Which I did. 

Of course I posed with it. I tried to replicate my grandfather's pose, but a) I'm shorter, and b) the bust is on a higher table, so most of the results look like me on my tippy toes straining to put my elbow on his head. This was the closest approximation I could get in a semi-relaxed pose. 

Further, I was able to (gently, gingerly) pull the bust away from the wall enough to see the signature on the back! This was super exciting because it was confirmation of what I believed I already knew. 

It's a little hard to read, but it says, "Keeler Art Bronze Fndy". This was a thrill, because my mom remembers seeing the signature when she was a young woman shopping for a bridesmaid's dress for her middle brother's second wedding, to Auntie Judy, with Grandma Catherine at that Bullock's in Downtown Los Angeles. 

But here's the twist: On the way home, I decided to run a google search of "Keeler Art Bronze" to see if that might bring up other works he was involved with, and what I found was surprising indeed. 

Research on my family connection to the Oscars led me to learn more about Guido Nelli, the first bronze foundry to cast the original Oscars. Well, Nelli happened to have a partner. His name was Fred E. Keeler. Keeler was a partner in Nelli's California Art Bronze Foundry and he had his own: Keeler Art Bronze Foundry. I know these things because of archives on the web.

The Gilcrease Museum, aka the Thomas Gilcrease Institute of American History and Art, is home to the archives of the Charles M. Russell research collection. In this collection are documents outlining a relationship between Russell, a sculptor, and Nelli and Keeler, the bronze foundry where Russell's sculptures were cast. Where Keeler is mentioned, he is named as the Keeler Art Bronze Foundry. 

Coincidence? Did Brad, working for Phillips, just happen to give his work the same exact name? Or is there another piece of the puzzle I have yet to uncover?

My first thought was somehow that Fred Keeler might be a relative, but if he is, it's not clear or direct. My family tree on Ancestry has no one in it named Fred, and Fred's has none of the same distant family that I would expect to find. There are no Rufuses, for instance, and no Josiah. But he does go way back to the Keeler Tavern in Connecticut. So even assuming for a minute that there is some genetic connection, there's no evidence that the two men knew each other. But, weirdly coincidental, Fred Keeler also was involved in ceramics. He ran Empire China in Burbank. There is even a Keeler Street. And, later, he became the founder of the now infamous Lockheed Aircraft Company. 

I am so confused! 

If it weren't for the family photographs, I would have attributed this bust to Fred Keeler's short-lived Keeler Art Bronze Foundry. But I have the pictures to prove my grandfather's involvement. So there remains the mystery. 

Did Brad work for Fred, too? Did Fred and Rae Warren Phillips work together too? There is that Oscars connection, the brief contract that moved from Nelli to Phillips in 1935. 

Clearly there is more research to do. I'll leave you with this clipping announcing the launch of the unveiling of the bust, naming the sculpters as Holger and Helen Jensen. 

Oscars in the Family Album

Excerpt from Clay Bodies:

Among my grandmother’s things from her life as Mrs. Brad Keeler is a photograph of eleven presumably bronze statuettes that look eerily similar to the famed Oscars of the Academy Awards. Family lore is that Grandpa Brad had a hand in designing the first statuettes. But is it true? Here’s what I know: 

 In spite of other assertions that Brad’s first job was for Padre Potteries, it appears that his first first job was working for the Phillips Bronze and Brass Corp. studios, which was owned and operated by Rae Warren Phillips, a friend of his father’s who is named on his patent for a specialized clay-cutting apparatus that is intended to neatly cut square architectural tiles, thus saving the ceramist the tedious work of hand-cutting. Rae, or R.W., was the metallurgist who knew how to cast shapes in various metals, particularly bronze, and he was the craftsman behind Phillips Bronze and Brass.

Brad sculpted and created large-scale works in bronze including the bust of John Bullock, founder of Bullocks Department Store, and some larger-than-life parrot sculptures that are as tall as I am. There is a photo of him, elbow propped on the head of Bullock, his other hand on his hip, whole body cocked to the side in a confident posture, a literal feather in his cap.

And there are the photographs of the Oscars.

Official written history is that George Stanley sculpted the original statuette from a sketch by director Cedric Gibbons, and the first of what would be many contracts with foundries went to Guido Nelli, an Italian immigrant who lived from 1888-1952. The California Art Bronze Foundry was co-owned by Nelli and a man named P. E. Keeler. 

Keeler. Coincidence? Probably.

There is no one so far that I can locate in the family tree with those initials who lived during that period in that place. 

What I have sussed out so far: Nelli was the creative artist and craftsman behind the foundry. Coming to Los Angeles by way of entering the United States through New York by way of Petrograd, Russia and originally from Rome, Nelli introduced the lost wax process of casting metal sculptures. 

[Mom, while working for Lynx making golf clubs, learned the lost wax process of casting in metal. It is something she has spoken of with some pride.]

Nelli cast the Oscar designed by Stanley and presumably held the contract until the Great Depression forced him to close down the foundry, and for the duration of World War 2, due to a metal shortage, the Oscars were made of plaster. After the war would put us into 1945, and by that time Brad would have been in his thirties and well beyond his early work sculpting for R. W. Phillips at Phillips Bronze and Brass (also known as Phillips Bronze Corporation, or, as I recently learned, Phillips Bronze Bushings Works). So I begin to wonder, did Brad have a hand in the plaster version of the statuettes? That would have been 1944, according to the timeline. 

Letters from Brad to Catherine dated 1942, the summer they rented the Laguna Beach beach house on the Pacific Coast Highway, the one that is now painted a periwinkle blue and owned by a chiropractor, was the summer she was pregnant with her middle child, a son, Patrick. They were already living at the Delay Drive house. On the census for 1940 he is listed as a ceramist and Catherine as a finisher, and a lodger named Elizabeth is with them and she is also employed as a finisher. On his draft card from the same year, he lists his employer as Padre Potteries in Los Angeles. So it would seem by 1942 he was building his own pottery in the backyard on Delay Dr., and already working with James Webster on the Bradster works. James is referenced multiple times in the letters home when talking about his work. 

Looking at the photo of the Oscars that I have, I compare that against a timeline of what the Oscars have looked like. The photo I have is clearly different from the war-time plaster Oscar but identical to one that Katharine Hepburn received in 1933. Identical. 

So where was Brad in 1933? He would have been twenty years old. That would have been two years before his marriage to Catherine, one year before his father Rufus died. Brad had two years of college, according to voting records. That would make the timing of his first job, around age 20, about right. 

In fact, though, all of the earliest statuettes match the ones in the photograph. But Brad would only have been sixteen years old in 1929, so it’s unlikely he worked for Guido Nelli at that time. Could there have been a bidding war for the right to produce the statuettes? 

What I can tell you is that internet says Brad was employed by Phillips circa 1931. The timing is right. And Nelli closed the foundry during the Great Depression. It couldn’t have been 1929, when he was producing the first statuettes, but I can find no record of his producing them after that. And while the Depression lasted until 1939, when World War 2 brought us out of it, it’s unlikely he would have closed down so close to the end—surely it was more toward the middle? 1934ish? Or even earlier, maybe? 

Let’s say hypothetically that Phillips outbid him for the Oscars and produced them in 1933. 

It’s possible.

An avenue for further research. 

What I know is this: We have an original photograph of the Oscar statuettes. In the photograph are eleven statuettes. The statuettes match the design of the originals, including one won by Katharine Hepburn in 1933. Brad worked for Phillips Bronze and Brass for his first job, which would have been around that same time. He would have still been living at home. By 1935 he was married and living at another family property, on Delay Drive in Los Angeles, and working for Padre.

Was Brad involved with the production of the first Oscars? Maybe not the first, but close.

**

Postscript: It is the following morning and I am thumbing through the photographs and find one that I had previously overlooked: three more statuettes, two with engraved plaques that read,

Academy of

Motion Pictures

Arts and Sciences

First Award

1934

So there it is. 

Although the one without the placard is on a very tall base, unlike any of the others I have seen thus far. So the mystery remains.

***

Post-Post Script

My continual searching on the internet eventually turned up an article, "The Oscar Statue Gets a Makeover", on the Los Angeles Magazine site circa 2016. In the article is the following sentence:

In 1935 the Academy switched to Phillips Bronze Bushing Works near Central and Washington for one year.

So there's the answer. I still have many questions, like, why? And why only a year? Where did the author get his information? 

It's a Bust

Meet John G. Bullock, founder of Bullock's Department Store. For people of a certain age, you might remember shopping here, especially those in Southern California. I don't have memories of Bullock's, per se, but I do remember it as an option at the mall. It closed its doors forever in 1995, but when it opened in 1907 it was glamorous. 

Here is in an inside joke: When my husband and I go out to antique stores in search of Brad Keeler Artwares, if we don't find anything, my husband will declare it "a bust" to which I unfailingly reply, "no, it's a torso". I'm the one in the family who makes the dad jokes. But in this case, it really is just a bust, not a torso. 

Yes, there's a Brad Keeler connection.

Brad graduated high school in 1931. Upon graduation, and even before, he lucked into some industry jobs thanks to his famous father, Rufus Bradley Keeler, whether that be cleanup work on the Malibu Potteries after a fire, or in the case of this bust, working for Phillips Bronze Bushing Works.

Rufus and a man named Rae Warren Phillips became acquainted circa 1909, the year that Rae Warren married Rufus' first cousin Jennie. Despite being in different fields--metallurgy and ceramics-- the two men occasionally worked together on projects, even going as far to apply for and receive a patent for a tile making apparatus. 

Both men, now married and both with sons, continued to make their way in life. Eighteen year old Brad, having demostrated a gift for drafting and modeling, began working for Rae as a modeler. There are large bronze parrots (as in, 5' tall!) that have been attributed to Brad, but which are signed simply Phillips. We can only make assumptions based on the similarities between Brad's later ceramic parrots and these early bronze ones. However, there's more data when it comes to the bust of John G. Bullock.

Here is a photo from the family album: Brad Keeler leaning casually on the bust. My mom remembers, after her father died, while her brother Pat was engaged to his second wife, Judy, going with her mom to Bullocks Wilshire in Los Angeles and seeing the bust in person. And she remembers that it is signed Brad Keeler on the back.

It has occurred to me to wonder from time to time where that bust wound up, considering how long its been since Bullocks closed its doors. Google is not always helpful, until it is. You have to have the exact right search terms. And I have tracked it down. It's housed within a former Bullocks which is now a Macy's, on Lake Ave in Pasadena, down a hallway to the bathrooms. The store itself is a museum of sorts, with its original furniture and fixtures and artifacts from the golden age of Bullocks Department Store, including the bust.

Pasadena is about an hour away from house and its one of our regular haunts for looking for Brad Keeler Artwares. Next time we're in the area, I plan to make a pilgrimage to the bust. Sure, it's up against the wall now, so I may not be able to see his signature.

But I will know its there.

For next time: Brad Keeler and the 1935 Oscar statuettes.