The Alhambra Historical Society has received three books that include information related to Alhambra.

“The High Sierra” by Ezra Bowen was published by Time-Life Books in 1972. On page 31 the book reads:

“The back-country visitor will stay out for five or six days. And whether on horse or foot he will be there basically to do as John Muir did–to let the beautiful days enrich his life and saturate themselves into every part of the body. He is someone quite like the fireman from Alhambra, California, who went onto the Muir Trail recently with his two sons, aged 11 and 13, to make a very special, very sentimental journal: he had done the Muir once before in 1937 at the age of 12, and now there was the precious dividend of seeing it again through eyes so young.”

“Sam Hyde Harris” (1889-1979) by Marine St. Gaudens is a book that accompanied the exhibit of the famous local painter at the Pasadena Museum of California History. Harris lived on Hildago, but had a studio on Champion Place, called Artists Alley, which attracted many other artists, including Norman Rockwell.

Harris’ widow, a former UCLA librarian, Marian Dodge, died only a few years ago. The book is mostly a collection of his works, which are of the ‘plein air’ school, where the artists worked outside, in front of an easel, and, like Harris, usually with an umbrella to shade them from the sun.

Harris designed many posters for the railroads during their heyday, when he had his advertising agency in downtown Los Angeles. Several examples of these are in the book. Harris was President Inflatable Water Slide of several art associations including the San Gabriel Artist’s Guild, and the San Gabriel Fine Arts Association.

Harris bought the studio of another famous artist in Artists Alley–Jack Wilkinson Smith. When Harris died, it was noted that he was the last of his stature to work there.

“American Chinatown: A People’s History of Five Neighborhoods” by Bonnie Tsui, published by Free Press in 2009, talks about the Chinatown area of Alhambra. She writes about Los Angeles’ Chinatown and enclaves in Monterey Park and San Gabriel, the San Gabriel Valley and Alhambra (p.145).

The Alhambra Historical Society Museum, 1550 West Alhambra Road at Bushnell in Alhambra, is open every Thursday from 2 to 4 p.m., and on the second and fourth Sunday from 2 to 4 p.m. For more information call 626 300 8845.