Etan Does LA is celebrating National Library Week by visiting LA’s historic libraries on the National Register of Historic Places.

The smallest branch in the Los Angeles Public Library system, Helen Hunt Jackson Branch had an outsize impact thanks to Miriam Matthews – the first Black librarian employed by the LAPL

Added to the National Register of Historic Places on May 19, 1987

What we have here is a tiny ghost of a library. The building at the corner of Naomi Ave. and 25th St. was once home to the Helen Hunt Jackson Branch, the smallest of the LA Public Library branches at the time. Opened in 1925 and designed by C.E. Noerenberg, who also designed the Edendale, Jefferson and Figueroa Branch libraries, this one-story Spanish colonial was tiny but mighty. Its small scale fit right into the surrounding residential community at the north end of South LA’s historic Central Ave. corridor. 

Helen Hunt Jackson evolved out of the earlier Central Avenue Branch, which shut down in 1925 and split into this one and the Bret Harte Branch on 23rd street (now shut down). It was named after the author of Ramona, a phenomenally popular novel from 1884 about a romance between a mixed-race woman named Ramona and her Native American paramour Alessandro, during the mission era in California. Think of it as a wild west Romeo & Juliet.

The library made its mark on history, in no small part due to Miriam Matthews, the head librarian at Helen Hunt Jackson from 1929 through 1934. Matthews was the first African-American librarian employed by the Los Angeles Public Library – and the only one for 20 years. She ran book clubs and gave on-air book reviews on local radio stations. It was also during her time at Helen Hunt Jackson that she began collecting a trove of books and photos about Black history in California. Her collection ended up as a resource for historians and librarians throughout the US. By 1949, Matthews was supervising 12 branch libraries as the Regional Librarian of the South Central Region; she stayed in that position ‘til her retirement in 1960. 

The Helen Hunt Jackson Branch lasted for only 15 years. In 1940, it had been downgraded to a “station,” open only 21 hours a week. At some point it was converted into a church, and more recently some sad contractor decided to cover over the windows with white stucco, paint the entire thing a dull gray, replaced the charming doorway with a boring one and wrapped the whole thing in a white security fence. It’s a sad state of affairs for a building with such a meaningful (albeit short) story. But I guess keeping those stories alive is why we’ve got history blogs, right? 

Recommended Reading

+Helen Hunt Jackson Branch’s NRHP nomination form  

+Hand Book of the Branch Libraries (Los Angeles Public Library, 1928) (PDF)

+The Incomparable Miriam Matthews (Los Angeles Public Library, 1921)

+Vintage library cards from the Helen Hunt Jackson Branch (The Library Card Museum)