J. D. Black Papers. CSLA-15
THE THOMAS AND DOROTHY LEAVEY CENTER FOR THE STUDY OF LOS ANGELES RESEARCH COLLECTION
J. D. BLACK PAPERS, 1876-1999 (CSLA-15)
ADMINISTRATIVE INFORMATION
COLLECTION TITLE AND NUMBER: J. D. Black Papers, 1876-1999. CSLA-15
ACCESSION NUMBER: 1999.24; gift of Jacqueline Holmes and Barbara Black Fitzpatrick
COLLECTION SIZE: 22 archival document boxes, 14 oversize boxes
PROCESSING HISTORY: Processed by Clay Stalls, Department of Archives and Special Collections. Guide written by Clay Stalls.
RELATED COLLECTION: Big Pine Citizen Newspaper Collection. CSLA-30
DIGITIZED MATERIALS: A selection of photographs from the J. D. Black Papers has been digitized. To view the photographs, select this link: America's West: The Owens Valley of California.
J. D. (John David) Black, known by his friends as Jack, was born in 1893 to a pioneer family of California's Owens Valley of the eastern Sierra Nevadas. He would reside here, in the towns of Big Pine and Bishop, California, until his death in 1960. J. D.'s father and mother (John and Rose Black) had moved to Bishop in 1886, where John bought a saloon in 1888. In 1902, still retaining the family home in Bishop, John Black bought a saloon in nearby Big Pine, and eventually moved his family there. In Big Pine, beginning sometime in the 1910s, J. D. Black began running a men's clothing store, which he later combined with groceries, and which remained open until 1947. Sometime around 1923, J. D. Black opened "Black's Cash Store" in Bishop. John Black participated in other business enterprises, such as mining, and father and son also held mining property jointly.
Besides materials related to the personal life, and mining and business interests of J. D. Black, this collection offers a particularly rich yield of documents and photographs on one of the major events in Los Angeles and California history of the 20th century: the City of Los Angeles' takeover of the land and water rights of the Owens Valley. Both as member and leader, J. D. Black was active in the 1920s in different Big Pine citizens' organizations seeking relief and compensation for economic losses owing to the City of Los Angeles' control of the Owens Valley. The surviving records of these organizations' dealings with the City, and vice versa, are now housed in this collection.
The J. D. Black Papers also contain rare photographs of mining and daily life in the California Sierras and neighboring Nevada. Among the more valuable photographs are those of the Nevada mining towns of Tonopah and Candelaria, and the present-day ghost towns of Bodie and Keeler, California.
To learn more about the holdings of the J. D. Black Papers consult the following pages of this on-line guide:
COLLECTION DESCRIPTION: A general description of the types, topics, and research value of the materials found in CSLA-15.
SERIES DESCRIPTIONS: The collection is arranged in subject categories called series, which are described in this section of the on-line guide. The series descriptions provide links to their box and folder lists, which index each series' folders and contents, and the boxes in which they are stored.
RESEARCH ACCESS: The collection is open for research by appointment with no restrictions under the conditions of the access policy of the Department of Archives and Special Collections, William H. Hannon Library, Loyola Marymount University, 1 LMU Drive, Los Angeles, CA 90045. To schedule an appointment, please call the Department of Archives and Special Collections at 310-338-5710 or 310-338-5357, or email the department: Special.Collections@lmu.edu. The Research Collection is a program of the Thomas and Dorothy Leavey Center for the Study of Los Angeles.
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