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URGENT HELP NEEDED !
posted by
Raadg
on
November 1, 2005 at 5:23 am
Urgently looking for all and any information on the 1938 built Miramar Theater in San Clemente, California!
A.K.A as the San Clemente Theater & Possibly the El Hidalgo theater
Built by Strang Bros. Contractors
Designed by Clifford Blach (any special info on the architect or respect and acknowledgment of their work locally or nationaly is much appreciated!)
** can anyone scan or get their hands on or suggest how I can get my hands on a copy of a magazine called Southwest Builder and Contractor, the july 2, 1937 edition????
Comments (3)
I’ve searched the Los Angeles Public Library’s web site, and they apparently have the entire collection of Southwest Builder and Contractor on microfilm, available in the Science and Technology Department at the central library, 5th and Grand, downtown. I’d like to take a look at the collection myself, but I live several hundred miles away from Los Angeles now.
There isn’t much about Clifford Balch on the Internet. Almost all the results of a Google search link back to this site. Here is Cinema Treasures' list of theatres worked on (partial). He may have worked in the offices of L.A. Smith in the early 1920s, as when Smith died (about 1924-1926), Balch completed many of the theatres on which Smith had been working.
Balch appears to have specialized in theatres, most designed with his partner, engineer Floyd Stanbery. I’ve found reference to only one non-theatre project by Balch- plans for an IOOF temple at the southwest corner of Green Street and Fair Oaks in Pasadena, in 1913. Either this was unbuilt, or has been demolished. There has been a gas station on that corner for as long as I can remember, which is back to the early 1960s.
The various libraries of the University of California
(Berkeley, UCLA) have the Southwest Builders on microfilm and/or paper. If you don’t have access to one of those, go to your local library and see if they can get the microfilm for you:
Title Southwest builder and contractor.
Publisher [Los Angeles : F.W. Dodge Co.]
Description 98 v. in 186 ill. 31 cm.
Publishing History v. 50-147, no. 12; July 6, 1917-Mar. 25, 1966.
Note Formed by the union of Builder and contractor and Southwest contractor and manufacturer
Language English
Do you still need information about this theater? I have a few articles if you want them. My email is . I think you had trouble finding much about the architect because his name is Balch, not Blach. Let me know if you want these pdf’s.