Jean Trébaol Vanishes

Sometimes, people just disappear.

It's much less common in the digital age. It would have been relatively easy to vanish without a trace - either intentionally or unintentionally - in 1919, when Jean Trébaol was last seen alive.

Born in Brest, he came to the States in 1893 at the age of 24, and soon married another Brest native, Jeanne de Kersauson de Pennendreff. The couple rented a house at 125 4th Street and would eventually have fourteen children (with thirteen surviving infancy).

Jean was a teacher and linguist, but took a job editing the French-language newspaper Le Progrès either with or under the notoriously unsavory J.P. Goytino. A squabble prompted Jean to leave and establish his own paper, Le Français. He boasted in English-language advertisements that Le Français was "the only French newspaper in Southern California established, published, and owned by a Frenchman." 

This must have come as quite a surprise to Pierre Ganée, a fellow French immigrant who established, published, and owned rival paper L'Union Nouvelle. 

The Herald published an article in 1897 about Constance Goytino (wife of J.P. and daughter of Joseph Mascarel) horse-whipping Mme. Trébaol outside a courtroom after a hearing. Jeanne's 17-year-old brother Robert, who was to inherit a considerable sum of money, had nominated J.P. as his legal guardian. Jeanne and her sister Isabel had concerns about Goytino's appointment. Constance also accused the Trébaols of trash-talking her. Jean sent a letter to the Herald politely informing them that Constance had attacked Jeanne unprovoked, that Jeanne had not actually taken the stand, and that "Judge Clark granted what we were intending for, namely, that Goytino as a guardian be put under heavy bonds and be restrained from incurring any liabilities on the principal of his ward."

Le Français merged with L'Union Nouvelle in 1900, and Jean went back to teaching.

With a large family to support and teacher pay being less than robust, Jean had more than one job. He taught French at Los Angeles High School, taught night classes at Polytechnic High School, taught at the Ebell Club of Pasadena, and taught privately. 

He also wrote for the Herald occasionally. Of particular note is Jean's 1901 essay "The Corset Question". While Jean wasn't 100 percent correct on the history of corsets, he expressed concerns over the health effects of tightlacing and predicted - correctly - that some women would continue to wear body-shaping undergarments (although these days waist trainers and other shapewear are far more common than corsets) instead of embracing their natural shape. While he chalks this up to vanity, I surmise he was unaware of the pressure to look a certain way that many women still face, well over a century later.

In 1903, Jean suffered a breakdown from stress, overwork, and starving himself for months to feed his children. He was sent to the San Gabriel sanitarium for a few weeks to recover. A newspaper blurb solicited financial assistance for the Trébaols, who had five children by this point. (Given the date of the article and the birthdates of their children, Jeanne would have been caring for 8-month-old Yvonne and was already expecting Edouard.)

1903 blurb regarding Jean Trébaol's hospitalization due to a breakdown

Blurb regarding a subscription, or donation fund, for the Trébaols

Jeanne was appointed legal guardian to her husband after his breakdown. A real estate transaction listed in the newspaper suggests she sold the family home on his behalf.

1909 newspaper blurb mentioning Trébaol's second hospitalization

A snippet from one of the San Francisco papers indicates that Jean lost or pawned a bag filled with important papers and photographs (which were an expensive luxury in 1909) prior to being committed to a mental hospital again. Jeanne came to San Francisco and requested police assistance in locating the bag. 

When World War One broke out in 1914, Jean tried to enlist. He was turned down due to being in his forties and having thirteen living children. (Georges Le Mesnager, by contrast, had five children, four of whom had reached adulthood.)

The Trébaols moved to Hollywood, which was still semi-rural. The family's three cows got out one day, prompting the judge to order Trébaol to keep them in another neighborhood and secure them properly.

1917 blurb about the Trébaol family's cows escaping

Jean took a job at the French Consulate for a while, then accepted a teaching post at the Mare Island YMCA in Vallejo, teaching French to sailors from the naval base bound for France. He published a small textbook related to this post. The rest of the Trébaols remained in the family home in Los Angeles.

Jean was known to the staff of the Echo de l'Ouest, one of the Bay Area's own French-language newspapers. He stopped by the newspaper's office on May 31, 1919, appearing to be severely depressed, and told the staff that he needed a complete rest. According to them, he was not himself that day. 

On June 1, Jean spent the night at the home of his brother René, who lived in Vallejo. The San Francisco Call stated that he was suffering from a nervous breakdown. He vanished the following morning.

Jean Trébaol was never seen again.

One colleague noted that there was talk of him drowning, which is certainly plausible given Vallejo's location on the Bay. It was widely assumed that he must have died in either an accident or - especially in the light of his apparent depression - by suicide.

Jean never found out that he had just been selected as the Vallejo schools' French teacher. 

Jeanne came up from Los Angeles to search for her missing husband, but it was to no avail. 

The California Historical Society Quarterly claimed that "Mascarel offered Madame Trébaol a house of prostitution as a good source of revenue after her husband's disappearance, but she declined, especially as she would have to live in it herself!" While the French Colony was known to step up for those in need, this story isn't even possible; Joseph Mascarel had passed away twenty years earlier in 1899 at the age of 83.

Jeanne DID need money, of course. She was a mother of thirteen living children, and although her two oldest children were in their twenties, the youngest was only four years old.

Six of the Trébaol children were already "appearing in motion pictures", as the Call put it, when their father disappeared. The other seven were soon looking for acting gigs as well. 

Jean had suffered from memory loss during previous mental health episodes, and had once spotted a newspaper advertisement placed by Jeanne, recovered his memory, and returned home. Besides earning money in the movies, the family hoped Jean would see and recognize one of his children on the screen.

Older brothers Hervé and Oliver went overseas (presumably to fight in the war), returning in 1919 and going on to higher education (in Hervé's case, becoming a priest and serving for years at St. Mariana in Pico Rivera). Eldest daughter Cecile helped Jeanne keep house and worked as a telephone operator at night. The other ten siblings continued to act.

1919 news article with picture of Jean Trébaol

When he was cast as the Artful Dodger in the 1922 version of Oliver Twist, Edouard told the San Bernardino Sun that "somebody asked mother to try to get some of us in the movies and so finally mother took a few of us around to picture studios. It was hard work, walking from studio to studio, and there was very little for us then. In fact it was many weeks before we received our first call. That was for a picture with Miss Pickford. Since then, the picture directors have been very kind. After they learned about our dad...they seemed glad to give any of us work when they could. Now every one of us is in pictures. Why, even mother herself sometimes plays."

1922 picture of Jeanne with her 13 children.
Headline reads "Thirteen Children Act in Movies But Want Their Daddy Not Fame."

Out of the thirteen Trébaol children, IMDB lists acting credits for Edouard, Jeanette, François (credited as "Francis"), Philippe, Yves, and Marie. I hasten to add that in the very early days of the motion picture industry, actors were not always credited by name, and it's likely that the other children worked as extras or in uncredited roles, since Jeanne did.

In an interesting footnote, Jeanette was apparently not put off teaching by her father's struggles. A 1946 news article mentions her joining the summer school staff at San Pedro High School thirty years earlier, teaching English and Spanish. That fall, she stayed on, teaching at Polytechnic High during the day and night school in the evenings.

Some Forgotten French Papers of Old LA

One of the most annoying aspects of researching French LA is that some historical documents, especially those written in Northern California, either completely ignore the French Colony in LA or - at most - treat it as an afterthought.

A reader pointed me toward the California Historical Society Quarterly's four-part series on the French-language press in California, written by one Clifford H. Bissell. I wasn't optimistic, but I always check these things out just in case. The CHS is known to have an impressive collection of newspapers.

Part one: blah blah blah NorCal.

Part two: blah blah blah more NorCal.

Part three: blah blah blah it's like the southern half of the state doesn't exist.

Part four: blah blah blah NorCal NorCal NorCal...then, long after I'd abandoned hope, a section on the French press in Southern California began on the thirteenth page. 

FINALLY.

I've mentioned the Spanish-language newspaper El Clamor Público before. For a brief period of time, the newspaper printed a page in French - not surprising, since editor Francisco P. Ramirez learned French from his godfather Jean-Louis Vignes. After the French page ended its run a few months later, the occasional French-language article, letter, or ad continued to run. This is also not surprising, since many French Angelenos picked up Spanish before (or instead of) English.

Two years after Corsican-born F. Tamiet founded L'Union in 1876, Tamiet disappeared. L'Union's editor F.V.C. de Mondran, who had left to establish Le Courrier de Los Angeles, used its debut issue to explain that Tamiet had forged checks, embezzled money, and left debts behind. The French Benevolent Society's meeting minutes from much of 1877 are missing, possibly because Tamiet was the Society's secretary at the time and may have been destroying unflattering records. 

Mayor Joseph Mascarel was the second owner of L'Union. Bissell does insult Mascarel's intelligence, claiming he was nearly illiterate (I have never seen anything to indicate this claim is true). 

As for F.V.C. de Mondran, aka Frédéric François, Vicomte Cazeaux de Mondran, his newspaper career seems to have been short-lived, as Le Courrier only lasted a few issues, and he left town soon after that (although unlike Tamiet, he didn't leave any sort of mess behind him and doesn't seem to have had a known reason for leaving). 

Pierre Ganée founded weekly paper L'Union Nouvelle in 1879, not long after L'Union folded, and remained editor and publisher until he passed away in 1902. The paper was widely read by most French-speaking families in Southern California, and was still being published when the Herald-Express ran its last issue in 1962.

Le Progrès followed in 1883, helmed by Dr. Pigné-Dupuytren and then Georges Le Mesnager, neither of whom really had the time to both keep it going and attend to their other jobs. For a time, J.P. Goytino, notorious son-in-law of Joseph Mascarel, edited the paper, but he left to focus on the Basque-language Eskual-Herria. (Goytino had a well-earned bad reputation that goes far beyond the scope of this entry. He was particularly notorious for being a scam artist and a slumlord.)

Belgian-born Charles Raskin (whom we've briefly met before) founded Le Gaulois in 1887, but ceased publication in 1891 due to being called to Brussels for his other job (agent for the Red Star Line and Compagnie Générale Transatlantique). Subscribers were turned over to L'Union Nouvelle after the final issue of Le Gaulois. Raskin also used the final issue to call out J.P. Goytino. 

Roughly translated:

An unfortunate and miserable vagabond, let's name him, J.P. Goytino, a former resident of the Los Angeles County Prison, has particularly taken on the task of vilifying us. We know full well that he belonged in France, for three years, to the Congregation of the Ignorant Brothers, under the name of Frire Lupulus, and that he was guilty of a series of unnatural crimes. Forced to leave France as a result of these misdeeds - and also as a result of acts of fraud and forgery committed to the detriment of his uncle, Mr. Bernard Etcheverry, he failed in California. Everyone knows that he owes only to the accidental death of his cousin Léonis, not to occupy a cell today in the state prison in San Quentin. It was as a result of his fortuitous release that he became editor of Le Progrés! Our readers know what has been achieved.

Félix Violé came on board at Le Progrés - the very same newspaper that had inspired Félix and his brother Jules to come to Los Angeles - in 1890. 

The 1891 city directory lists a Le Progrés Californien, with no editor or publisher listed, and there seem to be no other references to it anywhere. Perhaps it was short-lived, like Le Courrier, but with no surviving copies. That left Le Progrés as L'Union Nouvelle's only serious competition.

Ganée was certainly an opinionated editor. L'Union Nouvelle leaned Democrat until 1896, when Ganée's disapproval of President Cleveland's trade policy prompted him to switch the paper's allegiance to the Republican Party. Bissell adds "It was very anti-British, and seemed obsessed with the likelihood of the world's being dominated by the Anglo-Saxon races, i.e. Great Britain and the United States. It was rabid on the subject of Dreyfus."

(The less said about Ganée's opinion of Alfred Dreyfus, who was wrongly accused, wrongly convicted twice, and the subject of a cover-up when the real traitor was uncovered, the better. Ganée was eventually forced to admit Dreyfus' innocence.)

Ganée was equally mistaken about the Spanish-American war, believing Spain's navy to be superior to that of the United States. Oops!

Jean Trébaol edited Le Progrés either with or under the direction of Goytino, but left after a squabble and founded Le Français. He proudly advertised it in English as "the only French newspaper in Southern California established, owned, and published by a Frenchman." This must have come as news to Pierre Ganée, the Frenchman who established, owned, and published the long-running L'Union Nouvelle. In the end, Le Français merged with L'Union Nouvelle in 1900, and Trébaol went back to his old job: teaching. Like Tamiet, he mysteriously disappeared in 1919, but I'll dig into that another time.

Bissell notes that in 1895, a semi-weekly called La Concorde appeared, published by Mrs. L. Pavlides, a Parisian married to a Greek doctor. The paper was short-lived; Bissell states that the couple moved away and that no copies were known to exist.

At the start of the twentieth century, there was one French newspaper left standing: L'Union Nouvelle, of course. After Ganée died in 1902, Jacquard Auclair assumed publishing duties before selling it to Adrien Davoust, Ganée's former assistant, in 1904. 

By this time, L'Avenir had appeared. It disappeared after 1906.

Le Courrier Français (not to be confused with 1878's Le Courrier) appeared in 1917, billing itself as an "independent, progressive weekly newspaper of the French, French-Canadian, Belgian, and Swiss Colonies, and also the French reading public in Los Angeles." (See, I told you French LA wasn't totally homogeneous!) It merged with San Francisco-based Courrier du Pacifique in 1939.

L'Union Nouvelle, once again the last newspaper standing, ran its final issue in 1962.

The French Colony died multiple deaths - the railroad, the land boom, Prohibition, the freeway - but between the last French newspaper dying out, the original location of Taix (last survivor of the French Colony) being demolished for government buildings, and Bastille Day getting the shaft in 1968, I feel comfortable saying that the 1960s are the decade that wiped the French Colony from the city's collective memory.

The French Weekly, The French Library, Pierre Prévotière, and Amaury Mars

Pierre Prévotière was an attorney from Paris. 

Arriving in the US in 1900 at age 24, he made his way to Los Angeles by 1906. A newspaper excerpt stated he was in town "to study social conditions" and that he was going to establish a French library for the use of other French immigrants. 

Pierre moved into the Hotel Melrose on Bunker Hill. He took a job as assistant editor of L'Avenir du Sud de la Californie ("The Future of Southern California"), a French-language weekly newspaper based in the Temple Building. (Old LA had so many French-language newspapers that I have held off on writing a separate entry about them because I know I'll have to update it, possibly over and over. I seem to unearth another newspaper at least once a year.)

1906 listing for L'Avenir newsweekly

My French is lousy at best, but in a nutshell, this city directory listing describes L'Avenir as a weekly newspaper focusing on politics and literature, organized for French speakers. The listing boasts it was the most widely circulated French newspaper in California, with 3500 copies printed weekly. L'Avenir also held the distinction of being the only French newspaper with correspondents in both France and California. Amaury Mars was listed as editor, administrator, and publisher. A newspaper ad boasted that L'Avenir included "a beautiful French novel every week."

The same directory does list a French Library at 107-108 Temple Building, which means it was based in L'Avenir's offices. Amaury Mars was listed as proprietor, and lived on the premises. 

Mars was smart - one article referred to him as a genius - but there was more to him than met the eye, and he had quite a downfall of his own making.

Starting out at a different French paper, Mars founded L'Avenir and set about pretending to be the French Colony's leader. When the Pope's ambassador came to town in 1903, he was on the Executive Committee for the visit. He served on the Bastille Day committee multiple times. By 1904, he was already prominent enough to be invited to the launch party for La Colonia Italiana, LA's first Italian-language newspaper. He joined the Knights of Columbus, an organization whose membership rolls sounded like a who's who of Catholic Angelenos. Wherever LA's prominent citizens (especially prominent French, Catholic, or Republican citizens) were, Mars went. 

In the early 20th century, talk of Prohibition was widespread. Some towns and cities, including Hollywood (which hadn't yet been absorbed by Los Angeles proper), had already gone dry. A few 1905 newspaper articles state that Amaury Mars gave an address in French at an anti-Prohibition meeting. It's safe to say he was in favor of keeping the city's many saloons open.

In 1906, Mars asked then-Mayor McAleer to give a reception for the Paris Chamber of Commerce's envoys, pitching a large perfume factory in either Hollywood or somewhere between downtown and Pasadena. The envoys were said to be in Marysville at the time, purchasing land to grow flowers. Mars intended to accompany the envoys as an interpreter, and planned to meet them in Marysville with twenty French residents of Los Angeles for the trip south. The article concludes "It is worthy of note that in the correspondence of the Paris Chamber of Commerce they have commented on the favorable water situation at Los Angeles, as demonstrated by the securing of the great Owens River supply for the future." (Boy, THAT aged like milk.)

1906 was an election year in Los Angeles. The Los Angeles Herald notes that French Angelenos were offended by a paid advertisement for S.T. Eldridge, who was running for County Supervisor (his district would have included the Second and Third Wards of Los Angeles, plus still-independent Hollywood). The Herald translates part of the advertisement thusly:

He seeks the suffrage of the French-speaking population because he is certain that he can satisfy their views concerning the free trade in wine and liquors in contrast to his opponent Dr. W.A. Lamb, who wages a determined war against the traffic. 

Let us hope that he will be the candidate who shall have the voters' preference at the coming election.

The French community was insulted by the ad, and demanded an explanation from Mars. Can you blame them? Eldridge's campaign ad effectively reduced the French community to a bunch of boozers.  While Prohibition did later play a role in scattering the French Colony, French Angelenos' interests have never been solely limited to their ability to produce and sell alcohol. 

I'm not a journalist, but I'm pretty sure newspaper editors are supposed to remain objective. 

Earlier that year, Mars joined the French Relief Committee that year, which raised funds for San Francisco earthquake survivors, although I can't say whether the sentiment was real or if it was just politically expedient to support the cause. Strangely, he was also the addressee of a suicide note left by French-Canadian printer Charles Malan. Malan checked into the Hotel St. Angelo, plugged the keyhole and doorway gaps with paper, turned on the gas, undressed, lay down on the bed, smoked a cigarette, drank two bottles of Burgundy, and waited. In the note, Malan said he was "disgusted with life and tired of being trouble to others." Malan's acquaintances stated that he was fairly successful and couldn't think of any reason for him to be suicidal (but you never really know what someone is going through).

Mars' misdeeds caught up with him in 1907.

For starters, his name wasn't Mars. He was known as Chavet in New York, then went by a different name in Mexico. Fluent in several languages, well-educated, well-traveled, highly intelligent, and adaptable, Mars may well have been an ideal con man. 

Mars ran the newspaper La France in San Francisco, went to San Jose, wrote a book to commemorate President McKinley’s visit, allegedly bilked Santa Clara County out of $1500, and left town. Like so many other shysters before and after him, he came to Los Angeles. 

By 1907, Mars had founded a daily paper, Progress (not to be confused with Le Progrés) and was President of the Liberal Alliance (a political organization geared towards LA's many foreign-born voters). 

The working people of the Colony - druggists, grocers, butchers, saloon keepers, and so on - openly disliked Mars. People who work for a living tend to not like it when money isn't accounted for - especially when it's money they are owed.

You see, Mars was accused of selling a great deal of stock, using newly elected Mayor Harper's name to clinch the deal, and not turning in the money. 

At the same time, Mars began pursuing his teenage stenographer, Madge Clark (and because this isn't creepy enough already, Mars was living in Madge's mother's boarding house). Mars was married with a daughter, and Clark was in love with a chauffeur, but that didn't deter Mars. 

On the morning of March 30, 1907, Clark was speaking to the chauffeur at the corner of Franklin and New High Streets. Mars grabbed Clark, dragging her to the newspaper's upstairs office at 207 New High Street, and scolded the terrified teenager. Clark screamed. Fortunately, Justice Stephens had an office across the hall. Constable H.J. De La Monte and Deputy Charles R. Thomas responded and issued a warning. 

Other people who worked in the building had noticed Mars was a little too interested in Clark, who was not at all interested in him. 

Mars told the Los Angeles Times "This talk of jealousy is absurd. The girl is too young to think of being in love. I am particular about my employees being on time, and this morning she came late. That is all. There is no jealousy about it. Perhaps I was a little rough with her. She is very sensitive, hysterical, and she cried. Then the constables came. It is very unfortunate."

"Hysterical", my derrière. What's truly unfortunate is working for an abusive (and creepy!) boss, especially when they also live in your family's home.

A newspaper account briefly states that Clark ran off with the chauffeur, and wound up being detained by the police matron.

Between the fraud and the sexual harassment, Mars knew he was in trouble. He promptly skipped town, leaving his creditors in the lurch. Over a week later, he wrote to the newspaper's manager claiming he had left town to render services to the Progress Publishing Company. The rest of the paper's officials were glad to see him go, but not in the way he went, and were already taking steps to depose him (since he was technically still editor). 

After the vile things he said and did, Mars had the nerve to return to Los Angeles later. Newspapers place him back in LA as early as 1921, he somehow became secretary of the French League, and he lived in LA until his death in 1927.

By 1922, he was editing yet another French newspaper, Le Courier Francais. Prohibition was now in full effect, but it was widely ignored in LA. Mars, who had vocally opposed Prohibition back in 1905, reached out to Assistant U.S. District Attorney Camarillo offering to personally ostracize any members of the French Colony who knowingly violated the Volstead Act (two Frenchmen were being held for that reason). 

I'll just come right out and say it: the man wasn't just a con artist, a creep, and a fraud. He was a hypocrite, too.

Both L'Avenir and the French Library seem to have disappeared after the campaign ad controversy, and Mars' assistant editor Pierre Prévotière seems to have disappeared from Los Angeles by 1907. It isn't clear whether he finished his study on social conditions, but if anyone on either side of the ocean happens to stumble upon his work, please drop me a line. I surmise it's more enlightening than reading about his former boss' bad behavior.

The Humble Surgeon

Those of you in the medical field may have heard the name Dupuytren. 

Baron Guillaume Dupuytren, a brilliant surgeon, pathologist, and professor of medicine, had humble origins as the son of a penniless lawyer in Pierre-Buffiere, France. He attended medical school in Paris while the French Revolution raged, became Chief Surgeon of the famed Hôtel-Dieu during Napoleon's reign (supposedly treating the Emperor's hemorrhoids), and amassed a huge fortune. Eleven medical terms bear the Baron's name. He was widely disliked due to being pompous, combative, conniving, miserly, and a harsh critic, but he was such a talented surgeon and teacher that it didn't stop him from treating an estimated 10,000 patients a year (including Napoleon, King Louis-Philippe, and King Charles X).

Some of the Baron's huge fortune went to establish a chair at the ècole de Médecine and some of it went to establish a home for doctors in distress. The Baron had also offered a million francs to Charles X when he was newly overthrown and bankrupt. 

The Baron was also quite generous with his nephew.

Dr. Jean-Baptiste Pigné-Dupuytren

The Dupuytrens had been far from wealthy; the Baron attended school on charity and still had to work at the same time. His sister and her husband were struggling farmers in Limoges. Their son Jean-Baptiste Pigné was delivered in 1807 by a colleague of the Baron's, one Professor Cruveilher. 

The Baron had no son to inherit his estate or title, and legally adopted Jean-Baptiste with Napoleon's assistance, adding his own surname to his nephew's. He then enlisted Professor Cruveilher to see to the boy's education, making it as complete as possible. Jean-Baptiste attended the best schools in Paris, received a bachelor's and master's, and had the Professor as his own private tutor when studying medicine and surgery. 

After completing his medical studies in France, Jean-Baptiste was sent to Heidelberg, Germany for further studies (for which he also mastered German). After graduating, the Baron sent him to the Royal College of Surgeons in Edinburgh for still more medical studies under English-speaking professors. 

Dr. Jean-Baptiste Pigné-Dupuytren, by now 38 years old, was put in charge of the Museé Dupuytren, an anatomical museum founded by the Baron, and was made prosector of dissection materials for anatomy students at the Hôtel-Dieu. He did not care to stay in France due to ongoing political upheaval (the 1848 Revolution was just around the corner), and left for New York, bringing all the medical equipment and furniture he would need to set up a practice. (Le Guide Francais states that as of 1932, the bed that had come over from France with the Doctor was still in the possession of his daughter Leona. Does anyone out there know its current whereabouts?)

Dr. Pigné-Dupuytren rubbed elbows with the likes of railroad barons and the owners of Delmonico's restaurant in New York, but wanted to see the rest of the United States. Armed with multiple letters of recommendation, he visited Niagara Falls, Philadelphia, Baltimore, Washington D.C., Richmond, Chicago, St. Louis, and New Orleans (a city he favorably compared to France). He attempted, unsuccessfully, to set up a practice in New Orleans. Upon returning to New York a few months later, the Delmonico brothers asked him to go to San Francisco to oversee the second restaurant they had just established. San Francisco was booming, and the restaurant would only take part of his time. The doctor accepted. 

Legend has it that Commodore Vanderbilt offered Dr. Pigné-Dupuytren a free ride around Cape Horn on one of his ships. However, another source states that he in fact sailed on the Sea Witch, which was owned by Howland & Aspinwall, and which was known to sail from New York to San Francisco via Cape Horn during and after the Gold Rush.

San Francisco's population was growing so exponentially that the Doctor's first practice was in a tent, owing to a severe shortage of office space. Or, for that matter, any indoor space at all.

Before long, Dr. Pigné-Dupuytren backed the Marquis de Pindray, Count Gaston de Raousset-Boulbon, and dozens of other San Francisco Frenchmen on a failed expedition to Arizona and Mexico, with the goal of reopening old silver mines and establishing a French colony. The people of Sonora, understandably, weren't having it, and the Marquis was killed in a raid. Most of the survivors returned to San Francisco.

Just a few years later in 1856, Dr. Pigné-Dupuytren was called to perform autopsies on James Casey and Charles Cora, lynched by San Francisco's Vigilance Committee for allegedly murdering a newspaper editor. The doctor was the founder and first President of San Francisco's prominent French organization Ligue Liberale, and doubled as editor of French-language newspaper Courier de San Francisco. He was such a prominent San Franciscan that he was one of a few residents chosen to represent the city at the 1867 World's Fair in Paris, and brought over 3,000 mineral specimens to exhibit. While living in San Francisco, he became friends with both Prudent Beaudry and the diplomat J.A. Moerenhout, who we'll meet at a later date.

In 1874, the Doctor sent his wife Isabella (née Grain, born in New York to a French colleague) and their daughter Leona to Los Angeles to establish a new home. He followed on the Orizaba a few months later, and at some point purchased a plot of land at what is now 7th and Grand downtown. And, of course, he renewed his friendships with Beaudry and Moerenhout.

One source states that Dr. Pigné-Dupuytren traveled back and forth between San Francisco and Los Angeles until permanently settling in LA around 1883, another states that he took on a smaller clientele in LA so he could spend more time on other interests. Newspaper accounts seem to place the family in both cities off and on, and one indicates that Dr. Pigné-Dupuytren's Los Angeles practice could have opened as late as 1877.

Dr. Pigné-Dupuytren served a term as President of the French Benevolent Society and had a stint as Vice President of the Southern California Medical Society.  The Los Angeles Times described the doctor, in part, as "one of the best-informed men to be found, and could talk well and to the point about any given subject, his store of knowledge on all topics being apparently inexhaustible." The doctor also doubled as an editor for two of LA's own French-language newspapers, unsuccessfully attempting to revive L'Union (which had a negative reputation for its prior owners' irregular publishing schedule) and going on to edit Le Progrés. Due to his advanced age, he resigned after one year and was succeeded by Georges Le Mesnager.

When the well-heeled surgeon died in San Diego County in 1886, his friend and colleague Dr. E.A. de Cailhol delivered the eulogy at the funeral. In part:

"The deceased has often laughed with me over the circumstance, which seemed to run counter to his modest desires, arguing that he would never bear the title for several reasons: First, because he himself was unworthy of it, having never done anything remarkable; second, because being an unflinching and determined Republican, it would be a reproach to accept an empty title." (Note: Dr. de Cailhol's use of the word "Republican" probably referred to French politics. Although Dr. Pigné-Dupuytren was a naturalized US citizen, the threat of the French monarchy's restoration had a hand in prompting him to leave France.)

True to his word, Dr. Pigné-Dupuytren had never accepted the title of baron (his famed uncle had died in 1835). He seems to have been content to be a doctor, polymath, and sometime adventurer in the Old West.

News, Maps, Guns, and Félix Violé

Félix and Jules Violé happened to be visiting their cousin in Bayonne when they encountered something unexpected: a copy of Le Progrés. 

Founded in 1883, Le Progrés was one of 19th-century LA's French-language newspapers (there were at least four, and there is some evidence that there may have been as many as ten). Le Progrés was politically independent and a popular newspaper, despite strong competition from rival paper L'Union Nouvelle (which lasted until well into the twentieth century). And a relative in Los Angeles had sent an issue of the newspaper to the Violé brothers' cousin.

A busy frontier city in the furthest reaches of the faraway American West had so many French expats that it had its own French-language newspaper - more than one, in fact. The very idea intrigued both brothers (who had little to look forward to besides modest success and a comparatively dull life). Félix decided to pack up and move to Los Angeles himself. (Jules would follow him to LA within a year. I will cover him in a separate entry.)

Interestingly, immigration records indicate that Félix entered the United States through another great city with French roots - New Orleans. The year was 1888, and Félix was 30 years old. 

Félix quickly settled into his adopted city. He was a civil engineer by training, but as the boom of 1887 was over (thus meaning little work for engineers), he took a job with hotelier Pascale Ballade - the very relative who had sent the copy of Le Progrés to Bayonne in the first place. Soon, Félix became editor of a different local French-language newspaper, Le Gaulois, and served on the committee for the Bastille Day centennial celebration. 

I've covered the Bastille Day celebration earlier, in my entry on Georges Le Mesnager. In a strange footnote to one of the biggest events Frenchtown ever hosted, there was a dispute over payment of a bill connected to the celebration. Félix was slated to duel with Charles Raskin, then-editor of Le Progrés, over the issue on September 5, 1889. Strangely, about a year later, Félix was listed as editor of Le Progrés (a position he would hold for two years) and Raskin as editor of Le Gaulois in different newspaper articles. I surmise the issue prompting the duel was solved in a nonlethal manner.

Just a few months after the duel, on January 13, 1890, Félix married Hortense Deleval in San Diego. (Hortense's uncle was murder victim Henri Deleval.)

Félix and Hortense had three children - Gabrielle, Marie, and Laurence. Sadly, Gabrielle only lived for 18 months.

Félix also had a wholesale wine and liquor business, along with his house, at 736 S. Spring Street (a block I know well, having been to 721 S. Spring Street, aka California Millinery Supply, plenty of times). Los Angeles did have some restrictions on alcohol sales by the 1890s, and Félix was fined $20 for selling liquor after hours in 1893. 

Two years later, Félix applied for a saloon license and was denied. It isn't clear whether this had anything to do with the 1893 fine - or with the French newspapers' strong opposition to the French gangsters who ran many of the saloons and brothels in neighboring Lil Paree. (Beret-tip to David Kimbrough for the clipping.)

Félix also worked as a surveyor, was the city's official draftsman until his death, ran for City Engineer, and incorporated the Félix Violé Map and Address Company. Félix compiled new maps of Los Angeles said to be the most detailed and complete to date, one of which was distributed free of charge through the city's Chamber of Commerce. If you've ever seen a map of Los Angeles produced in the 1900s-1910s (or a real estate directory), it was probably made by Félix.

Félix was active in the Knights of Columbus, and was an avid clarinetist. Laurence Violé also became a civil engineer, sharing office space with his father at 2nd and Main.

Félix passed away in 1924 and is buried at Calvary Cemetery.