Access
Custodial History note
Preferred Citation note
Biographical/Historical note
Scope and Content note
Related Archival Materials note
Title: Esther McCoy research papers
Identifier/Call Number: 0000103
Contributing Institution:
Architecture and Design Collection, Art, Design & Architecture Museum
Language of Material:
English
Physical Description:
4.0 Linear feet
(2 boxes, 1 oversize box and 1 flat file drawer)
Date (inclusive): circa 1940-circa 1984
Location note: Boxes 1-2/ADC - regular Box 3/ADC - oversize** 1 Flat File Drawer/ADC - flat files
creator:
Abell, Thornton M., (Thornton Montaigne), 1906-1984
creator:
Bernardi, Theodore C., 1903-
creator:
Davidson, Julius Ralph, 1889-1977
creator:
Killingsworth, Brady, Smith and Associates.
creator:
McCoy, Esther, 1920-1989
creator:
Neutra, Richard Joseph, 1892-1970
creator:
Rapson, Ralph, 1914-2008
creator:
Rex, John L.
creator:
Schindler, R. M., (Rudolph M. ), 1887-1953
creator:
Smith, Whitney Rowland, 1911-2002
creator:
Soriano, Raphael, 1904-1988
creator:
Spaulding, Sumner, 1892/3-1952
creator:
Walker, Rodney
creator:
Wurster, William Wilson
Access
Open for use by qualified researchers.
Custodial History note
Gift of Esther McCoy, 1984.
Preferred Citation note
Esther McCoy research papers, Architecture and Design Collection. Art, Design & Architecture Museum; University of California,
Santa Barbara.
Biographical/Historical note
Esther McCoy was born in Arkansas in 1904 but spent the majority of her childhood in Kansas. She attended college in Missouri,
Kansas, St. Louis, and Michigan. In 1925 Esther left the University of Michigan to launch her writing career in New York City.
Her architectural career began when she entered a training program for engineering draftsmen at Douglas Aircraft. Then in
1944 she began to work as a draftsperson at the office of acclaimed architect Rudolph Schindler in Los Angeles, CA. Her prominence
as an architectural historian flourished at this time, as she began disseminating concepts of modern architecture to large
audiences through her writing.
From the year 1950 to 1989, the year she died, Ester McCoy was a frequent contributor the
Arts & Architecture,
Architectural Form,
Architectural Record,
Progressive Architecture,
L’Architectura, Lotus,
The Los Angeles Times and
The Los Angeles Herald-Examiner. In 1960 she published her first architecture book entitled
Five California Architects. Three years later she published
Modern California Houses: Case Study Houses 1945-1962. Later in her life she wrote catalogues for gallery and museum exhibits devoted to modern California architecture. She lectured
at the University of Southern California and the University of California, Los Angeles. Esther McCoy also catalogued the Richard
Neutra papers at the University of California, Los Angeles. Her last work, however, was an essay for the catalog of an exhibition
on the Case Study Houses at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. McCoy died on December 30, 1989.
Scope and Content note
The Esther McCoy research papers span four linear feet and date from circa 1940 to 1989. The collection consists primarily
of documents relating to Esther McCoy’s research regarding the Case Study House Program and Richard Neutra. Box one houses
Esther McCoy’s inventory of Richard Neutra’s collection of microfilmed architectural drawings and reprographic copies, box
two houses a VHS tape of Esther McCoy’s 80th birthday party, and one oversize box and one flat file drawer houses architectural
reprographic copies of Case Study House numbers: 1 (Julius Ralph Davidson), 2 (Summer Spaulding and John Rex), 3 (William
W. Wurster and Theodore Bernardi), 4 (Ralph Rapson), 5 (Whitney R. Smith), 7 (Thornton Abell), 13 (Richard Neutra), 16 (Rodney
Walker), 17 (Rodney Walker), 18 (Rodney Walker), 21 (Richard Neutra), 26 ( Killingsworth, Brady, Smith & Associates), and
1950 (Raphael Soriano).
Related Archival Materials note
Esther McCoy papers, 1920-1989, bulk 1920-1989. Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution.
ADC Study collection, Architecture and Design Collection. Art, Design & Architecture Museum; University of California, Santa
Barbara.
Subjects and Indexing Terms
McCoy, Esther, 1920-1989
Architecture -- California
Architecture -- California -- Los Angeles -- 20th Century
Case Study House 1950 (Los Angeles, Calif.)
Case Study House No. 1 (Los Angeles, Calif.)
Case Study House No. 13 (Los Angeles, Calif.)
Case Study House No. 16 (Los Angeles, Calif.)
Case Study House No. 17 (Los Angeles, Calif.)
Case Study House No. 18 (Los Angeles, Calif.)
Case Study House No. 2 (Los Angeles, Calif.)
Case Study House No. 21 (Los Angeles, Calif.)
Case Study House No. 26 (Los Angeles, Calif.)
Case Study House No. 3 (Los Angeles, Calif.)
Case Study House No. 4 (Los Angeles, Calif.)
Case Study House No. 5 (Los Angeles, Calif.)
Case Study House No. 7 (Los Angeles, Calif.)
Reprographic copies