Title: Jock Peters papers

Identifier/Call Number: 0000164

Contributing Institution: Architecture and Design Collection, Art, Design & Architecture Museum

Language of Material: English

Physical Description: 13.0 Linear feet (6 record storage boxes and 3 flat file drawers)

Date (inclusive): 1912-1933

creator: Peters, Jock, (Jacob Detlof), 1889-1934

Partially processed collection, open for use by qualified researchers.

Gift of Ursula De Swart, 1986.

Jock Peters papers, Architecture and Design Collection. Art, Design & Architecture Museum; University of California, Santa Barbara.

Jock Peters, born Jacob Jock Peters, was born on March 16, 1889 in Jarrenwisch, Schleswig Holstein, a region of farmland near the Danish border. At age 14, Peters apprenticed under a stonemason in Hamburg. Three years later, in 1907, Peters attended the Baugewerksschule, a building trade school in Germany. By 1912, Peters was a draftsman in an office in Dusseldorf. In 1913, he worked in the office of K.G. Bensel. From 1913 to 1914 Jock Peters worked in the office of Peter Behrens in Berlin, until he was drafted. In 1920, shortly after Peters was released from duty, he was appointed the director of the U. Kunstgewerbeschule, a state school for the applied arts in Altona near Hamburg. Due to poor heath, Peters decided to emigrate to the United States to join his brother in 1923. From 1924-1927 Peters worked as the art director at Famous Players/Lasky (later Paramount). In 1927, Peters founded the firm Peters by Jock, Brothers Modern American Design Office. Sometime before 1929, Peters started working for the store planners Neil Paradise, an association that led to the Bullock’s Wilshire commission for which Peters designed the first three floors of the department store. In 1931 Peters was commissioned to design a club house and swimming pool for the Park Modern subdivision in Calabasas, which stills stands today. He also designed two houses built in Los Feliz and San Marino, California. Jock Peters died at the age of 45 on March 31, 1934.

The Jock Peters papers span 13 linear feet and date from 1912 to 1933. The collection is primarily composed of presentation boards of architectural projects and movie set designs. The collection also includes architectural drawings and reprographic copies, black-and-white photographs, negatives, a scrapbook filled with clippings and photographs of Peters’ projects, and small sketches.