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Guide to the J. Paul Getty Assorted Building Plans, 1906, 1941-1967, and undated
IA20014
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Title: Assorted building plans
Date (inclusive): 1906, 1941-1967, undated
Number: IA20014
Creator/Collector:
Getty, J. Paul (Jean Paul), 1892-1976
Physical Description:
34.43 linear feet
(2 boxes, 8 flat files)
Repository:
The Getty Research Institute
Institutional Records and Archives
1200 Getty Center Drive, Suite 1100
Los Angeles, California, 90049-1688
(310) 440-7390
archives@getty.edu
Abstract: Records consist of blueprints, architectural drawings, a photograph, and a manuscript, 1906, 1941-1967 and undated, that depict
and describe buildings having some relationship to J. Paul Getty, the Getty family and Getty businesses.
Request Materials: To access physical materials at the Getty, go to the
library catalog record for this collection and click "Request an Item." Click here for
general library access policy . See the Administrative Information section of this finding aid for access restrictions specific to the records described
below. Please note, some of the records may be stored off site; advanced notice is required for access to these materials.
Language: Collection material is in
English
American oil tycoon and art collector Jean Paul Getty was born in Minneapolis, Minnesota on December 15, 1892 to George Franklin
Getty (1855-1930) and Sarah Catherine McPherson Risher Getty. Around 1906 the Getty family moved to Los Angeles. Jean Paul,
called "Paul," attended a private military school before going on to the University of Southern California in Los Angeles
and the University of California, Berkeley. In 1911, Paul went to Oxford to study economics and political science, completing
his diploma in 1913. Afterwards he embarked on a year-long Grand Tour of Europe, which no doubt sparked his interest in art
and antiquities.
In 1914 Paul joined the family petroleum business and spent a year in the oil fields of Oklahoma. An astute investment in
160 acres near Stone Bluff, Oklahoma led to Paul’s announcement two years later that he had earned his first million dollars.
He returned to Los Angeles and took a break of more than a year before returning to the oil business. Paul then persuaded
his father to shift the focus of the family business to the Los Angeles basin. Paul continued to work for the family company
in addition to conducting oil drilling of his own, securing the family fortune by the time the stock market crashed in 1929.
Upon his death in 1930 George left controlling interest in the company to Sarah. In 1934 Paul forced Sarah out of control
of the company and gave her an annuity. His fortune grew as he acquired the controlling interest in several companies and
became the head of a vast organization with activities in oil exploration, transportation, production and marketing, as well
as minerals, manufacturing, real estate and agriculture. In the mid-1940s Getty bought the Saudi Arabian portion of the lease
on the mineral rights in the Neutral Zone between Saudi Arabia and Kuwait; his wealth dramatically increased when this site
produced oil in 1953.
Beginning in the early 1930s Getty lived in a house he built next to William Randolph Hearst’s on the beach in Santa Monica.
During World War II he moved to Tulsa, Oklahoma for four years to supervise wartime production of parts for Allied aircraft
at his Spartan Aircraft plant. In 1946 he purchased 64 acres in Malibu, California and renovated the existing hacienda, known
as the Ranch House, where he lived until 1951. When Getty departed the United States for Europe in 1951, he kept his Malibu
estate for the display of his art collection and for the possibility of his eventual return. Getty had been collecting art
since the 1930s. In 1938 he made his first major purchases: a group of furniture; a carpet that had belonged to Louis XIV,
often called "Ardabil Carpet"; and Rembrandt’s
Marten Looten (he donated the Ardabil Carpet and the Rembrandt to the Los Angeles County Museum of Art in 1954). His other interest was
antiquities, fueled by visits to the Vatican Museums that began in 1939. He took pride in being knowledgeable in the areas
in which he was collecting and in finding bargains. Getty continued to collect art throughout his lifetime, despite occasional
assertions that he was no longer in the market. By 1968 his art collection had begun to outgrow the Ranch House and he began
planning a new building on the property to properly house these works. He chose to pattern this new museum building after
a first-century Roman country house, based primarily on the plans of the ancient Villa dei Papiri near Herculaneum. This museum,
often called the Villa, opened to the public on January 16, 1974.
After leaving the United States Getty lived in hotel suites in Europe until 1960 when he moved to Sutton Place, a historic
72-room Tudor manor located 25 miles southwest of London. In 1957
Fortune magazine designated Getty as the world’s wealthiest man, and he became the object of considerable public interest. For the
rest of his life, both the respectable press and the tabloids reported on his perceived eccentricities and his private life,
which included five marriages and divorces. J. Paul Getty died in England on June 6, 1976 without ever returning to California.
Although he never saw the museum, he is buried at the Getty Villa property, on a bluff overlooking the Pacific Ocean. Much
to everyone's surprise Getty left the bulk of his fortune to the museum with a mission to promote “the diffusion of artistic
and general knowledge."
J. Paul Getty's publications include:
- Getty, J. Paul. The history of the oil business of George F. and J. Paul Getty from 1903 to 1939. Los Angeles (?), 1941.
- Getty, J. Paul. Europe in the eighteenth century. [Santa Monica, Calif.]: privately printed, 1949.
- Le Vane, Ethel, and J. Paul Getty. Collector's choice: the chronicle of an artistic odyssey through Europe. London: W.H. Allen, 1955.
- Getty, J. Paul. My life and fortunes. New York: Duell, Sloan & Pearce, 1963.
- Getty, J. Paul. The joys of collecting. New York: Hawthorn Books, 1965.
- Getty, J. Paul. How to be rich. Chicago: Playboy Press, 1965.
- Getty, J. Paul. The golden age. New York: Trident Press, 1968.
- Getty, J. Paul. How to be a successful executive. Chicago: Playboy Press, 1971.
- Getty, J. Paul. As I see it: the autobiography of J. Paul Getty. Englewood Cliffs, N.J. : Prentice-Hall, 1976.
The records described in accessions 1986.IA.06 are available for use by qualified researchers.
The records in accession 1986.IA.19, subject to review for permanently closed information, are open to qualified researchers.
Requests for access will be reviewed on a case-by-case basis.
The following records are permanently closed: records containing personal information, records that compromise security or
operations, legal communications, legal work product, and records related to donors. The J. Paul Getty Trust reserves the
right to restrict access to any records held by the Institutional Archives.
Contact
Library Rights and Reproductions .
[Cite the item and series (as appropriate)], Assorted building plans, 1906, 1941-1967 and undated, J. Paul Getty. Institutional
Archives, Research Library, Getty Research Institute, Finding aid no. IA20014.
The items in this finding aid originated in accession nos. 1986.IA.06 and part of 1986.IA.19 (transferred by the J. Paul Getty
Museum).
Some items were rehoused and a preliminary inventory created by Institutional Archives part-time staff prior to 2005. In 2005
Sue Luftschein rehoused some of the material and encoded this finding aid. In 2009 Cyndi Shein revised the Biographical Note.
Scope and Content of Collection
Records consist of blueprints, blueline prints, architectural drawings, a photograph, and a manuscript, 1906, 1941-1967 and
undated, that depict and describe buildingsthat have some relationship to J. Paul Getty, the Getty family and Getty businesses.
These include the Melody Lane Building on Wilshire Boulevard, Los Angeles, commissioned by Ada Oil, one of the Getty family
oil companies; One Wilshire, Los Angeles, which was the headquarters of a number of Getty family businesses; 624 S. Grand
Avenue, Los Angeles, the proposed site of a J. Paul Getty Museum; additions to houses owned by J. Paul and George Getty, both
in Los Angeles; and two projects, the Mobridge Municipal Swimming Pool and the Hot Creek Hatchery, locations unknown.
These records are organized in three series:
Series I. Commercial buildings, 1906, 1941, 1966-1967, undated;
Series II. Residential buildings, 1948, undated;
Series III. Other structures, 1939-1940, undated.
Getty, George F. (George Franklin), 1855-1930
Getty, J. Paul (Jean Paul), 1892-1976
Architecture--California--Los Angeles
Architectural drawings (visual works)
Blueline prints
Blueprints (reprographic copies)
Manuscripts
Photographs
Ada Oil Corporation
Getty, J. Paul (Jean Paul), 1892-1976