Descriptive Summary
Access
Administrative Information
Related Materials in the Huntington Library
Historical Note
Scope and Content
Indexing Terms
Descriptive Summary
Title: Banning Company Records, Addenda
II
Dates: 1841-1989
Bulk: 1854-1944
Collection Number: mssBanning Company records addenda II
Collector:
Banning, Katharine Stewart.
Extent:
Approx. 1,683 items
Repository: The Huntington Library,
Art Collections, and Botanical Gardens. Manuscripts
Department
1151 Oxford Road
San Marino, California 91108
Phone: (626) 405-2191
Email: reference@huntington.org
URL: http://www.huntington.org
Abstract: The collection consists of
correspondence, business and financial papers, family notes, bound volumes, and
ephemera related to the Banning family of Southern California, chiefly dating from 1854-1944, that was collected by Katharine
Stewart
Banning.
Language of Material: The records are in English.
Access
Open to qualified researchers by prior application through the Reader Services Department. For more information, contact Reader
Services.
Administrative Information
Publication Rights
The Huntington Library does not require that researchers request permission to quote from or publish images of this material,
nor does it charge fees for such activities.
The responsibility for identifying the copyright holder, if there is one, and obtaining necessary permissions rests with the
researcher.
Preferred Citation
[Identification of item]. Banning Company Records, Addenda II, The Huntington Library, San Marino, California.
Provenance
Acquired in 1996 as an addenda to the Banning Company
Records.
Related Materials in the Huntington Library
Historical Note
The Banning Company was started by Phineas Banning (1830-1885), a transportation leader in the Los Angeles area and founder
of the city of Wilmington, California.
Phineas Banning (1830-1885) was born in Wilmington, Delaware. In 1861 he arrived in
San Pedro, California, and worked as a store clerk and stagecoach driver before
starting his own staging and shipping company, which rapidly expanded throughout
California as well as to Arizona and Utah. In the late 1850s, he joined a group of
investors who purchased 640 acres of land near San Pedro to expand the port. This
land was later named Wilmington after Banning’s birthplace. By the 1860s Banning was
heavily involved in most of the operations of San Pedro Harbor. During the Civil War
he was given the honorary title of Brigadier General of the California First
Brigade, and continued to use the honorarium “General” for the rest of his life. In
the 1870s he became a California state senator and campaigned for more elaborate
transportation connections between Los Angeles and San Pedro port. Banning’s first
wife was Rebecca Sanford, with whom he had three children who survived to adulthood:
William, Joseph Brent, and Hancock. After Rebecca’s death he married Mary Hollister,
and they had two surviving daughters, Mary Banning Norris (1871-1953) and Lucy
Tichenor Banning (1873-1929). By 1880 Banning had scaled back his business ventures,
and after several years of illness died in San Francisco.
In 1888 Joseph Brent Banning (1861-1920) married his cousin Katharine Stewart
Banning (1866-1954), the daughter of Phineas Banning’s older brother William Lowber
Banning (1814-1893), a railroad executive and politician from Minnesota. Katharine
was a co-founder of the Los Angeles Children’s Hospital and was actively involved in
war relief efforts during World War I. She died in Los Angeles
Scope and Content
The collection consists of correspondence, business and financial papers, family
notes, bound volumes, and ephemera related to the Banning family and collected by
Katharine Stewart Banning. It includes most of her original notes on the Banning
family, focusing on family traditions (particularly Christmas), genealogy, and the
organization of their homes. The correspondence consists primarily of Banning family
letters and correspondents include Ellen Banning Ayer, Frederick Ayer, Elizabeth
Lowber Banning, George Hugh Banning, Hancock Banning (1865-1925), Joseph Brent
Banning (1861-1920), Katharine Stewart Banning, Phineas Banning, William Banning,
William Lowber Banning, William Phineas Banning, Beatrice Ayer Patton, and George
Hugh Smith. The legal, land, and financial papers include contracts, deeds, titles,
and statements of account for Banning properties. The miscellaneous manuscripts
include sewing instructions from the American Red Cross, notes on Santa Catalina
Island, and some photographs, as well as copies of printed articles on the life of
Phineas Banning. Volumes include "Memories of Phineas Banning" (c.1895-1909), a Yale
scrapbook belonging to Joseph Brent Banning (1889-1969) with accompanying ephemera,
a Virginia Military Institute yearbook (1914) owned by Hancock Banning (1892-1982)
with accompanying photographs, embossed volumes used to copy stories and poems and
owned by Ellen Barrows Banning (Ayer) and May Alice Banning (1876), a Banning Rancho
log book (1889-1894), various family scrapbooks assembled by Katharine Stewart
Banning, various notes on "Bills' Comfort Bag for Soldiers and Sailors"
(c.1917-1941), and Katherine Banning's Los Angeles Children's Hospital notebooks, as
well as a diary kept by Katharine Banning aboard the Lusitania in 1914. Also
included in the collection are various published books owned by the Bannings and
miscellaneous ephemera.
Arrangement
The correspondence is arranged alphabetically by author. The collected notes and
ephemera are arranged chronologically. The original arrangement of the volumes
has been maintained. They are not organized alphabetically or
chronologically.
Indexing Terms
Personal Names
Ayer, Frederick,
1822-1918.
Banning
family.
Banning, Hancock,
1865-1925.
Banning, Hancock,
1892-1982.
Banning, Joseph Brent,
1861-1920.
Banning, Phineas,
1830-1885.
Banning, William
Lowber, 1814-1898.
Smith, George H.
(George Hugh).
Corporate Names
American Red
Cross--History--Sources.
Children's Hospital of
Los Angeles.
Virginia Military
Institute--History--20th century.
Yale
University--History--20th century.
Subjects
Domestic
relations--California.
Land use--California.
Lusitania (Steamship)
Transatlantic voyages.
World War, 1914-1918--Civilian
relief.
Geographic Areas
California--History--19th century.
California--History--20th century.
England--Description and
travel.
Santa Catalina Island
(Calif.)
Genre
Family papers--California--19th
century.
Family papers--California--20th
century.
Letters
(correspondence)--California--19th century.
Letters
(correspondence)--California--20th century.
Scrapbooks--20th century.
Ephemera--20th century.