Collection Guide
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Southern California Edison Collection of Negatives and
Photographs
photCL SCE
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Table of contents
Language of Material:
English
Contributing Institution:
The Huntington Library. Photo Archives
Title: Southern California Edison collection of negatives and photographs
Creator:
Southern California Edison
Company
Identifier/Call Number: photCL SCE
Physical Description:
843 Linear Feet
(822 boxes)
Physical Description:
approximately 80,000 Items
Date (inclusive): approximately 1883-1989
Date (bulk): 1910-1960
Abstract: The Southern California Edison
collection of negatives and photographs consists of roughly 80,000 images created and
acquired by the company from approximately 1883-1980s, with the bulk of the collection
covering 1910-1960. Formats include glass and film negatives, photo cards, loose
photographs, photograph albums, lantern slides, and related materials. Most of the images
were produced by Edison staff and contract photographers to document Edison facilities,
products, operations, activities, and staff and for the purposes of education, advertising,
training, and liability.
The collection is arranged in 10 series according to format:
- Series 1. Digital images (scans of items in Series 2-6)
- Series 2. Photo cards
- Series 3. Photograph albums
- Series 4. Loose photographs
- Series 5. Glass negatives
- Series 6. Film negatives
- Series 7. Lantern slides
- Series 8. Photo log books, photo binders, and notes
- Series 9. Microfilm, photo releases, and enclosures
- Series 10. Unprocessed materials
- Subseries 1. Edison Electric Company, 1883-1912
- Subseries 2. Southern California Edison, 1908-1960
- Subseries 3. Pacific Light and Power, 1902-1917
- Subseries 4. Mt. Whitney Power Company, 1899-1920
- Subseries 5. Doug White, photographer, 1938-1960s
- Subseries 6. Joe Fadler, photographer, 1950s-1970s
- Subseries 7. California Electric Corporation [Cal-Electric], 1941-1964
- Subseries 8. Art Adams, photographer, 1960s-1980s
- Subseries 9. Edison News, 1950s-1980s
- Subseries 10. Miscellaneous
- Subseries 11. Images for book: "Iron Men and Copper Wires"
- Subseries 12. Images for book: "The Story of Big Creek"
- Subseries 13. Photo albums, 1904-1945
The Southern California Edison collection of negatives and photographs consists of roughly
80,000 images created and acquired by the company from approximately 1883 – 1980s, with the
bulk of the collection covering 1910 - 1960. Formats include glass and film negatives, photo
cards, loose photographs, photograph albums, lantern slides, and related materials. Most of
the images were produced by Edison staff and contract photographers to document Edison
facilities, products, operations, activities, and employees and for the purposes of
education, advertising, training, and liability.
The SCE collection offers a range of subjects far broader than the company's original
intent. In addition to infrastructural images of transmission lines, steam plants,
substations, equipment, vehicles, and hydroelectric plants, the company captured the uses of
light and electricity in its myriad capacities, including night lighting of streets,
billboards, storefronts, and gas stations; electric kitchens and appliances in domestic and
industrial settings such as restaurants and cafes; agricultural innovations in the dairy and
poultry industries; lighting for recreational uses such as swimming pools, bathhouses,
tennis courts and golf courses; office work and lighting; and accident scenes and disasters,
particularly the St. Francis Dam disaster of 1928.
Edison superintendent Benjamin F. Pearson began visually documenting aspects of the company
in 1896. Pearson, an avid amateur photographer, took pictures of Edison Electric Company
(EEC) facilities until 1904 when G. Haven Bishop (1879–1972) was hired as the company's
first full-time staff photographer. Using an 8 x 10- inch view camera, Bishop recorded
approximately 30,000 scenes during an Edison career that spanned more than three decades, or
until 1939. Bishop's work is found in Series 1 through 7, and comprises most of subseries
2.
Doug White became staff photographer around 1940 during the critical period of World War II
and postwar suburbanization. The archive contains approximately 5,000 negatives by White.
His photographs are supplemented by those of Robert K. Noble (1895-1957), an Edison employee
and skilled amateur photographer who functioned as a semi-official company photographer upon
request. White's photographs are primarily found in subseries 5.
Beginning in 1952, Edison hired outside vendors to produce most of its photography. In
1978, SCE acquired the files of two of its most widely used photographers: Joe Fadler
(1924-2013) and Art Adams. Fadler began shooting for Edison in 1951, mostly for Public
Information, Advertising, Commercial, Operating, and the Engineering and Community Relations
divisions. The archive contains approximately 24,856 images between 1951 and 1974 by Fadler
in subseries 6. Art Adams worked for Edison beginning in 1959 and shot much of the material
that appeared in Edison News as well as recording other special events and meetings. The
archive contains approximately 4,000 negatives in subseries 8 by Adams, from 1959 through
1978.
Together Fadler and Adams covered the construction of all three San Onofre Nuclear Plants
(SONGS); the Sylmar earthquake of 1971; Mandalay Water Desalinization Plant; environmental
treatment of Edison facilities; street lighting developments; the first Electro-Static
Precipitator at El Segundo; management meetings and special events; construction of Mammoth
Pool; and the operation of coal plants at Four Corners and Mojave.
Southern California Edison (SCE) is the largest electric utility in California, serving
more than 14 million people in 15 counties of central, coastal and southern California. The
company traces its origins to several regional light and power companies, including Holt and
Knupp in Visalia, California, Santa Barbara Electric Light Company, and Riverside Water
Company. West Side Lighting Company and Los Angeles Edison Electric Company merged in 1897
to form Edison Electric Company (EEC) of Los Angeles, with John Barnes Miller serving as
general manager. Miller, called "The Great Amalgamator," bought 40 power companies over the
next five years. In 1909, Miller renamed the expanded entity, Southern California
Edison.
In 1911, the Pacific Light and Power Company (PL&P) – then owned principally by Henry
E. Huntington –began construction of the Big Creek hydroelectric project in the High
Sierras. The company further expanded the operation in 1913, making Big Creek the largest
hydroelectric project in the world. PL&P conveyed all rights and properties to Southern
California Edison in 1917, thus uniting the two largest utilities in Southern
California.
Big Creek construction occurred over three distinct phases, which is documented in the
collection in depth. Phase 1 (1911-1914): Building Powerhouses Nos. 1 and 2 and Huntington
Lake; Phase 2 (1917-1929) Expansion of Big Creek, including Huntington Lake storage and
additional generating units to Powerhouse Nos. 1 and 2; construction of Florence Lake,
Shaver Lake, Mono-Bear Diversions and Siphon, Powerhouse No. 2A, Powerhouse No. 8, and
Powerhouse No. 3; Phase 3 (1948-1960), Construction of Redinger Lake, Lake Thomas A. Edison,
Mammoth Pool Reservoir, Powerhouse No. 4, Mammoth Pool Powerhouse, Portal Powerhouse, and
several small diversions.
Other historic milestones in the collection include: the 1902 survey of the Colorado River;
construction and 1924 opening of Long Beach Steam Plant No. 2, the first modern steam plant
on the West Coast; passage of The Boulder Canyon Act of 1928, designating SCE's operation of
some Hoover Dam generators; completion in 1930 of SCE's Art Deco headquarters at Fifth and
Grand in Los Angeles; construction of the San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station (SONGS) in
1963, with units 2 and 3 added in 1972; acquisition of California Electric Company, or
Cal-Electric, in 1964; and the opening of Solar One in 1982, the nation's first large-scale
solar generation site.
Companies acquired by Southern California Edison and represented in the collection are
Pacific Light & Power Company; Mount Whitney Power Company; the Nevada-Electric
Corporation (which operated the Nevada-California Power Company, the Southern Sierras Power
Company, the Hoton Power Company, the Imperial Ice and Development Company, the Cain
Irrigation Company, and the Hillside Water Company); and the California-Electric Power
Corporation (also known as Cal-Electric).
Related Materials in the Huntington Library
- Southern California Edison records, 1848-1989 (mssSouthern California Edison records)
- Southern California Edison motion picture film (mssSCE MP)
Immediate Source of Acquisition
Gift of Edison International, August 2005.
William Deverell and Greg Hise, eds.
Form and Landscape: Southern California Edison
and the Los Angeles Basin, 1940-1990
(San Marino: Huntington-USC Institute on
California and the West, 2016) Call no. F869.L857 F67 2016.
Online exhibit of images from this collection:
Form and Landscape: California Edison and the Los Angeles
Basin, 1940-1990
[Identification of item]. Southern California Edison collection of negatives and
photographs, The Huntington Library, San Marino, California.
Existence and Location of Copies
Approximately 70,000 images in this collection have been digitized and are available in the
Huntington Digital Library:
Southern California Edison negative and photograph
collection
In 2005, Edison International donated the Southern California Edison collection of
negatives and photographs (photCL SCE), business records (mssSouthern California Edison
records), and motion picture film (mssSCE MP) to The Huntington Library. As part of the
agreement, Edison required digital images of all photographs for its internal use. The
Huntington undertook a three-year rehousing and digitization project from 2006-2009,
scanning approximately 70,000 images from Series 2, 3, 4, 5, and 6, which now make up Series
1 (Digital images) and are available in the Huntington Digital Library. Ross Landry, an
Edison employee, arranged and described the digitized images using Edison log books (see
Series 8) and internal files. Edison received copies of all scans at the project's
completion in 2009. In 2019, Jennifer Watts and Suzanne Oatey created this finding aid.
Subjects and Indexing Terms
Civil engineering
Dams
Department stores
Electric industry workers
Electric power production
Electric signs
Electric substations
Electrical engineering
Electricity
Hydroelectric power plants
Municipal lighting
Nuclear energy
Nuclear power plants--California
Power-plants
Public utilities -- California
Restaurants
Street lighting
Water-supply
Los Angeles (Calif.) -- Photographs
Los Angeles County (Calif.) -- Photographs
Hoover Dam (Ariz.. and Nev.) -- Photographs
California, Southern -- Photographs
Nevada -- Photographs
Arizona -- Photographs
Big Creek (Calif.) -- Photographs
Long Beach (Calif.) -- Photographs
Photographs
Photograph albums
Glass plate negatives
Negatives (photographs)
Lantern slides
Microfilms
Southern California Edison
Company
Pacific Gas and Electric
Company