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Getty (J. Paul) diaries
IA40009
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Table of contents
Language of Material:
English
Contributing Institution:
Institutional Records and Archives
Title: J. Paul Getty diaries
creator:
Getty, J. Paul (Jean Paul), 1892-1976
Identifier/Call Number: IA40009
Physical Description:
4.3 Linear Feet
(5 boxes; 29 volumes)
Date (inclusive): 1938-1946, 1948-1976
Abstract: The collection comprises twenty-nine handwritten diaries (1938-1946, 1948-1976) of billionaire J. Paul Getty. The diaries
focus on his travels, business dealings, art collecting, and interests, providing insights into his personality, priorities,
politics, relationships, tastes, and values. They contain daily accounts of Getty's activities, briefly describing social
events, business meetings, museum visits, historical and archaeological sites, art objects, and the various people with whom
he interacted. They reveal his business practices and philosophies, his passion for history and art, and his cultivation
of friendships with influential people. The diaries also illustrate Getty's relations with people in the art world and contain
his personal opinions on particular art objects, demonstrating how he developed the collections of decorative arts, antiquities,
paintings, and sculpture that evolved into the J. Paul Getty Museum.
Physical Location: 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.
The collection comprises the handwritten diaries (1938-1976) of billionaire J. Paul Getty. Although there are certainly references
to family and friends throughout the diaries, the journal entries focus more on Mr. Getty's travels, business dealings, art
collecting, and interests. They provide insights into the personality, priorities, politics, relationships, tastes, and values
of the man as he built and maintained his empire. The diaries contain daily accounts of Mr. Getty's activities, briefly describing
social events, business meetings, museum visits, historical and archaeological sites, art objects, and the various people
with whom he interacted. They reveal his business practices and philosophies, his passion for history and art, and his cultivation
of friendships with famous and influential people. Getty's diary entries also show his attentiveness to and concern regarding
world affairs, such as his acute awareness of the threat of war while he was traveling through Germany in the late 1930s,
and his respect for world leaders such as Winston Churchill and J. F. Kennedy.
Of particular interest to the study of art collectors and collecting are diary entries that assess art objects or illustrate
Getty's relations with people in the art world. Journal entries include his contact with dealers, auction houses, collectors,
curators, art experts, and other advisors, including Duveen. Within the diaries Getty comments on objects he considers acquiring
in addition to objects he chooses not to acquire, disclosing how he developed his collections of decorative arts, antiquities,
paintings, and sculpture. The diaries document acquisitions that became the foundational objects of the J. Paul Getty Museum,
such as the ancient Roman
Lansdowne Herakles, as well as acquisitions that Mr. Getty donated to other museums, such as Rembrandt's
Marten Looten. The diaries also disclose Getty's rather competitive interest in what his contemporaries (individuals and institutions)
were collecting at the time.
With age Mr. Getty's penmanship became shaky to the point of illegibility, yet he continued to make daily diary entries in
his own hand until October 29, 1974 when he began dictating them to his secretary. The journal entries during the final few
years of his life naturally focus on his declining health, but still contain many references to art collecting, business,
and the new Villa museum facility he was building near Malibu, California. Mr. Getty made daily entries in his diaries with
very few exceptions. The collection comprises 29 loose-leaf binders. Though the diaries are nearly comprehensive for the
years 1938-1976, gaps exist in the chronology for the following date ranges:
- November 14, 1938 - March 23, 1938
- December 31, 1939 - August 7, 1940
- December 8, 1946 - July 1, 1948
- May 9, - August 27, 1956
Accession 2010.IA.16 was processed by Cyndi Shein in 2010.
[Cite the item and series (as appropriate)], Diaries, J. Paul Getty. Institutional Archives, Getty Research Institute (IA40009).
http://hdl.handle.net/10020/cifaia40009
Original physical diaries described in accession 2010.IA.16 are fragile and are not available for public use. The diaries
have been digitized in their entirety and are available online through the Getty's Primo system; links are provided in this
finding aid.
The following types of 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
Rights and Reproductions at the Getty Research Institute for copyright information and permission to publish.
The diaries are arranged in chronological order.
Accession 2010.IA.16 was purchased from Scott J. Winslow in April, 2010.
The following materials are offered as possible sources of further information on the people and subjects covered by the records.
The listing is not exhaustive.
Contributing Institution:
Getty Institutional Archives
Art and Real Estate Holding Companies Records, 1939-1982, and undated, J. Paul Getty. Institutional Records and Archives,
Getty Research Institute, Finding aid no. IA20011.
Collected Papers for Biography of J. Paul Getty, 1957-1973, 1984 and undated, Ralph Hewins. Institutional Records and Archives,
Getty Research Institute, Finding aid no. IA20012.
J. Paul Getty Family Papers, circa 1880s-1989 and undated. Institutional Records and Archives, Getty Research Institute, Finding
aid no. IA20009.
J. Paul Getty and the Ashby Sisters Papers, 1926-1992, and undated. Institutional Records and Archives, Getty Research Institute,
Finding aid no. IA20013.
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 investment in 160 acres
in 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 traveling throughout Europe and 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 the "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.
Information in the biographical note on J. Paul Getty was adapted from:
- Walsh, John and Deborah Gribbon. The J. Paul Getty Museum and its collections: a museum for the new century. Los Angeles: J. Paul Getty Museum, 1997.
Subjects and Indexing Terms
Art -- Collectors and collecting
Diaries -- United States -- 20th century
J. Paul Getty Museum
Getty, J. Paul (Jean Paul), 1892-1976