The Whittier Museum's New Auto Row Exhibit Starts on Greenleaf Avenue

In 1946, after World War II, Clint Harris opened a car dealership in Uptown Whittier with three cars. According to the Whittier Daily News, he sold about 20 that first year. The lot was on Greenleaf Avenue, where Lee Owens Park is now.

Harris built that business into one of General Motors' elite dealerships, and at one point it was selling 1,000 cars a year. In 1964 it moved to 13617 Whittier Blvd. It closed in September 2010, and by late June 2011 crews were demolishing the building.

The Whittier Museum at 6755 Newlin Ave. opens "Harris Oldsmobile & Whittier's Auto Row" this Saturday, Nov. 14. The exhibit is on the museum's first-floor Main Street. Its subject is how Whittier's car trade left the founders' grid for the boulevard. The same morning there's a free talk on how that grid got its names. Taken together, the exhibit and the talk explain a map you already drive every day.

Two Nights at 6755 Newlin Avenue

This weekend is the busiest the museum has scheduled for the fall.

Tickets for the Friday tours are sold through the museum's events page. Caputo's tours mix scary stories with some Whittier history. With the auto row exhibit opening the next morning, Friday works as a good preview night.

How the Car Business Left Uptown

Before Whittier Boulevard had an auto row, the city's car dealers were clustered on Greenleaf Avenue in Uptown. According to a 2007 Whittier Daily News account, automakers in the 1960s directed dealers to move out to Whittier Boulevard. Once there, they spread along the corridor. Some ended up near Michigan Avenue, and Cadillac and Board Ford sat across from what was then the Whittwood shopping center.

Harris made that move in 1964. The city's own history of Whittier to 1970 describes the wider shift: car-oriented retail grew away from Uptown and toward Whittier Boulevard and nearby thoroughfares.

The boulevard dealerships lasted about four decades. Board Ford closed in December 2007. By then Sun Nissan, Whittier Dodge, Whittier Kia and Lincoln Mercury had also closed within the previous 15 years. The dealership Clint Harris founded closed in September 2010, after GM pulled its franchise in June. By then it was Harris Buick Pontiac GMC, and it closed together with Saturn of Whittier. As demolition of the Harris building got underway in June 2011, the Whittier Daily News noted that President Richard Nixon had often visited it. The paper also described Harris, who died in 2003, as a lifelong confidant of Nixon.

Workers began demolishing the Board Ford building that same Monday, with the Cadillac building to follow. At the time, city officials talked about rezoning the area from auto sales to a commercial "shopping cluster" to allow more flexible uses.

The arc runs from three cars on Greenleaf to a GM dealership selling 1,000 a year on the boulevard, and then to a demolition site. The new exhibit tells that story on the museum's first-floor Main Street.

The Grid Harris Started In

The founders' grid Harris left in 1964 is still the one Uptown uses, and many of its street names are tied to the town's founding. The Whittier Daily News printed the origins in its 1987 centennial edition and republished them in 2012. They trace back to the Quaker colony that founded the town.

• Greenleaf Avenue and Whittier Avenue honor the Quaker poet John Greenleaf Whittier. The city's name comes from him too.
• Penn Street honors William Penn. City Hall sits on it at 13230 Penn St., where the holiday tree goes up next month.
• Friends Avenue takes its name from the Religious Society of Friends, the formal name of the Quakers.
• Philadelphia Street points back to Philadelphia, which William Penn founded as a refuge for Quakers.
• Painter, Newlin, Bailey, Pickering and Lindley are named for directors of the founding company: John Painter, Elwood Newlin, Jonathan Bailey, Aquila Pickering and Herve Lindley. Painter Avenue got its name in 1887.
• Hadley Street and Washington Avenue are both named for pioneer banker Washington Hadley. Hadley Street dates to 1887.

The museum is on Newlin Avenue, named for Thomas Elwood Newlin, one of the Quaker founders. The city's history lists Jonathan Bailey, John Painter and T.E. Newlin among the leaders of the Whittier Quaker Colony. Chris Krause's talk on Whittier street names is on Saturday morning, at the same meeting where the auto row exhibit opens.

Upstairs, a Band That Marched for Nixon

The second-floor opening, "Whittier Cavalier Band & Lin Lovettes marching group," picks up a thread that also runs through the Harris story.

According to the Whittier Elks Lodge #1258 history, the lodge voted in 1962 to sponsor the award-winning Cavaliers Youth Band. The lodge describes the group as 108 musicians, a 50-member drill team and a 17-member dance band. The Cavaliers marched in President Richard M. Nixon's Inaugural Parade. They played Whittier's 1976 Bicentennial Community Picnic and took part in national bicentennial celebrations in Philadelphia and New York.

Nixon shows up on both floors. Harris was his lifelong confidant, the band marched at his inauguration, and the museum's permanent collection already includes a Richard Nixon exhibit.

What Was Already on the Floor

The third opening is a refurbished classroom exhibit on the first floor. The museum's brochure describes the classroom as a hands-on area. The other permanent exhibits include:

1. A Victorian cottage showing life around the turn of the 20th century
2. A replica of the water flume
3. An authentic barn and blacksmith shop
4. A replica of the Greenleaf Hotel
5. A replica of Whittier's first fire station
6. A military corridor

The Greenleaf Hotel replica fits the weekend's theme, since it carries the poet's name and the same street the auto row exhibit starts from. The wider collection covers agriculture, the Quaker settlers, Whittier College and notable locals, including Nixon and Pio Pico.

Admission is free, and donations are welcome. Check the museum's visit page for current hours before a weekday trip.

A Stop on Hadley Street

If you want coffee nearby, Hadley Street now has Relapse Killer Brews. It's a coffee bar and speakeasy that the Whittier Daily News profiled on Oct. 30. Owner Ruben Corvera, who also runs The Wolf and Witch Art Collective and Lifestyle, serves a short menu of four signature drinks in a Gothic, art-filled room. Uno Mas by Niko handles food on weekends, and hours are posted on the shop's Instagram. The street it's on was named in 1887 for the colony's banker.

Uptown's next big dates are the Whittier Holiday Tree Lighting at City Hall on Tuesday, Dec. 1, with the 26-foot tree lit at 5:45 p.m., and the Uptown Whittier Christmas Parade, "Home for the Holidays," which starts at 10 a.m. on Saturday, Dec. 12.

Pickering, Bailey, Painter and Newlin are street names in Whittier as well as founders' names. If you're thinking about selling a home on one of the founders' streets, Brad Kerr Team can tell its story with the same care and back it with a clear, local price. Request a Free Home Valuation, and we'll start with your street.