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VALLEY
llos Angeles m,mes
4 Part 11 Sunday. April 19. 1987 r: *

JOE vrm / Loi Angtltl Tlmtt
Linda McFadden, participant in a painstaking inventory of Hart Museum artifacts, sews an identification tag on one of 67 rugs in the collection.
After 40 Years, County Comes
Through With TLC for William S. Hart Museum
Dusting Off Memories of the Old West

By LYNN O'SHAUGHNESSY. Hollywood until he retired to the
TimtsStaff Writer Newhall ranch. where he died at
81.
hen silent-film star About 50.000 people annually
William S. llart be- walk through the cool, spacious
queathed his Spanish vllla Lhal Hart dubbed La Loma de
W villa and Its surround- Los Vientos, or HIii of the Winds.
Ing 233-acrc ewhall estate Lo Los Some still visit because they adored
Angeles County in 1946. the county Hart as a stern villain-turned hero
had to fight in probate court ror who usually got the girl. But as the
more than a decade to gain posses- memory or his film aura fades,
sion. more visitors are lured by the
13ut over the years, the county's fabulous collection of art and mem-
Interest in the villa. which is filled orabilia.
with Hart's Invaluable Western art Perhaps the museum's most fa-
and artifacts colleclion. waned. In mous painting, Russell's "Buffalo
the 1960s. during a county bureau- Hunt No. 14," hangs in the huge
cratic shuffle. the villa-turned- living room near a grizzly bear rug,
museum lost Its curators. a gift rrom Will Rogers. The
Since then, some or the muse- Smithsonian Institute issued the
um's artifacts have deteriorated to painting's number to differentiate
the point that county museum it from other paintings Russell did
experts consider the vast collec- to commemorate buffalo hunts.
tion's general condition to be only Bronzes by Frederic Remington
fair. and Charles Christadoro decorate
A cherished Charles Russell the house's shelves and tables.
pamling is beginning to buckle, and Hart villa, above, houses Paintings and drawings by James
other oil paintings are bleeding. Western art and heirlooms, Montgomery Flagg, who drew the
Beads that decorated ornate Indian including silver candy dish, famous military recruiting poster
clothing and other tribal treasures below. Katherine Child, or Uncle Sam, are generously rep-
have been discovered on the floor. left, curatoria I assistant at resented.
Hart's stockpile or Westerns shot Hart's extensive weapons collec-
on nitrate mm is reared to be Museum of Natural tion includes a Colt revolver once
deteriorating. History, paints ID number brandished by train robber Al
In a lengthy report last year, a on table as part of Jennings, and an ax head auto-
consultant chided the county ror inventory she is directing. graphed by Kit Carson. But there Is
being remiss In coring ror Hart's on Impostor in the collection: Hart
heirlooms. thought that one or his revolvers
"The county has had possession belonged lo Billy the Kid, but
or this fine collection ror over 40 someone later traced the serial
years, but hos taken no real steps number and discovered that the
toward maintaining accountability gun was forged four months after
for It," wrote Susan J. Buchel, a the notorious outlaw died.
former curator with Scotty's Castle The 'Hart mansion Is the only
at Death Valley National Monu- county-owned museum that makes
menL "Other museums that have do without curators. Since the staff
railed to mainuun objects properly from the county's Museum or Nat-
have been taken to Lask by donors ural History departed in the 1960s,
or families or donors and. In some the museum has been under the
cases, have had to give the collec- Jurisdiction of the county's Depart-
tions back!" ment or Parks and Recreation,
Mark Rodriguez, chief deputy which many agree has done its best
director ot the Los Angeles County under dlrrlcult circumstances.
Museum or Natural History, says the Newhall or it arc captured at the museum In signed "The parks department isn't set up to run a
facility "captures o portion or history, especially In photographs, letters and mementos from the likes or museum," explained Katherine Child, a curatorial
the Los Angeles basin and the West CoasL It has a Wyatt Earp, Calamity Jane, Buffalo Bill and Will assistant at the Museum or Natural History who has
lot or meaning os to how Los Angeles developed In Rogers. been directing on Inventory or the museum's
the Initial years or Hollywood," Hart was truly an urban cowboy. Born In New holdings. "They don't have people trained to toke
Many early Westerns were filmed near the villa in York, he started his career as a Shakespearean actor care or artifacts or identify artifacts."
the Santa Clarita Valley's rugged hills. dotted with and didn't leave Broadway until he was 49. He made John Weber, the park department's regional
scrub brush and crawling with rattlesnakes. Memo- 70 cowboy movies during his Hollywood career. He director, said his staff has tried hard to maintain the
ries or the real Wild West and Hollywood's version lived in a large home on De Longpre Avenue in Pleasesec ART, Page 7