Los Angeles County
Biographies
CARL LEONARDT
LEONARDT, CARL, Capitalist, Contracting, Los Angeles, California, was born in Luedenscherdt, Westphalia, Germany, in 1855. He had three children, Clara, Adolph and Emily Leonardt (now Mrs. F. H. Powell).
Mr. Leonardt, who is now one of the most famous contractors in the United States and one of the greatest constructors in the West, received his schooling in Germany, and was graduated in cement chemistry at Aachen, that country. After working for some time in cement manufacture, in the Fatherland, Mr. Leonardt was called to the United States, in 1885, to take charge of a cement plant project in the State of Texas, of which he eventually became head chemist.
He remained in the Texas fields for two years, and then he went to Los Angeles, California, where he has been located since.
Mr. Leonardt’s career in the Southern California metropolis has been one of success and distinction since the day he started, and in addition to this he has become recognized as one of the most scientific and reliable cement and concrete constructors in the business.
His work is reflected in almost every kind of work into which these wonderful substances are used and numerous private mansions, public buildings and factories stand as monuments to him.
As his entire time has been passed in this line of endeavor, it is necessary to indicate the accomplishments of this man during his business career, to publish herewith a list of some of the buildings to which his name is affixed as the builder. Among them are the Los Angeles Hall of Records, the Orpheum Theater, Los Angeles, a perfect example of artistic concrete construction; the Los Angeles County Hospital, the Pacific Electric Building, the H. W. Hellman Building, the Turnverein Building, and warehouses, large reservoirs and sewer outfall from factory to ocean for the Chino Beet Sugar Company; also factory buildings for the American Beet Sugar Company at Oxnard, Ventura County, California, and for the Oxnard Company at Rocky Ford, Colorado; Holly Sugar factory, at Huntington Beach, California; Hotel Green, Pasadena; Laughlin Building, Pasadena; concrete vats, basement, floors, sidewalks, etc., for the Cudahy Packing Company, Los Angeles; the Suits block, Santa Monica, Cal.; swimming pools at Redondo Beach and Santa Monica, California; jail at Bakersfield, Cal.; Hamburger Building, Los Angeles, and the Grant Hotel, San Diego, Cal., and sixteen flat buildings, in Los Angeles, for Madame Severance, a wealthy Californian.
The Grant Hotel, San Diego, and the big buildings mentioned in Los Angeles are all modern fireproof structures, of the skyscraper class, and taken altogether, they form the main portion of the big buildings in the city of Los Angeles. Mr. Leonardt is picked for the greater part of the big cement undertakings in the Southwest, particularly those requiring expert knowledge of the subject.
Besides the work mentioned, Mr. Leonardt built the Portland Cement Co. Factory at El Paso, Texas, and he is one of the directors and heaviest stockholders of that corporation. During his twenty-five years in Los Angeles, he has also become interested in many other enterprises, and today ranks among the most engrossed business men of that city.
In recent years he joined with the pioneers of oil development in California, and has invested liberally in that field, holding office and directorships in many of the more substantial oil companies. He is a tireless worker and spends practically every one of the waking hours in business. He is one of the real upbuilders and civic boomers of Los Angeles.
Transcribed 2-10-10
Marilyn R. Pankey.
Source: Press Reference
Library, Western Edition Notables of the West, Vol. I, Page
373, International News Service, New York, Chicago, San Francisco, Los Angeles,
Boston, Atlanta. 1913.
© 2010 Marilyn R. Pankey.
GOLDEN NUGGET'S LOS ANGELES BIOGRAPIES
.