The Emperor Norton Trust

TO HONOR THE LIFE + ADVANCE THE LEGACY OF JOSHUA ABRAHAM NORTON

RESEARCH • EDUCATION • ADVOCACY

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Rarely Seen 1876 Photo Offers a Tiny First Glimpse of Emperor Norton's Residence

October 21, 2020  /  John Lumea

From late 1862 / early 1863 until his death in January 1880, Emperor Norton lived at the Eureka Lodgings — a kind of 19th-century SRO located at 624 Commercial Street, on the north side of Commercial between Montgomery and Kearny Streets, in San Francisco.

There is a handful of 1860s–1880s photographs, taken from across Montgomery or Kearny, that show distant views of the 600 block of Commercial Street.

What we’d never seen, though, is a photo of the 600 block of Commercial taken during the Emperor’s lifetime — taken from within the block — and showing the real, intimate flavor of the section of the street where Emperor Norton lived.

Our discovery, hidden in plain sight, is a c.1876 photograph apparently taken by Eadweard Muybridge.

A bonus: The photo appears to reveal a glimpse of the Eureka Lodgings itself.

If we’re right about this, we may have produced the first-ever visual ID of photographic evidence of the Emperor’s residence.

Kind of a big deal.

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categories / Research, Original sources, Places
tags / Eureka Lodgings, Commercial Street, U.S. Sub-Treasury, U.S. Branch Mint, 642 Commercial, 632 Commercial, 624 Commercial, 608 Commercial, Morning Call, Mark Twain, Bret Harte, Samuel Clemens, Eadweard Muybridge, Historic American Buildings Survey, Library of Congress, 1876

Life and Death of an Emperor Norton Mural (Bottle Caps Edition)

July 08, 2020  /  John Lumea

A fondly regarded public artwork — a mural-sized rendering of Emperor Norton in bottle caps — came on the scene in The Mission, San Francisco, in late 2011.

It left quietly a few months ago.

Photographs and Google street views from 2009 to the present document the rise, fade and fall.

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categories / Places, Tributes, Legacy, ARENA
tags / Art, public art, mural, bottle caps, Scott Bowers, Mission, Bryant Street

Emperor Norton in the Artistic Taxonomy of Antonio Sotomayor

May 06, 2020  /  John Lumea

The Emperor Norton mural in The Pied Piper, at the Palace Hotel, in San Francisco — painted by the city’s longtime “artist laureate,” Antonio Sotomayor (1904–1985) — is one of the best-known and -loved Emperor-themed works of art.

A newly discovered art-historical survey done for the San Francisco Arts Commission in 1953 offers an elusive date for the painting — and a new way of seeing it.

Includes rarely seen photographs.

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categories / Research, Original sources, ARENA, Tributes, Legacy, Places
tags / art, mural, Antonio Sotomayor, Palace Hotel, Pied Piper, Happy Valley Room, San Francisco Arts Commission, Martin Snipper, Mark Twain, Bret Harte, The Great Unknown, Lotta Crabtree, Frederick Coombs, George Washington II, 1935, 1953

Emperor Norton, Political Independent, Gives a Speech in 1875

April 24, 2020  /  John Lumea

Here, we document our discovery of something we’ve never seen reported elsewhere: Emperor Norton’s attendance and participation at a “no party” political meeting held at the Mercantile Library, San Francisco, on 13 July 1875.

The Emperor’s role is included in next-day accounts from two San Francisco newspapers — the Daily Evening Bulletin and the Daily Alta California — as well as in a San Francisco dispatch that appeared in the Los Angeles Evening Express.

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categories / Research, Original sources, Places
tags / politics, independence, no party, Mercantile Library, Evening Bulletin, Daily Alta California

On the Road to the Emperor Norton Bridge, 1926–1932

October 07, 2019  /  John Lumea

Between 1926 and 1932, local, state and federal authorities in San Francisco; Oakland; California; and Washington, D.C., leaned in to an intense process for determining how best to create a transbay vehicular and rail bridge linking Oakland and San Francisco.

There were at least four major studies focusing solely on the bridge issue or, in one case, the bridge as part of broader regional transportation concerns.

Three of these studies — in 1926, 1927, and 1930 — included the specific location and route that Emperor Norton backed in 1872: Oakland to San Francisco via Goat Island, with a San Francisco landing at Telegraph Hill.

All three of these studies shortlisted two options that, between them, included these features: (1) direct connections between the traffic centers of Oakland and San Francisco; (2) a “hinge” at Goat Island (Yerba Buena Island); and (3) a San Francisco landing at Rincon Hill.

The 1930 study was the first to include an option that put all these features into one location and route — the one that eventually was built.

Read on for the Big Picture story of how it all came together — including the top-line maps, produced for these studies at the time, that illustrate the evolution of the design of the Emperor Norton Bridge.

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categories / Original sources, Places, Bay Bridge, Research
tags / Board of Supervisors, Department of Public Works, Board of Engineers, Hoover-Young San Francisco Bay Bridge Commission, Department of War, Department of Commerce, Herbert Hoover, C.C. Young, maps, 1926, 1927, 1928, 1929, 1930, 1931, 1932, California Toll Bridge Authority

Lockhart & Porter, Undertakers and Casket Makers to the Emperor in 1880

September 27, 2019  /  John Lumea

The two book-length biographies of Emperor Norton, published in 1939 and 1986, mention “the undertakers” and “the undertaking rooms.” But, a blind spot in Norton studies has been that there was a specific firm — with a name and an address — that provided funeral and burial services for the Emperor, including manufacturing the oft-mentioned rosewood and silver-trimmed casket.

We know that the Emperor’s old friend, James G. Eastland, and friends of Eastland’s at the Pacific Club raised the money and made the arrangements — but, rarely mentioned is who was on the other side of the contract.

The obituaries didn’t name the firm. And, the name appears to have been mentioned only a couple of times by later writers — in 1946 and again in 1974. But, even these were only passing mentions.

Here, we rescue from obscurity the name and the early history of a business that played a crucial role in giving Emperor Norton a fitting farewell.

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categories / Original sources, Places, Research
tags / Lockhart & Porter, undertaker, coffin maker, George A. Lockhart, William H. Porter, 16 O'Farrell Street, coroner, morgue, James G. Eastland, Pacific Club, Daily Alta California, San Francisco Chronicle, Robert O'Brien, William M. Kramer

When a Veteran Rocker’s Great Great Grandparents Hosted Emperor Norton at Their Sonoma Valley Ranch

May 21, 2019  /  John Lumea

He’s a two-time Grammy Award winner — for co-writing “After the Love Is Gone” (Earth, Wind & Fire) and “Turn Your Love Around” (George Benson).

As a solo artist, he had his own minor hit in 1981 with “Sara.”

In the 1970s and ‘80s, he was one of the most in-demand backing vocalists in Los Angeles, appearing on hundreds of recordings, including by: Elton John, Al Jarreau, Lou Rawls, Nancy Wilson, George Benson, The Tubes, Patti LaBelle, Neil Diamond, Donna Summer, Barry Manilow, Kim Carnes, Kenny Rogers and on and on

His cover of the 1967 Ray Charles tune, "In the Heat of the Night,” was used as the opening theme for the television series that ran from 1988 to 1995.

For nearly 30 years, from 1981 to 2009, he was a member — and was instrumental in the rebirth — of one of the best-known and longest-running bands of all time.

And, he is widely recognized as being one of the best vocalists in rock.

But, it was his great-great grandparents who had the real connections in the family.

Read on for the whole story.

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Comment
categories / Places, Histories, Research
tags / Champlin Ranch, Sonoma, Stage Gulch Road, Charles Chaffee Champlin, Sara Bartlett Champlin, Bill Champlin, Oakland Tribune

Emperor Norton at Madame Pique's

April 05, 2019  /  John Lumea

In his original Proclamation of 17 September 1859, Emperor Norton summonsed “the representatives of the different States of the Union to assemble in Musical Hall, of this city, on the 1st day of February next, then and there to make such alterations in the existing laws of the Union as may ameliorate the evils under which the country is laboring, and thereby cause confidence to exist, both at home and abroad, in our stability and integrity.”

Alas, Musical Hall was destroyed in a fire on 23 January 1860 — just a week before the appointed date.

The Emperor quickly rescheduled his meeting, issuing a Proclamation on January 28th revising the date and the venue to “the 5th day of February next, in Assembly Hall, on Kearny street, of this city.”

This is the secret history of the would-be site of Emperor Norton’s national convention of February 1860 — and of the woman who gave the building its original name.

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categories / Original sources, Places, Research
tags / Madame Pique, Frances Pique, Edward Pique, Assembly Hall, Kearny Street, Post Street, Vigilance Committee, Musical Hall, Harry Meiggs

Emperor Norton at a Pro-Civil Rights Lecture, March 1868

February 24, 2019  /  John Lumea

Emperor Norton’s on-point attendance at an early event of the Order of Freedom’s Defenders — a Unionist-Republican political club dedicated to preserving Lincoln's legacy; advancing Reconstruction; electing Grant as President; and securing the Constitutional protections necessary to guarantee the civil rights of African-Americans — can be seen as “of a piece” with the Emperor’s broader commitment to African-American equality.

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categories / Original sources, Places, Research
tags / Order of Freedom's Defenders, General Oscar Hugh La Grange, Platt's Music Hall, Union, Republican, Abraham Lincoln, Ulysses S. Grant, Reconstruction, civil rights, San Francisco Examiner, Peter Anderson, Fifteenth Amendment, Pacific Appeal, Proclamations, 1868, 1869, 1871, 1874

The Emperor Norton Rooms of 1961

February 12, 2019  /  John Lumea

In spring 1961, two establishments opened in San Francisco.

One was a hotel bar on Geary Street. The other was a lunch spot and cocktail lounge on Maiden Lane.

Both were less than two blocks from Union Square.

One was created by a designer who went on to be celebrated in the pages of the Architectural Digest. It had an "Emperor Norton" doorman. And, per Herb Caen, it once was host to Jack Dempsey and Lefty O'Doul — sharing a bowl of peanuts on the same night.

The other was home to a new portrait of the Emperor commissioned by the San Francisco Chronicle.

Both were called the Emperor Norton Room.

Here’s the intriguing story of two Nortonian stars that briefly rose and just as quickly fell in the same San Francisco season.

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categories / Original sources, Places, Legacy, Tributes, Research
tags / Emperor Norton Room, Hotel Stewart, Geary Street, In Between, Maiden Lane, Herb Caen, Jack Dempsey, Lefty O'Doul, William Weber, San Francisco Chronicle, San Francisco Examiner, 1961, 1962, Harry Handlery, Handlery Hotels, Scott Newhall

THE LONGEST PROCLAMATION? Emperor Norton at the Lyceum for Self-Culture

September 04, 2018  /  John Lumea

Virtually all of the published Proclamations of Emperor Norton were short — a couple of sentences; two or three very short paragraphs, tops — and virtually all originally appeared in newspapers.

Virtually all — but not all.

What appears to be the longest Proclamation by the Emperor — his verdict on the Beecher-Tilton affair, issued on 30 July 1874 and clocking in at 430 words — was published in Common Sense: A Journal of Live Ideas. This short-lived publication was a clearinghouse of information — reportage, commentary, lecture texts and letters — on "liberal" and "radical" writers, practitioners and societies of free thought and spiritualism, with a focus on the Pacific Coast.

One of the main societies covered in the pages of Common Sense was the Lyceum for Self-Culture, which met weekly at Dashaway Hall, on Post Street between Kearny and Dupont. Emperor Norton was a member and regular attendee of the Lyceum.

The full story — including the Proclamation and a rarely seen 1867 photograph of Dashaway Hall by Eadweard Muybridge — is on the flip.

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categories / Research, Original sources, Proclamations, Places
tags / Lyceum for Self-Culture, Dashaway Hall, Common Sense (journal), William N. Slocum, Amanda M. Slocum, Henry Ward Beecher, Elizabeth Tilton, Beecher–Tilton affair, 1874

"My Dear Lotta": Emperor Norton's Telegram to Lotta Crabtree

February 28, 2018  /  John Lumea

Of the 14 telegraph message forms in the California Historical Society's collection of Emperor Norton artifacts, most appear to be fakes written and signed by prankish telegraph operators. But, one appears to be authentic and in the Emperor's hand. It's a message from Emperor Norton to Lotta Crabtree, commending her on the recently dedicated fountain that she has commissioned as a gift to the City of San Francisco — and bestowing upon her the imperial title "Lady of the Fountain."

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categories / Original sources, Places, Research
tags / telegram, Lotta Crabtree, Lotta's Fountain, 1875, California Historical Society

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