Isaias Hellman
Esther Hellman, Isaias's wife, as a young woman,
Herman Hellman as a young man
This is the first house that Herman and Ida Hellman lived in. It is located on Fourth and Spring Streets in Los Angeles. Herman later tore it down and in 1903 he build his magnificent office building on the site.
Calle de los Negros in Los Angeles
This is Downey's Block in Los Angeles before 1870. Under the Harris & Jacoby sign, you can see the notice "Successors to HW Hellman." Herman had his stationary store here from around 1867 to 1870.
Ad for Hellman, Temple and Company.
Hellman's first bank, Hellman, Temple and Company, opened in the building on the left in 1868. It stood next door to the Bella Union Hotel, one of Los Angeles' first brick buildings.
Temple B'nai Brith in Los Angeles. This building was erected in 1872,
Isaias and Esther Hellman's home on Main Street in Los Angeles, built in 1877.
The second site of the Farmers and Merchants Bank. Hellman moved the bank to the intersection of Main and Commercial streets in 1883. It remained there until 1905.
Clara Hellman as a young girl
IW Hellman Jr., known as Marco, as a young man
Esther Hellman
The Nevada Bank on Pine and Montgomery in San Francisco.
In 1892, the Hellmans moved to a new house on the corner of Franklin and Sacramento in San Francisco's fashionable Western Addition. His boyhood friend from Reckendorf, Isaac Walter, lived next door. Philip Lilienthal, the president of the Anglo-California Bank, lived two doors away. They often walked downtown together.
The Hellmans dining room in their house on Franklin and Sacramento streets in San Francisco.
This is the library of the Hellman's home on Sacramento and Franklin.
Home of David Walter on Van Ness Avenue.
Home of Phil and Bella Lilienthal at Clay and Franklin
Home of William Haas.
Temple Emanu-el on Sutter Street. This building was destroyed in the earthquake.
Temple Sherith Israel on California Street.
A portrait of Isaias Hellman painted by Toby Rosenthal in 1899.
In 1896, Meyer and Babette Lehman held a dinner dance for their nieces Clara Hellman and Cecile Newgass at the famed Delmonico's Restaurant. Young Marco Hellman took the train from San Francisco for the party. He renewed his acquaintance with his former neighbor Frances Jacobi, who was then living in New York. They married in Setptember 1898.
Frances Jacobi Hellman on her wedding day in September 1898. Her sister Renee is on the left, next to Frederick Jacobi. Her other sister Edith is on the right.
The Joseph Brandenstein family.
Florence Hellman and Clara Hellman
IW Hellman family around 1903. From left, Marco Hellman, Frederick Hellman, Warren Hellman, Frances Jacobi Hellman, IW Hellman, Florence Hellman, Esther Newgass Hellman, Clara Hellman Heller, Edward Heller, Emanuel Heller
A view of Pine Lodge from Lake Tahoe. Isaias started accumulating land in 1897 and had 2,000 acres and two miles of lake front by 1903. The estate is now Sugar Pine Point State Park.
Hellman's summer home at Sugar Pine Point in Lake Tahoe.
The living room of Pine Lodge in Lake Tahoe
The Hellmans on the porch of Pine Lodge in Lake Tahoe in 1903.
Esther Hellman and Clara Hellman Heller on the front porch of Pine Lodge in Lake Tahoe. The family loved to relax on the porch, which had sweeping views of the blue waters. The Hellmans has Llewellyn setters and used to order dog biscuits by the crate
Esther Hellman at Lake Tahoe. probably around 1903
Frolicking at Lake Tahoe. The boy in the photo is Edward Heller. The woman is Anis Van Nuys
IW Hellman and his daughter, Florence, at Lake Tahoe
Jake Neustadter and IW Hellman at Pine Lodge in Tahoe
Florence and Clara Hellman with their mother, Esther
In 1905, Hellman built a new building for the Farmers and Merchants Bank at the intersection of Fourth and Main. This had been the same spot he had built his family home in 1877 -- only then it was far out in the country. Hellman also erected an L-shaped office building around the bank.
IW Hellman at his desk at the Farmers and Merchants Bank in Los Angeles around 1905
Herman Hellman and family in Los Angels. From left, Frieda Hellman, Herman Hellman, Amy Hellman, Marco H. Hellman, Irving Hellman, and Ida Hellman
The Wells Fargo Nevada Bank building after the 1906 San Francisco earthquake.
Hellman temporarily moved Wells Fargo into the home of his daughter Clara Hellman Heller after the disaster. The home at 2020 Jackson Street was also the headquarters of the Union Trust Company and the Heller and Powers law firm.
Immediately after the earthquake, the Hellmans and friends went to Oakland to stay at the summer home of Isaias Hellman, Jr.
Warren Hellman (near head of horse) Frederick Hellman, Florence Hellman and another at Oakvale, the summer home of IW Hellman Jr.
IW Hellman and his wife, Esther Hellman, with IW Hellman Jr. , Frances Jacobi Hellman and their children Warren. Frederick, and Florence in Oakvale around 1907
Warren and Frederick Hellman at Oakvale
Reckendorf
1911 trip to Reckendorf, Germany, birthplace of IW Hellman. He met up with his childhood friends, the Haases and the Walters
The Reckendorf synagogue, built in 1793. It had a gallery upstairs for women. The men sat downstairs in a circle around the bima.
The entrance to the Reckendorf synagogue. Note the worn first step.
Isaac Walter and William Haas peekng through a barn door in a house in Reckendorf.
The house where Isaias, Herman, James, Bertha, Flora, Ernestine and Regina Hellmann grew up.
In 1911, while touring Europe, Isaias returned to his childhood home, Reckendorf, and unexpectedly ran into his childhood friends, the Haases and the Walters. They had left the town more than 50 years earlier.
IW Hellman with his dog
In 1911, Marco and Frances Hellman took a trip to Egypt with their entire family.
Isaac Waler and William Haas
IW Hellman
Flora Brandenstein Jacobi with her grandchildren
Marco Hellman
Florence Hellman
Florence Hellman on the day she married Lloyd Dinkelspiel
Frances and Lloyd Dinkelspiel on their wedding day. From left, Edward Heller, Frederick Hellman, Lloyd Dinkelspiel, Florence Hellman Dinkelspiel, ??, James Schwabacher
A group of young Jews in Lake Tahoe. Lloyd Dinkelspiel is kneeling. His wife, Florence, is seventh from the left in the dark fur coat and dark cap.
IW Hellman with his grandchildren. The girl is Florence Hellman and the boys may be Marco Hellman and Edward Heller
From left, Frederick Hellman, Florence Hellman, Marco Hellman and Warren Hellman
IW Hellman in front of the staff of the Wells Fargo Nevada National Bank in 1918.
Isaias Hellman as an older man.
The tombstone for Wolf and Sara Hellmann, located in the Jewish cemetery, about 2/3 of a mile from Reckendorf. An identical tombstone of their good friends, the Walters, is adjacent. The sons who went to America and became millionaires ordered the identical tombstones.
Charlotte and Juliet Wayne drawing etchings on the grave of their great great great great grandparents, Wolf and Sara Hellman in Reckendorf, Germany in 2003
We went to Reckendorf, where the Hellman brothers were born, in 2003 We were standing in front of what we thought was their birthplace, but we turned out to have the wrong house.
We had a family reunion at the Dunsmuir-Hellman House in Oakland, the summer home of Marco and Frances Hellman. From left, Katherine Hellman Black, Frances Dinkelspiel Green, Warren Hellman, and Nancy Hellman Bechtel.
Cover image of Towers of Gold.
