ever carried the sense of moral and municipal hegemony that normally exists between a central city and its satellite suburbs" (Banham, 201-203). Centers such as Anaheim and Pasadena developed independently and the city's 'sprawl' included a merger of the outlying areas with the center as well as the annexation of the giant San Fernando Valley district into the city. But efforts were made to develop the kind of city center that was perceived to be a necessary element of a major metropolis.
This effort began in the 1880s with the building of structures such as the County Courthouse (1886-91) in downtown Los Angeles; buildings that served as downtown's cultural "signposts on the genteel frontier" (Clark 6). The building was an Americanized "version of the Richardsonian Romanesque" that was the latest word in public building (Clark 6). The problem was that Los Angeles continually received the styles that had already been played out in the Eastern locales it sought to emulate, and when the Courthouse was razed in 1936 it was widely (and probably ex
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