page_title: Christine Sterling
section_title: Early life
hierarchical_section_title: Christine Sterling / Early life
caption_attribution_description: English: Title: Know Your City No.249 Front porch and marker of Avila Adobe on Olvera Street, Los Angeles, Calif. Published caption KNOW YOUR CITY, NO.249 -- How better to begin the windup of this series than at the beginning. And that's what you see here--the beginning. It is probably one of city's most historical structures. If you don't know the answer, then look on Page 14, Part 1. Notes ANSWER: The structure in the photo is the Avila Adobe, generally conceded to be the oldest building in Los Angeles. It is located at 14 Olvera Street. Built in 1818 by Don Francisco Avila, it served as American headquarters in 1847 when U.S. troops captured the city. It has the further distinction of having flown four flags--Spanish, Mexican, the California Republic, and the Stars and Stripes. And, as Consuelo de Bonzo, "Queen" of Olvera Street, puts it: "It is the only place in the world around here like that." Publication Los Angeles Times Publication date July 24, 1956 Source Los Angeles Times photographic archive, Digital collections — UCLA Library. http://digital2.library.ucla.edu/viewItem.do?ark=21198/zz0002t8d0 Note about non-renewal of copyright: [1]
context_page_description: Chastina Rix, later known as Christine Sterling, was born in Oakland,
  California. Her most notable works were as a preservationist who helped save the Avila Adobe and created Olvera Street in Los Angeles. She also helped create China City.
  "The booklets and folders I read about Los Angeles were painted in colors of Spanish-Mexican romance, ...They were appealing with old missions, palm trees, sunshine and the ‘click of the castanets.’"— Christine Sterling, journal
context_section_description: Christine Sterling was born Chastina Rix in Oakland, Alameda County, California on 5 November 1881, one of four children of Edward Austin Rix and Kate Elizabeth Kiteridge. Her father, was a mining engineer via UC Berkeley (Zeta Psi) and inventor of the "Rix Rock Drill", later, vineyard planter born to Chastina Walbridge Rix and Alfred Stevens Rix (1822-1904), a San Francisco Committee of Vigilance leading member and a San Francisco justice of the peace, from New Hampshire, and Vermont, left for the gold fields California in 1852, married Chastina Walbridge in 1849, at Vermont, later married Margaret Arabella Tuite in 1858, at California. 
  Chastina, changed her name to Christine, as a teenager, and briefly studied art and design at Mills College in Oakland. After a brief first marriage, she married Jerome Hough, an attorney, having two children, June, and Peter in 1915, then moving to Hollywood for his film industry work. By 1920 the family was living on Bonnie Brae Street near downtown Los Angeles. Hough abandoned the family and soon died, from a stroke, leaving Christine a widow without means. 
  "At last Los Angeles was home, The sunshine, mountains, beaches, palm trees were here, but where was the romance of the past?" — Christine Sterling, journal
  By 1928, she had changed her last name to Sterling.
caption: Avila Adobe,1956
exif: {}