The Sun received an e-mail from a woman named Kathleen, who lives at 10603 Palms Blvd. We referred it to Julie Lugo Cerra, the official historian of Culver City, who passed it on to Joan De Soto, who gave us a flood of memories about this part of Palms.

First, the letter:

We just found out that they want and are most likely going to LEVEL our OLD OLD OLD house — [built] 1905-1915 at 10603 Palms Blvd. and the apartments at 10609 Palms at Keystone for a five-story apartment building with subterranean parking.

Does no one believe in old house HISTORY??? We were told that this house was most likely the summer house of the DeSotos. I wanted to look up the history, just have to get to the city clerk's office.

I also need to contact the number on the orange sign I found on our gate the other day that told me of their "plans."

KATHLEEN
May 18, 2006

The property Kathleen says is scheduled for development is just to the east of the 7 - 11 store at Palms and Overland.

That IS an old house, and yes, it IS historic. But nobody knows exactly when it was built — probably almost a hundred years ago.

Joan DeSoto, whose husband owned the house and sold it some nine years ago, told us in phone calls and e-mails from Leona Valley (west of Palmdale) that there was no record of the construction date when a title search was done at that time.

The simple frame structure was built and then occupied by George Tranquilino Talamantes (b.1865), the taller man in the photo, and his wife, Addie Hunter Talamantes (b. 1870), in the dark outfit; they had six chidren. George owned a harvesting and threshing company.

George outlived his wife, and when he died in 1943 all of his property (from Keystone to Overland on the north side of the street) was divided among his three remaining children — Delfina (in the white blouse), Anita (whose husband was Thomas Garcia) and Eva Francis (whose husband was Jose P. De Soto).

In the photo, Delfina's husband, Ignacio Machado, is on the right; his grandfather was Ignacio Antonio Machado, whose family, along with the Talamanteses, had the La Ballona land grant in 1839 from the Spanish king.

Joan DeSoto told us that her husband, John, and his sister, Juanita, inherited the Keystone property from their parents, Jose P. and Eva Francis De Soto.

Delfina's nearby home was situated where the 7-11 stands now, at Overland. Delfina left her house to her daughter, Irene, who sold that property in 1965-66, according to Joan De Soto.

All of these families mentioned — the Machados, the Talamanteses and the DeSotos — were pioneer Californians.

"They were a very dignified family," Chicago-born Joan DeSoto said about the California clan she married into.

Photo from Google shows 7-11 store at left, Keystone at right, Palms Blvd. at bottom. The old house is shrouded by bushes now and can't be seen from the blvd.

Arrow marks the house in this map from the 1930s. Palms Blvd. was known as Stilson east of Overland and as Ocean Park Ave. west of Overland.