A Tale of Two Castles 

As early as the year 1900, Dr. Alfred G. Schloesser relocated to Hollywood from Chicago, with his wife, Emma, and children as the surgeon favored the warm climate.  He began a real estate venture, buying up land just north of Franklin Avenue near present day Argyle Avenue.  In 1904, Schloesser was advertising the sale of 20 lots in that area he called the Schloesser Terrace Tract.  He decided to build a home on the northeast corner of Franklin and Argyle Avenues with the assistance of Dennis & Farwell, architects, who designed a castle with features taken from Oxford University, his wife's family home in Glengarry, Scotland, and gothic features of the Nuremberg Castle in Germany.  The front entrance was an exact replica of the City Hall of Bremen.  The Carrera marble lions, which guard the front terrace, stood in front of the palace Italian Cardinal several hundred years earlier.  He named the home "Castle Glengarry" which was completed circa 1904. 

Schloesser was an art collector, buying pieces from Paul de Longpre to hang in his home.  He would throw lavish parties for the Hollywood elite.  However, Schloesser was not happy with the size of the house and within 4 years, Dennis & Farwell were designing him a bigger castle right across the street.  He sold Castle Glengarry to a banker in 1912 and moved into his new home which he called Castle San Souci.  Schloesser, who calle Castle Glengarry a building "experiement" and that his new castle would resemble German Rhine Castles and gothic halls of Baronial England.  The estate will be surrounded by an antique brick gate and winding carriage drive.  There will be a series of outside terraces.  The entrance will lead to a huge hall which will be the center of the home with a massive stone fireplace.  At the south end of the hall would be grand staircase that would lead up to a gallery and the north end of the hall would contain an organ loft in a recess above the main stairway.  There would be an open air terrace above the main entrance.  The north wing would have a breakfast room opening into a large open air dining room under a pergola and all the servants quarters would be in this wing of the house.  The south wing would contain a Louis Quinze reception room, a library and sitting room, all having fireplaces.  All the bedrooms would be on the second floor, each with a bath, dressing room and sleeping porch.  

While Dr. A.G. Schloesser enjoyed his new castle, actor Sessue Hayakawa (1886-1973) rented Castle Glengarry from 1919 to 1923.  Japanese born Hayakawa and his wife, actress, Tsuru Aoki, were raking in over 2 million a year in their own filming production company and could afford to rent the castle.  Hayakaka acted in over a hundred films and is best remembered for his role a Coloniel Saito in "The Bridge on the River Kwai" starring William Holden and Alec Guinness in 1957 in which Hayakawa was nominated for an academy award for Best Actor in a Supporting Role.  Below are photographs of Hayakawa's time living at Castle Glengarry.  Sessue and Tsuru were married from 1914 to her death in 1961.

In 1918 Dr. Schloesser legally changed his surname to Castles as Schloesser is the direct translation, becoming Dr. Alfred G. Castles.  In 1928, Dr. Castles demolished his personal estate, Sans Souci, on a three-acre plot at the intersection of Franklin Avenue and Argyle Avenue in Hollywood.  In its place, he conscripted San Francisco architect Leonard L. Jones to design and construct the Castle Argyle Arms while Castle Glengarry remained across the street. Castles died five years later, but the Castle Argyle remained. After many decades of regular use, the building "deteriorated into a drug den" before being "broken up into small apartments for low-income tenants." 

In 1956, Castle Glengarry was demolished and replaced by Capitol Gardens Apartments, which still stands at 1920 Argyle Avenue.  The two castles may be long gone but not the memory.  Hollywood has changed.  In Charles Dickens words, "It was the best of times.  It was the worst of times".