It's Monday Again????

Yikes!  But it's ok; since Felix the Cat was my role model growing up, I always have a couple of mosaics hidden in my bag of tricks. This is the second Home Savings and Loan mosaic that Millard Sheets designed for Torrance, I believe. The first was set against black granite (maybe marble) on the old Torrance City Hall that became a Home Savings in the 1960s--on Cravens. Blogged about it here.

After maybe a dozen years there, Home set up a new building on Torrance Blvd, and that's where this mosaic is--now a Chase Bank at 2121 Torrance Blvd. 

If I'm interpreting correctly, we have a vaquero on the left, which makes sense because Torrance was once part of the Rancho San Pedro. The center figure may be Jered Sidney Torrance hisself--the clothes seem appropriate, as does the Red Car behind him. Leonard & Dale Pitt's Los Angeles A to Z: An Encyclopedia of the City and Countysays that Mr. Torrance planned out the city in 1911 as a model industrial city, and that it was a major stop in the Pacific Electric Railway.

The far right figures are a bit puzzling, not the least because of the shadows in my photo. But I see a young girl skipping rope. Next to her is a seated woman holding a child. Everyone's wearing flower-print clothes. At their feet is an animal--a cougar? The greenery around them could be a jungle or park--I opt for jungle because of the cougar.