English architect known for designing notable USC buildings featured in new exhibit

You may not be familiar with the architect John Parkinson, but you will undoubtedly recognize the structures he crafted at USC. Parkinson envisioned the Bovard Administration Building, the Gwynn Wilson Student Union, Town and Gown, along with other Romanesque Revival edifices established at the university during the 1920s and 1930s.

Initially engaged in 1919 by the then-USC President George Finley Bovard to devise a campus layout that would accommodate the automobile era, he arranged buildings along University Avenue (now Trousdale Parkway), which was then a bustling thoroughfare.

Parkinson is often remembered for his contributions to the design of Los Angeles City Hall, Union Station, and Bullocks Wilshire. In addition, he was the mastermind behind the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum and holds the unofficial honor of having raced in the first event at the famed venue shortly after the completion of its initial construction phase in 1923. His competitors were contractor L.E. Dixon and stadium manager Zack Farmer.

“Zack was 28, a versatile athlete; Dixon was 32, a slender fellow; and I was 61, no longer slender, but feeling quite youthful. I challenged them to a race,” Parkinson reminisced. “They quickly agreed, and off we went. Zack crossed the finish line first, running comfortably 50 feet ahead of Dixon, while I trailed 50 feet behind Dixon, moving well but relieved to reach the finish line. … That was the right moment for me to retire from racing.”

Author Stephen Gee honors Parkinson’s extraordinary career with an exhibition of historical photographs sourced from the Los Angeles Public Library’s archives. This is exhibited at the History and Genealogy Department at the Los Angeles Central Library until August 17. The exhibition chronicles Parkinson’s journey from his modest beginnings in Lancashire, England, to his passing in 1935.