Almira Hershey was a Hollywood hotel proprietor and property developer.

Early life

Almira, better known as Mira, was the fourth and youngest daughter of Benjamin Hershey

Benjamin Hershey

Benjamin Hershey was a lumber and farming magnate in Iowa and Nebraska during the middle to late 19th century....

 (1813–1893), a lumber and farming magnate.

She never married, and worked for her father in the family lumber business. Almira was left a substantial legacy by her father when he died. She moved to Los Angeles

Los Ángeles

Los Ángeles is the capital of the province of Biobío, in the commune of the same name, in Region VIII , in the center-south of Chile. It is located between the Laja and Biobío rivers. The population is 123,445 inhabitants...

 at the end of the 19th century and commissioned the building of European style mansion in the Bunker Hill district of Los Angeles. Bunker Hill was the prime residential district of that time.

Mogul years

Sometime around 1906 she took a horse and buggy ride to Hollywood and visited the Hotel Hollywood

Hollywood Hotel

The Hollywood Hotel was a famous hostelry and landmark located on the north side of Hollywood Boulevard between Highland and Orchid Avenues in Hollywood, California.-History:The first section of the hotel was built in 1902 by H.J...

. She was so impressed with the new hotel she decided to buy it. It turned out to be a great asset as the fledgling movie industry was developing fast and the Hotel Hollywood became the temporary residence of almost all the top actors and movie moguls. It was so successful, Almira had the hotel extended so that it took up the complete block on the north side of Hollywood Boulevard

Hollywood Boulevard

-Revitalization:In recent years successful efforts have been made at cleaning up Hollywood Blvd., as the street had gained a reputation for crime and seediness. Central to these efforts was the construction of the Hollywood and Highland shopping center and adjacent Kodak Theatre in 2001...

 between Highland and Orchid Avenues. She added beautiful gardens to the frontage and inner courtyard. The hotel became a favorite tourist attraction on the famous balloon route trolley car service. Sometime in the 1920s the name of the hotel changed to the Hollywood Hotel.

She went on to build two more hotels. The Hershey Arms Hotel on Wilshire Boulevard was the first hotel built on this famous avenue. She also built a hotel in the Naples area of Long Beach, called the Naples Hotel. She sold this hotel just before the great financial crash of 1929, before any guests had stayed there.

Later years

She spent her later years at the Hotel Hollywood with friends. In her will she left $300,000 to UCLA

University of California, Los Angeles

The University of California, Los Angeles is a public research university located in the Westwood neighborhood of Los Angeles, California, USA. It was founded in 1919 as the "Southern Branch" of the University of California and is the second oldest of the ten campuses...

for the construction of the school's first on-campus dormitory, Hershey Hall.

Sources

• http://www.myancestralfile.com/hershey/pafg01.htm
• http://www.onbunkerhill.org/
• Early Hollywood by Marc Wanamaker and Robert W. Nudelman.
• The Story of Hollywood by Gregory Paul Williams.