Tower of Wooden Pallets facts for kids
Quick facts for kids Tower of Wooden Pallets |
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Tower of Wooden Pallets, circa 1953
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| Location | 15357 Magnolia Boulevard, Sherman Oaks, California |
| Built | 1951 |
| Architect | Daniel Van Meter |
| Designated | April 19, 1978 |
| Reference no. | 184 |
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The Tower of Wooden Pallets was a structure of discarded wooden pallets built by Daniel Van Meter and designated as a Historic Cultural Monument. It was known as the City of Los Angeles Historic Cultural Monument number 184 and located at 15357 Magnolia Boulevard in Sherman Oaks, California.
History
In 1951, Van Meter found thousands of discarded 3-by-3-foot (0.91 m × 0.91 m) standard pallets from a local Schlitz Brewing Company plant. This gave him the idea of building some sort of structure from these. He gathered up five truckloads of these discarded pallets and began building a tower structure in his backyard.
The bee hive cone-shaped tower of some 2000 wooden pallets had a base of 22 feet (6.7 m) and ultimately rose to over twenty feet in height when finished. Van Meter's Tower of Pallets sat on the gravesite of a child buried in 1869. It took Van Meter several weeks to build the wooden tower of pallets. The top had an opening that was thirteen feet across. The "room" inside contained outdoor patio furniture.
In 1953, Los Angeles county building inspectors were baffled as to how to classify Van Meter's innovation. They ultimately decided it was a wooden "fence". No further regulatory action was taken for over twenty years and the building department left him alone, along with his "folk art" innovation, until 1977. In that year the city fire department declared his creation "an illegally stacked lumber pile." He was instructed to tear it down. Van Meter, using some imagination, convinced the Cultural Heritage Commission and the city of Los Angeles to designate his creation a Historic Cultural Monument. It was declared then as HCM Monument No. 184 in 1978. This designation protected Van Meter's pile of pallets until he died or moved.
Van Meter lived to be 87 years old and died in 1998. Some say Van Meter's tower of wooden pallets was one of a kind and consider him an "outside artist." In 2006 the remainder of the Tower of Pallets was bulldozed. Van Meter's heirs sold the underlying land for $4.5 million; a 98-unit multi-level apartment building was built in the tower's place. Supposedly, there will be a memorial display of the Tower of Pallets in the lobby of the apartment building.
Van Meter was quoted as saying when he lobbied for his tower’s landmark status:
...in a few years this piece of the good earth may be covered by apartments for the storing of surplus people. In the meantime, pray, let this strange structure be, let it continue to be a haven of rest for an individual – that endangered species – who once knew how sweet was our Valley.
- Los Angeles Times; Jan 23, 1938, p. A6, '"Noted Inventor Burial Planned"
- Los Angeles Times; Feb 25, 1942, p. A1, Noble Called Racketeer by Former Associate
- Los Angeles Times; Apr 16, 1942, p. 15, Brothers Seek Arrest in Vain
- Los Angeles Times; Jul 6, 1942, p. 6, Noble Aids Go on Trial Today
- Los Angeles Times; Nov 28, 1946, p. 10, Seven Denied Damages by State Board
- Los Angeles Times; Jul 14, 1954, p. B8, Rites Set Today for Mrs. Esther Van Meter
- Los Angeles Times; Feb 15, 1988, p. 8, Simon, Richard, Tower of Tranquility Unusual Sherman Oaks Landmarks Provides a Refuge from Turmoil
- Los Angeles Times; Feb 19, 1988, p. 3, Simon, Richard, For a Collector, His Is an Odd Pallet
- Los Angeles Times; Nov 14, 2002, p. B4, Harvey, Steve Only in L.A.; The Valley’s Once-Mighty Tower of Pallets Has Fallen on Hard Times
- Los Angeles Times; Jan 26, 2005, p. Metro A1, Garrison, Jennifer Does It Stack Up as Art?
