Pearl Chase referred to Charles Fletcher Lummis as “good-looking and considerate, and he knew how to arouse interest in public affairs.” She noted that, “He had the gift of gab and writing, and one of the things which Santa Barbara has cherished has been a speech he made here.”
Lummis, who lived from 1859 to 1928, gained national attention when he walked across the country, from Cincinnati, to take a job as city editor at the Los Angeles Times. He documented his journey in columns he later turned into a book, A Tramp Across the Continent, one of 20 books he wrote. The Los Angeles Conservancy notes, “Lummis is considered by many to be the father of historic preservation in Southern California, having founded the Landmarks Club in 1895 to promote restoration of the badly deteriorated 18th-century missions.”
Like Chase, he was a transplant from Massachusetts; she from Boston, he from Lynn. Lummis had attended Harvard University with Theodore Roosevelt and had the privilege of joining his former classmate on a trip to the Grand Canyon in 1903. The president gave an impassioned speech to the Arizona residents who had gathered to witness his presence.