Editing Huntington Library (section)

==History==
[[File:Lightmatter huntington library.jpg|thumb|Huntington Library, built in 1920; its main reading room now is an exhibition hall.|alt=Huntington Library building with a green lawn in the foreground and white clouds in the sky.]]
As a landowner, [[Henry Edwards Huntington]] (1850–1927) played a major role in the growth of [[Southern California]]. Huntington was born in 1850, in [[Oneonta, New York]], and was the nephew and heir of [[Collis P. Huntington]] (1821–1900), one of the famous [[Big Four (Central Pacific Railroad)|"Big Four"]] railroad tycoons of nineteenth century [[History of California|California history]]. In 1892, Huntington relocated to [[San Francisco]] with his first wife, Mary Alice Prentice, and their four children. In 1902, he relocated from the financial and political center of [[Northern California]], [[San Francisco]], to the state's newer southern major metropolis, [[Los Angeles]]. In 1903, he purchased the 600-acre "San Marino Ranch" from James DeBarth Shorb Jr (1870–1907) for $240,000. He later purchased other large tracts of land in the [[Pasadena, California|Pasadena]] and [[Los Angeles]] areas of [[Los Angeles County]] for urban and suburban development. He divorced Mary Alice Prentice in 1906. He was one of the founders of the City of San Marino which was incorporated on April 25, 1913. On July 16, 1913, he married his uncle's widow, Arabella Huntington (1851–1924). As president of the [[Pacific Electric Railway Company]], the regional [[streetcar]] and [[Public transport|public transit system]] for the Los Angeles metropolitan area and southern California and also of the [[Southern California Railway|Los Angeles Railway Company]], (later the [[Southern California Railway]]), he spearheaded urban and regional transportation efforts to link together far-flung communities, supporting growth of those communities as well as promoting commerce, recreation and tourism.

Huntington's interest in art was influenced in large part by Arabella, and with art experts to guide him, he benefited from a post-[[World War I]] European market that was "ready to sell almost anything". Before his death in 1927, Huntington amassed "far and away the greatest group of [[Art of the United Kingdom|eighteenth-century British portraits]] ever assembled by any one man". In accordance with Huntington's will, the collection, then worth $50 million, was opened to the public in 1928.<ref name="life1938012433">{{cite news | url=https://books.google.com/books?id=yEoEAAAAMBAJ&q=life%20magazine%20jan%2024%201938&pg=PA33 | title=$50,000,000 Huntington Collection was Amassed by One Man in 17 Years | magazine=Life | date=1938-01-24 | access-date=November 24, 2011 | page=33}}</ref>

On October 17, 1985, a fire erupted in an elevator shaft of the Huntington Art Gallery and destroyed [[Joshua Reynolds|Sir Joshua Reynolds]]'s 1777 portrait of [[Edwin Lascelles, 1st Baron Harewood|Mrs. Edwin Lascelles]]. After a year-long, $1 million refurbishing project, the Huntington Gallery reopened in 1986, with its artworks cleaned of soot and stains. Most of the funds for the cleanup and refurbishing of the [[Georgian architecture|Georgian]] mansion and its artworks came from donations from the Michael J. Connell Foundation, corporations and individuals.<ref>{{cite web |title = The Huntington's Glorious Restoration |last = Muchnic |first = Suzanne |website = [[Los Angeles Times]] |date = September 28, 1986 |access-date = 16 April 2018 |url = https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1986-09-28-ca-9422-story.html |ref = none}}</ref> Both the Federal art-supporting establishment of the [[National Endowment for the Arts]] and the [[National Endowment for the Humanities]] gave emergency grants, the former of $17,500 to "support conservation and other related costs resulting from a serious fire at the Gallery of Art",<ref>{{cite report |title = 1986 Annual Report |editor-last = Jurenas |editor-first = Joan Bowersox |publisher = [[National Endowment for the Arts]] |year = 1987 |page = 103 |url = https://www.arts.gov/sites/default/files/NEA-Annual-Report-1986.pdf |ref = none |access-date = 2018-04-16 |archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20171128013751/https://www.arts.gov/sites/default/files/NEA-Annual-Report-1986.pdf |archive-date = 2017-11-28 |url-status = live }}</ref> and the latter of $30,000 to "support the restoration of several fire-damaged works of art that depict the story of Western culture."<ref>{{cite report |title = Twenty-First Annual Report: 1986 |publisher = [[National Endowment for the Humanities]] |year = 1987 |page = 76 |issn = 8755-5492 |hdl = 2027/osu.32435070039284 |ref = none}}</ref>

On September 5, 2019, The Huntington kicked off a year-long celebration of its centennial year with exhibitions, special programs, initiatives, a special Huntington 100th rose, and a float in the 2020 [[Rose Parade]] in nearby [[Pasadena, California]].

{{wide image|Huntington art gallery at huntington library california.jpg|1000px|Formerly the residence of Henry E. Huntington (1850–1927) and his wife, Arabella Huntington (1850–1924), the Huntington Art Gallery opened in 1928.}}