Includes: Design for a Community Centre Building…Competitive Drawings [White Pine Series of Architectural Monographs, Volume V, Number 4] (New York, 1919) 24pp. Original wrappers. Illustrated. With 25 year-old Williams’ submitted designs pictured on Pp. 12-13, receiving “Special Mention”. * Williams, Paul R. The Small Home of Tomorrow (Hollywood, 1945) Hardcover “Deluxe Edition”. 8.75 x 11.5 inches, 95pp. Extensively illustrated. Partial, crudely tape-repaired Dust Jacket. * New Homes For Today / Remodeling Interiors / Duplexes / Ranch Houses (Hollywood, 1946) Hardcover “Deluxe Edition”. 8.75 x 11.5 inches, 95pp. Extensively illustrated. Chipped, repaired Dust Jacket. * Murray, Walter. Interior Decoration for Today and Tomorrow (Hollywood,1946) 96pp., with a one-page Introduction by Williams. * 1953 press photo of Williams presenting an award to an MGM producer for the film “Bright Road”, starring Harry Belafonte and Dorothy Dandridge.
Five items spanning the remarkable career of Los Angeles architect Paul Revere Williams (1894-1980), the first certified African-American architect west of the Mississippi and later the first Black fellow of the American Institute of Architects. The now-classic books issued by a small Hollywood publisher at the end of World War II, reflect Williams’ interest in providing attractive and affordable homes for young veterans and their families during the post-war housing boom. He did design thousands of buildings throughout southern California, private as well as public. But his real fame came from designing palatial mansions in Beverly Hills for Hollywood movie stars like Frank Sinatra, Lucille Ball, Tyrone Power, Bert Lahr and Danny Thomas. Williams was well aware of the irony that many of his houses were on parcels with deeds that included segregated covenants that barred Black ownership.