Mechanical Music Articles and Stories

The Fabulous Raney Collection

The Raney Ranch, Whittier, California

Introduction by Terry Hathaway

I never had the pleasure of meeting Albert Clifford Raney, Sr. I was between my 5th and 6th grade level in elementary school when Mr. Raney died in July of 1949. I met Ruby Raney, his wife, in the late summer of 1955, when I bought my first automatic musical instrument, a Wurlitzer Bijou Orchestra, from Mrs. Raney (see Memories of a Collector). Sadly, she died in early November of that same year, and so I never had the pleasure of any further relationship. Then, circa 1957, I met Cliff Raney (Albert Clifford Raney, Jr.), when he visited me in Santa Fe Springs to finalize and collect the payment for the second automatic musical instrument I bought, a Wurlitzer Style LX Orchestra Piano, which was stored in the Ross Davis Merry-Go-Round Shop on Alhambra Avenue. The Wurlitzer Bijou Orchestra and Style LX Orchestra Piano were not part of the Raney collection that was sold off circa 1953, mainly because the two instruments were in the Merry-Go-Round Shop waiting for restoration and/or repairs by Herbert Vincent. Then, on November 24, 2000, Albert Clifford Raney III, grandson of A.C. Raney, Sr., and son of Cliff Raney, Jr., reached out to me by email after stumbling across my HathaWorld web site and learning that I had spoken to and knew his grandmother, Ruby Raney (the mechanical music material was moved to the Mechanical Music Press website in 2003, in association with my good friend Art Reblitz). Albert Raney III still happily remembered, as a toddler, riding his tricycle around in front of the large Concert PianOrchestra. And he made telephone contact with Clara May and Marion, the two daughters of A.C. and Ruby Raney, to try and set up an interview, but due to some unexplained old conflict between the three children after the death of their parents, nothing came of this attempt.

In the meantime, Ron Cappel, who was part of the restoration staff at Hathaway & Bowers, Inc., continued on with his own restoration activities after H&B closed down in late 1972. Then, circa late 1992, Ron agreed to take on the restoration of a Seeburg KT, which then, in April of 1993, he purchased the Seeburg KT that he had just finished restoring for one Clara May Akard (who was the late A.C. Raney’s oldest daughter) and so now Ron and I both knew that Clara May (Raney) Akard was alive and still living in the Whittier, California, area, and we both now had her contact information, although at that time I did not attempt to contact her. But because of my ongoing email correspondence with Albert Raney III, and other factors that I do not now recall, the day finally arrived when I felt as though it was time for me to try and make contact with Clara May. A bit to my surprise, she was graciously welcoming and freely talked about the family history, occasionally checking with Marion, her sister, regarding some details, and at no time did I feel as though she was withholding information or was perturbed by my inquisitive nature. In all, there were several brief telephone conversations and four formal interview sessions that took place in the charming home of Clara May and Henry Akard, with the interviews conducted on January 23, 2003; January 30, 2003; February 6, 2003 and February 15, 2003. Present during the interview sessions were Clara May (Raney) Akard; Henry Akard; Terry Hathaway, and a friend of mine, Rich Irwin. We all sat comfortably around a table and enjoyed a relaxed and friendly conversation, which resulted in far more historical information than I had anticipated, all of it interesting but much of it bore no relevance to the Raney’s mechanical music collection. In hindsight, however, I regret not asking a few questions about the personal history of Cliff Raney, Jr., Clara May, and Marion. Nevertheless, after sifting through all of the collected information and arranging the bits and pieces relating to the Raney mechanical music collection into a more or less story format, the result of this unique collaboration is the foundational basis for the Raney story as shared below on this web page—an amalgamation or blend of my writing style interspersed with Clara May’s verbalized descriptions.

As a result of the interviews, I prepared a two-CD-ROM set of discs that contained transcripts of the interviews with Clara May, and of her husband Henry Akard, which is a story in and of itself, plus an illustrated history of the Raney family and the automatic music collection, along with museum quality scans of all photographs relative to the Raney family and the automatic musical instrument collection. This two CD set was made available to Clara May, her younger sister, Marian (Raney) Rieniets, Albert Raney III, and the uptown branch of the Whittier Public Library. There was no further effort on my part to write up and publish the Raney story, either on my HathaWorld website or that of the Mechanical Music Press website. Early on during my interviews with Clara May, I got the impression that her sister, Marian, was quite sensitive about what might be said or published about the Raney family, which I recognized might also reflect Clara May’s own unspoken sensitivities. And I remembered that Albert Raney III was also quite concerned about anything published regarding the Raney Family and insisted that he first read and approve of what was to be published. And so, out of respect for this all-around sense of uneasiness, I never felt like doing anything further about the Raney story, it languishing quietly on two CD discs, as well as resting nearly forgotten in an archive drive on my computer.

Then, in December of 2023, a little more than 20 years after my interviews with Clara May, and while talking with Art Reblitz, I mentioned the Raney story and wondered if it might be time to finally do something about it. It was sobering to realize that all the people that I had personally known and whom were at one time or another either in or somehow associated with the Raney family or the mechanical music collection were now long ago deceased. And so, I wondered, why not now honor them by finally publishing the Raney story? I offered to send Art an old 2003 page I had made up that showed reduced size images of the Raney collection, along with what little information I had regarding the various machines. I asked Art if he would look over the page and fill in anything he could add about the various instruments. He agreed, and asked if he could share the page, to which I replied that he could share it with anyone he so desired. The result of this unanticipated “sharing” is what triggered me into writing the Raney story that follows below, which turned out to be an unexpectedly emotional process, and one I have hopefully carried out with my deepest respect for all those now departed souls.

Copyright Restrictions

Copyright © 2003 by Terry Hathaway and [the late] Clara May (Raney) Akard - All Rights Reserved.

Be it herein made known that Terry Hathaway and/or Clara May (Raney) Akard and their heirs and assigns are entitled to the unrestricted use of this material either jointly or separately as individuals. Notwithstanding the aforementioned, permission is hereby granted to any and all parties for this material to be freely used and/or distributed for non-commercial historical reference and educational purposes. This means, for instance, that libraries or other educational or historical entities can freely display, copy, and distribute this information when used for educational and reference purposes, but any other or commercial use by anyone other than the above stated copyright holders is strictly prohibited without the expressed written permission of Terry Hathaway or Clara May (Raney) Akard, either jointly or by one or the other.

The Raney Story...

Albert Clifford Raney (1891 – July 4, 1949)

Albert Clifford Raney was born in 1891 in Oklahoma Indian Territory. His father died of pneumonia before he was born, and his mother died when he was about eight or nine years old. His mother had four or five brothers, she being the only girl, with the family sir-name of Delzell. Most of the Delzell boys were involved in the Civil War. After A.C. Raney had completed his basic schooling, he attended college to become a surveyor. While in College, he also studied calligraphy. At the time, people were interested in good penmanship, which he learned to do and could thereinafter easily and normally write in a decorative calligraphical style. After he graduated college, circa 1909, he worked as a surveyor.

In September of 1914, Albert Clifford Raney and Ruby Pearl Larsh were married and honeymooned in Long Beach, California, afterwards returning to his home in Arkansas City, Kansas, located on the border of Kansas and Oklahoma. By late 1915 the newlyweds lived in Denver, Colorado, and A.C. Raney was by that time employed by the Santa Fe Railroad, reportedly working in or on refrigeration cars, although his exact duties or his position within the company are unknown. While living in Denver, Robert Delzell, the brother of A.C. Raney’s mother, also lived in Denver. The large book collection on the shelves in the Raney ranch house living room originally belonged to Robert Delzell, with the books at some point given to A.C. Raney. In March of 1916 they were apparently living in Chicago, Illinois, Mr. Raney temporarily needing to be in Chicago on railroad business. But by June of 1918 they were known to be back in Arkansas City, Kansas, because on June 17, 1918, their first child, Albert Clifford Raney, Jr., was born.

Ruby Pearl (Larsh) Raney (1894 - November 8, 1955)

Ruby Pearl Larsh was born in 1894, in Perry, Oklahoma. Her mother’s maiden name was Jackson. The mother of A.C. Raney and the mother of Ruby Larsh knew each other; Clara June (Raney) and Clara Bell (Jackson) Larsh were the best of friends. A.C. Raney and Ruby Larsh grew up together, knowing each other since they were children. Clara Bell (Jackson) Larsh died giving birth to Ruby. She did not stay with her father when she was a tiny baby. The neighbors took her in and cared for her. They repeatedly said that they thought she was such a cute little thing, just a little gem; and so we will just call her Ruby Pearl. And so, Walter Larsh, her father, thought, “well that’s good, they are already calling her Ruby, so let’s just make it legal.” It is unknown how long the neighbors took care of Ruby Pearl. There were grandparents, who probably got involved too. When Ruby’s father remarried, she lived with them. Her father, Walter Larsh, and his new wife, Bertha, had two children, a girl named Elizabeth, and a boy named Walter, Jr. At the time these two children were born, Ruby was about thirteen years old and so she was the babysitter.

During the third wave of the 1918-1919 flu epidemic, in the spring of 1919, Ruby lost a lung due to the flu. One lung completely collapsed and the other one was diseased. And so, she often breathed as though she had asthma. From then on, and for most of her life, she had what someone might think was asthma. Ruby also had a heart problem caused by the flu. She could not do heavy work. Her daughter, Clara May, did the ironing and they sent out the dirty laundry. Because of the flu-induced injury, her heart was three times as big as it should have been. Ever since her children were little kids, they knew that their mother might not live long. They repeatedly said that their mother would go first. Thus, it was a surprise to everyone in the family when A.C. Raney was the first to die, because all those years when Ruby was a young lady she was treated like a butterfly, because she was thought to be quite fragile.

The Raney Children (plus one Grandchild):

Personal historical information for the Raney children is woefully incomplete, not because of any intended slight, but because questions specifically addressing the children’s history were overlooked during the extensive interviews with Clara May (Raney) Akard in early 2003. The focus at that time was on learning about A.C. and Ruby Raney and the mechanical music collection, with anything learned about the children being incidental to the main topic, and if such information was later needed Clara May would have happily provided it. But, as is often the case, by the time the Raney Story was in the process of being written, some twenty years after the interviews, and when it was finally realized that this missing information might be useful, there was nobody known to ask.

The Move to North Inglewood, California

In late September of 1920 the Raney household had arrived in North Inglewood, California, to take up residence in a house on Damask Avenue. With them was their son Cliff Raney, Jr., and their second born, a daughter by the name of Clara May Raney who entered this world while the family was in transit on the Santa Fe Railroad while on their way to a new residence in Southern California. The two main streets of old Inglewood were Centinela and Main Street. North Inglewood was more or less like East Whittier, whereby it was not another actual town but more a residential area with homes, schools, and a little grocery store. The lot in Inglewood was perhaps ½ acre in size. There was a big front yard, a big single-story rambling house, and at the back of the lot was a big fig tree that the children enjoyed playing under. It was the same lot layout next door—a large and deep lot—where the Raneys had a truck garden. The Raney family lived at this location until 1927, when they moved to “sleep in Whittier,” at was to become the Raney Ranch.

Damask Avenue is situated near the Baldwin Hills Oilfield, it being home to oil exploration and an occasional oil well blowout during the 1920s, which the Raneys had a close enough vantage point to witness any such events, and it was, in fact, mentioned by Clara May (Raney) Akard that the whole family, on at least one occasion, drove to a place near the blowout well to observe the exciting goings on.

The Buyers Service Corporation

Buyers Service Corporation was started in late 1920 by A.C. Raney, who owned and operated it up until his death in July of 1949, a duration of some 29 years, although for the last five years he was not as active due to increasingly debilitating health issues. Buyers Service was located on South Hope Street, north of Washington Blvd., and it was a service whereby people could call in and be able to purchase whatever it was they wanted to buy and then have it shipped without having to come into the Los Angeles area to get it. Purchased items would then be shipped by rail, bus, freight line, or whatever mode of transportation was best suited. The Buyers Service client area initially covered California, Arizona, Nevada, New Mexico, and later also Colorado.

A.C. Raney was probably not traveling around much during the 1920s, staying close to home, because he was working at getting his Buyers Service business up and running, and at the same time he was, along with a partner, Charlie Hill, buying properties in the Inglewood area, such as houses and duplexes, and fixing them up and then selling them. This refurbishment business was separate from Buyers Service but was carried out at the same time. A.C. Raney spent most of his time building up and operating Buyers Service, while his partner would arrange to get carpenters, plumbers, etc., out to the job site, and make certain that the properties were fixed up, and then sold.

Then, once Buyers Service was established, once or twice a year A.C. Raney would travel throughout his client territory, visiting all of his customers, as well as finding new clients in whatever town he might be visiting. He would be on the road, traveling by automobile, for about a month, staying in auto courts, visiting every little town along his way. Many of his clients were along the famous Route 66, where he would work every little town along the way, including little towns way off of the main route. Because of these year after year road trips, he got to meet and know a lot of people, who were happy to use his Buyers Service. And then, once A.C. Raney became interested in collecting various artifacts and automatic music instruments, during these yearly business trips he would ask questions everywhere he went and then happily hunt down any new leads.

A.C. Raney was still actively growing his Buyers Service company during World War II. He had employed two men capable of running it and carrying out the daily workload, and so he was out on the road a lot, doing what he loved to do. He and his wife, Ruby, were busy traveling in the early 1940s, he always doing business at the same time. And while he would never quit being actively involved with Buyers Service, he was not driving into Los Angeles every working day. A.C. Raney died on July 4, 1949, and because his son, Cliff Raney, Jr., did not like having to go into Los Angeles and be confined to an office, the business was sold sometime around the end of 1951 or more likely near the beginning of 1952.

The Move to Whittier and the Raney Ranch

In 1926 A.C. Raney bought the Strong family’s ranch property in Whittier as a place to raise his children, whereupon the Raney family began a gradual move to the Whittier property but did not actually begin sleeping there until 1927. There were many eucalyptus trees and the pretty San Jose Creek with lots of sand and beach. There were filbert trees near creek bank at the end of Cliota Avenue alongside the ranch’s private access driveway. The ranch property extended across the creek with an old apple orchard on the other side. Along San Jose Creek there was a lot of watercress, cattails, reeds, and tall cottonwood trees with grape vines growing on them, and so it was an ideal place for the children to grow up with plenty of places in which they could explore and play. They would often climb up in the tall cottonwood trees that lined the creek’s shoreline and tie a rope with a sandbag onto a tree branch and ride out over the creek and jump off. For the children it was an exciting adventure living on such a rustic ranch setting.

The ranch house sat in the middle of the eucalyptus trees, it being basically nothing more than a one room house with a separate outdoor privy. Before the ranch house had an inside bathroom, the family took their baths in the creek. There was an outside shower head near the back porch to finish washing off the sand after bathing or swimming. Ruby Raney used a hand-cranked siren or a whistle to call the children home from the creek, which was maybe 500 feet west of the main ranch house. There was no electricity and for a long, long time the only nighttime illumination they had were coal-oil lamps. And the only light was in the kitchen area, so when it got dark outside the family went to bed. There was a little black wood-fired stove in the kitchen, a room that also served as the dining and living area. This wood stove had a little oven in the chimney, and it was this little stove at which Ruby Raney cooked the family meals. The house got an inside toilet long before electricity because it cost too much money to bring the power line from Workman Mill Road, and nobody else near the ranch wanted electrical power. The Raney ranch never had a source of natural gas, the only heating being a fireplace and the wood-fired kitchen stove.

The house was expanded from the day the Raney family moved in. A bedroom for A.C. and Ruby Raney was added. Then another little room was added for Cliff Raney, Jr’s. bedroom. Then, circa 1935, a larger bedroom was added to accommodate Clara May and Marion, which came about because times were getting better. A.C. Raney had promised Ruby Raney a new house, and so he said to her, “we could build the new house now.” But Ruby did not want a new house anymore, she replying: “oh, I’ve gotten used to this now. I just want a big room.” So, circa 1935, they built the living room—a spacious one with a fireplace—and that was the extent of the ranch house. The master bedroom was a large open room with windows and a walk-in closet. A Mermod Frères music box (Ruby’s cylinder music box) was at one end. Other items included a big bed, a Victrola, two rocking chairs, a vanity, a chiffonier [a high narrow chest of drawers], a dresser, a sewing machine, and a round table. There was a lot of furniture, but the room was open and did not seem crowded. When the family motored into the ranch, they drove in under the eucalyptus trees and walked up a little sidewalk and up about 6 or 7 steps and into the back porch, which is where Ruby fed the hobos that tramped along the nearby railroad tracks during the depression years and where our old ice-box still sat. A.C. Raney told Ruby “if anybody comes to the door feed them and then they won’t give you any trouble.” Hobos would come up the back steps to the screened porch. On the porch was a refrigerator, a table, and a wash basin, so people could wash up in the sink. Ruby would tell them, “Sit down and I’ll bring you something.” She was good at making fried bread, which was kind of a cross between today’s French toast and a pancake.

There was a lot of wildlife on the ranch, but in particular there was a large flock of bright red cardinals that lived in the eucalyptus trees around the ranch. Cliff Raney, Jr., learned to whistle in a certain way that attracted the birds. When he would whistle, the cardinals would come into the trees near him. The Audubon Society learned of this and would come to the Raney Ranch and have Cliff call the cardinals, so that they could observe and study them up close. It is this flock of cardinals that was to later be the inspiration for the Whittier Union High School emblem, and the name Whittier Cardinals.

Ruby Raney did not have an automobile when the family first moved to the Whittier ranch, so she was alone all day on the ranch property. A.C. Raney would go to Buyers Service in downtown Los Angeles and not get home until 9:00 or 10:00 at night. The children would go off to Mill School from about 8:00 AM to about 4:00 PM by the time they walked home, and so they did not see much of A.C. Raney because he did not get home until after the children had gone to bed. Mission Mill School was on the east side of Workman Mill Road, just a little past Mission Mill Road. It was a one-story red-brick building, with one room for 1st, 2nd, and 3rd grades, another room for 4th and 5th grades, and then another room for the 6th, 7th, and 8th grades. It had a principal’s office, a storage room, and a large auditorium in the middle. Forty-six kids were in attendance, with three teachers. One of the teachers was also the acting principal, and one was the school nurse.

Crops grown on the ranch varied and at one time or another are known to have included walnuts, filberts, apples, oranges, pears, peaches, asparagus, and sweet potatoes. And there were plenty of chickens, geese, peacocks, and a pig pen. During the depression years the neighboring Johnson property, situated between the Raney Ranch and the Union Pacific railroad tracks, was purchased, it planted in walnuts and significantly enlarging the Raney Ranch. At the time the ranch property was purchased, it was walnut orchards from the railroad tracks up to near the Raney’s ranch house. Then, in later years, between the walnut trees it became popular to intersperse them with orange trees, because, it was figured, the Walnut trees were not going to last forever. For some reason the “water was not right for them,” so the Walnut trees were taken out when the orange trees were more or less fully grown. But disaster struck when crops and anything else near the creek were swept away during the flood that occurred on January 1, 1934. The land flattens out along the sandy beaches and picnic area where there is no creek bank. During the flood the San Jose Creek and the Rio Hondo River met in the beach and picnic area, and by the time the flood water got to Beverly Boulevard the comparatively little San Jose Creek and the Rio Hondo River had merged into one big frothing barrage of rushing water. The flood took out the pecans, the asparagus, the old apple orchard, and everything else alongside the creek, and it forever changed the course of the creek and the point at which it joined the Rio Hondo River channel. A lot of valuable ranch land washed away that frightfully wet and rainy day.

The Automatic Musical Instrument Collection

The Raney collection of automatic musical instruments was, by any measure of its time, an indeed fabulously varied and extensive collection, and it was built up during a period when there was little if any interest in such increasingly obsolete mechanical devices, with the relatively inexpensive and maintenance free radio and the automatic electric phonograph (the jukebox) becoming the new entertainment rage. Moreover, economic times were such that people almost universally had priorities other than preserving and collecting obsolete machinery, only survival and absolute necessities were considered important. And then, during World War II years, again people had little interest in collecting old worn-out and essentially useless mechanical junk. Thus, A.C. Raney was in the enviable but extraordinary position of being active during a time when nobody else gave a hoot about mechanical music, the radio and electric phonograph having replaced it. And as luck would have it, he had a business model that conveniently allowed him to scour the areas in which collectable items were still present, coupled with the business resources, networking, and shipping knowledge to get things back to his home territory.

And so, when did A.C. Raney begin collecting? A smidgen of evidence—which today cannot be substantiated because everybody involved is now long ago deceased and there is no surviving documentation—seems to suggest that A.C. Raney probably started looking for and collecting early phonographs, music boxes, coin pianos and orchestrions, western saloon art, and other interesting artifacts as early as 1932. This early collecting would have taken place during the worst part of the financial depression, when A.C. Raney was on the road working to find new clients and further build up the Buyers Service business. So, he could have been looking for and finding no longer valued treasures in basements, old taverns, brothels, and hotels, etc., all over the southwestern U.S., and fortuitously he had the networking infrastructure to generate copious leads and then ship newly discovered historic treasures back to his home-based music barn depository. By the early 1940s, and as his passion for collecting grew, his constantly expanding word of mouth networking capabilities throughout California, Arizona, Nevada, New Mexico, and Colorado probably made finding new items to collect increasingly easy, which might account for the notion that Raney did most of his collecting in the 1940s.

To shed a bit more light on the collection question, Clara May (Raney) Akard told the music box story about her sister, Marian: Ruby Raney (Marian’s mother), had a small cylinder music box, and Uncle Robert Delzell used to play it for Marian when she was a little girl. Uncle Robert supposedly “gave” it to her and when Marian got married in October or November of 1941, she announced that she was taking the music box. But her father (A.C. Raney) said, “You can’t do that. It’s ours.” But Marian took it anyway, and so A.C. Raney said, “Okay, then I’ll go and get my own music box.” As a result of this story, most of A.C. Raney’s collecting activity was thought to have taken place in the 1940s. But this is probably not the case, because by 1946 A.C. Raney was quite ill due to bowel cancer and was too sick and weak to travel around looking for collectible items. Thus, it is likely that most of the collecting activity occurred during the 1930s and early to mid-1940s. Once he had started collecting his interest grew ever stronger, whereupon he would actively seek out people who could help fix the machines and give him more leads to follow. Ruby Raney liked anything A.C. Raney enjoyed. When their three children got married and left the ranch, circa 1941, within a year Ruby was left alone. So, she decided, I’ll go down to the office too, and thusly she became involved and was right in the midst of everything—the Buyers Service and the collecting activities.

According to Clara May, the music building was not present on the ranch in 1941. When World War II started, Clara May and her new husband moved “north,” because he was in the Military Service and was being stationed in northern California. But, she said, the music building was there in 1946 when they returned to the Whittier area. So, Clara May guesses the music building was probably built in 1945. Now having returned to Whittier, Clara May would visit her father frequently, because at that time A.C. Raney was so sick that he was unable to do much of anything. Considering the foregoing, it seems more likely that the music building was built sometime earlier, between 1941 and 1945, because the music building had to be constructed in time for it to be filled to overflowing with the majority of the music machine collection, plus collecting and bountifully plastering the walls with artwork, all of which was in place by 1946, when A.C. Raney was ill and unable to do much but stay home at the ranch. Thus, it seems reasonable to presume that the music barn was built in the early 1940s rather than later, due to the fact that collecting, hauling, and then moving the oftentimes very heavy and difficult to move coin pianos and orchestrions into the music building would have been a next to impossible task to carry out within a one-year time frame if the music room was constructed in 1945.

There was a pair of tall double doors at the end of the music building, something like French doors—two doors that open out making for an opening about 10 feet wide. It was like one end of the shop just opened up. People did not really go in a door, they just walked in through the end of the building. A.C. Raney was always in there, and so the doors were always open. He used to sit by the hour and pick at and fix the bent tynes on the music box disks. Some of them had cardboard disks on the back, which were placed between the metal disks so that the projections would not be mashed. A lot of the disks were damaged and so he worked tirelessly on them. During the last three years of his life, when he was very sick with bowel cancer, Herbert Vincent, who sometimes brought along another man by the name of Bacigalupi, helped him put together and fix various coin pianos and orchestrions, because they were sometimes all apart when Raney got them. He would be out there sitting, working on his music machines. He was sick, but he would go out to the music building and sit while he was working. Ruby was often out in the music building with him, and people would come to see them and visit. They enjoyed lots of company. Sometimes he would fire up the calliope outside the building. People on Workman Mill Road would hear it and think there was some kind of carnival, and so they would come down to the ranch to see what was going on. A. C. Raney always talked to everybody. When there were no visitors, he would work inside the music barn on the machines.

The type of calliope A.C. Raney had is unknown, other than it must have been music roll operated. When asked questions like, was the calliope red in color or did it have whistles on top, Clara May described it thusly: “It wasn’t fancy like that. It was kind of just more like the works. It wasn’t especially pretty to look at.” Whatever it was, Jack Cochran of Jack’s Salad Bowl eventually bought it (Jack’s Salad Bowl restaurant was a popular Whittier Boulevard landmark for decades that closed in 2006). A.C. Raney had planned to move the collection to Harrah's Club, where they were going to give him his own section or floor to display the collection. He had been corresponding with Bill Harrah for several months before his death in July of 1949. He was planning to make a trip to Reno and look over what they had to offer, but he didn't live to make that trip. His connection with Harrah’s Club was through the people who owned the Pony Express Museum.

At this point in time, Henry Akard, who was no more than just a neighbor who lived next door, over on Mission Mill Road, enjoyed visiting the music building and seeing and listening to the music boxes. Henry remembers A.C. Raney telling him where he got many of the music machines, but Henry was more interested in hearing about the one that supposedly came from a whorehouse in Prescott, Arizona, because (being from Prescott himself) he probably had some relations there that had at onetime listened to it. As to what this former Prescott located coin piano might have been, Henry is not certain, but he thought that it was about the size of “Clara May’s Seeburg KT” [This Seeburg KT was sold in 1993 when Clara May was married to Henry Akard]. And so, it was apparently a cabinet style coin piano of some sort. Unfortunately, there are no surviving written records indicating the provenance of any items in the Raney collection.

According to Clara May, “A.C. Raney suffered from bowel cancer for about four years. Sometimes when he was so sick, my mother would put him in the car and take him places, just to keep him active, because she thought it was better for him that way. He hurt all the time and would sit in the music box room fixing bellows. Mother would take him dinner out there, and then he would come into the living room and lay on the couch. When he died [lying on the couch], he went into a coma. He didn’t get up again. They were married for 35 years.”

While A.C. Raney was actively operating Buyers Service, he was in the shipping business, back and forth, so he would know the best ways to have things of any size shipped and delivered to his premises. Moreover, he had cultivated a multi-state network or friends, trade artisans, and associates who were happy to help out when necessary. And as any modern-day collector of coin pianos and orchestrions knows all too well, moving around and maintaining a large collection of heavy and often complicated coin-operated machines can be an ongoing and challenging chore. Which is why, after A.C. Raney’s death, dealing with and maintaining the huge collection of music machines seemed an imposing and herculean task to Ruby Raney, who was not in good health herself. And after watching A.C. Raney work endless hours on all of those little bellows, which he said, “They have to have air going through them or they rot,” put Ruby in the position of not knowing what to do with the collection. So, she decided to sell all but a few select items that were housed in the ranch house living area. These few mechanical music reminders she planned to keep and move into a new home when it came time to forever leave the ranch.

The new home Ruby Raney was in the process of purchasing was right off of Beverly Boulevard, near Clara May’s home. Clara May lived on Carley Avenue, and Ruby’s soon to be new home was located on Lenvale Avenue, a short dead-end street, just a few streets away. [The streets in order are: Carley Ave.; Ben Alder Ave.; Mesagrove Ave.; Lenvale Ave.—a short dead-end street; and then Pioneer Blvd.]. It was a city sized lot, and Ruby hated the idea of moving there, because she had never lived that close to anybody. Even in Inglewood they had a lot of property.

Clara May remembered going to the ranch house during and after all the things were packed for the move to the new home, but what Ruby did with the mechanical music machines during this transition she did not know. Clara May and her sister, Marian, each got a Regina music box and Cliff Raney. Jr., got a mahogany music box that stood upright and played the disk records. At that time, Clara May had three little boys, ages 1, 4 and 5. Consequently, she did not go out to the ranch to see her mother every day, but talked with her on the telephone and knew that all things were going well. Ruby used to go over to Clara May’s house almost every evening for dinner and television, which was new then and Ruby loved to watch Ina May Sutton, Liberace, Spade Cooley, and other TV shows. She would go home about 9 PM. Clara May’s husband and the three kids loved to have her visit.

On this one day Ruby said to me, “Honey, I won’t be coming tomorrow night, so don’t worry about me, because I have to get up early the next day and go down to sign the final escrow papers.” She was having this done by somebody she knew, an escrow service near Buyers Service. I thought nothing about her not calling the following day. But, then, the next day I didn’t hear from her, so I worried. My husband was at work, and I had the three little boys. I thought something is wrong; I have got to see about my mother. I was out hanging up the clothes on the clothesline and all of a sudden something—one of those sheets just snapped me on the back like you might do with a towel—and it was just almost like the Lord telling me you better get with it. So, I dashed across the street and asked the lady if she would watch the kids for me. I lived on Carley, just south of Beverly Boulevard. I just had to go over around the hill and to the ranch.

The neighbor lady said yes, I could borrow her car, and I drove over to the ranch. When I got there, I didn’t see any chickens. Our chickens ran loose; there were no chickens. I felt something was wrong. I went to the door, and I could hear the dog inside and I knew that was not right. I tried to call, and nobody answered. I went around the house; nobody answered. Now I knew something was wrong, so I broke a window. You go up the steps to this screened porch and then that main door had a window top. I broke that window and reached in and unlocked the door. I went in and Ruby was dead in bed, and she had been there for some time. She was just lying on the pillow on her hands. She had evidently had some Jello and a piece of cake. The plate was there by the TV, and she had gone to bed and gone to sleep.

After my brother, Cliff, Jr., moved away there was nobody living close to her. We did not like the idea of her being alone, so we had a retired couple come and live on the ranch, and kind of look after mother. They lived in the cute little real estate house right beside my mother’s house, so that they could look after her and see that mother was okay. If she had any trouble with the car or anything, they were there to help. The retired caretaker couple had moved out the day before. They were all going to be out, and this was on a weekend, an ideal time for them to go.

Ruby was going to move on Wednesday, and it was the previous Sunday night, November 8, 1955, when she died. I talked to her on Sunday, and she told me not to worry about her. She was dead two days when I found her late Tuesday afternoon. The movers were scheduled to come the next day, Wednesday. The retired couple living in Mr. Hill’s real estate house helped her pack up and get ready to go. Then the retired couple in Mr. Hill’s house moved out on the weekend. So, everything was sitting in the house all boxed up and ready to move. My mother died and nobody knew where anything was; everything was all boxed up.

She died on Sunday night, November 8, 1955, and I found her late Tuesday afternoon. The mortuary did not come and get her until Thursday. The next day was Armistice Day, so the coroner’s office was closed. It was about ten days before she was buried, because having died alone she had to have an autopsy. She wanted to be buried by the Browns Mortuary, the same people that conducted the services for A.C. Raney, who were neighbors at the Buyers Service office. She was buried in the circle area of the Rose Hills Cemetery, overlooking the area that had once been the Raney Ranch.

The End of the Raney Ranch Story

Clara May (Raney) Akard had in her possession a cryptic note that appears to describe when and to whom discrete portions of the original Raney Ranch property (purchased from the Strong family) were sold, breaking apart the primary ranch property and marking the forever end of the Raney Ranch Story, as follows:

Today, if you drive along the San Gabriel Parkway (the 605 Freeway), at the Rose Hills Road on/off ramps, look up toward the Whittier Hills and the Rose Hills Cemetery and you will see absolutely nothing that might suggest that there ever was a beautiful fresh-water San Jose Creek or a magical ranch setting nestled within a grove of tall eucalyptus trees. Nor will you see any sign of the sprawling walnut and orange orchards that once graced the area. Rose Hills Road was formally known as Cliota Avenue, and before that it was known as Walnut Avenue. Along the south side of Rose Hills Road you will no doubt see the sprawling former Shepherd Machenry facility, now Quinn CAT, which covers over the area where the charming Raney Ranch house and the large music barn once stood proud.

Credits:

Terry Hathaway (based on interview transcripts with the late Clara May (Raney) Akard, circa 2003), the late Albert Clifford Raney, III.

Contributors: David Allan, David Ramey, Jr., and Art Reblitz.

Photographs:

Clara May (Raney) Akard; Terry Hathaway.

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