West Hollywood’s Havenhurst Drive and the Valley’s Hayvenhurst Avenue both borrow the name of William Hamilton Hay (1864-1946). That’s because Hay co-owned the 1905 Crescent Heights tract and the 1916 Encino Acres tract, where the two streets originate, respectively. In fact Hay named both his 1907 WeHo mansion and his subsequent 1925 Encino mansion “Hayvenhurst” – and both were located on their namesake streets. (WeHo’s Hayvenhurst Drive started out as Kays Avenue in 1905; it became Hayvenhurst by 1913 and dropped the “y” the following year. Hay’s property there was later supplanted by Alla Nazimova’s legendary “Garden of Alla” apartments.) William Hay was born in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada and came to Los Angeles around the age of sixteen. Despite a gap in public records, I believe his uncle was Andrew Hay, a Hollywood rancher with a dark side (see Formosa Avenue) who had owned the land where Crescent Heights was born and whose widow Lizzie held lots in that tract. William Hay was not as evil as his uncle but he had his issues, which came to light in 1910 when his first wife Mary divorced him with accusations of drunken, abusive behavior. Although she got custody of their daughters Ruby and Elizabeth, Hay remained close enough to the girls to honor them with Encino streets Rubio and Libbit.
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