Zelotes Larkin “Z.L.” Parmelee (1851-1926) named this street in 1904 on his Parmelee Home tract south of Gage Avenue. Born in Illinois, Parmelee came to Northern California with his family in the 1860s. After shuttling between Los Angeles, Stockton, and San Jose for a few years, Parmelee, his wife Eliza, and their kids settled in L.A. in 1885, when Parmelee took over a glassware and crockery store. In 1899, he sold the store and began manufacturing gas and electric fixtures – apparently to great success: the Parmelees relocated to posh South Pasadena in 1903. A year earlier, tragedy struck the family when 19-year-old son Charles, suffering from an unknown illness, shot himself in a San Francisco hotel, his suicide note tactlessly published in newspapers up and down the state. Z.L. Parmelee, who was described as “a very gentlemanly, cordial good fellow”, retired from business in 1913.
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