Nestled in LA’s Arlington Heights is a historic home, built in 1912, but few know its storied past.

The two-story, red-tiled-roof home on Adams Boulevard is home to the oldest Black women’s club in Los Angeles, the Wilfandel Club. The home became the Wilfandel Clubhouse in the 1940s, when a group of Black women acquired the property for their organization.

At a time when Black women were often prohibited from using facilities or belonging to country clubs, Glynis Morrow, the Wilfandel Club’s past president, said homes and churches were the only places to gather for entertaining or meeting.

“As the club grew, homes weren’t large enough. And so it was really important to establish a building, an organization where Black people could do all of the things that everyone else was doing with no restrictions,” Morrow said.

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The Wilfandel Clubhouse

CBS LA

They wanted a house big enough for their club, but racially restrictive covenants stood in their way. These were clauses in property deeds that legally blocked people of color from buying or renting, keeping neighborhoods intentionally segregated.

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Wilfandel Club plaque

CBS LA

“There was a definite need for something like this for us. We had the financial means to pay, it was just a matter of locating something and the willingness of the seller to sell to us,” Anne Bradford Luke, Wilfandel Club past president, said.

Once the restrictive covenants were defeated in the Supreme Court, they bought their house. Each woman pitched in 100 dollars for the building fund, and in 1948, the club acquired the Percy H. Clark stately 1912 Renaissance Revival Style mansion in the West Adams District of Los Angeles. 

Through relentless fundraising, often selling chicken dinners, they paid off the $18,000 mansion in just 15 years.

“Well, you know Della Williams, who was the wife of Paul Williams, was really the ringleader behind it, and she found a partner in Fannie Williams, hence Wilfandel, it’s named after them,” Carrie Henley, Wilfandel Club President, said.

“And they convinced some of their friends, actually another 48 women, for a total of 50 women, to raise the money to buy a house, to buy a place they could call their clubhouse.”

Members were the wives of doctors, lawyers, and educators, a real who’s who in the black community – and their guests also made quite an impressive list, from Lena Horn and Diego Rivera, to Tom Bradley and Martin Luther King. 

The clubhouse is where they have their monthly meeting, but it wasn’t just for the members then or now. They knew other Black people would also need a place to rent. 

“We began to rent out the place because our idea was this clubhouse would be where meetings, concerts, and social activities would be held in our own community,” Bradford Luke said.

 Nearly 80 years later, the Wilfandel Club and clubhouse are still going strong.

“We really find it important to keep the legacy going,” Henley said, noting the importance of owning the property as a club. They host a variety of events, from women’s wellness to an annual Easter egg hunt. 

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