In the fall of 1942, the prolific novelist and journalist Upton Sinclair was at his wits’ end. Sinclair — the author of “The Jungle,” the turn-of-the-century novel whose visceral descriptions of grueling meatpacking factory conditions led to public outcry and federal reform — was having a rough time in his Pasadena home. Mesquite bushes overran the property, and termites, rats, black widows and other critters constantly flitted through his various papers and books. Seeking a respite “farther from the industry, traffic and smoke,” as his wife Mary once put it, the couple moved to a patch of land in Monrovia, one of the earliest communities in the San Gabriel Valley.
The neo-Mediterranean home where the Sinclairs settled became the author’s “retreat,” says Lauren Coodley, a scholar and author of the biography “Upton Sinclair: California Socialist, Celebrity Intellectual.” The Pulitzer Prize winner once described the home as bestowing him “perfect peace to write in … a garden path to walk up and down on while I planned the next paragraph, and a good public library from which I could get what history books I needed,” according to the Monrovia Historical Society. Additionally, the property burst with two dozen exuberant fruit trees — a boon for the health-conscious Sinclair.
These days, the 1920s house, situated in the foothills of the San Gabriel Mountains, is listed in the National Register of Historic Places, a permanent record of the outsized role the home had in Sinclair’s life. Coodley says that Sinclair intended for his home to be repurposed as a learning center following his death, but it’s been in the hands of private ownership since his passing in 1968.
In a rare move, though, the home has just been listed for sale, 15 years since it last went on the market. It’s asking $1,999,000…