The photograph above captures a moment in time, April 28, 1907, when three members of the Lapori family, mother Theresa, daughter Rosie and son Alfred were out walking and collecting spring flowers. The family, along with father Ernest, lived in Fairfax on what is now Olema Road on the western outskirts of the town. In 1899, the Lapori’s purchased 10 acres of the original Dominga Sais land grant, Rancho Canada de Hererra, from George Dickson and took up residence in the house that once belonged to Sais’ daughter and her husband Joseph Bresson.
Theresa was an immigrant from Italy who tragically died the year after this picture was taken. She was just 36 years old. A January 1908 obituary announced her death adding, “Friends and acquaintances are respectively invited to attend the funeral…from her late residence, thence to St. Raphael’s Church, where a requiem mass for the repose of her soul will be celebrated.” There are other extant photographs of the Lapori family taken that same spring day. One is labeled, “On the road to Camp Taylor” with a large North Pacific Coast Railroad trestle crossing a creek in the background. Another shows the children in front of the family home.
In 1906, the Lapori’s leased most of their acreage for the construction of the White House Resort and in 1912 that land was sold to the Fairfax Development Company for the subdivision known as Fairfax Manor. The Lapori family also leased their home to a Mr. Recomi who established a restaurant in the basement. By the 1930’s the Lapori’s had sold the property and another restaurant, Duke’s Manor Villa, was established in the venerable residence which is surely one of the earliest structures in Fairfax and still stands today at 10 Olema Rd.
(Originally appeared as History Watch article in the Marin Independent Journal)