Crowds of 30,000 came to view items over a nine-day period, and the $4.7 million generated at auction were the third-highest in auction history at the time, behind Norton Simon's $12.7 million and the $7.5 million for items from the estate of Geraldine Rockefeller Dodge.
Famous residents of Lafayette Square have included George Pepperdine (founder of Pepperdine University), actors W.C. Fields and Fatty Arbuckle, industrialist and art collector Norton Simon, boxer Joe Louis, Syd Tha Kyd and Taco Bennet of Odd Future, architect Paul R. Williams (who designed his own home in the neighborhood), and members of the Crenshaw family.
He accepted appointments to the University of California Board of Regents, the Carnegie Commission on the Future of Higher Education, the boards of Reed College, the Los Angeles Music Center, the California School of Professional Psychology at Alliant International University, and the Institute for Advanced Study.
Lewis had learned from a Fortune magazine article that the Esmark holding company, which had recently purchased Norton Simon, planned to divest from the McCall Pattern Company, a maker of home sewing patterns founded in 1870.
Paul Simon | Simon & Schuster | Simon Cowell | Carly Simon | Simon Fraser University | John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation | Simon | Neil Simon | Simón Bolívar | Simon Templar | Simon & Garfunkel | Simon de Montfort, 6th Earl of Leicester | Simon Furman | Edward Norton | Simon Rattle | Simon de Montfort | Simon and Garfunkel | Norton | Simon Boccanegra | Simon Schama | Simon Mayr | Peter Norton | Eleanor Holmes Norton | Simon Winchester | Graham Norton | Simon Property Group | Simon Newcomb | Simon Fuller | Joe Simon | William E. Simon |
Norton Simon took an interest in the company in 1964, and it merged with Simon's other holdings, the McCall Corporation and Hunt Foods, to form Norton Simon Inc.