April 11, 2025
(Revised/Updated from October 16, 2023)
Birch Bay, Washington
One of George Hodel’s friends who was “in the know” (and apparently by his own words much more than that?) was surrealist photographer EDMUND TESKE. (His artwork is now prominently displayed in the Getty Museum)
Strange that Edmund Teske and my paths never crossed during the more than three decades we both spent living in the West Hollywood hills of Laurel Canyon and on the streets of Hollywood.
My attention was directed to the surrealist artist/photographer, Edmund Teske some six years after his death and more than a decade into my father’s serial murder investigations.
It was another”happenstance” meeting as documented in Black Dahlia Avenger II (Thoughtprint Press 2014).
On the spur of the moment, I decided to go to a luncheon in DTLA which announced the closing of the historic Clifton’s Restaurant, at 7th & Broadway. I went and met with a small group all of whom, like myself, wanted to honor the memory of the famous eatery that served so many servicemen during the WWII years.
I ordered the “Blue Plate Special”, turkey, gravy, and mashed potatoes and while enjoying my meal, was approached by the organizer of the event, Steven Lamb, a residential architect from Altadena.
Steve informed me that he had read my published writings on my investigation and was confident that I had correctly identified the killer (my father) and went on to inform me of his independent confirmations and then related the story of Edmund Teske approaching him in front of the Sowden/Hodel residence back in 1978 while he (Lamb) was taking photographs of the structure. Astounded, I asked Steve Lamb if he could fully document the meeting with Teske in a letter, which he did and which I published in the updated 2014 edition of BDA II.
The only mention of the name Teske that I had ever heard came from the former tenant/roomer, Joe Barrett. In a conversation, I had shown the below set of childhood photos taken in the courtyard of our home, which I informed him I believed were taken by our family photographer, Man Ray. Joe immediately corrected me by saying, “No, those pictures were taken by a photographer named Teske, a friend of your dad’s and Man Ray. I know that because I was there when he took them.”
I never gave it another thought until the name resurfaced a decade later coming from the architect, Steve Lamb at the Clifton’s cafeteria luncheon.
Architect Steven Lamb letter received in 2011:
Edmund Teske was an acquaintance of Aline Barnsdall and resided in Studio B residence in Barnsdall Park just a half-mile and a two-minute drive from the Sowden/Hodel residence. Aline Barnsdall’s residence at the park was designed by Frank Lloyd Wright, father of Lloyd Wright who designed the Sowden/Hodel residence at 5121 Franklin Avenue, the actual crime location of Elizabeth “Black Dahlia” Short and other L.A. Lone Woman murder victims.
Edmund Teske baseball card in chewing gum wrapper, 1975, just three years before contact with architect/photographer Steve Lamb in front of Sowden/ Hodel residence, 5121 Franklin Avenue, Hollywood. This is how Teske would have appeared when in 1978 Teske approached Lamb who was photographing the exterior of the Sowden/Franklin house, and stated out of the blue to Lamb that, “It’s an evil place. Artists, philosophers, accountants and politicians, WE ALL PLAYED THERE AND PAID THERE. Women were tortured for sport there. Murders happened there. It’s an Evil Place.” (SKH Note- This is not hearsay on Teske’s part, but rather in a court of law with Teske sworn under oath, would be considered DIRECT TESTIMONY.)
Rare copy of Edmund Teske 1974 signed catalogue to “Michael Drazmin.”
Artist/Photographer Edmund Teske born in 1911, just four years after George Hodel’s birth, died in 1996, just three years before George Hodel who died in 1999.
In another of the many Down the Rabbit Hole moments in my now twenty-five-year investigation it turns out that Teske, friend to my father George Hodel and Man Ray, who by his (Teske’s) own admissions “played and paid” at the Franklin/Sowden residence with “politicians, artists, and accountants” would have certainly known my father and mother’s paramour (and my future wife to be) Amilda Kiyoko Tachibana (“Kiyo”) during the years 1941-1950 from the many parties at our Franklin home. Further, he would have very likely continued his relationship/friendship with her when he moved to Laurel Canyon and after my divorce from Kiyo in the mid-to-late 1960s. (I was married to Kiyo from 1962-1965 and we bought and lived in film director Tay Garnett’s mansion on Utica Drive in the Canyon during those years.) After my divorce in 1965 Kiyo rented out the separate small houses on our property to THE DOORS, and to Neil Young of the Buffalo Springfied. Edmund Teske during that same time period took numerous photographs of Jim Morrison, so we have zero degrees of separation between Kiyo, Young, Morrison and Teske.
Kiyo circa 1942 in
George Hodel album Time Magazine “Kiyo Astrologer to the Stars” 1969 seen seated with Neil Young
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(Author Note- Actually rented by my ex-wife Kiyo, I divorced and gave her the property in 1965)
A major retrospective on Edmund Teske was held at the Los Angeles Getty Museum in June 2004, ironically just a year after the publication of my first book, Black Dahlia Avenger (2003) which presented Teske’s statements architect/photographer Steven Lamb as to his (Teske’s) knowledge of tortures and multiple murders occurring at the Hodel/Sowden House in the late 1940s.
The post Famed Surrealist Artist/Photographer Edmund Teske Personal Friend to George Hodel and Man Ray and His Direct Knowledge of the Sowden/Hodel Residence; “Women were tortured for sport there. Murders happened there. It’s an Evil Place.” appeared first on Steve Hodel.