Christine Sterling

1934 HABS documentation of the Avila Adobe, soon after the opening of Olvera Street. Chastina Rix (1881–1963), later known as Christine Sterling, was born in Oakland, California. Her most notable works were as a preservationist who helped save the Avila Adobe and created Olvera Street in Los Angeles. She also helped create China City.

"The booklets and folders I read about Los Angeles were painted in colors of Spanish-Mexican romance...They were appealing with old missions, palm trees, sunshine and the ‘click of the castanets.’"— Christine Sterling, journal in Oakland, Alameda County, California on 5 November 1881, one of four children of Edward Austin Rix and Kate Elizabeth Kiteridge. Her father was a mining engineer via UC Berkeley (Zeta Psi) and inventor of the "Rix Rock Drill", later a vineyard planter. He was born to Chastina Walbridge Rix and Alfred Stevens Rix (1822-1904), a San Francisco Committee of Vigilance leading member and San Francisco justice of the peace Later in 1858 he married Margaret Arabella Tuite in California.

Chastina changed her name to Christine as a teenager, and briefly studied art and design at Mills College in Oakland. After a brief first marriage, she married attorney Jerome Hough. They had two children, June (?) and Peter in 1915, later moving to Hollywood for his film industry work.

Her explorations of the city led to her discovery of the decrepit Avila Adobe, which she later went on to preserve.

"It might be well to take our Mexican population seriously and allow them to put a little of the romance and picturesque into our city which we so freely advertise ourselves as possessing. The plaza should be converted into a social and commercial Latin American center." — Christine Sterling