Aviva History

What is known today as Aviva Family and Children's Services began when World War I broke out in 1914. Aviva started as a day nursery and, in 1915, officially adopted the name of the Ida Strauss Day Nursery and Settlement (Ida Strauss, the wife of Abraham Strauss of New York City, died with her husband on the Titanic). The agency grew rapidly and moved to larger facilities, transferring from Boylston Street to the Jewish Federation Building at Temple Street and Bunker Hill Avenue.

As new needs developed, Aviva revised its mission to provide housing and services to young Jewish women entering the work force with no appropriate place to live. Some were newcomers to Los Angeles. Others, native to the area, were unmarried, but sought to live independently. These women were housed on the upper floors of the Day Nursery and Settlement, which was then renamed the Jewish Alliance of Los Angeles. By 1927, the Federation headquarters had become inadequate for its mission.

To the rescue came the Hamburger Family, who wished to establish a memorial to Asher and Hannah Hamburger, early founders of the May Company. The family financed the building of a home at 1225 South Union Avenue. The Jewish Alliance, renamed Hamburger Home, was dedicated in February 1928. By 1955 these quarters had outlived their usefulness and Hamburger Home moved to a stately mansion at Hollywood Boulevard and Camino Palmero where it continued to fulfill the needs of working girls, including World War II refugees, until 1966.

Recognizing in 1966 that there was a serious need for a therapeutic residence for adolescent young women with behavioral and emotional problems, the Board of Directors, in consultation with community leaders, voted to make Hamburger Home a residence with a shifted focus to meet the needs of troubled teen-age girls. And then in the fall of 1984, Hamburger Home again changed its name, this time to Aviva Center, using the Hebrew word Aviva, which means renewal/rebirth, to reflect its mission to help troubled girls.

For many years, the Aviva Center was only a 36-bed residence for girls, aged 12-18. In 1989, Aviva High School was opened to address the critical special education requirements of the girls in residence. As the demand grew for the specialized services for troubled teenaged girls, Aviva added programs and facilities.

In 1988, Aviva began adding programs to serve other disadvantaged children, of all ages, in Los Angeles County. In 1999, Aviva's Board of Directors once again changed the agency's name. They selected the name Aviva Family and Children's Services to reflect the broad range of services now offered.

Having outgrown its present facilities, Aviva moved the high school, foster family agency and administrative services into a new building at 7120 Franklin Avenue in October 2002, while maintaining its residential facility, renamed The Wallis Annenberg Center in recognition of Ms. Annenberg's generous support. The new building, along with the residential facility, allows Aviva to grow to meet the ever-increasing demand for services to abused, abandoned and neglected children.