Tom Heffernan
Corona Del Mar’s oldest restaurant, known today as Five Crowns was built in 1936 by Matilda “Tillie” Lemon MacCulloch. An American wife of a wealthy Scotsman, she lived in England but had grown up visiting Southern California as a child. She modeled it after Ye Olde Bell, an inn at Hurley-on-Thames, 35 miles west of London, England and called it the Hurley Bell. Local architect Shelby Coon used photographs of the inn to design it. Originally planned to be an inn, the MacCullochs ended up making it their home.
Shelton McHenry and Bruce Warren who ran the Tail o’ the Cock Restaurant in Los Angeles leased it for a new location in 1943 but it would only last for 3 years. Tillie and her daughter would revitalize the Hurley Inn for a few years until Tillie’s death in 1948.
