and they built their houses with foundations fashioned from the "great masses of stones and boulders" that lay throughout the town. For the most part, the "Indian pueblo idea" was followed, or a "rustic hills" style, and homes without boulder foundations were rare. By 1927, Tujunga had about 4,000 residents, having surpassed Sunland in population. Many of the settlers maintained small farms with gardens, poultry, rabbits, bees, and various other livestock. Tujunga was home to John Steven McGroarty, playwright, U.S. congressman, and California Poet Laureate. He lived in a home he built himself and completed in 1923, known as Rancho Chupa Rosa. The building is an Historic Cultural Monument (#63) of the City of Los Angeles and is now known as the McGroarty Arts Center. On Tujunga's main street in the 1920s was a place called "Dean's store, the locale of the 'Millionaire's Club of Happiness and Contentment', a little group of the town's pioneers that is featured in the writings of John Steven McGroarty". Tujungans led by McGroarty first wanted to become a city of the sixth class to be called "Verdugo Hills" in 1924, and a petition to that effect was submitted to the board of supervisors, which postponed the idea indefinitely because of concerns about the proposed boundaries. Tujunga was nevertheless incorporated after an election on April 21, 1925, with the southern border following the Rancho Tujunga boundary. A. Adams was elected treasurer, and Mrs. Bertha A. Morgan was chosen as city clerk. Bolton Hall served as the city hall until Tujunga was consolidated with Los Angeles in 1932. One of the first orders of business for the new city of Tujunga in 1925 was an attempt to enlarge the municipality by taking in the foothills south and southwest of the new city, bounded on the east by the "La Crescenta Rancho line, south to Big Tuna Canyon" and west to the then-Los Angeles boundary and Wicks Road. The attempt failed because Los Angeles annexed the area first. Tujunga's elevation and geographic isolation from the San Fernando Valley and the Los Angeles Basin freed it from some of the air pollution that was a problem in many other parts of Greater Los Angeles. Because of this, it attracted many asthmatics early on. In 1929, the Tujunga City Council set policy to establish zones where "sanitariums and other institutions for the care of tubercular patients" could be established.