Los Angeles Past

Welcome, and Farewell

2012-01-09T12:03:00.000-08:00

Welcome to the best little L.A. history blog on the internet!

Los Angeles Past is written as an introductory reference for people who know little or nothing about the history of the City of the Queen of the Angels. (Yes, that's the actual Anglicized name, not City of the Angels. See, you've learned something new already!) Expert L.A. historians will probably not find much here that will broaden their existing knowledge, but if this is all new to you, I guarantee you will find this collected material to be genuinely fascinating.

This blog contains only 10 short pages, but by the time you finish reading them, you will have learned more about the vanished city of pre-World War II Los Angeles than you have ever known before, or could even imagine. Five years ago, this was all new to me, too, and this blog charts the course of historical discovery I've followed since then. It's been a thrilling and very personally rewarding journey for me. However...

Just as I am welcoming you here, I regret to announce that I am closing Los Angeles Past. I won't be contributing any more new articles. I've now spent more time studying L.A. history than I spent studying in college, and since life is short and I'm pushing 60 now, it's time to move on. In any case, I've already learned everything about old L.A. that I set out to learn. Mission accomplished, as far as I'm concerned, and in gratitude for all the knowledge I've acquired, I hereby dedicate this blog to the great City of Los Angeles, to our forebears, to you, and to posterity.

While I won't be contributing new articles, I will still welcome comments and criticisms. Although I have striven for complete historical accuracy in my accounts, I know there must be some mistakes and errors of omission and interpretation in this material. So, if you find discrepancies, or discover something new on your own, please comment and let me know! I may not be actively posting anymore, but I will always be happy to correct or amend what I've already contributed.

So, I now bid you farewell. The time has finally come for me to join all those who have gone before me, in Los Angeles past.

Palms puzzle finally solved

2011-11-05T12:57:00.000-07:00

For the better part of five years, I have been curious about the origins and subsequent history of "General Longstreet's Palms," which may be the oldest trees in Los Angeles. Yesterday, reader Bradford Caslon pointed me to this online excerpt from the 2008 Images of America book, "West Adams," by Suzanne Tarbell Cooper, Don Lynch and John G. Kurtz, which has provided the crucial last pieces of the palms puzzle.

The authors make clear something that I have known for some time: that the "General Longstreet" whose name is associated with the ancient palms is NOT the Confederate Civil War General James Longstreet. The man who built the mansion off West Adams Boulevard with its once-world-famous twin lines of Washingtonia fan palms was a General Charles Longstreet, who died in Los Angeles in 1877. The year of his death suggests that the date given by the USC Digital Library for one of the earliest photos of Palm Drive (c.1875) is very likely correct. The even older image below (the earliest-known photo of the Longstreet Mansion and Palm Drive) therefore probably dates to c.1870, which I now feel comfortable assigning as the time that the palms were actually planted. Since fan palms of that height are no less than 5 years old, I therefore believe it has now been conclusively established that these trees did, in fact, begin their lives during the American Civil War, approximately 150 years ago.

Dating to c.1865, then, these palms are older than almost every man-made structure not only in Los Angeles, but in all of Los Angeles County, as well. I am so gratified to know that the remaining palms are now recognized for their historical significance by the good people of Los Angeles Orthopaedic Hospital, who I'm sure will protect these venerable Civil War veterans for as long as they shall live.

Finis.

Court House revisited

2011-10-31T11:09:00.000-07:00

Nice postcard of the old County Court House circa 1909, viewed from what today would be the intersection of Temple and Spring Streets. At the present time, the trial of Michael Jackson's personal physician is underway at this exact location, though obviously not in this exact building.

I'm amused by "Chester's" description on the reverse – how buildings typically "look better on post cards than they do real where you can get a good look at them." Presumably that was Chester's opinion with regard to the Court House in particular.

Main Street at Temple, Then & Now

2011-09-27T23:54:00.000-07:00

Looking south on Main Street from Temple.

c.1879: On the corner, the Temple Block.

Los Angeles Public Library Photo Collection

2011: Now it's all City Hall.

My first (and last) ride on the Red Car

2011-09-15T22:49:00.000-07:00

This video really affects me in a personal way. You see, back in 1961, my mom actually took me on one of these last Pacific Electric trolley runs down to Long Beach – a train ride exactly like the one depicted in the film. Although I was only 6 at the time, I still have some very clear memories of that excursion that took place that day half a century ago...

I think it was a school day, but one morning after breakfast, Mom just bundled me in the car and told me we were going Downtown to ride the last of the trolleys. She wanted her son to have that same experience that was so much of a part of her daily life when she was young. I'm really glad now that she did!

Anyway, before we rode the Red Car, we went to Angels Flight. That was the first of the two times I got to ride it, and it was a big thrill. Then we stood at a street corner for awhile – I guess it was probably Third and Hill – waiting for a street car to take us to the PE station. I'll never forget the NOISE of that intersection; how LOUD the general hustle-and-bustle of the city was. It was nothing like out in the suburbs. And I was especially impressed by the electric arcs and the sparks that shot out from the trolleys' contact with the overhead wires. Snap! Crackle! Pop!

The Red Car ride to Long Beach was actually pretty boring for a fidgety 6-year-old, despite it being my first time ever on an inter-urban train. I do remember the car was filled to capacity. I guess nostalgia was thick among the passengers, as there was little talking. Mostly just the sound of the train wheels going clickity-clack, clickity-clack, all along the rail road track.

When we got to Long Beach, Mom took me to this immense old cafeteria downtown. The ceiling was like two stories high. It was crowded and noisy, and kind of dark inside, even though it was mid-day. I can't recall the name of the big cafeteria, but I think my mom probably went there a lot when she had relatives living in Long Beach in the '40s.

I don't remember the ride back at all. I probably slept all the way. But overall, it was a very memorable day! I think Mom would be surprised how much I remember. At the time, she probably concluded that the experience was wasted on a little child like me, but it turned out it wasn't at all. I really wish I could tell her now how much it meant to me, and thank her accordingly...

I have to confess, I'm really struck by how ancient and worn this film looks. Knowing I was on one of those trains, well, it makes ME feel old, too. I have to say, though, that I am in much better shape after 50 years than this footage is! That's at least some consolation for a man my age. :-)

A Drive Through Bunker Hill, 1948.

2011-09-07T01:26:00.000-07:00

Richard Schave of Esotouric recently uncovered some remarkable film footage of 1940s Los Angeles on Archive.org.

Go to this page and have a look! (I tried embedding the video here, but it doesn't play satisfactorily at all at DSL speeds.)

The 6-minute film consists of three clips. In the first two, the car with the camera drives west up Second Street starting just west of Olive, then turns south on Grand. In the second clip, the car turns west from Grand onto Fifth Street and drives past the Central Library. The third clip starts just north of Fifth and Flower, proceeds up Flower to First, and ends just as the camera car crests the very top of Bunker Hill.

I think I can date this film pretty precisely to Summer, 1948. Just north of Fifth and Flower is a billboard for RCA Victor televisions that depicts a cartoon donkey and elephant wearing boxing gloves, with a caption saying "Pick a sure winner!" This suggests to me that this is a post-war national election year, with the national party conventions soon to be broadcast (these have always taken place in mid-summer). The style of television depicted on the billboard also looks post-war.

Then, just as the car turns east on First, another billboard advertises a show at the Hollywood Bowl running from July 25-Sept 5; another clue that this is summertime. Also, several of the cars in the film are post-WWII models. Although I'm no real expert on the subject, I don't see any autos here that date later than the 1948-49 model year.

Anyway, I highly recommend downloading the hi-resolution 217.8 MB MPEG4 file on the Archive.org webpage. The size and detail of the image is amazing. It really brings Bunker Hill back to life!

The Baker Block

2011-08-28T23:21:00.000-07:00

Los Angeles Public Library Photo Collection/Litho. C.L. Smith & Co., Oakland, CA.

The Baker Block was the architectural showpiece of Los Angeles during the city's centennial decade. In a town still consisting mostly of simple frame houses and adobes, this palace of commerce must truly have been a wondrous apparition. Standing for 65 years – from c.1877-1942 – the Baker Block was located at the southeast corner of Main and Arcadia Sts., only a few hundred feet south of the original Pueblo de Los Angeles. An excellent summary of the history of the Baker Block can be found on Brian Hsu's Urban Diachrony weblog. Here are some pictures of this grand old edifice.

Main Street looking north from atop the Temple Block, c.1880; the Baker Block just right of center. (This vantage point is now occupied by City Hall.)

Los Angeles Public Library Photo Collection

The uptown commercial heart of the old city, c.1880. The Baker Block at left, and the old Bella Union Hotel building at far right.

Los Angeles Public Library Photo Collection

Southeast corner of Arcadia and Main Sts., 1880.

Los Angeles Public Library Photo Collection

Fifty years later.

Los Angeles Public Library Photo Collection

c.1920.

Los Angeles Public Library Photo Collection

c.1940.

Los Angeles Public Library Photo Collection

1938. There goes the neighborhood: the new Federal Building begins to rise across Main Street.

Los Angeles Public Library Photo Collection/Herman Schultheis, Photographer.

Not long for this world, c.1940.

Los Angeles Public Library Photo Collection

Today, the 101 "Slot" runs right through the site where the Baker Block once stood...

Civic Center panorama, 1946

2011-08-12T23:33:00.000-07:00

The Los Angeles Civic Center, viewed from Broadway, March 11, 1946.

Click image for enlargement.
Source: Library of Congress.

Link to full-resolution TIFF file at loc.gov (4.6 MB).

Rancho lands in 1898

2011-08-10T17:33:00.000-07:00

These highly-detailed maps show the boundaries of the former Spanish land-grant Ranchos around Los Angeles County in 1898.

calisphere-eBay

Link to full-res version here.

Here is the section covering the San Gabriel and Walnut valleys. This one actually interests me more, personally, because this is the part of L.A. County that I grew up in.

calisphere-eBay

Link to full-res version here.

I hope you enjoy them. I can study these maps for literally hours on end...

1929 Postcard

2011-06-07T04:02:00.000-07:00

I've wanted this particular postcard for a long time, and now I finally have one of my own. The coloring is way off, but the aerial perspective of the Civic Center in 1929 is great. What's most striking to me isn't the Graf Zeppelin; it's that City Hall (left) and the Hall of Justice (far right) are the only two buildings in this entire view that are still standing today. Everything else – every structure, tree, even the hill in the background – is gone off the face of the earth. And this is Progress!

Urban Diachrony blog

2011-05-04T21:29:00.000-07:00

Just wanted to put in an enthusiastic plug for a relatively new L.A. history blog called Urban Diachrony. Its principal subject matter is "Then & Now" photographs of various locations within the city.

The blogger, Brian Hsu, not only does an excellent job of taking his "Now" photos from the exact same vantage point as "Then," his accompanying descriptions are very detailed and always interesting. I learn something new about L.A. history with every post. Definitely check it out! I guarantee you will find it worthwhile.

I'm going to have cataract surgery on my left eye tomorrow. Hopefully I can start posting to my own blog more often after I get my normal vision back. This bad eye of mine has been a real impediment to me in recent months...

Time-traveling to Old L.A.

2011-03-27T18:43:00.000-07:00

Reader and past contributor Nathan Marsak posited a question the other day: what if you had a time machine, and you could pop back to Old L.A. for a weekend. What time in the city's history would you choose?

For me, without a doubt, it would be the weekend of October 14-16, 1910.

Why? Mostly, it would be to attend the Saturday dedication of the brand new 'Million-Dollar' Post Office – the building which first sparked my interest in L.A. history.

USC Digital Library

For my accommodations, I'd book the top-floor corner room at the United States Hotel at Main and Market Sts., which would have an absolutely perfect vantage point for viewing the festivities in Temple Square.

USC Digital Library

There'd be plenty of other things to see and do while I was there, of course. Assuming I could get my hands on a period camera, I'd take a ton of good pictures of various buildings for posterity, especially the ruins of the L.A. Times Building, which had been terror-bombed only two Saturdays ago.

I would also love to take a 360-degree panorama from the top of the 1888 Court House. (1910 would be the last year you could do that, with the Hall of Records rising immediately south of the Court House at that time.)

I'd also try to get an Edison cylinder recording of the bell chimes of the old Court House (and the 1888 City Hall's bells, if there actually were bells in that tower – does anyone know for sure?).

And I'd probably walk the old diagonal alignment of Spring Street about a dozen times. I'd ride Court Flight over and over, too, until they kicked me off of it. (Never mind Angels Flight – been there, done that, 50 years later.) ;)

Court Flight

Re: dining – I'd probably eat breakfasts at the Hollenbeck Hotel and the Hotel Nadeau, and at least one lunch at the little hole-in-the-wall indicated in this old postcard. It had to be good! Someone actually wrote home about it!

But mostly I'd eat as much "Spanish" food (as Mexican food was called at the time) as I could. I'd be very curious to know what the native cuisine tasted like a hundred years ago!

I'd do a bunch of other things, too, including a mandatory jaunt down to the Longstreet Palms. World-famous at the time, no visit to old L.A. would be complete without seeing them!

Another time I'd like to travel back to would be October of 1936, so I could see the Los Angeles that my mother knew when she first moved there. Of course, Number One on my list of places to visit then would be the incredible Richfield Building. I'd also take my own set of panoramic photos from atop City Hall, and go to the Paris Inn every night for dinner, too. My kind of place, definitely!

But most of all, I'd make sure to be hanging out at the northwest corner of Olympic and Broadway during lunch hour on Tuesday, October 20th, so I could watch a certain snooty young lady get her picture taken by a street photographer. 8)

Ooooh, now here's a Twilight Zone thought for you – what if Mom's photographer actually turned out to be time-traveler Me?! D:

Temple Square: Then, Then, Then & Now

2011-03-16T22:46:00.000-07:00

Temple Square – the former junction of Main, Temple and Spring Streets – photographed from the roof of the Bella Union Hotel.

c.1870:

Los Angeles Public Library Photo Collection

1876:

Los Angeles Public Library Photo Collection

1888:

Link to image on flickr

And here is the view from the former site of the Bella Union in the present day...

Link to photo on flickr

Mom's first car at the Silver Lake Auto Court

2011-03-02T03:33:00.000-08:00

Mother's new position as General Secretary of the Los Angeles Civic Light Opera was apparently sufficiently remunerative for her to be able to buy her first car. It was a used 1936 Pontiac Master Six Coupe. Here she is with her new Pride and Joy at the Silver Lake Auto Court at 2500 Glendale Blvd. in June, 1938.

click image to view the original photo on flickr

I know she did not live there, however. I suspect either her sister or a friend did, and it was they who took the picture.

Here is a contemporaneous linen postcard of the place.

On the reverse of the card it states: "A 67 unit Auto Court with Trailer Sites. Resort Atmosphere in the heart of the City, well known for its Hospitality and Service. Rates Most Reasonable."

Here is an aerial view. As best as I'm able to determine, Mom was posing with her car near the spot where the red arrow is pointing.

silverlake.org

Remarkably, Michael Smith, a/k/a Kansas Sebastian on flickr, posted this Then & Now composite of the Silver Lake Auto Court in the 1920s with a comparison shot from 2010. His sleuthing revealed that the older aerial view was taken approximately 11 years before Mother was there posing with her Pontiac.

click image to view the original photo on flickr

Amazing the things one can find on the 'net, eh!

Los Angeles's THREE historical Plazas

2011-02-10T01:01:00.000-08:00

Fellow Los Angeles history buff "Richard R." recently found a very interesting webpage which details and summarizes various pieces of historical evidence pertaining to the location of the original pueblo and its plazas. Yes, that's "plazas," plural.

Article from the website 'La Nopalera'.

tl;dr version – It turns out there have actually been three different locations for La Plaza de Los Angeles:

• The first plaza dates to the founding of the pueblo in the 1770s. It is believed to have been located to the south and east of the present Plaza. Constructed on low ground adjacent to the Los Angeles River, the first plaza was obliterated by the Flood of 1815.

• The second plaza and the re-built pueblo were re-located to higher ground a few dozen meters to the north and west of the present Plaza Church, on the west side of Main Street. The approximate location of the second plaza is shown on the map below:

Map by Howard Hurtig Metcalfe from his webpage 'La Nopalera'.

The second plaza was in existence for only a decade or two, though, from the post-Flood of 1815 period to c.1830, when it was moved to its present location east of Main Street and south of the southern terminus of Wine (Olvera) Street. This is "La Plaza" that all latter-day Angelenos are familiar with. The general assumption that La Plaza has always been located where it is today, however, is now known to be demonstrably incorrect. Somewhere along the line, the knowledge that there had been two historical locations which pre-date the present Plaza was mostly forgotten.

Some general awareness of the location of the second plaza lingered on into the mid-20th century, however. In 1950, the "Plaza de Los Angeles, Inc." submitted this re-development plan to the State Park Commission. N.b. the yellowed label pointing to the "Original Plaza" at what would then have been the northwest corner of Main and Marchessault Sts.

USC Digital Library-Los Angeles Examiner

"Richard R." also found this interesting account in the Department of Water and Power database hosted by the Los Angeles Public Library:

'Historical Photo Collection of the Department of Water and Power, City of Los Angeles.'

It should be noted that the docent website of El Pueblo de Los Angeles does, in fact, acknowledge that the present Plaza is actually Los Angeles's third such town square. It was certainly surprising news to me, though, and I'm sure it remains an unknown fact to all but a handful of knowledgeable L.A. historians.

And what now occupies the former site of the second plaza? What else but a parking lot!

View Larger Map

A big thank you to "Richard R." for his excellent historical sleuthing!

View From Atop Angels Flight, 100 Years Ago

2011-01-31T02:34:00.000-08:00

A panoramic postcard view of Downtown Los Angeles from atop the observation deck of Angels Flight, just over 100 years ago.

Click image for a nice 2592x503 enlargement.

A full-resolution scan of this image is available here (300dpi, 5.5MB).

I believe this photo can be dated fairly precisely to late summer 1910, as the second Los Angeles Times Building has not yet been bombed, and the Hall Of Records behind it is in the earliest stage of its construction. Quite a remarkable view, in my layman's opinion!

Los Angeles Past

2011-01-12T11:09:00.000-08:00

An historical chronology from the 1943 Renie Road atlas of L.A. City and County. It's interesting to me to note what events/dates were thought to be significant at the time...

Ramona Boulevard – L.A.'s First Expressway

2010-12-31T18:55:00.000-08:00

Here's a nice little New Year's present for y'all. :-)

Most people believe that the Arroyo Seco Parkway (1940) was the first express thoroughfare serving the city of Los Angeles. That distinction actually belongs to Ramona Boulevard (at bottom on map below), which was constructed from 1933-1935. It originated at Aliso Street a few hundred feet past Mission Road. The parkway section first passed under the Macy Street viaduct, then continued east approximately 4 miles without any stops until thru traffic turned onto Garvey Pass Avenue.

Renie Atlas, "Victory Edition," May, 1943

View east on Aliso Street at its intersection with Mission Road (foreground) and Summit Avenue (far right) before its widening for the construction of Ramona Boulevard, November 27, 1933.

USC Digital Library-California Historical Society

The new east road is open to traffic, April 15, 1935.

USC Digital Library-California Historical Society

U.S. Highway 101 at Mission Road looking east, 2009.

Link to Google Maps Street View

More to follow...

Ramona Boulevard Construction

2010-12-31T18:21:00.000-08:00

View northeast along the proposed route of Ramona Boulevard, from the Macy Street viaduct, November 15, 1933.

USC Digital Library-California Historical Society

Earthmoving for the construction of Ramona Boulevard, June 4, 1934.

USC Digital Library-California Historical Society

Completed Ramona Boulevard from the Macy Street viaduct, April, 16, 1935.

USC Digital Library-California Historical Society

View northeast showing the proposed Ramona Boulevard from a point 100 feet north of the intersection of Mitchell and Echandia Streets, November 15, 1933.

USC Digital Library-California Historical Society

Site cleared for construction, c.1934.

USC Digital Library-California Historical Society

Ramona Boulevard after completion, April 16, 1935.

USC Digital Library-California Historical Society

Ramona Boulevard Extras

2010-12-31T17:48:00.000-08:00

The Arroyo de Los Posos, where Ramona Boulevard would soon be built. Looking westward from the vicinity of State Street, November 30, 1933.

USC Digital Library-California Historical Society

All of the overpasses shown below (except the one at Pomeroy Ave.) were still intact until the very early 1970s, when the three then-existing lanes of the San Bernardino Freeway were widened to more.

Traveling eastbound on Ramona, the first overpass after Macy was the State Street viaduct. April 16, 1935.

USC Digital Library-California Historical Society

View back towards town from atop the State St. viaduct.

USC Digital Library-California Historical Society

Next overpass eastbound was the pedestrian bridge at Pomeroy Avenue (c.1934-1939).

USC Digital Library-California Historical Society

Continuing east on Ramona, the overpasses for Marengo Street (foreground) and Soto (rear).

USC Digital Library-California Historical Society

Still more to come...

Views southwest from the Macy Street Viaduct, 1933-2010

2010-12-31T17:21:00.000-08:00

The proposed route of Ramona Boulevard, November 15, 1933.

USC Digital Library-California Historical Society

Ramona Boulevard upon completion, April 16, 1935.

USC Digital Library-California Historical Society

Interchange of the new Ramona Freeway and Santa Ana Freeway, July 12, 1955. Just look at that smog!

USC Digital Library-Los Angeles Examiner

Interchange of Interstate 10 and U.S. Highway 101, April 18, 2010.

Photo courtesy waltarrrrr on flickr

Happy New Year, everyone!

1904 Panorama

2010-12-09T09:23:00.000-08:00

Recently obtained: this "double postcard" panoramic view of Downtown, as it appeared near the turn of the last century. The diagonal street at center is Broadway, and we're looking roughly south from atop the clock tower of the old County Court House at Temple Street. To the left is Spring Street with its intersection with First Street, and to the right is the still largely intact residential area of Bunker Hill.

Today, looking to the right, the same view is pretty much solid skyscrapers.

Click image for a nice 1872x582 enlargement.

The postcard is undated, but my best guess is that the photo was taken in 1904. The Hotel Lankershim at the far end of Broadway opened in 1905, but here, the building appears still to be in the later stages of its construction.

Is there any way a normal person living here today would recognize this as Los Angeles? Amazing that a cityscape could change so completely in only one-and-a-half human lifespans, isn't it!

"The Million-Dollar Post Office"

2010-10-15T10:49:00.000-07:00

USC Digital Library

In Los Angeles history, October 1910 is indelibly associated with the unionist terror bombing of the Times Building, but just a fortnight after one major building in the city was destroyed by murderous violence, another important edifice was opened to the public with great jubilation and fanfare, 100 years ago today. It was the brand new Federal Building at Temple Square, colloquially (and somewhat derisively) referred to at the time as "The Million-Dollar Post Office," and it was the pride and joy of the whole city when it was officially dedicated on October 15, 1910.

Sadly, although clearly designed and built to endure for ages, this classic civic building would stand for only 27 years...

Richfield Kodachrome

2010-09-24T10:58:00.000-07:00

A mid-1950s Kodachrome postcard of the magnificent Richfield Building.

click image to enlarge

Can there be any doubt that this jewel was Los Angeles's single most grievous architectural loss of the 20th century?

Return to Angels Flight

2010-07-12T03:48:00.000-07:00

During my recent trip to Los Angeles, I got to ride Angels Flight again for the first time in 49 years.

All aboard!

Viewed from Hill Street, Angels Flight today looks frankly anachronistic and out of place. Two California Plaza (1992) truly towers over the 1901 landmark.

The vista looking southeast from atop Angels Flight, however, looks much as it might have 50 or more years ago. (The view today is actually better than it was in the old days.)

Sinai, ascending...

Angels Flight from Hill Street, 1910. What a difference a century makes!

The County House

2010-07-04T06:55:00.000-07:00

For Independence Day, 2010...

A perhaps unique postcard view of what was then Los Angeles's grandest civic building, depicted in its prime, almost exactly 100 years ago.

Gallery of historical photos

2010-06-27T14:52:00.000-07:00

For the past few days, I have been vacationing in Los Angeles, and twice last week, I had the privilege of visiting the amazing gallery of historical photographs on the 4th floor of City Hall. (Courtesy of Councilmember Tom LaBonge.)

Lining the 4th floor corridors are framed enlargements of some of the most extraordinary images of old Los Angeles I've ever seen. I wish my old digital camera had image stabilization, or I'd be posting about 50 of the pics here! A handful I've seen before in the USC/LAPL archives, but the vast majority of the photos were totally new to me.

If you're an L.A. history nut like me, I'd really urge you to treat yourself to a visit to the 4th floor. I've been there a total of three times now (my first visit was last year), and I intend on going back every chance I get. Don't forget to go up to the observation deck on the 27th floor, too! It's open to the public during business hours on weekdays.

First class People!!

2010-06-10T17:45:00.000-07:00

Here's a nice postcard view of old Broadway south from First Street in the mid-aughts. The sender's note is nice, too: "The finest street of the City, walking first class People!!"

Here is the photograph the postcard was evidently made from.

Note the return address of 625 S. Hope St.

This is what the 600 block of Hope looked like back then. Since odd numbered addresses are on the west sides of streets in L.A., 625 Hope must be one of those little cottages lined up between the Hotel Orena and Hotel Acacia.

Image: Library of Congress

A century later, that stretch of Hope looks just a tad bit different. ;) In fact, Wilshire Boulevard now cuts a wide swath right through where the cottages used to be.

Image: Bing

And 625 S. Hope proper? Today, it's the site of one of Los Angeles's most familiar skyscrapers – none other than the United California Bank Tower (1970), which was the tallest building on the West Coast for much of the time I lived in the L.A. area.

Image: Google

Currently, of course, the UCB/First Interstate building is known as AON Center.

100 years ago today

2010-06-07T12:30:00.000-07:00

Another Spring Street treasure I acquired recently is this postcard that "Therese E." mailed to a Mr. Rudolf Schneider. It was postmarked exactly 100 years ago today.

The postcard depicts the old diagonal alignment of Spring Street which existed before 1928. There are many variants of this image on postcards from this era, but I've never seen one with this sharpness of detail.

The building at the end of Spring Street with the high arched doorway is Los Angeles's then-new Post Office and Federal Building. At the time the postcard was mailed, the impressive edifice had already been under construction for four years, but was not yet open to the public. I'll tell the whole story of the "Million-Dollar Post Office" when its official centennial comes around in October.

New Spring Street treasures

2010-06-02T23:42:00.000-07:00

One of the main reasons I haven't been posting here lately is that there's been a long dearth of worthwhile additions to my L.A. history collection, which regular readers have probably noticed is where I get most of my material.

Anyway, my long drought came to an end a couple of weeks ago with the acquisition of this awesome postcard of the Hotel Nadeau from 1908. This was one of the most important structures in early Los Angeles – it being the city's first-ever four-storey building, and incorporating its first passenger elevator, as well.

The detail is remarkable, isn't it? I was particularly pleased to finally obtain a clear depiction of the Godfrey & Moore pharmacy in the hotel's corner storefront. And what a corner! First and Spring in 1908 – you could hardly imagine a more ideal location for a retail business back then.

Today, of course, the main L.A. Times building occupies this once-vibrant street corner...

And look! I just got this Godfrey & Moore druggist bottle, too. I think this one is older than the Godfrey & Moore bottle I posted about previously. Reason I think that is the presence of a period after "LOS ANGELES." The convention of placing a period at the end of non-sentences ended around 1902, so this bottle probably pre-dates the other (and the postcard) by at least 6 or 7 years.

I also like this specimen because it's a "dug" bottle. It was actually unearthed from somewhere under the old city, so it's almost akin to a fossil...

Bunker Hill panorama: Then & Now

2010-03-18T09:23:00.000-07:00

Bunker Hill, viewed in its entirety, as few people alive today have ever seen it.

c.1939:

Source: USC Digital Library. (Record IDs: whit-m2777, whit-m2775, whit-m2776 & whit-m2779.)
Click on image above to enlarge.

Only one human lifespan later, the same vista is virtually unrecognizable.

2009:

Photo by J. Scott Shannon.
Click on image above to enlarge.

South Broadway, 1905-'06

2010-02-12T05:26:00.000-08:00

Recall the image from my last post, which was taken from the roof of the then-new Hotel Lankershim. Now, turn 90 degrees to your right, and this is what you would see. It's South Broadway, looking north from Seventh Street, in winter 1905-'06 :

Source: USC Digital Library. Click image to enlarge.

A pleasing vista of the old city, isn't it? There are familiar landmarks like the pyramid-topped tower of City Hall up the street, with the Los Angeles County Court House on the hill in the background. At right is the tallest structure in town: The Braly Building, or the Union Trust Building as it was called at that particular time.

I have to laugh at the sign on the also-new Hotel Alexandria at center right. "THIS FIRE PROOF HOTEL IS ABSOLUTELY FIRE PROOF." Sounds like a paraphrasing of a familiar internet meme. ;)

Pop quiz! How could I date this photo so precisely to 1906? Hint: it has to do with the conspicuous absence of two formerly-prominent (and pre-eminent) buildings at the left of this picture. If you know which buildings I'm talking about, then you know it's 1906, too! As far as it being winter – that's a very wintry view of the San Gabriel Mountains there. Looks like it does after a cold front's passed through, if my recollection of the area's seasonal weather features is correct.

As nice as this image is, I've saved the best for last. The next view I'll share with you will take your breath away, I guarantee!

Where the skyscrapers rise today

2010-02-02T03:52:00.000-08:00

I realize I've been remiss in my duty here of late – not posting as much as I should (nor as much as I want). To make amends, I'm going to try to make up for my lack of quantity lately with an emphasis on quality. For starters, here's a view of old L.A. that I'll wager you've not seen before...

Source: USC Digital Library, click image to enlarge. (You must see it full size to appreciate it!)

It's winter 1905-'06, and we're looking northwest from atop the old Hotel Lankershim at Broadway and Seventh, with Seventh Street stretching out to the hills at left. The vista shows what was called the "Apartment District" at the time. Within 25 years, frontage on Seventh would become some of the most valuable urban real estate in the West. And a quarter century after that, the area to the right of center would become the skyscraper district.

It's really something to see this area as an ordinary residential neighborhood, isn't it? Remarkable that essentially everything we see here was wiped clean off the face of the earth without a trace. No earthquake or fire or other natural disaster could have accomplished such a thorough obliteration as was wrought here by the hand of man himself...

Stay tuned! There's another even more remarkable image to follow soon.

Nighttime on Fifth Street

2010-01-22T15:54:00.000-08:00

Fifth Steet, looking east, 1965.

This is probably the most "recent" image I've ever posted here (I usually stick to pre-WWII L.A.), but the color view of the Richfield Tower at night is too good to resist.

How could I tell this was taken in 1965? It has to with the building under construction at lower left. Here's the backstory. (Thanks, Nathan!)

Views of old Los Angeles

2010-01-13T08:05:00.000-08:00

Views of old Los Angeles, compiled by Larry Harnisch...

Pop quiz: Anyone care to guess the exact vantage point for the opening panorama shot?

Year of the palm?

2010-01-01T03:38:00.000-08:00

Will 2010 be the year that I can finally tell the whole story of the Longstreet palms in West Adams? Here's hoping! I've kind of come to an impasse in my own research, unfortunately, as I do not live in the Los Angeles area and so do not have access to the libraries and archives which likely hold the answers I seek.

In the meantime, I recently obtained this unusual "double postcard" of the palms which dates to around 1907. The detail in the enlarged card is remarkable, I think. In this picture, I can distinctly see the Singleton Court gateway in the distance all the way from Adams Street.

Click image to enlarge.

Interesting caption on the card. Palm Drive is referred to as being "famous," and the palms "historical" for being "planted by Gen. Longstreet."

Makes me wonder when (and why) the Longstreet palms stopped being famous and became all-but-forgotten relics of Los Angeles's past...

The complete picture

2009-12-28T04:25:00.000-08:00

In May, I posted this entry about the image of Los Angeles below. It's a photochrom colorized photograph that was taken by the Detroit Publishing Company in 1899-1900 from the tower of the old County Court House.

Click image to enlarge.

Well, it just so happens that I recently found two photos taken the same day from the Court House tower showing the complementing views to the east and west, as well. The panorama is complete!

This is the eastward view (actually more south-eastern). Today, City Hall would be in front of and to the left of us here, and looming very large.

Click image for source, and an enlargement.

And this is the westward prospect. Today, the skyscrapers would dominate the center and left of this picture; the Walt Disney Concert Hall would be visible near the upper right.

Click image for source, and an enlargement.

I especially like the latter view of 1900 Bunker Hill. The neighborhood is still very much in its heyday. Note that the Court Flight funicular railway (1904) has not yet been built on the dirt slope in the foreground at center right. And, in case you're curious, that large, remarkable Victorian residence at Court and Hill Streets is the Bradbury Mansion (1887-1929).

Do click on the images and have a look at the enlargements. The detail that can be seen is really quite impressive.

The Madame of the Opera

2009-12-25T12:21:00.000-08:00

I told you all that I had something special in the works. Well, here it is at long last – a Christmas present to my late mother...

One of the prime reasons I'm so interested in Los Angeles history is that my mom lived and worked in the city from 1934-1951. She moved there immediately after high school to attend Woodbury College, from which she graduated with her executive secretarial master's degree at the top of her class in 1936 at the ripe old age of 18. This was her Woodbury's senior class portrait.

link to original photo on flickr

Mom started out big in the L.A. business world, securing her first position at the Huntington Land Company. She didn't stay there long, though. The following year, her dream job came her way, when she became the first General Secretary of the newly-founded Los Angeles Civic Light Opera Association, working directly under its founder, impresario Edwin Lester.

Here she is in her office in The Auditorium in April, 1938, dealing with Ed Lester's daily mountain of mail.

link to original photo on flickr

(N.b., behind her head is the seating chart for Philharmonic Auditorium. To see it in greater detail, follow the flickr page link directly above and click on the Actions button and select 'View all sizes' for a high-res enlargement.)

The very first production of the LACLO was a musical adaptation of the life of classical composer Franz Schubert called "Blossom Time." Here's Mom's listing in the play's credits.

And here is a photo from the opening night of Blossom Time at Philharmonic Auditorium, June 16, 1938. Dead center is the world-famous actor Edward G. Robinson. Two rows back and to the right, the man picking his nose is none other than John Barrymore, and next to him is his wife, Elaine Barrie. At far upper left is Edwin Lester himself. And who is that smiling woman next to him? Ed Lester's date on his triumphal opening night was my very own mom!

link to original photo on flickr

During the operetta's rehearsals, Mother became good friends with the star of Blossom Time: the famed opera baritone John Charles Thomas, who played Schubert in the LACLO production.

link to original photo on flickr

Later, from 1942-1946, Mother would become J.C.T.'s private secretary during the singer's wartime years in Hollywood with the Westinghouse Radio Players.

link to original photo on flickr

Mother remained lifelong friends with both John Charles Thomas and Edwin Lester. Mom had reserved 5th row center seats at every LACLO production for life, courtesy of Mr. Lester. He acknowledged that he couldn't have gotten LACLO off the ground were it not for my mom's assistance back in 1938. Lillian Lowney was, indeed, the original Madame of Los Angeles's Civic Light Opera! I'm proud that my mom had this bit part in L.A.'s musical/cultural history, and I'm glad I've finally gotten the opportunity to tell her story here.

L.A. Christmas, 1899

2009-12-18T05:48:00.001-08:00

Click image to enlarge.

The Melrose

2009-12-04T20:47:00.000-08:00

One of my favorite Bunker Hill landmarks was the old Hotel Melrose (1882-1957), 130 South Grand Avenue, ?1946.

USC Digital Library-California Historical Society

The Melrose and its next-door neighbor, the Hotel Richelieu.

Los Angeles Public Library Photo Collection

The original and the "new" Melrose (at left).

Los Angeles Public Library Photo Collection

120 South Grand:

USC Digital Library-Los Angeles Examiner

1957. Note proximity to other downtown landmarks:

USC Digital Library-Los Angeles Examiner

View of Los Angeles from the Hotel Melrose, circa 1914:

Looking east:

USC Digital Library-California Historical Society

USC Digital Library-California Historical Society

Toward the southeast (c.1904):

USC Digital Library-California Historical Society

If you could stand on the front porch of the Melrose today, and look across the street, this is what you'd see. (You probably recognize the location better now.)

Link to Google Maps Street View

Check-out time, 1957.

USC Digital Library-Los Angeles Examiner

USC Digital Library-Los Angeles Examiner

USC Digital Library-Los Angeles Examiner

Old panoramic "birds-eye" maps

2009-11-27T22:19:00.000-08:00

These "birds-eye" maps of old Los Angeles on the Library of Congress website are must-have resources for any serious student of L.A. history.

The 1909 map is, in my humble opinion, the Greatest Map of L.A. Ever! This is the image that I referred to in this older post that first put the hooks in me with regard to historical Los Angeles. I've practically memorized this map, I've looked at it so many times.

Viewing tip: when you click on the thumbnail image and go to the Library of Congress page, don't bother with the complicated inline viewer, just go to the lower left of each page where it says "Download JPEG2000 image," snag that file, then view it directly in your computer's default picture-viewing program.

1909:

Click image for source at Library Of Congress.

1894:

Click image for source at Library Of Congress.

This one is notable for the detail of the landmark buildings depicted on its margins.

1891:

Click image for source at Library Of Congress.

This is the earliest birds-eye map of Los Angeles in the online LOC database. Note the covered bridge over the Los Angeles River at Macy Street...

1874:

Click image for source at Library Of Congress.

Old Civic Center – South to City Hall

2009-11-22T20:04:00.000-08:00

Broadway was the center of civil and commercial life in old Los Angeles. This was the view looking south on Broadway from the Hall Of Records in approximately 1915.

One block down, at the NE corner of Broadway and First, was the L.A. Times building, re-built after the 1910 labor bombing. In the distance, the structure with the pyramid-topped tower was the Los Angeles City Hall, erected in 1888 at 226-238 South Broadway. The postcard view below is from around the turn of the last century.

This grand Romanesque edifice of marble and red sandstone stood for only 40 years, however. It was torn down following the completion of the present City Hall in 1928.

Today, there's nothing to show that this was once an important site in Los Angeles history. It's just for parking now.

Actually, the old City Hall isn't completely gone. The Hosfield Building at right was built in 1914 as an annex to house city departments. I'd much rather the Hosfield Building was the one razed for parking, though. It really was a crime to demolish that elegant old civic landmark...

Old Civic Center

2009-11-12T01:07:00.000-08:00

These two postcard views give a really good idea of what the old Los Angeles Civic Center looked like, and where the buildings were in relation to each other.

In the top one, the intersection in the foreground is Broadway and Temple, and we're looking roughly north. At left, where the Broadway Tunnel and those trees are – that's where the 101 freeway "slot" is today. You'll recognize the 1922 Hall of Justice, of course, and the red sandstone building at right is the old Los Angeles County Court House (1888).

Now turn 90 degrees to the right, and see the familiar 1928 City Hall rising behind the Court House, and the Hall Of Records (1910) at right.

Judging by the similarity in the ivy growth on the Court House, I'd say that the two postcard photos were taken within a year or two of each other. The cars in the top one definitely look '20s-ish, and the presence of the new City Hall in the bottom image means it can't be earlier than 1928. So 1928-1930 seems a good guess for when this point in time existed in Los Angeles's past...

The old and the new

2009-11-09T07:56:00.000-08:00

Main Street south from Republic Street, 1939:

Today:

View Larger Map

In only 30 years...

2009-11-07T04:58:00.000-08:00

Cahuenga Pass, 1911:

Los Angeles Public Library.

Cahuenga Boulevard, 1941:

Los Angeles Public Library.

All this change in only 30 years! Not as much change since then, though; the Hollywood Freeway today still follows basically the same path as this old road. It's really something to see Cahuenga Pass when it was only a dirt road traversed by horse teams, though. It's amazing to think that was less than 100 years ago. Only 1-1/2 normal human lifetimes, and Cahuenga Pass is almost unrecognizable from what it originally was...

The Bryson-Bonebrake Block

2009-11-04T23:58:00.000-08:00

At the time of its construction in 1888, the Bryson-Bonebrake Block was without question the most attractive and architecturally-significant office building in Los Angeles.

Photo courtesy Floyd Bariscale on flickr

Floyd Bariscale quotes a contemporary source describing the new civic showpiece:

"Designed by Joseph Cather Newsom in 1888, located on the northwest corner on 2nd and Spring in Los Angles. From a 1981 reprint of J.C. Newsom's Artistic Buildings and Homes of Los Angeles:

'Bryson-Bonebrake Block, commissioned by John Bryson, Sr., Los Angeles Mayor, and Major George H. Bonebrake, banker, this huge office building was Newsom's most ambitious and commercial structure. The Los Angeles Times, September 17, 1888 reports: "At the corner of Second and Springs streets, is one of the largest and most substantial in Southern California, and is most ornamental in appearance. It is six stories and a basement in height, and will contain four stories, one bank, 126 rooms, and a lodgeroom on the sixth floor. It has 120 feet frontage on Spring street and 103 feet frontage on Second steet. The rooms are all large and well ventilated, and the halls are wide and lighted by light wells. The principal features of the building are the massive and elegantly carved stone entrance, with its beautifully grained Colton marble shafts, carved stone caps and base of Moorish design, and the court in the center of the building throwing light into the corridors and inner rooms. The steps of the entrance are of the best granite, and the entrance is tiled and has marble wainscoting. On one side is a large bulletin-board, and on the other a richly-carved staircase with marble steps... The interior of the building is finished in cedar, and the plumbing is of the best... All the offices are heated and lighted with gas, and there are electric bells from each room to the bulletin board on the first floor. The elevator runs from the basement to the sixth floor. There is a fine [sic] hose reel on each floor for use in case of fire. Its cost will be $224,000.'"

More 19th century views of the Bryson block...

Grand opening, 1888 - The Court House on Pound Cake Hill in the distance right of center was also constructed this same year. Also, note how Spring Street originally veered to the right after its intersection with First Street.

USC Digital Library

Looking west on Second Street from Spring.

California State Library

1905 - A nice close view showing the intricate exterior decorative elements of the Bryson block. Note that the entire original ornate top of the building has been removed and replaced by two additional storeys of offices.

USC Digital Library

1934 - Only 46 years after its construction, demolition of the Bryson block is underway. An annex building of the Los Angeles Times occupies the site today.

USC Digital Library

Temple Square

2009-11-04T19:37:00.000-08:00

From the 1860s to the 1930s, Temple Square was the original "civic center" of Los Angeles. Formed by the junction of Main, Temple and Spring Streets, it was the nexus of everyday life in the old city. Here are some postcard views of Temple Square from the first and second decades of the 20th century...

Today, no one looking at the intersection of Main and Temple could guess that a grand open public space once existed there. Temple Square has vanished without a trace from the face of the earth...

Southwest from City Hall: Then & Now

2009-10-29T02:35:00.000-07:00

I'm not quite done with the special project I've been working on of late, but I just got this old postcard and I can't wait to do a quick "Then & Now" with it.

As usual, I can't be absolutely certain about the date of this photo, but I'm thinking it's probably around 1962. The buildings around Angels Flight have been razed by this time, but The Dome is still alive and well at the corner of Second and Grand (upper right), so I think this is a good ballpark guess.

click image to enlarge

Taken by me from the observation deck of City Hall during my visit on July 10, 2009. I have to say – when I first saw that block-square open pit at First and Broadway, I had mixed feelings about it, but now that I see the building that was there before (The California State Office Building?), I have to say the current open space is a significant improvement.

click image to enlarge

It's interesting to me to think that the old photo is from a time that is actually within my living memory. This Then & Now comparison illustrates pretty much exactly the extent to which downtown Los Angeles has changed in the short space of my own lifetime...

Hiatus

2009-10-22T11:15:00.000-07:00

My apologies for the lack of updates recently. Due to Real Life circumstances, I've been forced to take a bit of a hiatus from writing about my favorite avocation here. When I come back, though, I'll have something really special to share – something quite different than what I usually post, and more personal, too. Anyway, rest assured, Los Angeles Past will be back again in a week or two. Stay tuned!

Palm Drive: Then & Now

2009-10-04T19:38:00.000-07:00

Nathan Marsak recently sent me this lush postcard image of the palm drive of Singleton Court in West Adams, circa 1915. These are the Longstreet palms which I've written about previously. Planted circa 1875, the 23 Longstreet palms that remain today are quite possibly the oldest living things in Los Angeles. These trees have a continuous documented photographic history which alone affirmatively attests to their great age.

Palm Drive, Singleton Court, West Adams, c.1915:

click image to enlarge

The same view of Palm Drive, 2009:

click image to enlarge

These palms actually began life during the Civil War, almost a century and a half ago. Only five buildings still standing in all of Los Angeles are older than these palm trees. They may look just like any others, but the Longstreet palms are really quite special, indeed...

Mission statement

2009-09-25T08:57:00.000-07:00

It's "history" now (literally), but "Los Angeles Past" actually started out on LiveJournal. One feature of LJ that I liked was their profile page where you could write at length about yourself and why you're keeping a journal there – like a blog mission statement. Unfortunately, my LiveJournal "Bio" is too long for my Blogger profile, so I thought I'd post the LJ blurb here so readers can better understand my motivation for creating Los Angeles Past...

"Natural and man-made catastrophes have played a part in the destruction of many old cityscapes in the United States. The original buildings of our nation's capital city – Washington, D.C. – were torched by invading British troops during the War of 1812. Most of Chicago was wiped out by its Great Fire of 1871. Victorian San Francisco was destroyed by its famous earthquake and fire of 1906.

"Historical Los Angeles, though, suffered a no-less-thorough destruction of its own. This civic calamity was no act of war nor of God, however. Old L.A. was destroyed intentionally by its own government and citizenry in the name of 'progress.'

"So complete was this man-wrought devastation that a person born in Los Angeles in 1875 and living a normal life span of 75 years would have lived long enough to see virtually the entire city they grew up and grew old in wiped clean off the face of the earth. And whatever life there was left in Los Angeles by 1950 was finally bled out of it by the freeways.

"By the time I was born in an L.A. suburb in 1954, Los Angeles had become little more than a commuter destination. When I was growing up, that's all it ever was to me. I never knew Los Angeles as a living city, as my mother and father had. So when I left the L.A. area for greener pastures at the age of 28, I didn't feel like I was leaving anyplace particularly special.

"In recent years, however, I have been delving ever-deeper into the pre-WWII history of Los Angeles, and I'm finding it to be quite a revelatory experience. Piece by piece, I am uncovering a vanished world. This historical city is almost entirely new and unfamiliar to me. It's been a fascinating adventure thus far! Old Los Angeles was a truly amazing place. Have a look through this blog and you'll see what I mean!

Historical map overlays at ucla.edu

2009-09-24T03:56:00.000-07:00

[Note: the information in this post is obsolete. The link below still works, however the instructions given here do not. Navigate the site as best as you can; I have yet to figure it out, myself! -JSS, 1/9/2012]

Recently, reader Gregg D'Albert wrote to tell me about the "hypercities" project at ucla.edu. This is an archive of historical maps of Los Angeles city and county that you can view in their original form, and also view as overlays on today's Google maps. Got a few minutes to explore a little? Whenever you're ready, begin by opening the URL below into a new browser tab or window:

http://linuxdev.ats.ucla.edu/#item_type=collection&item_id=8835

The site does have some limitations. For one thing, it can't be used with Internet Explorer. The interface is also a bit confusing at first. Here's how to view the maps and overlays.

First, go to the upper right of the map, and change the view from Satellite to Map. While you're up there, click the X box in the upper right of the sidebar to reveal the map selection menu.

Next, click the green button at upper left. Then, browse the available maps in the sidebar. Mouseovers of each menu item show the area covered by that map.

My favorite one to start out with is the 1898 "Official Map of the County of Los Angeles California." Click on that item in the sidebar, then wait for the map to load at left. (This can take awhile if you have slow DSL like I do.)

Now notice that there is a slide control inside the map's sidebar item. Move that back and forth to adjust the transparency of the historical level.

With the 1898 map, though, I recommend first just inspecting it as is for awhile. Zoom in there for a close look (remember to be patient as the historical map loads). The details are really fascinating! Find where you live now and see it as it was just over 100 years ago, and be amazed at the changes that have occurred here in the span of only 1-1/2 lifetimes...

Another one that's fun to explore is the 1897 Maxwell's City Directory street map. See Wilshire Boulevard when it was only 4 blocks long!

From 1897: The new Wilshire Boulevard at upper center (ats.ucla.edu).

Here, also, is a much better overlay "then and now" map of the streets of Downtown than I presented in this post.

I hope the folks at ats.ucla.edu won't mind me reproducing this small portion of its wealth of old maps! That hypercities site really is quite addictive, I must say.

Plan for proposed Los Angeles Civic Center, 1940

2009-09-18T02:34:00.001-07:00

At first glance it almost looks like something out of Stalin's USSR, or maybe even the Third Reich. Then parts of it start to look familiar. It's actually the Los Angeles Civic Center – at least someone's idea of what it should look like in the years after 1940.

Look at that completely absurd County government ~~building~~ palace in the foreground. It looks like Las Vegas in downtown L.A.! Thank goodness that monstrosity never got built...

I wish I knew the story behind this proposed but never-implemented plan, but I don't. Given the grandiose nature of that County building, though, it almost had to be the County's idea. ;)

Source on the USC Digital Library.

South from 250 Spring, in the "Aughts"

2009-09-12T00:43:00.000-07:00

Here's an interesting pair of postcards from the "aught" years of the 20th century. Both were taken from approximately the middle of the 200 block of Spring Street toward its intersection with Third Street. The top one faces the east side of Spring; the bottom one, the corresponding west side.

click image to enlarge

click image to enlarge

Note, in the one at top, the caption says, "...South from Elk's Hall..." Now, at far right in the bottom postcard, see the balcony with the mounted deer's head in the archway? (You may have to enlarge the pic to see it.) Logically, that must be the Elk's Hall! Curiously, the balcony and archway are both hung with black crepe, indicating mourning, and there's a portrait of the deceased in the center of the balcony's railing. I wonder who that could have been...

The bottom image is definitely older. I can maybe see one automobile among all those carriages and trolleys, so the photo was probably taken close to the turn of the last century. (So, could the deceased perhaps be President McKinley, assassinated in '01?) The top one could very well be right up-to-date with its 1907 inscription. At least three or four motor vehicles in that one.

What's still standing now? Not much. Less on the west side of the street, for sure. As far as I can tell, only the Douglas Building (the 5-storey block just left of center in the bottom postcard) remains today. On the east side of Spring, in the distance, there's the Hellman Building touched by the bottom tip of the hand-penned "7", and behind it, at the SE corner of Spring and Fourth, still stands the Braly Building. (Sorry, I obstinately refuse to call it the Continental Building. This was originally and always will be the Braly to me!)

Another pop quiz! Easy question: what is the name of the building at the extreme left edge of the top postcard – at the NE corner of Third and Spring? A bit more challenging: in the bottom pic, what's the building across Third Street from the Douglas? Don't be fooled! There were several similar-looking structures within a three-block radius of here in the old days.

Anyway, I just love the vibrant crispness of both of these images – the bustling street, the crowded sidewalks – how genuinely dynamic and alive it all appears. There's so much to appreciate in these old postcards, isn't there?

New old Court House view

2009-09-09T07:57:00.000-07:00

click image to enlarge

Another nice postcard view of one of my favorite buildings in the vanished city: the majestic Los Angeles County Court House, circa 1906. The vantage point was the intersection of Temple and New High Streets. No such intersection exists now, but Spring Street today crosses Temple within a few feet of this very spot...

The Spring Street diagonal, revisited

2009-09-05T06:18:00.000-07:00

In this post from May, I talked about the original diagonal alignment of Spring Street from its intersection with First north to Temple Street. I stated then that the old alignment was done away with when construction began on the new City Hall in 1927. I didn't make that up – I'd read it somewhere else before – but this past week, while looking up reference material on the LAPL website for my last post, I was delighted to discover photographic evidence that at least a portion of the old diagonal still existed until after the new City Hall was completed.

First, here is the Spring Street diagonal looking north from First Street in 1887:

Photo courtesy Los Angeles Public Library.

And here is the same view, 40 years later:

Photo courtesy Los Angeles Public Library.

See? There's the southern section of the diagonal alignment, still intact, with the completed City Hall in the background!

Then I found this photo of a Spring Street in transition taken around the same time from atop the new City Hall:

Photo courtesy Los Angeles Public Library.

Isn't that neat? I was especially surprised to see that the intersection of Spring and Franklin (foreground) still existed as late as 1928.

Finally, here's a view from the north side of the new City Hall. That trapezoidal building at center is the ancient Temple Block – once the center of civic life in 19th century Los Angeles – also still standing much later than I imagined.

Photo courtesy Los Angeles Public Library.

And, from this old post, here's the Temple Block and City Hall as viewed from Temple Square:

Photo from La Reina - Los Angeles in Three Centuries, Published by Security Trust & Savings Bank, Los Angeles, 1929.

I love discovering new stuff like this. It really brings the old city alive for me! :-)

More buried treasure!

2009-08-30T15:13:00.000-07:00

Just added a new treasure to my collection! This pharmacy bottle dates to sometime around the turn of the last century...

Not nearly as rare as my Broadway and Temple medicine bottle, but this is a much nicer specimen of its type.

Pop quiz! As you can see, the location is given as:

S.W. Cor. First & Spring

In which building in historical Los Angeles was the Godfrey & Moore pharmacy located?

EDIT: Reader "Duncan" answered correctly. It was the Hotel Nadeau. Here is the SW corner of First & Spring in the mid-1880s, when the hotel was brand spanking new:

Image courtesy Los Angeles Public Library.

Today, of course, the main building of the Los Angeles Times occupies this site.

Speaking of names...

2009-08-29T06:20:00.000-07:00

Speaking of original names, I confess I've long had my doubts about the alleged appellation of nuestro pueblo at the time of its founding. According to almost every account, it was:

El Pueblo de Nuestra Señora la Reina de los Angeles del Río de Porciúncula

Am I alone in thinking that this sounds just a wee bit contrived? There are probably more letters in this name than there were residents in the original settlement!

Well, it so happens that recently I found out that I'm not alone in my suspicions. Buried in the references of the Wikipedia entry for Los Angeles is this notation:

There is some question about the legitimacy of this name, which may have, through a series of misinterpretations and inflations, been corrupted from the actual name authorized in writing in 1781, "La Reina de Los Angeles". Cf. Theodore E. Treutlein, "Los Angeles, California: The Question of the City's Original Spanish Name", Southern California Quarterly 55, no. 1 (Spring 1973): 1-7. Historian Doyce B. Nunis, Jr., has traced the longer name to the histories written by the Franciscan missionaries, especially Francisco Palóu, who wished to play up the region's connections to their order. Pool, Bob, "City of Angels' First Name Still Bedevils Historians". Los Angeles Times (March 26, 2005), Sec. A-1.

Notate bene that this reference states unequivocally that, "the actual name authorized in writing in 1781 [was], 'La Reina de Los Angeles' (The Queen of the Angels)." If this is true, then why, oh why, should the absurdly long mythological name be further perpetuated?

Another picky-picky-picky observation on my part...

La Reina de Los Angeles

Consider: the city was named for the Queen (La Reina) of the Angels, not the angels (Los Angeles) themselves. So shouldn't the short form of the Spanish name be "La Reina?" It's not the "City of the Angels," as you always hear, it's actually the city of the Angels' Queen. Where did this go wrong? The original settlement name of San Diego was "San Diego de Alcalá," but we don't call it Alcala today, nor did what was first dubbed "San Francisco de Asís" end up being called Asis. The cities were named for St. James and St. Francis respectively, not their referential associations.

I'm sure we can thank the Americans for the bastardized name, "Los Angeles." If the old town had remained Mexican through its entire history, I have little doubt that today the city would be called "La Reina" instead.

Post scriptum: As you can see, at least one book on Los Angeles history got it right. ;)

La Reina - Los Angeles in Three Centuries, Published by Security Trust & Savings Bank, Los Angeles, 1929.

To apostrophe, or not to apostrophe?

2009-08-23T14:15:00.000-07:00

I know it's regarded as historical canon these days that the name "Angels Flight" is not supposed to contain any apostrophes. Being the fan of heterodoxy that I am, however, I would like to ask someone/anyone to produce documentary proof for this lack of possessive punctuation. I wish to see conclusive evidence that the original name of our world famous funicular railway is, in reality, what modern experts on the subject say it is.

The main reason I have my doubts about this is that, back in the '00s, '10s and '20s, when there were lots of people around who should know the correct, original spelling, the appellation is apostrophized more often than not; as either "Angel's" or "Angels'." It seems to me that the apostrophized spelling only fell out of favor after the 1920s, when the The Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks erected the massive filigreed archway that today is the landmark's signature. There is no apostrophe to be found on this monument. But should there be, in actual fact? I do wonder...

So, can someone maybe produce, say, a copy of the architect's/builder's original plans that would prove their intent to either apostrophize or not apostrophize the railway's name? Or perhaps there was an official program printed for the dedication of the railway in 1901 that would settle this spelling question once and for all. Even a good, close-up photo of the original archway should do.

Until I see proof one way or another, I will continue to abstain from using apostrophes when I spell "Angels Flight," but I remain quite curious about just exactly how the name should properly be punctuated....or not, as the case may be.

Whose palms are these, anyway?

2009-08-14T09:07:00.000-07:00

Seems I've uncovered a bit of a mystery. Here, previously, I've told the story of "General Longstreet's palms." In it, I related information I found on the USC Digital Library site which stated that the palms and the house pictured in these two photos were on property owned by Confederate General James Longstreet, most notably of the Battle of Gettysburg fame.

Trouble is, subsequently, I have never been able to independently corroborate that James Longstreet ever lived in Los Angeles, or that he even owned property there. No biography of the man that I've been able to find thus far has him setting foot in California during his entire life.

Then, the other day, thanks to reader Gregg D'Albert, I got pointed to the hypercities site hosted on ucla.edu, and there I found an 1884 map of Los Angeles showing the ownership of plots of land in the old city. Of course, the first thing I did was go to Figueroa and Adams to see who owned the Longstreet palms.

Well, as you can see, the tract in question was, indeed, owned by a Longstreet, but it was "C.A. Longstreet," not "J. Longstreet." Hmmm. Maybe "C.A." stood for "Confederate Army?" Not likely on a deed map like this one; "C.A." would have to be the initials of the legal owner of the property. James Longstreet's wife, perhaps? No, she was named "Louise." A child, or other kin? In my searching, I could find no relative or descendant of General James Longstreet who had the initials "C.A."

Then I thought, wait, there was that 1938 Nuestro Pueblo article about the palms that also referred to a General Longstreet. Surprise! I'd missed the fact previously that that article referred to a Gen. Joseph Longstreet, not James Longstreet. Also, this Joseph Longstreet's wife was named Lucy, not Louise, and Lucy had died in 1917, versus 1890 for the CSA General's wife.

So, who then was General Joseph Longstreet, and how was "C.A. Longstreet" related to him? I've tried finding info about the other Longstreet on the web, but my search has gone nowhere yet.

Whatever Gen. Longstreet planted those palms, though, they still remain historically significant as possibly the oldest living things in Los Angeles. It would have been nice to be able to connect them with the famous General Longstreet, but even a not-so-famous General Longstreet will do just as nicely, too. ^^

View from the top

2009-08-03T03:13:00.001-07:00

For at least 25 years after Angels Flight opened, there was an observation tower adjacent to the incline railway from which one could take in a breathtaking overlook of downtown Los Angeles. Here's a commonly-seen view of Angels Flight from the bottom. (Please pardon the spelling!)

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And the much more rarely-seen view from the top of the observation tower.

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It's a rather dizzying sight, isn't it? We're even higher up here than Bunker Hill itself! What a teeming multitude is below. Judging by the shadows and the crowd, it looks like it's noontime on a high summer's workday, and yearwise, you can tell we're still in the "aughts" here as indicated by the scarcity of automobiles. It's almost all foot- and trolley-traffic down there.

Here's another view from the top of the tower, from the LAPL archives. This one dates closer to the 1901 opening of Angels Flight, though...

Where Mother was: Then & Now

2009-07-30T05:44:00.000-07:00

In this old post, I told the story of my mother having had her picture taken by a street photographer somewhere in downtown Los Angeles in 1936, when she was a 19-year-old secretary for the Huntington Land Company. Some time later, I finally identified the location of the picture as having been the 900 block of South Broadway. Here's a nice clear photo of the locale in 1939.

USC Digital Library-Dick Whittington Photography Collection

Anyway, thereafter, I decided that if I ever went back to Los Angeles, I would like to visit the place where my mother was photographed, 73 years ago. And three Wednesdays ago, during my recent L.A. vacation, I did just that.

Here's the exact spot, then and now.

Remarkably, relatively little in the background has changed in the intervening seven decades. The two principal buildings visible in the old photograph are still there – the 9th and Broadway Building (1929), and the L.L. Burns Building (1914); the latter is the one with the "Kelly's" ad painted on its side. (No ads today – this section of Broadway is not in any way the commercial hotspot it used to be.) The lampposts are noticeably different in height and style, but the bases themselves are apparently the same ones as when Mother was there.

And where was Mom walking to that day in October, 1936? Probably to a trolley stop at the intersection of South Broadway and Olympic Blvd., which is only a few feet in back of where the 1936 photographer was standing.

Heh, it's funny, when I was there last week, I tried to show Mom's picture to several passers-by, but nobody could be bothered. Admittedly, if I were walking on South Broadway and some stranger asked if I'd like to see a picture of his mother, I'd probably avoid the guy, too. ;)

The palms yet live!

2009-07-26T04:30:00.000-07:00

I've just returned from my first visit to Los Angeles in 10 years, and by far, the greatest thrill of my trip was seeing that at least some of General Longstreet's ancient palm trees in West Adams are still alive. After reading this, I was genuinely afraid that all of the old palms might have been removed by now. What a relief it was to see that my fears were not realized.

Here's a gallery of palm pics taken during my visit on July 17. Thanks to Deborah Justice at Orthopaedic Hospital for granting me permission to take photos on the site.

Many of the 150-year-old palms have been removed over the decades, but 23 of them are still thriving today...

click image to enlarge
link to original photo on flickr

The palms are in their full summer bloom now and are still robustly healthy, despite their great age and having been immediately adjacent to the bustling, smog-belching Harbor Freeway for the last third of their almost impossibly long lives.

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link to original photo on flickr

What a joy it was to be in the presence of these Civil War-era veterans. Los Angeles historically has been characterized by impermanence, but these palms are a living testament to endurance in the face of constant change. All in all, theirs is quite an inspiring story. I consider it an honor to have passed that story on to Angelenos of the 21st century...

City Hall rotunda

2009-07-10T18:25:00.000-07:00

View of the central rotunda from the fourth floor inside Los Angeles City Hall, taken earlier today.

click image to enlarge
link to original photo on flickr

My post office (again)

2009-07-01T22:20:00.000-07:00

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Here's a nice view of Temple Square looking west toward my (yes, my!) post office, from what would probably have been the intersection of No. Main Street and Commercial Street, otherwise known as Ducommon Corner. And, judging by where the cars are headed, I'd guess we're standing on the southeast corner of Main and Commercial, in front of the U.S. National Bank. When? Best guess, c.1910, probably not too long after the new post office first opened for business.

To get your bearings of where this was, the north bit of the present City Hall would today be visible just beyond the left edge of the postcard.

At left is the good ol' International Savings and Exchange Bank at what used to be the northern terminus of Spring Street, and between the two buildings can be seen a smidgen of the old Los Angeles County Court House at Temple and Broadway.

Louis Phillips at Spadra Cemetery

2009-06-08T04:40:00.000-07:00

Louis Phillips was an important figure in late 19th century Los Angeles. He's perhaps best known as the developer of the elegant Phillips Block (1887-1912), formerly located at Spring and Franklin Streets.

Although influential in the commercial life of Los Angeles, Louis Phillips did not reside in the city itself. He lived on his land holdings in Spadra, on Rancho San Jose in eastern Los Angeles County. In 1875, Phillips built a mansion at Spadra, and there he dwelt for the rest of his life. When he died in 1900, Phillips was interred at nearby Spadra Cemetery.

Now for a personal connection. It turns out that I knew about the pioneer Phillips family decades before I became an L.A. history buff. It just so happens that, in the 1920s, my father went to school in nearby Pomona with one of Louis Phillips's descendants. One of the few stories Dad used to tell about his childhood was how he got a bad case of poison oak while he and the Phillips boy were hiking up on Elephant Hill, which overlooked the old family mansion...and Spadra Cemetery.

I'd known about this old settlers burial ground myself since the 57 freeway was built in the early 1970s; it could be clearly seen from the northbound viaduct as it came down from Diamond Bar. I was intrigued by the place, but I never actually visited the cemetery until 1998. When I did, I was pleased to discover the Phillips family plot there, and I took this photo of the marble monument.

click image to enlarge

While researching this post, however, I was shocked to learn that Phillips's gravestone had more recently been vandalized.

click image to view Flickr page; photo by rwpeary.

Bastards! This sort of thing genuinely sickens me...

A pleasant prospect

2009-06-03T03:04:00.000-07:00

Received yesterday another postcard view I've long been eager to acquire – this pleasant prospect of Los Angeles, as seen looking east from Bunker Hill, near Olive and First Streets, sometime around the turn of the last century.

click image to enlarge

I'm truly transported by scenes like this. It's a time and a place I never knew, but I feel completely at home here. Unlike the L.A. of my younger years, this is a town that I could have lived in and genuinely loved...

Some familiar landmarks stand out. Looming over downtown, at left, there's the old County Court House. In the center can be seen the Phillips Block – in its heyday the largest mercantile building in the city – at Spring and Franklin Streets. And, toward the lower right, with its broad cupola, is the ill-fated Times Building at First and Broadway. (Its presence in this view establishes the date at no later than 1910.)

Interestingly, the USC Digital Archive has the actual photograph this postcard was made from. (The date's given as circa 1887, but the old Boyle Heights orphanage is visible on the far horizon, so it can't be earlier than 1890.)

The view from Olive and First Streets is quite different today. (And not in a good way.)

The last time I was in Los Angeles – ten years ago – I walked past this very spot. I could never have imagined that, a century before, such tranquil beauty once existed there...

Downtown Harbor Freeway, 50 years ago

2009-06-01T18:21:00.000-07:00

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Today, this is the downtown section of the Pasadena Freeway (Interstate 110). In 1959, though, when this photo was taken, it was the northernmost section of the Harbor Freeway (California State Highway 11), and this is how I first remember it.

I like this photo primarily for its composition, but also because it gives a great close-up view of what an old L.A. freeway looked like. Mom hated the Harbor Freeway, though, so we rarely took this route, but I still have vivid recollections of the eastern San Bernardino Freeway (U.S. 99 then/I-10 now) in the late '50s, and our hometown stretch looked exactly like this (minus the fancy planters in the center divider).

The freeways were quite different back then. For one thing, all of the exit and informational signs on the original freeways were made of porcelain steel, and had white letters on a black background, like the one here that says "Downtown." The smaller informational signs at the roadside had reflectors in the letters so they could be read at night, but the large signs were illuminated by lights, much like a billboard. (Here's another view of the Downtown Harbor, showing some nice examples of the larger black-and-white signage.) The first time I remember seeing the green freeway signs of today was when the first stretch of the Santa Monica Freeway opened in 1961.

To me, though, the most remarkable feature of the early freeways was the complete absence of any kind of crash barrier in the median strip. This plus the fact that seat belts were still a relatively rare innovation in the 1950s – well, it's no wonder many people back then thought that driving on a freeway was literally taking your life in your hands. Note that the curb isn't even sharply angled to keep a tire from straying into the dividing strip. It's easy to imagine how someone in the fast lane could take their eyes off the road for only a second or two, drift to the left a few inches, then suddenly find themselves facing an imminent, fatal head-on collision. (Here is a photo of the Pasadena Freeway in 1958, showing a similar lack of any effective barrier in the median.)

The first built-in barrier I can recall was again on the new downtown Santa Monica in 1961, which had chain-link fencing in the center divider. (!!!) Oh yeah, I felt A LOT safer then! It was only after they started using chain-link, though, that you could see just how often cars strayed into the median (and how pathetic the chain-link was at preventing cross-overs). Really, that fencing looked like a war zone in places. And it must have been a genuine pain to repair, too, as the metal posts were seated directly into the asphalt of the center divide.

One thing about the freeways that's stayed the same over the last 50 years is the traffic congestion. Everything else in L.A. may change, but traffic jams there really are forever.

Photos courtesy of the USC Digital Archive.

L.A. Streets: Then and Now

2009-05-19T22:22:00.000-07:00

Back when I was first learning about Los Angeles past, I made frequent use of Brent Dickerson's wonderful illustrated historical narrative, A Visit to Old Los Angeles and Environs. (I continue to learn a lot from it to this day, in fact.) Anyway, in his page about New High Street and Broadway, Mr. Dickerson presents a map of the street layout in downtown in the early 20th century. I've found it to be very useful a number of times, especially for finding streets that no longer exist.

A few months ago, though, I got the idea to superimpose a Google map from today over the old map, mostly to see exactly where the freeways were built in relation to the existing streets and neighborhoods of the '40s and '50s. Here was the result:

Unfortunately, I couldn't get the two maps to align precisely, but this was a good enough result for the purpose I intended, and much more. I hope you find the many possible comparisons as interesting as I do!

(Thanks to Mr. Dickerson for permission to post the modification of his original map.)

ADDENDUM: There is a much better overlay map in this post. Check that one out, if you haven't already.

View from the Court House tower, circa 1900

2009-05-16T01:43:00.000-07:00

Found a lovely image online yesterday of one of my very favorite views of old Los Angeles. It depicts downtown as seen looking south from the clock tower of the County Court House (1888-1933), formerly located at the corner of Broadway and Temple Street. I have almost a dozen postcards depicting this view, but none are anywhere near as nice as this one.

click image to enlarge

If you live in L.A. today, ask yourself – does anything here look familiar to you? Anything at all? If I told you that's Spring Street at left and Broadway at right, would that help? Probably not, because hardly anything you see in this picture still exists today.

I'm no real expert, myself, but I can identify only four structures in this image that are still standing: the Bradbury (1893), Irvine-Byrne (1895) and Homer Laughlin (1896) buildings around Broadway and Third, and the Douglas Building (1898) at Spring and Third.

Because of the presence of the Douglas Building, this image can't be from earlier than 1898. However, it can't be later than 1903, because the Bryson-Bonebrake Block at the NW corner of Spring and Second still has its ornate Victorian gables, and construction of the Braly Building at the SE corner of Spring and Fourth has not yet begun. And actually, I think I can pin it down to 1900 exactly, because I have a photo of the gabled Bryson-Bonebrake dated 1900 that has at least two of the same three advertisements painted on the north side of the building.

*whew!* History can be really exhausting sometimes! ;)

Anyway, here is the old Court House from whose tower that picture was taken.

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I guesstimate this view dates from roughly the same period as the vista of downtown. It's definitely from 1896-1908, because at least one of the smaller U.S. flags there has 45 stars. The height of the palms, however, makes me suspect that it's more likely closer to 1908 than 1896. That big flag has only 44 stars, though (that was our flag from 1891-1896), so who really knows. I'll still go with circa 1908, I think. It really can't be much later, because construction on the new Hall of Records just south of the Court House began the following year, and there's no evidence of that happening yet.

Oh yeah, I almost forgot – to get your bearings, the part of downtown where the majority of the really tall skyscrapers are today would be at the extreme right of the top picture. In fact, only one or two of them would be visible from this frame of reference if it existed now. Not only is this original vantage point gone, though, pretty much everything else someone could see from there is, too. So it goes in ever-changing Los Angeles...

Western and Wilshire in 1925

2009-05-07T08:08:00.000-07:00

Got this old postcard via eBay the other day. It shows Western Avenue from its intersection with "Wiltshire" Boulevard, from around 1925. I bought it almost as an afterthought, but having it in hand and looking closely at it, I've found it to be quite interesting.

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First, just to get our bearings, the street corner at lower right by the blue car is where the Wiltern Theatre would be built about half-a-decade later. Today, across Wilshire, where the Standard Public Market is in the postcard, stands the new Solair residential and retail center. The neighborhood's changed quite a bit since 1925, hasn't it!

What really intrigues me in the postcard image is the traffic control device in the center of the intersection. Anyone know what that gizmo's called? It appears to have just a single red light, or maybe it's merely a red reflector, so it's not really a traffic signal as we know them. Also, look how the cars are bunched around it. It's almost like the sign is a marker for a place where autos are supposed to turn; sort of like a modern roundabout. Notice how the driver of that blue car is signaling for a left turn, but he's over near the right side of the road. I don't know – I've never seen this kind of traffic control before. Anyone else got any ideas, or maybe know the actual story behind this device?

The Spring Street diagonal

2009-05-02T03:17:00.000-07:00

Ever since I started collecting postcards of old Los Angeles, this 90-year-old view of the north end of Spring Street has been one of my "holy grails." One reason for its desirability is that it features the old Post Office that first got me interested in pre-WWII Los Angeles. Mostly, though, this card fascinates me because this particular stretch of Spring Street no longer exists at all.

In fact, this portion of Spring's not only completely vanished, this exact vantage point is today located inside L.A.'s City Hall! (See position of red arrow below.)

Here's the backstory. Before 1927, when work on the new City Hall began, Spring Street north of First Street did not run parallel to Main Street and Broadway as it does today. Rather, north of First, Spring jogged east-northeasterly, following a diagonal course to the intersection of Main and Temple (the postcard view). This short diagonal portion (also in red, below) was actually the last vestige of an old indian footpath along the base of Bunker Hill which pre-dated the establishment of the Mexican pueblo itself.

Detail from the 1849 Ord survey map

Here are a couple of other postcard views of Spring Street as it was before 1927. This first one shows the intersection of Spring and First Streets, looking north, around 1915. You can see that Spring continues straight through past the intersection for about 30 or 40 feet, then it turns at an angle to the right. That's the beginning of the old diagonal alignment.

Now, if we were to go up on the roof of the building at the NW corner of Spring and First and look further up the street, this is what we'd see.

And there, near the end of Spring, is that International Savings and Exchange Bank building again, and the 1910 Post Office just beyond that.

A later perspective: here's a photo of the Civic Center around 1940, after Spring Street had been straightened. That structure just to the immediate right of City Hall is the same International Savings and Exchange Bank. Note the angle of the facade. That was the last visible evidence of the old diagonal alignment of Spring Street...

A prelude to terror

2009-03-30T17:45:00.000-07:00

click image to enlarge

One century ago today – indeed, 100 years to this very hour – this postcard was penned in a long-vanished boarding house at Temple and Figueroa Streets in Los Angeles, and addressed to a now also non-existent residence in Cleveland, Ohio...

In 1909, the intersection of Broadway and First Street was the center of civic life in old Los Angeles. Today, however, absolutely nothing you see in this postcard still exists. Old San Francisco was destroyed by its famous earthquake and fire of 1906, most of Chicago was wiped out by its own Great Fire of 1871, but old Los Angeles was even more thoroughly destroyed by the hand of man himself.

In 1910, however, another kind of destruction would visit Broadway and First, when the building to your immediate left (you could almost reach out and touch it from this vantage point) would be dynamited into fiery rubble in the third most murderous act of domestic terrorism in the first half of the 20th century. Only the Wall Street bombing of 1920 and the Bath School bombings of 1927 produced higher death tolls than this anarchist attack in Los Angeles in 1910.

And yet, I doubt that even 1 out of 10,000 of the present-day residents of L.A. know about the horrific bombing that took place in their own city less than a century ago. I didn't, myself, before the history of pre-WWII Los Angeles became an avocation of mine a few years back.

I'll have more to say about the bombing at its centennial in October of next year...

Old city center: Then and Now

2009-03-26T02:58:00.000-07:00

Two superb postcard scores within a week! The top one is a rare view of Los Angeles taken around the turn of the last century from the top of the old County Court House, looking east-northeast.

click image to enlarge

At far right is Temple Square: the heart of the city at the turn of the last century. The street car is running on Main Street. The wide dirt road by the semi-circular postmark is Aliso Street, and the narrower road running parallel to it at right is Commercial Street.

Now, here's roughly the same east-northeast view a half-century later.

click image to enlarge

This photo was taken from the top of the present City Hall at the SW corner of Temple and Main (out of the picture to the right of where the street car is in the earlier view). Aliso Street has been replaced by the 101 freeway; Commercial Street runs just to the left of the large natural gas storage tower and to the right of the yellow Brew 102 brewery.

In the 1950s view, the street running from side to side in the lower center of the picture is Los Angeles Street. Two buildings on the east side of Los Angeles Street appear in both postcards. Can you spot which ones?

Here they are...

Buildings "A" and "B" on Los Angeles Street survived at least into the 1950s.

Neither structure still stands today, however.

New treasures!

2009-01-15T11:15:00.000-08:00

Last month, I got this neat old postcard of Broadway near its intersection with Temple Street. The photo was taken from the top of the south entrance of the Broadway Tunnel. The design of the reverse side of this Rieder postcard indicates it was printed between 1907-'08. The photo, however, dates to approximately 1903. The Braly Building (1902-'03) can be seen in the distance, just to the right of the Court House. The scene can't be later than 1904, though, otherwise the Hotel Lankershim would be visible at the far end of Broadway.

click image to enlarge

This is one of my absolute favorite views of the vanished city. I just feel totally at home here, gazing at this simple scene...

Then, last week, this old medicine bottle showed up on eBay. Broadway & Temple! Holy crap! I just had to have it. And, as of today, I do!

I know a little bit about antique bottles, and this one definitely dates to pre-1915. So, it's essentially contemporaneous with the postcard view! I wonder which of the three possible corner buildings housed the Bodenmann pharmacy. I will find out eventually, I'm sure!

Lost in time...

2008-11-09T12:09:00.000-08:00

I've gone nuts, I really have. I am truly lost in time...

This old postcard showed up on eBay the other day in the Los Angeles category. As you can see, it says it's "Broadway looking North from Sixth St." But right away, I thought, that's weird, if this is Broadway looking north from Sixth, then why can't I see old City Hall, or the County Court House on Pound Cake Hill? No, this can't be Broadway. Is it even Los Angeles? Yes, it is, absolutely. The square white building at right center is definitely the Pacific Mutual Building at Sixth and Olive Streets.

OK, so where exactly in old Los Angeles is this, then? Well, first of all, we are obviously looking west on Sixth. That's Central Park there at right (now Pershing Square), so that would be Hill Street at the east edge of the park, then coming this direction, the unseen street in front of us would be Broadway. That means the picture was taken from a location on Spring Street, and, judging by the angle and perspective, that vantage point would almost have to be the Los Angeles Trust and Savings Bank at the northwest corner of Sixth and Spring. That's it! So, this postcard is actually "Sixth Street looking West from Spring St." And the date? It's postmarked 1912, and the L.A. Trust & Savings building... I believe that went up in 1910, so yeah, I'd say the photo for the postcard was probably taken then, in 1910.

Then I stop and think – I can recognize where I am in Los Angeles a century ago with perfect precision, but if I found myself at the same spot in downtown L.A. in 1999 (the last time I was there), I would have been almost completely lost.

What's funny is, I've acquired all this knowledge about the streets and buildings of old L.A. simply by casually viewing old images and maps I've found in online archives in only the last year or so. I've never actually sat down and studied any of this. I've just passively absorbed all this information, and have reconstructed most of turn-of-the-last-century Los Angeles in my imagination. These imaginings are so vivid now, they almost seem like real memories sometimes. It's so strange to feel so at home in a place and time as far away as this. Strange, but wonderful, too!

"Best lighted Street in the World."

2008-09-25T07:24:00.000-07:00

While on the subject of street lighting, I'd like to share what is probably my favorite postcard of old Los Angeles: this view of Broadway from First Street. Note the caption. Broadway is said to be the "Best lighted Street in the World." Although the card was mailed in 1907, I believe the image itself is about a decade older, from around the turn of the last century (due to the conspicuous absence of automobiles).

I love this card mostly because the detail in it is amazing – it really brings the old city alive for me. Broadway was both the commercial center of Los Angeles and the seat of its government. (The tall Romanesque campanile with the pyramidal top is the bell tower of the old City Hall, built in 1888 – at that time, the tallest structure in Los Angeles.) Sadly, as with my even older postcard of Spring Street, not a single structure visible on this Broadway postcard remains standing today.

Here is the same view today. What was once a bustling downtown street filled with people, commerce and civil life is now a home only for sterile monolithic buildings.

The postcard itself has an interesting story to tell. It was originally mailed to Belgium, and as you can see, it took almost a month to get there; traveling as it must have by sea.

In Europe, the postcard somehow survived two World Wars, made its way to the Netherlands where I bought it from an eBay seller there, and in the 21st century, the postcard is now back in California, with me. ^^

Now, see where the person who sent the card lived, and what's there today...

I can't quite decipher the name of the sender. It looks something like "Mrs. Linton," but her address is clearly "1351 Delong St."; note her 1s written in the European style.

Well, Delong Street is another of those vanished residential L.A. streets, like Palm Drive. And actually, Delong turns out to be walking distance from Palm Drive, in what was generally a very nice old out-of-the-way part of town.

Here's a view of Delong from an 1894 "bird's eye" map of Los Angeles.

We're looking towards the south here. In L.A., odd numbered addresses are on the west sides of streets, so 1351 would probably be the house immediately to the right of the "S" in "ST.", or maybe the small green one up and to the right of the "S."

Anyway, here's an aerial view of the neighborhood today, and a Google Maps Street View image. Delong Street is now occupied by the Los Angeles Convention Center...

Where «34 rue de l'industrie» is in Vilvorde, Belgium, though, I wasn't able to determine. Like Delong St. in Los Angeles, it, too, is likely no more...

That depressing orange glow

2008-09-22T14:35:00.000-07:00

One thing I would like to see before the end of my lifetime is a return to white-light-emitting street lighting.

If you were born in the USA after 1970, chances are you have never seen our cities and roadways illuminated by anything other than the orange-light-emitting sodium vapor street lights. They are pervasive, at least here in California.

I have always detested the orange lights. Well, not quite always. The first time I ever saw them was on some stretches of the Motorways in England in 1967. I was impressed by how bright they were compared to our white street lights at home.

It wasn't until the sodium vapor lights came to my hometown around 1970 that I realized how awful they were. Yes, they were bright, which of course is a desirable feature of street lights, but the quality of the light was absolutely horrible. It hurts my eyes, and it generally depresses my mood. To this day, I loathe that intense orange glow.

One of my postcard "holy grails" is to find a nighttime image of Los Angeles with the old white street lights. This is as close as I've come thus far:

click image to enlarge

Most of the lights are already the sodium vapor type, but Broadway (lower right corner diagonal towards the center) still appears to have all-white street lights. Further out, it's a bit difficult to tell, as it looks like it was quite a smoggy day in the LA area, but I can attest that the orange-emitting lights didn't come to my suburb until I was a junior in high school, which would have been 1970-'71.

(Actually, I can date the postcard rather precisely to early-1968, as the Richfield Building – with its white spire at upper right – is still occupied and fully illuminated. Its demolition began in November 1968. It has to be after mid-1967, though, because like I said, I never saw the orange lights anywhere over here until after my trip to the UK in the summer of that year.)

Anyway, I guess it's not that big a deal, really, I would just like to see our cities and roads return to natural spectrum lighting at some point. I understand there are now white LED street lights in use in some places. I hope they attain as rapid and wide an acceptance as the sodium vapor lights did almost 40 years ago. I guarantee people will vastly prefer the white lighting once they see the difference themselves.

Birthday postcard

2008-09-21T18:59:00.000-07:00

Got an unexpected surprise via eBay the other day: an old postcard mailed exactly 100 years ago today, and 46 years before I would be born.

It features a really nice view of the old L.A. County Court House, too; probably the nicest in my postcard collection.

click image to enlarge

Lovely penmanship...

Gen. Longstreet's palms: The oldest trees in Los Angeles?

2008-07-20T00:00:00.000-07:00

It's funny how things that we don't pay any attention to at first can gradually worm their way into our consciousness and eventually become an obsession.

Here's how one such obsession of mine began. As you can tell from my blog, one of my hobbies is collecting postcards of old Los Angeles; a common subject of which is a "palm drive" or "palm avenue," depicting a street lined usually on both sides with either native or exotic palm trees. Stereotypical California scenes, I thought, of no real noteworthiness. So, I generally ignored these palm-themed postcards – my specialty is downtown street scenes and buildings – but after a while, I started to notice that a lot of the really old palm postcards appeared to depict one specific location: one on or near West Adams Street.

Curious, I looked it up in my 1941 "Hill's Guide" of Los Angeles, and was somewhat surprised to learn that Palm Drive was an actual place.

Then, I went to Google Maps to check the location today. I recognized the area immediately. It's an old memory from my childhood, actually. Palm Drive is located on what is now (or was) the campus of the world-renowned Orthopaedic Hospital. I almost stopped my search for the palms at that point, thinking it unlikely they'd still be there. But just on a whim, I decided to have a look at the location with Street View. What I found simply blew me away. Amazingly, the palms still lived!

Look how tall they are! Given that the early postcards of these palms were from the first decade of the 20th century, this meant they were at least a full century old. Truly remarkable! What I was about to find out, though, is that these palms were, in fact, much older, and even more remarkably, they had an improbable connection to a well-known figure in American history...

Cutting to the chase: in the course of my research, I uncovered convincing evidence that these two rows of Washingtonia fan palms could very well be the oldest living things in Los Angeles. They were planted by none other than Confederate General James Longstreet, about 135 years ago. That may not sound terribly ancient, but to better frame the time perspective, there are only 4 man-made structures still standing in all of Los Angeles that are older than these palm trees.

I compiled the following pictoral history principally by piecing together photos and bits of information I gleaned from two online archives: the USC Libraries Digital Archive, and the photographic collection of the Los Angeles Public Library. Now, watch the palms grow through the years!

c.1875: This is the earliest photo of Palm Drive that I've been able to find. ("Early" defined in terms of the height of the trees themselves.) How old are they here, really? There's a house near mine that was built around 1992 that has a Washingtonia in its front yard that is about as tall as these are below. From that, I infer that these historic palms probably began life around 1860. That would make them almost 150 years old today. It was from the text accompanying this photo that I learned about the connection to Gen. Longstreet (that's his home at the end of Palm Drive).

click image for source information

1886: More information about Longstreet and his estate: "From a letter to the Herald Express (1940 February 5): 'About 1875, Confederate General Longstreet acquired the 40 acres on the northeast corner of Figueroa and West Adams streets. He did what was possibly up to that time the most extensive grading job done in Los Angeles. He made a pleasing slope up to where the house was to be built, a slope such as we used to read about in southern love stories. He built a mansion of Southern grandeaur [sic] and elegance and made the entrance from West Adams, between the palms which he planted, a southern romance. He planted the whole place with orange trees and it became the showplace of Southern California...'."

click image for source information

c.1900: This scene looks very similar to the photos of Palm Drive in the earliest 20th century postcards (e.g., as above), so even though this photo is undated, around 1900 seems about right. Here is a photo of General Longstreet's estate's grounds taken around 1890-1900. The caption mentions that the house at this time "was in use as an osteopathic hospital." The website for Orthopaedic Hospital says the clinic was founded in 1911, but evidently the property's history as a place for treating bone disorders extends back in time to the late 19th century when the property was still owned by Gen. Longstreet himself.

click image for source information

c.1910: The referenced page says this photo was taken around 1920, but I guesstimate it was more likely taken closer to 1910.

click image for source information

c.1920: The text accompanying this photo gives the account that, at the time, these were the "tallest palm[s] in the city." Aha! Logically, if these were the tallest, then they were also likely the oldest. The more famous palm-lined avenues of Beverly Hills were just being planted in the late 'teens/early '20s. The trees of Palm Drive were already about 60 years old by then.

click image for source information

c.1928: From the back cover of "La Reina - Los Angeles in Three Centuries," published by Security Trust & Savings Bank, 1929. The palms are truly in their prime! General Longstreet's house is gone now, and at right is the Holton Arms, an upscale West Adams "apartment hotel."

c.1940: This is the latest photo I was able find of the historical palms in the online archives. By this time, even before WWII, they had been here for 65 years, and were approximately 80 years old...

click image for source information

And it just so happened that while I was beginning to put the finishing touches on my information search, one of my favorite L.A. blogs (Larry Harnisch's The Daily Mirror) reprinted a column about General Longstreet's palm trees that had appeared in the Los Angeles Times 70 years ago, on July 8, 1938:

click image for source

Reading this old "Nuestro Pueblo" article was a big thrill, as it provided independent confirmation of many of the factoids I'd found in the USC and LAPL archives, with the happy inclusion of Mrs. Lucy Longstreet's role in the story.

On to the present day... via the web, I've learned that the site of Orthopaedic Hospital was sold in 2006, and that its redevelopment for luxury apartments commenced in 2007. According to this page, it appears at least some of the ancient palms have already been removed; perhaps all of them are gone now, I don't know. I don't live in the L.A. area, or I would definitely look into this myself.

It would truly be a shame to lose these venerable survivors. I wonder if anyone else but me has any idea just how old or significant these palms really are – that they were planted by a famous Confederate General and his wife, that they were once a celebrated showpiece of Los Angeles, and that today, they might just be the oldest living things in the entire city. Are Gen. Longstreet's palms really gone? I sincerely hope not...

An 1899 postcard featuring "Palm Avenue" (click image to enlarge)

My oldest postcard

2008-07-01T02:32:00.000-07:00

A new treasure! I just got this last week. This is my oldest postcard, probably printed in 1898. Actually, technically it's called a Private Mailing Card (as you can see). These were the first privately issued US postcards (from 1873-1898, only the USPS was authorized to produce postal cards).

Anyway, this one shows a hand-colored photo of Spring Street in Los Angeles at its intersection with 2nd Street in the late 1890s.

click image to enlarge

The imposing gabled brick building on the corner at left is the Bryson Block, an important center of commerce in Los Angeles in the last decade of the 19th century. At what looks like the end of the street in the distance is another important early commercial building, the Phillips Block. The dome you see in the background at center left is the top of the tower of the Los Angeles County Court House, and in this photo, the building immediately below it is the old 4-storey Nadeau Hotel, which, when it was built in 1886, was the tallest building in Los Angeles, and was also the site of the city's first passenger elevator.

When construction for the new Los Angeles City Hall was begun in the late 1920s, Spring Street was straightened, passing right through the site of the old Phillips Block. Here's the view north from the intersection of Spring and 2nd Sts. today. Quite a difference, eh?

Not a single stick or brick of the old buildings from this point north on Spring Street remains today. In fact, they were all long-gone by 1950...

Rediscovering the "Willard" house

2008-06-23T03:24:00.000-07:00

When I was a teenager, there were two movies that had a profound influence on me. One was Ring Of Bright Water (1969) which was about a man and his pet otter, and the other was the original Willard (1971) about a young man who befriended rats. Actually, it was the combined effect that both movies had on me that led me to the life I've lived for the past quarter-century.

Ring Of Bright Water planted a seed in me that didn't actually sprout until 1976, but Willard's effect on me was much more immediate. I identified strongly with the main protagonist, Willard Stiles. Willard was the son of a steel-industry man; so was I. Willard's mother was domineering and sickly, and demanded complete devotion. So did mine. Willard's working life was made a living hell by his duplicitous general manager and harassing co-workers. Mine, too. And, as I did, Willard turned to the companionship of animals as a psychic refuge from his tortured daily existence.

Because of Willard, rats became my favorite creatures – my first animal "archetype." I studied animal psychology in college in large measure so I could work with rats. While most behaviorists exploited their animal subjects, however, I would make my lab into a rat's paradise. By 1976, though, my attention was captured by another animal archetype – the river otter – and the rest was history, or rather, my future.

But otters led me back to rats, if only for one momentous afternoon. You see, after college, in 1980, I started a conservation group to champion the plight of the river otter. I self-published a newsletter called The Brightwater Journal, and the person who did the layout for my newsletter was a fellow otter-lover named Jan Gildersleeve. Jan moved her office twice while I was doing the otter newsletter, and when I was ready to give her the copy and graphics for issue #3 in autumn 1981, she gave me the address to her new place.

Her new office was in an old mansion just off Wilshire Boulevard in L.A. I was impressed! Jan was definitely moving up in the world if she could afford to rent this place. Anyway, I trotted up the front stairs, opened up the huge carved wooded door, and stepped inside. Right away I saw it wasn't just one office, but many. I walked through the main hall seeing a large parlor then a large dining room to my left. To my right was a grand staircase. Then, just as I spotted Jan's office door straight ahead at the end of the entry hall, it struck me.

I've been here before.

But no, no way. I'd never been in this house, obviously. But that front room, the room next to it, that staircase. Holy. Shit. This is the Willard house! Talk about a chill running up my spine! I was completely dumbstruck. This was nothing less than a miracle. The path I'd been following for the last 9 years had led me to the precise scene of my first animal awakening. Then I approached Jan's office. I walked through a doorway, and there, again, to my right was another staircase – Willard's mother's staircase, the one in the movie that had the invalid's escalator chair on it. And Jan's office was in the former kitchen, where Willard prepared the poison for Ben and the rest of the rats!

This is almost too much.

So before I even said "Hi" to Jan, I asked her, "Is this the house where they filmed Willard? "Yeah! How did you know that?" "I just walked in and I recognized it from the movie." Then I looked out the back windows, and there was the overgrown garden and the cement pond, again, just like it was in the film. I don't even remember us talking about my otter newsletter, I was so "high" on the experience of being in that house.

(There was another memorable thing about Jan's office. It was the first time I ever saw a computer used in an office environment – an Apple II, of course. ^^)

Anyway, just tonight, I finally found the Willard house online! I came across my old index card with Jan's multiple addresses on it, and there at the bottom was "637 S. Lucerne, LA 90005." Google Maps street view to the rescue! And there it was. First time I'd laid eyes on the place in over 25 years. I'm amazed it's still there! I really expected to see an office building or apartment complex in its place...

Google Maps link

Once I had the address, I then found this webpage confirming that the house was, in fact, where the interior scenes for Willard were filmed.

Quite a journey, eh? There and back again on multiple levels. Here I am, at the end now, looking back at my beginnings. The circle is truly closed now...

Origin of an obsession

2008-06-13T13:52:00.000-07:00

It was this building and this shabby old postcard of it that planted the seeds of my present obsession with pre-WWII Los Angeles.

It's kind of a long story, but I'll try to make short work of it. Back in late 2007, while browsing the Panoramic Maps collection on the Library of Congress website, I found a number of "bird's eye" views of old L.A. I'll never forget my reaction upon seeing them for the first time.

"I don't recognize anything here."

The two maps which most caught my eye were both dated 1909. They were the most detailed, by far. After searching them for a while, I finally found something familiar: the Bradbury Building at Broadway and Third. OK, now that I had my bearings, I kept scanning the maps and found what looked like a civic center: a Hall of Records and a Court House. And, nearby, a large Post Office. Strange thing, though. The two maps had two completely different drawings of that building. Which was the correct one?

A cursory web search proved fruitless, so, just on a whim, I searched eBay for 'los angeles post office', and up came this single postcard. The image was striking and completely unfamiliar. Surely if this building were still standing when I was growing up in the L.A. area, I would have remembered it.

But if such an expensive and ornate edifice – which was clearly meant to endure as a civic monument into the ages – was gone by the time I was born, what happened to it? Well, after studying the more-accurate 1909 map a bit more, I saw why. The old post office was located very close to where the 101 freeway "slot" would be constructed in the 1940s. No wonder everything in that vicinity was gone now...

At that point, I really wanted to find out what that part of town looked like back in the day. Googling again, I queried about the post office's location – Temple and Main Streets – and voilà, I found a Blogger entry by a "lastraphanger" entitled "Temple and Main Streets: What Used to be Here." Wow! With both text and photos, this guy answered every question I had about the locale and much much more. I was utterly fascinated by his descriptions of this vanished part of old Los Angeles, and upon searching his blog further, I was delighted to find an absolute wealth of new information there.

So I became an ardent reader of this anonymous person's weblog. Practically every day, I learned more and more about this L.A. I never knew. Unfortunately, less than two months after I found lastraphanger's blog, he moved on in life and deleted it. To this day, I lament the loss of that important historical document...

However, that loss ultimately proved beneficial, because since I no longer had someone else to rely upon to tell me about the history of old L.A., I had to dig up the knowledge I sought by myself. Back when I was a college student, I loved literature searches, and thanks to the various online archives and the wealth of information they contain, I quickly became adept at finding my own answers to practically every aspect of old L.A. that I was curious about. The result is what you see here in my blog today!

*smiles* I still remain rather fixated on that old post office, though. As with everything else about the vanished city, the more I find out about it, the more fascinated I become. Anyway, I will definitely have a lot more to say about this building when its centennial arrives in 2010. Trust me, it will be a tale well worth the telling!

3rd & Hill Streets, Los Angeles: Then and Now

2008-05-29T07:59:00.000-07:00

Within a span of only two lifetimes, an almost unimaginable transformation...

1895:

1903: (The two-year-old funicular railway "Angels Flight" (left), and the just completed 3rd Street tunnel.)

1905:

1908:

1912:

1918:

1960: (This was Angels Flight as I remember it.)

1970:

Today:

Credits: "1895," "1903" and "1970" from the Los Angeles Public Library photographic collection; "1912" from the USC Digital Archive/California Historical Society collection; "Today" from Google Maps Street View.

1045-1/2 S. Norton Ave, Los Angeles, 6, Calif.

2008-05-27T03:29:00.000-07:00

I've mentioned in my personal weblog many times before that both Dad and Mom were mostly hush-hush about their lives prior to their marriage. This included talk about where they had lived in the past. In fact, of all the places they each lived before I was born, there was only one for which I knew an actual address, and that was Mother's apartment in West Los Angeles during the '40s. She lived at 1045-1/2 S. Norton Ave, Los Angeles, 6, Calif.

Even though Mom talked about her place on Norton, she never actually took me there, so all these years I've kind of suspected that the reason was it didn't exist anymore. It wasn't until just the other day that I went on Google Maps' Street View and discovered to my complete amazement that the place is still there!

Here's Mom in front of her apartment building on July 28, 1941:

And here it is today!

View Larger Map

After I gathered all the Norton pics together, I was further surprised that they dated all the way from 1941-1950. This means she was living there right up to the time she married my father. I honestly had no idea she resided there that long...

Another picture from July 28, 1941:

January 14, 1945. This is Mom with her longtime roommate, Anne Rooney, from Butte, Montana. (I now think it must have been through Anne that Mom met her late soldier husband, Larry Fitzpatrick, also from Butte.) Anne would later marry LeRoy Swenson, and together they ran a Dr. Pepper bottling plant in Stockton, California:

October 1945. I never knew before where this picture was taken, but seeing the palms in the Google Maps image, I now think there's no doubt that the baby palms in the background here are the exact same trees:

April 28, 1946:

December 1946:

And this last one was from 1950:

I also now tend to think that the photos in this post might have been taken inside Mom's apartment here.

It looks to me like the place on Norton is still nice. I wonder, who lives there now?

The other Wrigley Field

2008-05-17T08:25:00.000-07:00

Several times, I remember Dad telling me about the other Wrigley Field, the one in Los Angeles: original home of the Los Angeles Angels (Pacific Coast League, 1925-1957; American League, 1961). I've never seen pictures of it before now, though.

Located at 42nd Place and San Pedro Street, California's Wrigley Field opened in 1925.

This Wrigley Field got its lights in 1930. Its namesake in Chicago would have to wait another 58 years for night baseball.

It was initially proposed that the Dodgers would play here after relocating from Brooklyn. This concept drawing from 1957 depicted proposed improvements to turn Wrigley Field into a major league park. Instead, it met the wrecking ball in 1966.

Photos from the USC Libraries Digital Archive/California Historical Society, and the Los Angeles Public Library.

Temple and Main Streets, Los Angeles: Then and Now

2008-05-15T07:38:00.000-07:00

The civic center of Los Angeles in three centuries...

Temple Square – the heart of the city, 1885 – at the intersection of Temple, Main and Spring Streets:

Temple Square, 1927. The new City Hall looms over the doomed Temple Block:

Temple and Main Streets, today:

The Temple Block was the ornate 3-storey brick structure in the older photos. It was the hub of civil life in Los Angeles during the 1860s-1880s. As we face the Temple Block, Main Street runs to the left, and Spring Street emerges at a diagonal angle to the right. Temple Street runs from left to right in the upper photo, but it can't be seen because it's obscured by the Downey Block at far right. (Here is Temple Street heading west from Temple Square.)

Spring Street was realigned when construction of the new City Hall began in early 1927. Spring now runs parallel to Main, and intersects with Temple where the large skyscraper at right is now located.

What strikes me the most when I compare these images is how the city center of old Los Angeles was a vibrant place, alive with people and commerce, while today's sterile Civic Center is almost exclusively a home for government, and where the populace is only a transitory visitor.

It's difficult to imagine this extensive a change taking place within a period of only two normal human lifespans, isn't it? Were a citizen of 19th century Los Angeles to suddenly find themself transported to today's Temple and Main, the place would no doubt be completely alien to them. Like another world entirely...

(1885 photograph from the USC Libraries Digital Archive/California Historical Society; 1927 image reproduced from "La Reina - Los Angeles in Three Centuries," published by Security Trust & Savings Bank, 1929; 2008 color image from Google Maps.)

The Richfield Building

2008-05-12T04:02:00.000-07:00

I'm in love again! ;-) This time with the Richfield Building (1928-1968), formerly located at 6th and Flower, Los Angeles. Unquestionably, the most elegant Art Deco skyscraper ever built west of the Mississippi. Its intricate, sculpted exterior was adorned with terra cotta tiles of black, burnished gold and turquoise. It rose 500 feet from street level to the top of its stainless steel neon tower.

I was alive and living in L.A. County during the last fourteen years of the building's existence, but unfortunately, I have no memory of it whatsoever. Not too surprising, considering its location, because Mother hated the adjacent Harbor Freeway and avoided it whenever possible. So near and yet so far...

Even its elevators were Deco design jewels:

Sadly for architecture buffs like me, after Richfield Oil merged with Atlantic Petroleum to form ARCO in 1966, the Richfield headquarters in Los Angeles was deemed redundant. It was torn down in 1968-1969, and replaced by the impossibly drab twin ARCO Towers in 1970.

Bleah. :-p

Aside: here is a restored Richfield service station (1934). Richfield's service stations of the time were also tastefully designed... simple but stylish.

Courtesy C. V. Dusty on Flickr.

Nostalgia for a place I never knew...

2008-02-27T02:56:00.000-08:00

I should be taking eBay auction pics right now, but I'm feeling too edgy.

So, I'm relaxing like I have been a lot lately – traveling back in time to 20th century Los Angeles.

It's amazing to me that I feel nostalgic for a place I fled from in terror 25 years ago.

But it's not actually that Los Angeles I journey to in my mind. Mostly it's to a Los Angeles I never knew; before WWII, when it was a real city – a downtown that people actually lived in, as opposed to commuting to.

The freeways changed all that, though. The freeways bled the life out of Los Angeles. By the time I was born in the mid-'50s, most working folks had already left the city for suburbia.

I think this postcard photo was taken around 1950. (That's a '49 Buick in the foreground, and I can't really see any cars on the freeway that look much newer.) It's the Hollywood Freeway westbound just as it's leaving the city center.

click image to enlarge

It's a pretty view, but from a historical perspective, what's interesting to me is seeing all those houses and trees on Bunker Hill (above the billboard). It was still a largely residential neighborhood in 1950. I don't remember it being like that when I was growing up in the '60s. I do remember when the fate of the last two houses on Bunker Hill became a matter of public debate around 1968, though. That's when I as a young man first really became aware that there ever was a neighborhood there (and a quite wealthy neighborhood it was in its time, too).

*chuckle* I still think it's strange that I think fondly of L.A., though, at any stage of its history. Strange it may be, but that's where my thoughts have been going a lot lately when my mind wanders, which has been fairly often. ;-)

The Bradbury Building

2008-02-17T23:32:00.000-08:00

(Photo: University of Southern California)

Right after you got your driver's license, where was the very first place you drove to on your own? Do you remember? I sure do! As soon as I could talk my dad into loaning me his car for a day, of all places, I went here – to the Bradbury Building, at 304 S. Broadway in Los Angeles. I couldn't wait to see this place with my own eyes. I was 16 years old then, and the Bradbury Building was, at least in an architectural sense, my first love...

(Photo: Floyd B. Bariscale)

I'd learned about the Bradbury Building via a favorite TV show called "Ralph Story's Los Angeles," and what I saw really struck a chord in me. For starters, I could hardly believe such an old building still existed in Los Angeles (it was built in 1889-1893). I'd grown up in the L.A. area and I never heard of the place before, and neither had my parents, both of whom had lived most of their lives in the southland.

Just to look at it, though, you can understand why the Bradbury Building didn't attract a lot of attention. It doesn't appear to be anything special at all from the outside. It's the interior design of the place that sets it apart from all others of its time, and still makes it a standout to this day...

Introducing the world's first modern open atrium office building.

(Photo: GreatBuildings.com)

(Photo: GreatBuildings.com)

(Photo: you-are-here.com)

*chuckles* Are you thinking maybe you've seen this interior space before? Well, you probably have! (It was J.F. Sebastian's apartment building in Blade Runner.) ^^

I remember the day so well – I'd dragged my friend Gary along for the ride, and it being a Saturday, we had the whole building essentially to ourselves. It was great! We went up and down one of the ancient elevators at least twice. (It was surprisingly quiet, as I recall.)

When we were there in 1971, the Bradbury hadn't yet achieved its national landmark status, and was in need of a little TLC. These recent pics of the interior really impress me, though. What amazing ironwork! And whoever did this restoration did a truly brilliant job. It looks a lot nicer now than it did way back when.

*sighs* I always wanted to be an architect when I was growing up, but my teachers and counselors finally convinced me that I didn't have the math or art skills to be good at it. (Thanks a bunch, folks.) I should have just gone ahead and done it anyway. I know now I could have been great. I've always had an eye for beauty in buildings. By and large, I'm very disappointed with the quality of the architecture my generation has produced. I know I'd've done a lot better if I'd had the chance...

A Short History of America, by R. Crumb

2007-05-17T23:02:00.000-07:00

While not about Los Angeles specifically, this short comic by Robert Crumb does rather closely parallel L.A.'s evolution from pristine open rangeland to mid-20th-century urban blight.

Here's a video of the same comic. I like how the images are carefully superimposed to animate the changes from one panel to the next...

Mystery postcard

2006-02-09T12:48:00.000-08:00

This is a "Real Photo" postcard of my mother snapped by a street photographer somewhere in downtown Los Angeles in October, 1936. Mom would have been 19 years old then; a secretary at the Huntington Land Company.

I've wondered about this picture for years. Where exactly was it taken, and what's that almost Stalin-esque building in the background? Adding to the mystery is: I remember this place. My mom used to take me on shopping trips there when I was around 5 years old, which means this place-in-time still existed at least until the late-'50s. Can anybody tell me where in town this is/was, and perhaps help me to finally put this ghost memory to rest?

I'm always struck by Mother's appearance here. She's so young, so self-assured, and so fashionable. Even at that young age, the personal poise she was known for all her life was already in full flower.

And I wouldn't be born for another 18 years...

EDIT, May 17, 2008: Mystery solved! I actually figured out the location a while back, but now I can show you proof positive, thanks to this recent postcard acquisition...

Mother was walking south on the west sidewalk of the 900 block of South Broadway in Los Angeles. Here's a contemporaneous postcard view of this stretch of Broadway at night:

On the right, there's the Radio Supply Co. with the "Stalin-esque" building behind it. That edifice turns out to be the actually rather beautiful Ninth and Broadway Building, built in 1929.

So, hurrah! I've also now even been able to pinpoint within about 50 feet exactly where Mom was on the sidewalk when the picture was taken. I'll leave that for a later post, though. :)