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unihikid Nov 28, 2012 9:50 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Earl Boebert (Post 5917397)
Larry Harnisch has a short piece about this venue and its tragic story on his blog:

http://ladailymirror.com/2012/11/28/...ter/#more-9710

Cheers,

Earl

Prophet: that may be the motel,in all three of the sam cooke bios that ive read they have different names for the motel,Polaris,Webb,and Haicienda,im thinking that two of them were neighboring buildings(Haicienda and Polaris)one of them got torn down..but which one?

and this is my last bit Sam Cooke knowledge,but Earl that was a nice little story,the Ebony showcase was a small 2 story brick building,I passed it all the time while walking home from my friends house.I was surprised when they tore it down and replaced it with a awful looking building that looks like the new pershing square came to mid la in form as a building.But Sams last photograph alive was taken on Dec 6th 1964 at the Ebony.

BifRayRock Nov 28, 2012 9:59 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by rcarlton (Post 5916945)
We haven't touched on the mysterious case of Thomas Harper Ince yet.

Nice summary!:cheers:


Text accompanying the image below (from LAPL) identifies several of the notables mentioned in recent posts. It does not identify the individual with the cropped head sporting the clerical collar or nehru jacket behind the grassy knoll, . . er . . .um canopy. ;):sly:
Quote:

October 31, 1928 reads, "Photo shows a distinguished group of filmland notables at a welcome party honoring Marion Davies, famous star just returned from a three-month trip abroad. Standing, left to right, Lorraine Eddy, Matt Moore, Aileen Pringle, Louis B. Mayer, Gloria Swanson, Harry D'Arrast, Miss Davies, Louella O. Parsons, Ricardo Cortez, Charlie Chaplin, Norma Shearer, Irving G. Thalberg, Harold Lloyd and Robert Z. Leonard. Seated in foreground are Harry Crocker, left, and William Haines. The French room of the Ambassador was transformed into likeness of a Parisian cafe for the surprise party greeting Miss Davies."
http://jpg1.lapl.org/00094/00094452.jpghttp://jpg1.lapl.org/00094/00094452.jpg

This costume party photo is reported to have occurred in 1925, sometime after Ince's demise.
http://content.cdlib.org/ark:/13030/tf2b69n8dp/hi-reshttp://content.cdlib.org/ark:/13030/tf2b69n8dp/

tovangar2 Nov 28, 2012 10:08 PM

Spotlite/Spotlight
 
Quote:

Originally Posted by DouglasUrantia (Post 5916635)
The original Spotlight was on Vine St. I drew a little arrow at the bottom of this photo. The sign is directly above on the left side of the street.
The bar was in the center of the room. You could walk around it. The floor was carpeted and the place had originally been rather upscale. Of course, as The Spotlight it was a different animal entirely.
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v4...nespotlite.jpg

Great photo. Thanks. Looks like maybe '52 or '53(?) Back in the smog days for sure. Even Hermosa Beach, where we lived, didn't escape that. Pity the Plaza Hotel rooftop sign got blocked by a billboard, as that one always looked so great backed by the one atop the Broadway Hollywood. All in all a seriously glamorous streetscape.


Another shot of the same location in 1930. Dyas Department Store sign (before the Broadway Hollywood took over the building) and the original Plaza Hotel sign are shown. Vine St theater on the left. The empty SE corner of Selma and Vine at lower right was the original location of the DeMille barn. The barn had belonged to the Stern Estate which ran from Hollywood Blvd to Sunset on both sides of Vine:
http://farm6.static.flickr.com/5206/...386ae7cd_o.jpg
jsjensen

P.S. An "island" bar, such a cool idea, like the Round Robin at the Willard in D.C..

MichaelRyerson Nov 28, 2012 10:14 PM

USC digital archive
 
What happened to the USC digital archive? Can't view anything, format has changed, nothing retreivable. Appeared normal an hour or so ago. Downloaded one image, went back link no longer worked. Backed all the way out, went back via google, main page layout appears to have changed, images no longer hyperlinked, thumbnails no longer clickable.

tovangar2 Nov 28, 2012 11:35 PM

Davies and Haines
 
Quote:

Originally Posted by BifRayRock (Post 5917490)

Text accompanying the image below (from LAPL) identifies several of the notables mentioned in recent posts. It does not identify the individual with the cropped head sporting the clerical collar or nehru jacket behind the grassy knoll, . . er . . .um canopy. ;):sly:

Quote:
October 31, 1928 reads, "Photo shows a distinguished group of filmland notables at a welcome party honoring Marion Davies, famous star just returned from a three-month trip abroad. Standing, left to right, Lorraine Eddy, Matt Moore, Aileen Pringle, Louis B. Mayer, Gloria Swanson, Harry D'Arrast, Miss Davies, Louella O. Parsons, Ricardo Cortez, Charlie Chaplin, Norma Shearer, Irving G. Thalberg, Harold Lloyd and Robert Z. Leonard. Seated in foreground are Harry Crocker, left, and William Haines. The French room of the Ambassador was transformed into likeness of a Parisian cafe for the surprise party greeting Miss Davies."

http://jpg1.lapl.org/00094/00094452.jpghttp://jpg1.lapl.org/00094/00094452.jpg

Damn, how many kids did Marion have? Patricia was born on a three-month trip abroad in 1923, but I guess not all Davies' extensive trips abroad produced children.

1928 was the year Davies made "Show People" with Billy Haines. They look good together here too (he's sitting at her feet).

Buenos Aires-born Harry d'Abbadie D'Arrast (1897-1968), shown standing on Marion's right, has a killer bio:

"Harry d'Arrast's entry into the movie industry was somewhat unusual--he was wounded while serving in the French army during WW I, and while recuperating in a military hospital met French-born American film director George Fitzmaurice, who invited him to come to Hollywood after he had recovered. He did so, and got work as a researcher and technical adviser on several films, including Charles Chaplin's A Woman of Paris: A Drama of Fate (1923), then became Chaplin's assistant on The Gold Rush (1925). He made his directorial debut in 1927 and directed seven films until he left Hollywood in 1933. Although his output was sparse, his films were universally acclaimed for their wit, sophistication, beautiful photography and smooth pacing. D'Arrast often found himself in conflict with his producers, however, for his refusal to cut corners and speed up production, and in 1933 departed Hollywood for Europe. He made one film in Spain, then returned to his home in France. He spent the rest of his life at his family estate outside of Monte Carlo, and made his living at the roulette tables in the Monte Carlo casino."
IMDb Mini Biography By: frankfob2@yahoo.com

DouglasUrantia Nov 29, 2012 12:13 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by MichaelRyerson (Post 5917518)
What happened to the USC digital archive? Can't view anything, format has changed, nothing retreivable. Appeared normal an hour or so ago. Downloaded one image, went back link no longer worked. Backed all the way out, went back via google, main page layout appears to have changed, images no longer hyperlinked, thumbnails no longer clickable.

Its still working for me. Try this URL:

http://digitallibrary.usc.edu/cdm/

tovangar2 Nov 29, 2012 1:14 AM

CC Pierce, Hollywood 1910
 
http://cdm15799.contentdm.oclc.org/u...XT=&DMROTATE=0
cc pierce/usc

1910 view of Hollywood by the great CC Pierce. The west end of the Hollywood Hotel addition is on the left margin, Hollywood High is left of center and the cupola dome of the Brown/Tearle/ASC house at Franklin and Orange can just be seen on the bottom edge.

The streets end abruptly on the south, the last major east/west cross-street is Sunset, with farmland and oil derricks in the distance.

http://cdm15799.contentdm.oclc.org/u...XT=&DMROTATE=0
cc pierce/usc

The opposite view eight years later in a 1918 aerial photo, again by CC Pierce. Hancock Park has been laid out on the plain, connecting to greatly-expanded Hollywood via Rossmore/Vine.
Third St runs horizontally just below the center of the image with the Marlborough School on the left.

The Wilshire Countrry Club will be built over the big oil field on the left. There's no sign yet of Larchmont Village, which will later connect Hancock Park with Hollywood.

FredH Nov 29, 2012 3:02 AM

1935 Mae West extortion case
 
http://img254.imageshack.us/img254/5...hreatcombo.jpg
Los Angeles Times

The L.A. Times Story is here;

Oct. 7, 1935: Actress Mae West, in black dress, and district attorney investigator Harry Dean – impersonating Mae West – pose for the news media after a suspect was detained in an extortion case.

Dean impersonated West in an attempt to capture an extortionist who threatened to throw acid in her face unless she delivered $1,000 to the corner of Sunset Boulevard and Bronson Avenue. However, after four nights of the ruse, West and her chauffeur “Chalky” Wright dropped off the money.

A busboy, George Janios, was detained when he retrieved the money. The Times also reported the next morning that “six other suspicious characters found loitering in the neighborhood were taken to the District Attorney’s office for questioning.”

But, as reported in this Oct. 10, 1935, Los Angeles Times story, everyone was released:

While the government joined forces with the District Attorney’s office in the investigation, George Janios, 38-year-old bus boy, yesterday was released from custody after having been held since Monday as a suspect in the $1,000 extortion plot directed at Mae West…

The bus boy was arrested last Monday night when he picked up a pocketbook which Miss West’s chauffeur had placed by a palm tree near Warner Brothers’ Sunset Boulevard studio, per instructions contained in the last of six notes received by the actress.

Janios stuck to his story that he happened along as the pocketbook was placed by the tree and that he had picked it up out of sheer curiosity….

Before the release of the suspects, Harry Dean, District Attorney’s investigator who, dressed in feminine finery, impersonated Mae West while placing the pocketbook on four attempted contacts with the extortionists, received acclaim from his fellow-workers.

He arrived at his office to find the telephone decorated with bits of ribbon, on the desk top an array of flowers from sweet peas to pansies, and the room sprayed with essence of hyacinth.

Note: With an uncharacteristic display of discretion and good taste, I am withholding any snide comments on the relative feminine good looks of Mae West vs. Harry Dean.

overthere Nov 29, 2012 3:08 AM

A delayed 'thank you' from my page 512 intro :cheers:

Thanks Ethereal for the welcome :):) yes, the odd juxtaposition of that big old [beautiful] house and the 'modern' ;) Center Motel letters lured me in rather quickly.

And GaylordWilshire & Tovangar2 a big thanks for the info about Mrs. Halberstadt and the stories about 6720 Sunset Blvd! Very interesting and it really makes conjuring things up a lot more fun - wow, at 91 she's got her hands and time in a motel, impressive...

I love this picture...
http://imageshack.us/a/img62/951/aablaconf.jpg

Tovangar2 - thanks so much for sorting out my Sunset/Cahuenga intersection confusion...

Followed your 'directions' and did a google street map to try a match-up, this is the best I could do...

Sunset looking west from Cole Place
http://img18.imageshack.us/img18/643...ngwestfrom.jpg

So another question about the area I some times lump together and call 'HV' or Hollywood and Vine[/B]

Molly's [next to the Ricardo Montalban theater on Vine]


http://img856.imageshack.us/img856/1...elmaimage1.jpg

The 'Since 1939' on the awning always intrigued me. Course we know it's closed now. But does anyone have any older photos of this hamburger stand? I really feel sad seeing these greasy spoons closing up for fancy-pants eateries... soon all we will have are greasy memories and '$40.00 cheesburger and fries' spots

I also saw this about the parking lot next to Molly's [sorry if this is old news to you all] :uhh::uhh:

Controversies - Greasy Burger Shack Threatened by Purple-Hued Office Project

http://la.curbed.com/uploads/2010.06.mollysdown.jpg

More info...
http://la.curbed.com/archives/2010/06/_the.php

Last begging, ooops, I mean question - Still hoping... Are there some photos out there of what used to occupy the space now currently known as Amoeba Records? [6400 Sunset Blvd]

Thanks much, will try to contribute more than just questions when/if I can... I realize I am a mere tent amongst skyscrapers :skyscraper:

tovangar2 Nov 29, 2012 3:25 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by overthere (Post 5917946)
So another question about the area I some times lump together and call 'HV' or Hollywood and Vine[/B]

Molly's [next to the Ricardo Montalban theater on Vine]


http://img856.imageshack.us/img856/1...elmaimage1.jpg

The 'Since 1939' on the awning always intrigued me. Course we know it's closed now. But does anyone have any older photos of this hamburger stand? I really feel sad seeing these greasy spoons closing up for fancy-pants eateries... soon all we will have are greasy memories and '$40.00 cheesburger and fries' spots

Aug, 1960 (The burger stand looked better, but the theater looked worse)
http://sphotos-a.xx.fbcdn.net/hphoto..._5028364_n.jpg
Richard Wojick collection on Vintage Los Angeles.

"Opened in 1929 as part of a Richfield gas station, the lunch counter was first known as Mom's Place. Its name was changed to the Curb Charbroiler in the 1950s and to Molly's Burgers in the 1960s." Last day was 30 June 2011. (quote fom LAT)

This one's pretty fuzzy:
http://sphotos-a.xx.fbcdn.net/hphoto...2_949999_n.jpg
Molly's fb page

In the 50's
http://sphotos-b.xx.fbcdn.net/hphoto..._4996004_n.jpg
Molly's fb page

Still looking for Amoeba.

BDiH Nov 29, 2012 3:55 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by tovangar2 (Post 5917976)
Aug, 1960 (The burger stand looked better, but the theater looked worse)
http://sphotos-a.xx.fbcdn.net/hphoto..._5028364_n.jpg
Richard Wojick collection on Vintage Los Angeles.

"Opened in 1929 as part of a Richfield gas station, the lunch counter was first known as Mom's Place. Its name was changed to the Curb Charbroiler in the 1950s and to Molly's Burgers in the 1960s." Last day was 30 June 2011. (quote fom LAT)

Still looking for Amoeba.

We can thank Eric Garcetti for closing down Molly's. Garcetti, who wants to be the next mayor of Los Angeles, is bent on razing landmarks and building high-rises. He's known for his comment that Los Angeles needs more office space. Los Angeles needs more office space because Garcetti promoted turning office space into condos. Look for a new, bland office building to replace Molly's. Developers have found a friend in the city councilman.

DouglasUrantia Nov 29, 2012 4:44 AM

Here's how the charbroiled burger place The CURB looked in 1958.
It was on Vine St. just south of Hollywood Blvd.



http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v4...6/hartford.jpg

The original little building that later housed Molly's restaurant [The Curb] appears to also be an automobile rental company called U-Drive...'75 cents per day'. It has U-Drive written on both sides of the building in vertical lettering..with all of their 15 shiny rental cars parked along both sides of the building.

Evidently the car rental building operated simultaneously with the lunch counter and then much later changed name again to Molly's "The Curb".

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v4...06/u-drive.jpg
From the LA Times:"According to some, Molly's has history on its side. Originally opened in 1929 as part of a Richfield gas station, the stand was initially called Mom's Place. In the 1950s, its name was changed to the Curb Charbroiler. The Molly's name dates from the 1960s."

I hope we're closing in on the history of this location. The Forum members who posted before have done a great job in researching this...which has inspired me to continue here.

tovangar2 Nov 29, 2012 6:23 AM

Mom's/Curb/Molly's
 
Quote:

Originally Posted by DouglasUrantia (Post 5918083)
[SIZE="5"]

The original little building that later housed Molly's restaurant [The Curb] appears to be an automobile rental company called U-Drive...'75 cents per day'. It has U-Drive written on both sides of the building in vertical lettering..with all of their shiny rental cars parked along both sides of the building. Evidently the car rental building became Mom's Lunch Counter and then changed again to Molly's "The Curb".
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v4...06/u-drive.jpg

I hope we're closing in on the history of this location. The Forum members who posted before have done a great job in researching this...which has inspired me to continue here.

The photo above has me thoroughly confused. "Mom's" was supposed to have opened in 1929 and CBS didn't move in until 1936, yet the CBS signage is up in the photo, but no burger stand (?) The oldest pic in my last post is very fuzzy, but it looks like there's something in front of the gas station building.

Below is quoted from Historic Hollywood Theaters
https://sites.google.com/site/hollyw...tres/montalban:

"Opened: January 19, 1927 as a legit operation, Wilkes' Vine St. and was later called just the Vine Street.

Historian Mary Mallory notes: "The theatre is built on the site of the Robert Northam estate, later the Jacob Stern estate. The house was completed in 1901, and its barn on the other side of the street is now the Hollywood Heritage Museum across from the Hollywood Bowl."

In March, 1931 it became a cinema, the Mirror, under the direction of the Howard Hughes' Hughes-Franklin circuit. It ran double features with 3 changes a week.

In the mid-30s it was the Studio Theatre. In 1936 CBS took over and started calling it the CBS Radio Playhouse. Later they did a remodel and the Studio signage was removed.

Huntington Hartford bought the building from CBS in 1954 gave the place a "modernizing." It re-opened it as a legit venue named after himself -- The Huntington Hartford Theatre.

In 1964 it was sold to James Doolittle who at the time also operated the Greek Theatre. Later it was operated in conjunction with UCLA and was renamed the James A. Doolittle Theatre.

In 2000 it was purchased by "Nosotros," a UCLA affiliated group."


The Northam/Stern Estate was huge, complete with orchards and formal gardens and ran from Hollywood Blvd, along Vine, to Sunset. The estate barn (1895, older than the 1901 house) at the SE corner of Selma and Vine was rented by DeMille in 1915 for The Lasky Co. The barn had been previously rented to another film company in 1913.

http://www.jumpingfrog.com/images/po...34/pco4833.jpg
thejumpingfrog/eBay

If only we had a Googlemobile/Time Machine!

kznyc2k Nov 29, 2012 7:41 AM

FYI, tovangar2, that picture is from 1938 (hence the CBS and KNX signage), and was the subject of much discussion a year ago when someone recognized the mother and child walking by our mystery building to be his very own father and grandmother: http://forum.skyscraperpage.com/show...postcount=5166

Beaudry Nov 29, 2012 7:59 AM

I gotta say, tovangar2's recollections of Normal Hill back in the 'day are something to be reckoned with. Rich and evocative shifting sands are nowhere more evident than that part of the world...so I had to dig out a couple of slides from my collection and put them here.

1948:
http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8339/8...727663b3_o.jpg


1958:
http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8337/8...b841bd52_o.jpg

rcarlton Nov 29, 2012 2:02 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by BifRayRock (Post 5917490)
Text accompanying the image below (from LAPL) identifies several of the notables mentioned in recent posts. It does not identify the individual with the cropped head sporting the clerical collar or nehru jacket behind the grassy knoll, . . er . . .um canopy. ;):sly:


http://jpg1.lapl.org/00094/00094452.jpghttp://jpg1.lapl.org/00094/00094452.jpg

Interesting in 1928 Davies, Chaplin, Pringle and Parsons are together. Four from the ill fated weekend cruise. Probably good friends by then.

Lwize Nov 29, 2012 3:12 PM

http://www.trbimg.com/img-50b6a8f7/t...5-20121021/600
http://www.trbimg.com/img-50b6a759/t...6-20121021/600
(photos from LATIMES.COM)

Quote:

Originally Posted by LATIMES.COM
As downtown L.A. grows trendier, Spring Street Arcade is left behind

The stores that were once crowded with immigrant shoppers struggle to stay in business. The family that owns the 88-year-old complex has plans to try to attract young, hip residents.

By Sam Allen, Los Angeles Times

November 29, 2012, 5:00 a.m.

The salesmen at the Spring Street Arcade spend their day gazing out at a city that's passing them by.

All around, a trendy downtown is on the rise — pet stores selling gourmet dog chews, chic bars with ginger and juniper soda cocktails, a new generation of mostly young residents jogging in spandex and cruising on bikes.

But inside the 88-year-old shopping arcade, with its giant curved skylight, arched Spanish Renaissance entryways and Beaux Arts exterior, many of the stores are vacant, and the remaining merchants seem stuck in another era. Bargain-rate clothes, toys, suitcases and DVDs share shelf space with dusty boomboxes and T-shirts from '90s rock bands like Korn and Nirvana.

Mohad Azimi lingers through the morning outside his kitchen appliance shop, chatting with the Taiwanese salesman at the toy store next to him. These days, the jokes focus on a new Starbucks that's just opened at Spring and 6th streets. Maybe that's where all the people are going now, the merchants say.

"Look around here — business is dead," Azimi says as he looks across the arcade's empty corridor, which stretches from Spring to Broadway. "Nobody comes inside."

Azimi opened his business in the early 1990s, after emigrating from Afghanistan. Back then, Los Angeles was still enjoying a boom in immigration from places like Guatemala, Mexico and El Salvador, and the mall was so busy on the weekends that you could barely walk inside. Broadway was a bustling promenade, with shoppers pouring in on bus lines from all over the city.

Families would come to buy kitchenware at Azimi's shop, sometimes shipping the products back to relatives in Latin America. And while they were there, he says, they'd pick up toys and clothes for their children.

Azimi still stacks the same goods on a white plastic table at the front of his shop — toaster ovens, blenders and microwaves in battered cardboard boxes. Inside the cluttered shop, there are old keyboards, calculators and Nintendo GameCube consoles.

But he makes only a few sales each week, he says, and he's not sure he can make it to the end of the year.

"The new residents, they don't have a family, they don't have anyone to cook for," Azimi says. "They just have a dog."

::

When the Spring Street Arcade opened in 1924, it was hailed as Los Angeles' premier shopping center — and celebrated with a bash that brought out Will Rogers and Charlie Chaplin.

Back then, the area was filled with department stores, high-end shops and rows of movie palaces. Even as downtown faded after World War II and the department stores and movie houses closed down, the small merchants along Broadway, Main and other downtown streets managed to find new customers.

By the 1980s, hundreds of them were making a good living catering to the city's rising Latino immigrant community, both new immigrants and Mexicans who would cross the border for shopping runs.

The retail economy was so strong that Broadway storefronts famously commanded rents similar to those of Rodeo Drive in Beverly Hills.

But changes in immigration patterns, improved economic conditions in Mexico, competition in other communities and the recession have left many downtown merchants fighting to survive. While new, "500 Days of Summer" residents are frequenting bars and restaurants and coffeehouses, they have little need for the bargain shops that line the arcade.

Joel Kotkin, an urban studies fellow at Chapman University, says the shift is evident all around downtown.

It's the "gradual dissolution of one economy — a really vibrant, unique economy — and an attempt to replace it with another," he says. "The question is, are we just seeing the death of something that will be replaced, or will we have this parallel universe of yuppies alongside the decline?"

::

Inside the arcade, merchants are quick to reminisce about the prosperous years — and lament how it went so wrong.

"Any store you opened here on Broadway, it was a gold mine," says Cesar Balbuena, a 60-year-old electronics salesman who has worked downtown since 1971. For the last 28 of those years, he's been a fixture at Audio Video Plaza, a glass-walled electronics shop at the edge of the arcade.

The first signs of decline, he says, came around 2000, when an economic downturn hit many of the low-income workers who did their shopping at the arcade. Broadway began facing stronger competition from markets in such communities as East L.A. and Huntington Park and, later, chains like Costco and Wal-Mart. Mexico's economy was rapidly improving, cutting the supply of shoppers who would come north to buy merchandise.

These days, the dozen or so remaining businesses inside the arcade are desperate. Many of the merchants scrape by on month-to-month leases, and aren't sure how much longer they can hold out.

Before the Great Recession, Balbuena says, Audio Video Plaza cleared more than $10,000 in sales on a good day. Now, it hopes for $3,000.

"It's empty!" Balbuena says as he steps out into the open corridor of the mall. "Ten years ago, eight years ago, there was no way you could pass."

::

Over the last decade, the Hellen family has watched as the arcade's fortunes have faded.

The Australian family bought the landmark in the 1980s during the boom times. Like many property owners along Broadway, the Hellens generated their revenue from storefront rents and didn't bother to lease out the eleven floors above, which were in such disrepair that the city ordered them vacated.

But in the last few years, the family has started to embrace a vision of a trendier Broadway, fueled by downtown's growing residential population. The family recently converted the floors above the arcade into upscale apartments. Next, they're working on major renovations to the arcade itself, hoping to attract the new downtown dwellers.

By this time next year, the family hopes to add an English pub and a host of new restaurants to the mall offering gourmet tacos, vegetarian cuisine, crepes and gelato. Construction work has already begun in some of the arcade's vacant shops, says Greg Martin, a vice president at the Hellens' company, Downtown Management Inc.

"The dynamic has changed," Martin says. "But Broadway is still a valuable piece of the puzzle."

Rather than a mecca for immigrant shoppers, the city sees Broadway's future as a shopping and entertainment center anchored by the old movie palaces that line the street. There's also a proposal to bring back the streetcar that trundled down the street in the 1930s and '40s.

"The 'cowboy days' of Broadway are slowly coming to an end," says Tom Gilmore, a veteran developer in the historic core. "Landlords are beginning to invest in a longer view of how the street evolves."

For Brittany Luttio, one of the new residents of the apartments at the arcade building, the shopping space is more of a curiosity than a destination. But she'd go there regularly if it had more restaurants, she says.

"There are holes that still need to be filled — we could use more places to eat," says Luttio, a 21-year-old fashion student. "But I like it here; it has character."

Arcade veterans like Balbuena and Azimi wonder about what all the changes will mean to them.

On this Sunday afternoon, they go through their familiar routines, checking through the week's receipts hoping for a big day of sales. But things are quiet once again.

Shopper Jackelin Panuco, 17, walks past with her younger brother Raul. Years before, she says, her mother would bring her to the arcade to buy toys and dresses.

But this afternoon nothing catches her eye. Balbuena's electronics store doesn't have the iPod she wants.

"There's not really much to find here anymore, and it's not busy," she says as she walks out to Spring Street. "I think we're going to look somewhere else."

sam.allen@latimes.com


GaylordWilshire Nov 29, 2012 4:04 PM

:previous:

http://img716.imageshack.us/img716/3...decomplete.jpg
Los Angeles Times, February 15, 1924

Godzilla Nov 29, 2012 4:07 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by rcarlton (Post 5918361)
Interesting in 1928 Davies, Chaplin, Pringle and Parsons are together. Four from the ill fated weekend cruise. Probably good friends by then.

The truth is out there, but Agatha Christie remains mum. ;)



What could go wrong on a three hour tour?
1965
http://jpg1.lapl.org/00082/00082832.jpgLAPL


Notable entertainers at Banning Theater. Notes suggesting photo is from '40s could be 20 years off. Pictured: some of Crosby Clan, Dean M., Bob H., and, front and center, someone named Natalie Wood - who also met with a water-related tragedy in November '81.
http://imgzoom.cdlib.org/Converter?i...0&w=1044&h=771 CalStLib

Godzilla Nov 29, 2012 4:39 PM

Very close to "Molly's" / "The Curb" :previous:was the Hollywood Legion Stadium. 1628 El Centro Avenue. It's been mentioned before but only in passing. As noted below, it was built and rebuilt and torn down.

Undated:
http://digitallibrary.usc.edu/utils/...311&DMROTATE=0USC Digital

Text accompanying the LAPL photo dated April 30, 1938:
Quote:

Helping to ring down the curtain on the famous old stadium, where film stars watched the fights and sometimes swapped a blow themselves, some of Hollywood's noted fight fans are shown in the ring after the last boxing matches last night. Left to right: Chico Marx; Al Jolson, who once traded punches with Walter Winchell outside the ring at the stadium; George Burns; Jackie Coogan, for whom a "collection" was started last night; Jack Benny; Joe E. Brown; Alan Hale; Robert Taylor; Pat O'Brien and Charlie Murray.
Read about Winchell and Jolson's dust up here: http://news.google.com/newspapers?ni...g=2370,3048389

http://jpg2.lapl.org/pics39/00054081.jpgLAPL

http://www.indiewire.com/static/dims...tadium-680.jpggoogle

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3080/...d3aec8e10e.jpggoogle


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