Here's a 1995 write-up on The All-Star Theatre Café & Speakeasy in the lobby of the Knickerbocker.



https://i.imgur.com/4E1mSp0.jpg
allstartheatrecafe.com

The Knickerbocker Mural
 

I fiddled with the picture a bit to bring it up:

http://www.boebertandblossom.com/LANoir/Mural.png

and I'm pretty sure that the figure on the right is operating a TV camera. There were boxy movie cameras in the 20's but I'm not aware of any that had a lens turret. Also, the proportions of the (probable) thermostat on the post in the main picture fits that of a Honeywell T42, which was made between 1939 and 1953. Given that, and the mid-century style of the mural, I would date picture to 1950 plus or minus a couple.

Cheers,

Earl

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..................Mitzi, Let's Go!

https://imagizer.imageshack.com/img924/6852/UublCd.gif



City bus in front of Pickwick Books on Hollywood Blvd. [1969].................Very cool red VW!

https://imagizer.imageshack.com/v2/1...923/IYNnQH.jpg
recently found on eBay



I'm curious about the storefront you see behind the bus. At first I thought it might be a Christian Science Reading Room.




Here's a closer look.

https://imagizer.imageshack.com/v2/1...924/Mn8B9V.jpg


Thelan's _ _ _ _ _ Center. ...My first guess was Career Center. . . but it doesn't quite fit.



There also appears to be numbers that light up along with the rest of the sign.

https://imagizer.imageshack.com/v2/6...922/xTEIJG.jpg
detail

_87(?)

Union Local? ..........Street Address? :shrug:







And there are two separate signs mostly hidden by the bus.

https://imagizer.imageshack.com/v2/6...923/aiElHu.jpg

.........................................Narco?..................Marco?






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:previous:

From the 1969 CD:

Hollywood Boulevard

6731 THELANS CAMERA CNTR 464-9443
6733 NORCO STAMP-COIN CO 467-4804
6735 REINGOLD L M 467-3051
6737 DE KEYSER MUSIC 465-5035
6739 PARTRIDGE BOOKSTORE 466-1477
6743 PICKWICK BOOKSHOP 469-8191
6743 PICKWICK BOOKSHOP 275-8191

Santa Monica
Hotels
Mira Mar
Greyhound
Holiday Inn

Here's an earlier view of (Ray) Thelan's Camera Center from almost eight years ago on NLA. The full post showing more of the block is here.

Last night I was watching a youtube video where a couple gentlemen, with video camera in hand, who are Elvis enthusiasts, came to visit the Knickerbocker to look at where some of the Elvis photoshoot took place when he stayed there in 1956. They go into the lobby and some guy that works there ushers them out again, but...he happens to be an Elvis fan, too, and did that for show, inviting them to come back and he gives a tour, of sorts, to them.

In the videos they look for locations of where the Elvis pictures were taken, including up on the roof, and where he stayed. (They show the historic photos and try to match them.) They also talk about other things, some I mentioned here:


The guy who works there also lives there and takes him into his room at one point. Lots of interesting stuff. There's panoramas from the present day roof top, both day and night and I think a little drone footage, too.

All of the videos were posted in Dec. of 2019, which I was assuming when they were shot, but it just occurred to me that the Capitol Records building did not have their Christmas tree up on their rooftop, so it had to have been before December sometime.

It's in 3 parts, about 45 minute total:

Elvis Presley Knickerbocker Hotel 1956 Love Me Tender Hollywood The Spa Guy Part #1 of 3 (14:56)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mf9DqP9XxBo

Elvis Presley Knickerbocker Hotel 1956 Love Me Tender Hollywood The Spa Guy Part #2 of 3 (16:18)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pU8kw8ED7i4

Elvis Presley Knickerbocker Hotel 1956 Love Me Tender Hollywood The Spa Guy Part #3 of 3 (13:45)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vrgBhAkvY5o

And a follow up that corrects a couple informative things:
Elvis Presley Why Kicked out of Knickerbocker Hotel Hollywood The Spa Guy
(13:00)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lxRJcV3QCUU

That photograph is exactly how I remember it! The text matches my memories, too.

https://i.imgur.com/CRXfjZOl.jpg

If you were there in the 20teens, nadeau, I must be mistaken about the date when I returned to the place (with the “All-Star” no longer there). The closest I can guess about the date of my re-visit would be “some time between 2005 and 2015”. I honestly can't remember the date more precisely than that. :(

Thanks for that link, Noir_Noir!

It looks, Scott Charles, like our memory of a place (post All-Star) is coming more into focus. For me, I t could have been any time between 2009 and 2015. I stumbled across it just before seeing something at Pantages. Maybe it was a pop-up thing, or a short term venture. Hollywood Blvd was experiencing a peak in nightlife at the time. Whatever it was, it was pretty swank, and I recall some sort of very large curtain that I assumed was hiding a door to the lobby area.

Thanks for figuring out the mystery signs, Hoss...(Thelan's Career Center & Norco Stamp-Coin)...I appreciate it. :)


Here's a mystery street corner in Los Angeles showing a newsboy in the 1940s. ... Link


https://imagizer.imageshack.com/v2/1...923/2qQHoU.jpg
eBay


I know it's the 1940s because the Examiner is offering "Miss Liberty" Dolls. ....I'm always surprised by the amount of litter in these old photographs.





but I'm not 100% sure what the boy's sign says. At first I thought it said "Buy a Paper Get One Free"

but it's worded a bit differently.
https://imagizer.imageshack.com/v2/6...924/YmNVqg.jpg


hmmm :hmmm:. . . is it "Buy a Paper, Information Free"?

also what is this sign attached too? It looks like an old highway marker.

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Here is an exceptional photograph of the historically famous Lugo House [1894] currently listed on eBay


https://imagizer.imageshack.com/v2/1...922/KqbofM.jpg
Link





The information is also written on the back of the photograph.

https://imagizer.imageshack.com/v2/1...923/JoAAsG.jpg




Perhaps one of you transit fans can tell me what the two men are doing to the rails.

https://imagizer.imageshack.com/v2/1...923/igHzYJ.jpg

If I had to guess I'd say they're prying them up. (but that doesn't make much sense)



For search purposes:....Chinatown, Los Angeles 1894
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Over the years the rails get slightly out of alignment and the trolleys run wacky. The rails need to be realigned....often less than half an inch.

Agfa Film (as seen on the awning) was a Belgian-German company. In 1941 their American assets were seized as enemy property, and the American part of the company was rechristened as Ansco. In 1945 when the Allies broke up IG Farben, Agfa reappeared as an individual business.

So I suppose that would rule out the years 1941 through 1945 for the photograph?

The Examiner sign says free doll maybe that is what the hand written sign refers to. The sign may be attached to a mail box post (one of those small ones). I have seen a few of those still around years ago. I believe cut rate drugs was Thrifty Drug Stores come on. I sold papers on corners (Herald Express) and in the street in the late fifties and this photo predates my time selling papers. If you look carefully you can see the mailbox on the other side of the post..

https://i.postimg.cc/rm5tLQvb/lahs1-bmp.jpg
LAPL


From the 1899 Blue and White-- LAHS's yearbook

I wouldn't necessarily rule that out. There could be any number of reasons why it would still say Agfa Film on the awning in any of those years, IMO.

Stream of consciousness...It's an intriguing photo because there's so little in the way of clues. All the readable store signs are pretty generic, Discount Drugs, Cutrate, Sells for Less. There are no other people in the photograph on the street. The bicycle on the left has a lot of things hanging from it. The boy seems more contemporary than usually seen in a 40's photograph, maybe it's that hat. Or the collared polo-type shirt? The car one can see in the reflection in the store windows looks modern to my eyes, but it's a reflection. At the end of the street, is that a truck in the road? Is that white line in the picture a crease in it? What's on the crate by the boy's feet? At the end of the walk it looks like a pole in the middle of the sidewalk? I'm assuming the Miss Liberty Dolls advertised are paper dolls? Why is someone from Cambridge Springs, PA, selling this photograph and where did it come from? :shrug:

Fire destroys roof and interior of San Gabriel Mission church:

https://www.sgvtribune.com/2020/07/1...n-san-gabriel/

Fortunately, it stopped short of the altar; and, due to a renovation effort going on (which was probably the cause of the fire), most or all of the historic items had been removed to another location.

Calle de La Caridad (Charity Street)?
 

It was always my understanding that the street formerly known as Charity Street was our modern-day Grand Avenue.

However, the linked book gives that legacy to two different streets - Grand and Spring:

https://i.imgur.com/bojczhG.jpg

https://i.imgur.com/4ZHbqgs.jpg

Is the second paragraph simply in error? My understanding is that Spring Street used to be called Beware (or Lookout) Street....

:previous:

That book is simply (and no doubt inadvertantly) wrong, I'm sure. Here's the beginning of my own notes on Spring St., gathered from various sources over the years. It was probably only playfully called "Danger St." due to what's detailed in the latter part of this:

"Spring Street, the sometime “Calle Primavera” said to have been named by surveyor Ord for his beloved Maria de la Trinidad Serafina Ortega (married name de la Guerra), whom he referred to as his “Springtime” (“Primavera”); before realignment in the 1920s, it followed a diagonal running between close to its 1st St. corner and the intersection of Temple St./Main St., which was the path of the original Native American trail skirting the hills; 1846, the residence of Narciso Botello was on this street; January 2, 1858, published (Los Angeles Star): “Owing to inattention to the state of the sewerage, a row of houses on Spring street were inundated by the flood, causing considerable annoyance but no serious damage”; January 16, 1858, published (Los Angeles Star): “On Wednesday we were visited by a very heavy rain, which lasted for several hours. It fell in torrents, causing a flood in our streets, and almost inundating a row of buildings on the west side of Spring street, creating no little consternation among the inhabitants. This is a most unfortunate block of buildings, as the water from the adjacent hills flows down on them, and keeps the inmates on the look-out during each heavy rain."

Edit add: It might be worth adding that it wasn’t until the 1840s that the city began to look into the interesting question of giving the streets names--not naming streets was not unusual in California; Davis mentions that neither did San Francisco’s streets have any names in the mid-1840s (William Heath Davis, Seventy-Five Years in California, p. 115).

Interesting to hear your different ideas and questions, Martin_Pal


Here is a newstand photograph, with a glimpse of a newsboy, that we may (or may not) have seen on NLA.....The photograph was taken by Ida Wyman in 1950.

https://imagizer.imageshack.com/v2/1...924/AQ8kgC.jpg
Monroe Gallery of Photography

.......................................................................................................:previous: Does anyone have that issue of Life Magazine?



:hmmm:. . .did most newstands in L. A. have a liquor license back then?...(I see bottles)

The pages tacked up at the left are. . .(I used to know). . .racing forms? ...(but weren't they illegal?)
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