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This looks a lot more like 1851 than 1881 to me. |
Be afraid....be very afraid
Good golly, kznyc2k, what have you dug up here? Where was Abraham Lincoln, Vampire Hunter when we needed him?http://img28.imageshack.us/img28/2189/65376113.jpglapl
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Funny you should mention that.
In 2009, I found a few photos of the penthouse's interior as it looked when new in 1928. The images are tucked away in the UCLA Special Collections archive of Los Angeles Times photos, and before 2009 had never been published online. In fact, most of them had never even appeared in the newspaper. The penthouse's rooms and furnishings remained unaltered from 1928 to 1974, the year of James Oviatt's death. A few months afterward, nearly all of the furnishings were sold off. The penthouse today is well preserved, but it has undergone some notable changes since 1974. I've been to the penthouse often; I'll put together a photo essay for this thread. Quote:
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This afternoon, forum member 'Beaudry' and I went to the Hotel Christie building to find out. The short answer is yes, it is ... behind and beneath a black metal door. http://i58.photobucket.com/albums/g2...rentrance2.jpg http://i58.photobucket.com/albums/g2...r/IMG_1348.jpg The stairway down to the basement still exists: http://i58.photobucket.com/albums/g2...r/IMG_1351.jpg At the bottom of the stairs, the passageway turns sharply left and takes you down a second flight of stairs into the Hotel Christie building's vast, open, two-story-high basement. This is where the Club New Yorker reigned from 1932 to 1936. The bad news: the basement walls' plaster veneering (with its beautiful Deco murals) has been completely stripped from the concrete walls, and the floor is covered in what seems to be a foot of dirt. The space is completely empty, and bare of any conceivable ornamentation. Even the doors are gone. Nothing but the basement's massive volume gives a hint of how grand the Club New Yorker must have been. (It seated 300.) Unfortunately, 'Beaudry' and I were prohibited from taking photos of the basement. The image below shows a wider-than-usual view of it in the early '30s: http://i58.photobucket.com/albums/g2...e4c776960b.jpg |
Yes, we are all devotees of the internet (our legs happily devolved into useless fleshy orbs dangling from globular torsos) but get your gibbous ass outside and buy yourselves a book! Jim Dawson, the man who brought you bookshelf musthave Los Angeles's Angels Flight, is now The Man who brings us Los Angeles's Bunker Hill: Pulp Fiction's Mean Streets and Film Noir's Ground Zero!
http://www.electricearl.com/labh/LABH_frontcover2.jpg I just bought my copy at Caravan, of course, AKA The Only Bookstore In The World. But I don't need to tell all y'all that, because you visit Caravan every day, I trust; I did want to hip you to the fact that Dawson's book is out, and awesome, and I had to eat three entrées at my local Gallic place just so I could read it twice. Not that I'm complaining mind you, but now I am quite fat. These calories will certainly be burned off by my excitement over the book's endless Bunker wankery, its history of cinema, and Dawson's remarkable erudition and insight about Old LA. |
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http://img256.imageshack.us/img256/2006/00005420.jpg http://img535.imageshack.us/img535/4954/00005421.jpg http://img228.imageshack.us/img228/5963/00005422.jpg http://img824.imageshack.us/img824/4554/00005437.jpg http://img690.imageshack.us/img690/5756/00005425.jpg The name Dawson reminds me of the storied bookstore... here are some shots from its one-time location at 627 S. Grand. Way before the 'net I found alot of great L.A. obscurities--such as its own The Art of Street Lighting in Los Angeles by Eddy S. Feldman. Then there was its Los Angeles Before the Freeways by Arnold Hylen, which I bought a long time ago at Caravan. I have other books with Caravan's bookmark still in them--slightly different addresses: 605 and 550 South Grand. To tell you the truth, I didn't realize that the store was still around at 550. I'm very glad to see that it is. If anyone here hasn't been to Caravan, get on the next LARy car that comes by and go check it out. As Beaudry says--it is indeed The Only Bookstore In The World. |
e_r what a great noir story you found! It has just about everything. But I was also intrigued by the headline below Hush-Hush about that Yale sex scandal: The Nymphet and the Whiffenpoofs!:naughty:
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:previous: I was intrigued by that 'whiffenpoof' headline as well kanhawk.
I initially thought 'whiffenpoof' was slang for 'queer' until I recalled the famous 'Whiffenpoof Song'.* (*The 'Yale Whiffenpoofs' are the oldest collegiate a cappella group in the United States, established in 1909) That said, it does seems quite a stretch to connect this elite vocal group with an out of control 'nymphet'; but who knows...stranger things have happened. ___ |
What a face.
http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8019/7...cdb67771_b.jpg
00d/18/koal/14585/24(Photo by George Hurrell/John Kobal Foundation/Getty Images) George Hurrell's quintessential Joan Crawford, 1930 |
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Main and Spring
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http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8151/7...39f7befc_z.jpg Of course it goes without saying that the little fountain is gone. All fountains in this city eventually turn to asphalt, or planters. |
In April I put some pictures up showing the Doheny Mansion. E.L. Doheny's son was the victim of a shooting. Here is the story of the younger Doheny's mansion:
The headlines: Feb. 18, 1929 Doheny Murder Inquiry Discloses Controversy Secretary Declared to Have Killed Employer and Self Following Debate on Latter's Health Dist.-Atty. Fitts yesterday launched a sweeping investigation of event surrounding the slaying of Edward L. Doheny, Jr., late Saturday night by the latter's secretary, Theodore Hugh Plunkett, who later took his own life. Plunkett went to Doheny's home shortly after 9:30 p.m. And following a conference lasting more than an hour with his employer shot him to death with a revolver and turned the weapon on himself. Authorities believe Plunkett suddenly went insane. He ha been suffering from a nervous disorder for some time. The tragedy occurred in the first floor guest bedchamber of Doheny's Beverly Hills Mansion while Mrs. Doheny sat in the living room unaware of the tragedy being enacted at the end of the long hallway leading to the rear of the house. More. Looks like Johnny Socko beat me to the punch on this forum with the story and picture in 2010. Here is some additional information: The Scene: 905 Loma Vista Drive, Beverly Hills. The Greystone Mansion, home of Edward (Ned L. Doheny Jr., his wife and five children. Doheny was the son of oilman Edward L. Doheny Sr. In 1910, the elder Doheny bought 429 acres in the Beverly Hills area after striking oil in the 1890s. He gave the 22-acre plot to his son Ned as a wedding present in 1914, but the younger Doheny and his wife left the land alone until 1925. The house, sitting on 22 acres of choice real estate, took three years to build and cost 3.1 million dollars. The family moved into the newly completed house in September 1928. http://digitallibrary.usc.edu/assets...CHS-14582?v=hr http://www.beverlyhills.org/images/C...eystoneWeb.jpgCity of Beverly Hills http://www.greystonemansion.org/imag...MG0468.JPG.jpgThe Friends of Greystone http://cdn.cstatic.net/cache/gallery...c1b0e83b_o.jpgCURBED Los Angeles http://cdn.cstatic.net/cache/gallery...16dfcba3_o.jpgCURBED Los Angeles The Bedroom http://cdn.cstatic.net/cache/gallery...7f92fa56_o.jpgCURBED Los Angeles On the night of February 16, 1929, only six months after the family moved in, Ned Doheny was found by his wife, shot dead, the apparent victim of a murder/suicide. http://farm1.staticflickr.com/36/100...1a3ce96178.jpgLAist The Official Investigation's Findings: Homicide and suicide. Investigators determined that Plunkett had taken a .45 caliber revolver from the Doheny garage and had shot Doheny, then had turned the gun on himself. Testimony about Plunkett's unstable behavior over the previous six months, and Dr. Fishbaugh's testimony about the family's concern for Plunkett's sanity, reinforced this finding. No formal inquest was held. Unofficial Rumors and Alternate Scenarios: Over the years, questions have arisen about the events of that February night. Various rumors surfaced: that Plunkett and Doheny were more than just good friends, and that Lucy killed them in a fit of jealousy; that Plunkett shot Doheny in a quarrel over his salary. Questions were raised about the timing of the killings: was there a delay between the time of the deaths and the arrival of the police? Were the bodies moved to better suit the story told to the police? Was there an effort made to make Plunkett look crazy, to make the murder/suicice story more plausible? The undeniable wealth and influence of the Dohenys added to the public's fascination with the tragedy. Murder at Greystone, 1929 Kind of expensive to take photo's of the mansion. Here is the official pricelist. |
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ER, bravo for that epic post on the Finch Murder Trial. That supporting cast of characters is as interesting as the leads! |
http://img708.imageshack.us/img708/5...25complete.jpghttp://img100.imageshack.us/img100/2...meyler1932.jpghttps://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-6...urdferobit.jpg
Nearly 50 years after the first picture above was taken in 1925 (the second is from 1932), the woman in it was brutally murdered in her Hancock Park apartment. The obit is from August 29, 1972 (her address is revealed in it; she was actually 79). I discovered this noirish occurrence while researching my latest post on ST. JAMES PARK (full story on #12 HERE.) As far as I have been able to determine so far, the case remains unsolved.... I'm calling on our sleuths here to solve it, or at least to find more info. One thing I found was the Times article below from February 24, 1974, which I've abbreviated: http://img521.imageshack.us/img521/9...ticleforno.jpg The murder scene was on the second floor of the south side--to the left side of the top shot below--of 531 N. Rossmore-- https://lh4.googleusercontent.com/-t...303%2520PM.jpg https://lh6.googleusercontent.com/-h...2520PM.bmp.jpg Top 6 pics from the Los Angeles Times; others GoogleSV |
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Anyhow, movie crews used to show up and the good folks at Ghost Ranch would help out on the shoots and only charge fees when something significant was asked for. Then they got a board member who had been a bean counter for a Hollywood studio. Want to move that dead tree a couple of feet? $2500. And so forth. Cheers, Earl |
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Which is fine as long as you're comfortable selling your outdoor Los Angeles scenes as a rainy day with foreign looking street signs and "out of state" licenses plates on all the cars. |
Overlooked "Noirsh" Catalina Island?
Tales of mining, moonshiners, gambling, real estate speculators, and secluded hideaways? 26 miles from the mainland. 1939 aerial viewhttp://www.voncoelln.com/catalina/19...santa-cata.jpghttp://www.voncoelln.com/catalina/19...santa-cata.jpg In no particular order. 1925 http://digitallibrary.usc.edu/assets...CHS-49379?v=hr http://digitallibrary.usc.edu/assets...CHS-36097?v=hr Undated: http://digitallibrary.usc.edu/assets...CHS-36089?v=hr all from USC Digital http://digitallibrary.usc.edu/assets.../CHS-2795?v=hr USC Digital Quote:
http://www.lifeinthepast.com/f11/CAT4.JPGhttp://www.lifeinthepast.com/f11/CAT8.JPGhttp://www.lifeinthepast.com/catalina.html http://catalinamuseum.files.wordpres...lboarding1.jpghttp://catalinamuseum.files.wordpres...pg?w=500&h=621google Norma Jeane circa 1944: http://www.thisismarilyn.com/artwork...J-original.jpghttp://www.thisismarilyn.com/norma-j...44-42318.photo http://www.avalonca.com/Custimages/Pc5.jpghttp://www.avalonca.com/Custimages/Pc5.jpg Undated but probably early '50s http://federicodecalifornia.files.wo...irplane761.jpghttp://federicodecalifornia.files.wo...irplane761.jpg __________________________________ |
Aside from the Streets bearing his last name and his impressive Los Angeles residence, George Rufus Shatto, has not received much coverage. (Perhaps for good reason.)
http://image1.findagrave.com/photos2...9270484738.jpg Google He purchased Catalina Island in 1887 from with intentions of developing it into a tourist attraction. (According to some sources, within four years, Shatto defaulted on the mortgage and the property reverted to the Lick Estate. The Estate ultimately sold its Catalina interest to Phineas Banning's three sons (William, Joseph and Hancock) in 1892). Shatto family, in front of Government Barracks on Catalina, ca. 1887. http://digitallibrary.usc.edu/assets...EDD930DBE?v=hr Shatto had an impressive residence on Orange (later Wilshire Blvd.) http://jpg3.lapl.org/pics24/00061756.jpg http://jpg3.lapl.org/pics23/00061331.jpg (See http://forum.skyscraperpage.com/show...170279&page=87) He built the Hotel Metropole on the Island in 1887. Undated photo - hunting party http://digitallibrary.usc.edu/assets...CHS-14148?v=hrUSC digital Picture from 1901 (?) probably sporting Banning "improvements". http://www.insidesocal.com/history/hotelmain.jpghttp://www.insidesocal.com/history/hotelmain.jpg Metropole circa 1903: http://www.insidesocal.com/history/hotelpartofbeach.jpghttp://www.insidesocal.com/history/hotelpartofbeach.jpg Metropole circa 1904: http://digitallibrary.usc.edu/assets...CHS-14149?v=hrUsc Digital One source asserts that at the time of his May 1893-death (Railroad Accident, Kern County - inspecting mining property) he owned 500 lots in Los Angeles and 12 lots in Avalon. http://archiver.rootsweb.ancestry.co...-12/1009514810 Buried in the Angeleus-Rosedale Cemetery. Shatto's tomb: http://cemeterytravel.files.wordpres...osedale003.jpghttp://www.thecabinet.com/darkdestin...&image_id=1287 ______________________________ ______________________________ Shatto evidently employed a character known as John "Chicken Johnny" Brinkley. The source notes indicate Mr. Brinkley allegedly left the island once in his lifetime. One can only guess how Johnny a/k/a Johnnie or George obtained his nickname and why he left the island. Here he is circa 1885. (Second photo indicates a fondness for canned goods or maybe just cans. ;) http://digitallibrary.usc.edu/assets.../CHS-7669?v=hrhttp://digitallibrary.usc.edu/assets.../CHS-7668?v=hrUSC Digital |
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