Originally Posted by HossC (Post 6821323)

As Pee Wee Marquette once said, "Ladies and gentlemen, as you know, we have something special down here at Birdland this evening." (OK, so he was talking about the New York jazz club and not this attraction in Los Angeles). This article is from the December 25, 1910 edition of the Los Angeles Herald.

http://i809.photobucket.com/albums/z...d.jpg~original
California Digital Newspaper Collection

Here's Aviary No.3.

http://i809.photobucket.com/albums/z...ABirdland2.jpg
SDSU Library

Originally Posted by ethereal_reality (Post 6821313)

It (and the Tujunga Wash) was certainly large enough during this rainy period in 1938. (photos are of the Burbank area...including Warner Bros. and Universal)

All photographs are from someone's personal notebook. I've never taken the time to post all these before. (I hope it isn't overkill)
I found them a couple years ago on ebay.
__

Originally Posted by CityBoyDoug (Post 6821181)

My older brother liked Clearman's North Woods restaurants. Our family went there many times...usually a birthday dinner. If you want to talk to the person sitting next to you, this is not the place to go. The noise level is off the chart. But, if you want to ignore one of your in-laws....its perfect.

They have free peanuts on the table and you throw the shells on the floor...lovely barn ambiance. :P:P:P

Originally Posted by ethereal_reality (Post 6821943)

CBS Columbia Square at 6121 Sunset Blvd.

I've been trying to read the various programs listed on the marquee above the front doors. The center one is Dolores something...and...well... it's a bit difficult isn't it.

Any help would be appreciated.

__

Originally Posted by ethereal_reality (Post 6822225)

Well, it's almost time for me to leave for Illinois for Thanksgiving.
Before I go, I want to thank each and everyone of you for making this thread such a special place.


I'll leave you with these scenes from a Turkey Processing plant in Arcadia, circa 1952.


-the arrival
http://imagizer.imageshack.us/v2/xq90/913/O7J5bB.png
http://imagizer.imageshack.us/v2/xq90/537/r8WSb5.png
http://digitallibrary.usc.edu/cdm/co...d/68436/rec/80



-the bath
http://imagizer.imageshack.us/v2/xq90/633/6MGZMN.png
http://digitallibrary.usc.edu/cdm/co...d/68436/rec/80



group shower
http://imagizer.imageshack.us/v2/xq90/674/WEh2q8.png
http://digitallibrary.usc.edu/cdm/co...d/68436/rec/80



almost there...
http://imagizer.imageshack.us/v2/xq90/909/SKGsfG.png
http://digitallibrary.usc.edu/cdm/co...d/68436/rec/80



ta-dah!
http://imagizer.imageshack.us/v2/xq90/661/Wxn0o0.png
http://digitallibrary.usc.edu/cdm/co...d/68436/rec/80


Have a wonderful Holiday everyone! See you in a few days.

__

Originally Posted by ethereal_reality (Post 6821943)

I found this the other night with the rainy Vermont slide and the Capitol Records Vine St. slide.

At first I thought that was a Dept. of Forestry truck, now I'm thinking it might be a Ma Bell truck. (it comes down to whether that's a bell or a pine tree in the circular logo)
I never expected Bell telephone trucks to be GREEN!
__

Originally Posted by DTLAdenizen (Post 6822354)

Curbed LA picked up my blog post on the first modern images of the endangered Warner Huntington Park Theatre.

Worth a look:
http://la.curbed.com/archives/2014/1...rk_theater.php



My original link:
http://southonspring.com/warner-huntington-park/

http://southonspring.com/wp-content/...-4-940x742.jpg

http://southonspring.com/wp-content/.../2014/11/3.jpg

http://southonspring.com/wp-content/...ll-Housos-.jpg

http://southonspring.com/wp-content/...2014/11/14.jpg

Originally Posted by Martin Pal (Post 6822171)

DOLORES DRIVE-IN PRESENTS
"____ ____ HERE TONITE" 12:05 AM

(second word might be Horne?)

Third section:

__ PRESENTS "FAMILY FUN"
___ JAY STEWART __:__ PM

Originally Posted by ethereal_reality (Post 6821943)

I found this the other night with the rainy Vermont slide and the Capitol Records Vine St. slide.

I've been trying to read the various programs listed on the marquee above the front doors. The center one is Dolores something...and...well... it's a bit difficult isn't it.

Any help would be appreciated.

CBS Columbia Square at 6121 Sunset Blvd.
http://imagizer.imageshack.us/v2/xq90/909/snAhET.jpg
ebay

At first I thought that was a Dept. of Forestry truck, now I'm thinking it might be a Ma Bell truck. (it comes down to whether that's a bell or a pine tree in the circular logo)
I never expected Bell telephone trucks to be GREEN!
__

Originally Posted by AlvaroLegido (Post 6818347)

To a French ear like mine, this accent sounds British. But not quite : it sounds like an american who imitates awkwardly British. The diphtongs are not as much marked. And yes, fhammon, this is annoying. Some 1930s/1940s american actors had a little touch of British accent to my ears (Fred Astaire for instance, mainly when he sings).

Originally Posted by Those Who Squirm (Post 6822889)

It usually wasn't a conscious attempt to adopt a UK accent, but more likely based on what was then a typical old-money accent in the Northeast (for instance FDR and Eleanor Roosevelt, who really did speak in that accent). This is what I hear in old movies like The Philadelphia Story, [i]Bringing Up Baby (not Grant, but Hepburn's character, along with her relatives), and so on. The Roosevelts and Katharine Hepburn really did talk like that, it was their natural accent. In the case of many who emulated them, however, there probably was an element of Anglophilia involved somewhere.

For some reason the narrators of documentaries and travelogues during this period seem to have taken as a foundation that Northeastern upper-class accent--whether they possessed it or not-- and then added a layer of Kansas-rural-midwestern; I really cannot account for it any other way. James A. Fitzpatrick, perhaps the best known narrator from this era, grew up in Connecticut but sounds as rural as a Kansan wheat farmer. Gayne Whitman was from Chicago but I hear no trace of what today I would consider a typical upper Midwestern accent.

Still another factor may have been the perception of actors and directors that given the limitations of early sound equipment they had to enunciate a certain way...like the woman said...ROUND tones. ROUND tones...

Originally Posted by Those Who Squirm (Post 6822889)

It usually wasn't a conscious attempt to adopt a UK accent, but more likely based on what was then a typical old-money accent in the Northeast (for instance FDR and Eleanor Roosevelt, who really did speak in that accent). This is what I hear in old movies like The Philadelphia Story, [i]Bringing Up Baby (not Grant, but Hepburn's character, along with her relatives), and so on. The Roosevelts and Katharine Hepburn really did talk like that, it was their natural accent. In the case of many who emulated them, however, there probably was an element of Anglophilia involved somewhere.

For some reason the narrators of documentaries and travelogues during this period seem to have taken as a foundation that Northeastern upper-class accent--whether they possessed it or not-- and then added a layer of Kansas-rural-midwestern; I really cannot account for it any other way. James A. Fitzpatrick, perhaps the best known narrator from this era, grew up in Connecticut but sounds as rural as a Kansan wheat farmer. Gayne Whitman was from Chicago but I hear no trace of what today I would consider a typical upper Midwestern accent.

Still another factor may have been the perception of actors and directors that given the limitations of early sound equipment they had to enunciate a certain way...like the woman said...ROUND tones. ROUND tones...

Originally Posted by latimes.com

Venerable Los Angeles Athletic Club aims for more youthful look
Los Angeles Athletic Club
By Roger Vincent

On a recent weekday afternoon, one of the newest members of the Los Angeles Athletic Club sat in a high-backed chair in the club's plush Olympic Lounge. With its thick carpet, dark mahogany-paneled walls and heavy curtains, the room looked every bit the bastion of gentility it was built to be more than a century ago.

But instead of a tweed jacket, Dimitri Beshkov was wearing a snug black T-shirt and he was tapping away on a laptop he had pulled out of a backpack — all faux pas at traditional clubs that enforce dress codes and forbid members from doing anything that looks like work in their hushed communal lounges and dining rooms.

"A lot of clubs don't allow business use" of their facilities, General Manager Steve Hathaway said. "We encourage it."
All clubs need to do whatever they can to bring in younger members. The clubs that are really successful are really trying to bring down their average age. - Crystal Thomas, executive director of the California State Club Assn.

The venerable institution with a storied past and blue-blood roots is spending millions of dollars to make itself appealing to a new generation of more laid-back downtown denizens.

The move reflects an acknowledgment that intense real estate development in recent years has changed the face of downtown by bringing in thousands of new residents, many of whom are young entrepreneurs accustomed to working wherever they may be.

"We are trying to create the feeling that this is almost an extension of the office or loft or condo," Hathaway said.

The club will spend about $10 million on improvements meant to update the facilities and appeal to members' changing tastes. Pilates, spinning, yoga and open NBA-style locker rooms are in. Racquetball, which swept the country in the 1970s, is losing popularity to the older racquet sport of squash.

Youth will be served, as the old proverb goes, if private clubs hope to thrive in the digital age.

The days "when men left for the club and stayed out late" are gone, said Crystal Thomas, executive director of the California State Club Assn. Aging membership rolls are a threat to many clubs' survival.

"All clubs need to do whatever they can to bring in younger members," she said. "The clubs that are really successful are really trying to bring down their average age."

Fortunately for Hathaway, whose family has operated the Athletic Club for generations, the neighborhood around his building is on a major growth spurt. Obsolete office buildings from the early 20th century have been converted to apartments, and thousands of new housing units are being built.

It's quite a turnaround for the area outside the club's doors. When the building was erected in 1912 at 7th and Olive streets, the location was considered a proper address by the city's elite citizens.

The Times wrote about the club's opening gala in June of that year: "In a gorgeous spectacle with the very social elect of Los Angeles arrayed in almost barbaric splendor the new clubhouse was formally thrown open. The miracle of mixing athletics with society was accomplished."

But by the 1980s, the club stood beyond the boundaries of downtown's upscale office district and the streets outside were unsavory to the well-dressed men and women in the glass office towers.

Now the neighborhood is coming back. Seventh Street is home to some of downtown's top restaurants. and once-vacant office buildings nearby are filled with residents who pay substantial rent. Most are younger than 40.

"We need to focus on the needs of this group of people becoming the core of our membership," Hathaway said.

The makeover is being done in phases, with the focus now on the fifth and sixth floors, where many of the key athletic facilities are found.

As designed by prominent Los Angeles architect John Parkinson, the club was the first structure in Southern California to have a swimming pool above ground level. The sixth-floor "plunge," as the pool has always been called, was built like the hull of a ship and is held in place with steel plates fastened together by rivets.

But there was no women's locker room when the club opened because membership was limited to men. The 1960s addition of women's changing facilities took up space on the pool deck where there was once a restaurant.

"There were waiters in white jackets serving food on white tablecloths around the pool," said architect Brian Kite of SRK Architects, who is designing the makeover.

New side-by-side locker rooms will be built for men and women on the fifth floor, and the Plunge Cafe will be re-created by the pool. Renovations will include new shops, including a barbershop and nail salon. A new grand stairway will connect the fifth and sixth floors

One of the biggest structural challenges is cutting holes in the fifth floor to make room for new whirlpool baths in the locker rooms. There will also be a cold plunge pool and a spa facility that will include a European-style therapeutic salt suite environment meant to ease members' respiratory conditions.

The Los Angeles Athletic Club dates from 1880 and has had members with such prominent last names as Lankershim, Chandler, Dockweiler, Doheny, O'Melveny and Slauson. Movie stars such as Mark Pickford, Rudolph Valentino, Charlie Chaplin and Johnny Weissmuller once congregated at the club.

But its future is apparently is in the hands of young members like Beshkov, who said he was studying for law school entrance exams in the Olympic Lounge.

"This is like a second home," he said. "I play, study and meet up with friends. I'd say my membership is 51% social and 49% athletic."

One longtime member, 91-year-old developer Jerry Epstein, said he approves of the changes and relishes holding meetings in the Athletic Club's subdued dining areas.

"When you are in a club" instead of a restaurant, he said, "you don't have to scream at each other."