noirish Los Angeles - Page 658

BifRayRock · #**13141** Posted **Mar 11, 2013, 8:04 PM**

1925 - NW Corner of Arlington Avenue and Washington Blvd.

google

Unfettered

Fettered

Could do with a bit of chrome. Where is the nearest Western Auto Stores?

All B&W images from USC Digital

google

BifRayRock · #**13142** Posted **Mar 11, 2013, 8:39 PM**

1939 - Wilshire and St. Andrews Place. (Turn left (12 months earlier) and you may encounter the scene on Ingraham Street below.)

Terrazzo sidewalk? Scooter?

1938 Ingraham Street (east of St. Andrews) and one block south of Wilshire

Above from USC Digital

http://urbandiachrony.files.wordpres...wsingraham.jpg

MichaelRyerson · #**13143** Posted **Mar 11, 2013, 8:48 PM**

I don't know about the rest of you guys but the truncated pics are pretty much useless to me.

BifRayRock · #**13144** Posted **Mar 11, 2013, 9:07 PM**

Hate to beat a dead horse, but MR, have you tried changing the screen resolution? Again, I have seen it mentioned before: toggle zoom "Control"and "+". Seems as though many can view the larger images.

A second or possible fourth or fifth look . . . since the implementation of new format.

Western view of Wilshire Boulevard looking toward Wilshire Boulevard Christian Church. Yes the Derby.

USC Digital

GaylordWilshire · #**13145** Posted **Mar 11, 2013, 9:14 PM**

Quote:

Originally Posted by MichaelRyerson

an odd, archaic word. perfectly suited here. I'm wondering if you see the serendipitous quality also.

For the Love of Books: The Adventures of an Impecunious Collector, by Paul Jordan Smith

(Oxford University Press, 1934)

How interesting--I didn't know about that book. I see that it was published in 1934, after he and La Bixby Smith divorced and she presumably took back the checkbook...perhaps rendering him impecunious but not bereft.. she ate steak tartar and died the next year of the trichinosis (from the pork remains left on the butcher's meat grinder) while he lived a full life all the way to 1971.

Quote:

Originally Posted by MichaelRyerson

I don't know about the rest of you guys but the truncated pics are pretty much useless to me.

I had almost given up on the USC Digital Library as a resource, finding it clunky to fool with after the site was overhauled--difficult to find pictures rather than old issues of the USC Trojan. I still find it more trouble than it's worth for my purposes, but it looks like BifRayRock has figured the system out. The highly enlarged fragments are interesting as long as there is an accompanying shot of the complete, if small, pic.

GaylordWilshire · #**13146** Posted **Mar 11, 2013, 9:35 PM**

Quote:

Originally Posted by BifRayRock

Western view of Wilshire Boulevard looking toward Wilshire Boulevard Christian Church. Yes the Derby.

Fascinating shots, BRR--this appears to be ca 1926/27, between the construction of the Wilshire Christian Church and the Gaylord and the installation of the Wilshire Specials when the boulevard is being widened and utilities were being moved underground. It shows a dramatic dip at the intersection we've seen good bit of here--the slough running down along Mariposa--though maybe it only appears exaggerated due to the construction and the temporary curve.

Btw-- The house just to the left of the church tower looks like the W.D. Longyear house at the northwest corner of Wilshire (3555) and Ardmore (3555 Wilshire: http://wilshireboulevardhouses.blogs...2_archive.html.

A Look Back at Vintage Los Angeles

LAT

A snippet from W.D. Longyear's obituary from the Times of March 18, 1941

MichaelRyerson · #**13147** Posted **Mar 11, 2013, 9:45 PM**

Quote:

Originally Posted by BifRayRock

[COLOR="Indigo"][SIZE="2"][FONT="Tahoma"]Hate to beat a dead horse,...

Sorry Biff, I was apparently too cryptic by half. I was saying seeing these truncated images on the thread is pretty much a wash for me. Not to sound high-handed but posting them is (in my eyes) a waste of bandwidth. I haven't encountered any problem with moving (whole) images from USC to my hosting site (Flickr) and thence to here. I'm not sure why they are suddenly breaking up for some people. Really kind of an idle observation, I know.

MichaelRyerson · #**13148** Posted **Mar 11, 2013, 10:00 PM**

Quote:

Originally Posted by GaylordWilshire

How interesting--I didn't know about that book. I see that it was published in 1934, after he and La Bixby Smith divorced and she presumably took back the checkbook...perhaps rendering him impecunious but not bereft.. she ate steak tartar and died the next year of the trichinosis (from the pork remains left on the butcher's meat grinder) while he lived a full life all the way to 1971.

I had almost given up on the USC Digital Library as a resource, finding it clunky to fool with after the site was overhauled--difficult to find pictures rather than old issues of the USC Trojan. I still find it more trouble than it's worth for my purposes, but it looks like BifRayRock has figured the system out. The highly enlarged fragments are interesting as long as there is an accompanying shot of the complete, if small, pic.

Yeah, I have his book 'The Road I Came: some recollections and reflections concerning changes in American life and manners since 1890' Caxton (1960). It's not bad (the ponderous title notwithstanding), he's a fairly polished writer although, knowing what I/we know about him, the narrative could have been vastly more interesting.

As to the USC redesign, I guess I don't know what's going on. The search function is clunky and seemingly incomplete but when I load an image in the 'print' window, I'm able to right-click copy and take the image directly into my Flickr photo stream. Am I missing something?

Flyingwedge · #**13149** Posted **Mar 11, 2013, 10:41 PM**

Quote:

Originally Posted by MichaelRyerson

I don't know about the rest of you guys but the truncated pics are pretty much useless to me.

Amen, brother.

BifRayRock · #**13150** Posted **Mar 11, 2013, 11:02 PM**

Taking liberties . . . while looking for "4032."

Prior post http://forum.skyscraperpage.com/show...ostcount=10327 had several Wilton Place images that are likely missing due to the USC format change. For context, hope you all don't mind seeing some again.

1929 -

LAPL

1958 (SW corner of intersection)

LAPL

Assume one of these roofs to the right belonged to the property at 3974 Wilshire Tom n Toms, formerly Charlie Chan's Printing.

google

Couple doors west, ca., 1978

LAPL

Further west from the other side of Wilton, 1978.

LAPL

________________________________

More Wilton Place

and by popular demand . . . pea gravel.

Looks like a right charming station. Where are the keys to the comfort station?
1932

________________________________

Details Look at those light fixtures!

________________________________

Grand Opening - '32

No question about it. Dames go for guys in uniforms. Except when it comes to the guy in the suit who owns the station. Besides, it's not easy keeping those pants clean. Ooops.

Except as noted, all from USC Digital

BifRayRock · #**13151** Posted **Mar 11, 2013, 11:37 PM**

Quote:

Originally Posted by MichaelRyerson

As to the USC redesign, I guess I don't know what's going on. The search function is clunky and seemingly incomplete but when I load an image in the 'print' window, I'm able to right-click copy and take the image directly into my Flickr photo stream. Am I missing something?

I have been mindful of the problems some, but apparently not all, are having. When I first attempted to post the enlarged images, I viewed a few of the images on different computers with different browsers and screens. All but one had viewable images and the problematic one was corrected by changing the resolution settings. Apparently, not everyone is afflicted. The 'SC change has affected the image search tools. I have been able to locate the thumbnail version of an 'SC image but "error 404" or similar is a popular response when searching for the original image.

Have used a third party host where the images disappeared without recourse. May or may not have been user error. However, when I tried to copy the enlarged newly formatted images from the irksome site to the bucket, I was presented with a matrix "puzzle" you and others seem to be describing. Frankly, it would be nice if this site hosted albums, but that is probably asking too much.

Regarding enlargements from the 'SC site, I wish they had a grid system to highlight certain areas. Perhaps this is available, but I am operating more on intuition than anything else.

I still have trouble spelling DOS, let alone using it.

___________________________________

1923 - Searchin for the Gaylord from Wilton Place.

Driver, get me to the set before Cecil has a melt down!

All from truncation central, USC Digital

JScott · #**13152** Posted **Mar 11, 2013, 11:47 PM**

Quote:

Originally Posted by MichaelRyerson

I don't know about the rest of you guys but the truncated pics are pretty much useless to me.

Not to sound high-handed but posting them is (in my eyes) a waste of bandwidth. I haven't encountered any problem with moving (whole) images from USC to my hosting site (Flickr) and thence to here.

Not only that, but all of those images are hotlinked to the USC website, which means all USC has to do is change a single character in the format of their URLs, and the hotlinked pics will disappear from this thread. Again. Waste of bandwidth, indeed.

MichaelRyerson · #**13153** Posted **Mar 12, 2013, 12:14 AM**

Quote:

Originally Posted by JScott

Not only that, but all of those images are hotlinked to the USC website, which means all USC has to do is change a single character in the format of their URLs, and the hotlinked pics will disappear from this thread. Again. Waste of bandwidth, indeed.

Hot linked? Hey, don't they know about hot linking? They can't continue to do that! We need to have a conversation about the integrity of the thread.

Chuckaluck · #**13154** Posted **Mar 12, 2013, 12:36 AM**

Quote:

Originally Posted by MichaelRyerson

Hot linked? Hey, don't they know about hot linking? They can't continue to do that! We need to have a conversation about the integrity of the thread.

Didn't I read similar musings when the thread approached page 500?

I don't pretend to know much about electronic preservation, but a change on any hosting site affects the thread too. In effect, aren't all "hosted" images hot linked? Ever notice when LAPL's server/s is/are down this site slows down waiting for images to upload or pages post incompletely? USC's site occasionally crawls at a glacial pace too. Just because the majority rely on Flickr or PhotoBucket doesn't ensure that their posting/hosting policies will always remain the same.

The best insurance is probably acting as your own host.

GaylordWilshire · #**13155** Posted **Mar 12, 2013, 1:05 AM**

GSV/LAT

Speaking of the 4000 block of Wilshire... it contains--or did as of the last Google camera pass--one of the last holdouts of the residential boulevard. I haven't yet discovered when it was built, but, judging by the style, it seems it can't have been all that old as of the 1922 auction (although it's always possible that, given its verticality, it was the remodeling of an older house moved to the lot from an eastern neighborhood; in any case, it was not on the lot in 1914).

The only other info I have in my notes, which apparently came from the same series of auction ads, is the come-on that "This property will double in value in ten years or less. The city planning commission has already mapped out improvements for Wilshire Boulevard that will make it the finest boulevard in the country." Not mentioned quite this early was that the trend was commercial, not residential. And yet, somehow, here is still is--at least as of 2011.

As for hosting--I often use imageshack because they come out larger on the thread, but I do know that if you cull your images there, they will disappear here. This does not seem to be the case with images I upload to Picasa on my computer--if I delete those, they seem to stay here. (They're just noticeably smaller.)

JScott · #**13156** Posted **Mar 12, 2013, 1:15 AM**

Quote:

Originally Posted by Chuckaluck

In effect, aren't all "hosted" images hot linked? Ever notice when LAPL's server/s is/are down this site slows down waiting for images to upload or pages post incompletely? USC's site occasionally crawls at a glacial pace too. Just because the majority rely on Flickr or PhotoBucket doesn't ensure that their posting/hosting policies will always remain the same.

The best insurance is probably acting as your own host.

Yes, of course, all of the images here are hotlinked. Contrary to what you may imagine, though, hosts like Photobucket and Flickr do not routinely change their link URLs. They know that to do so would discourage people from using their services. Sites like USC and LAPL, however, are NOT set up to be image hosts, and they do not want people hotlinking to their sites - main reason being that the increased traffic slows down their servers - a problem you yourself allude to.

Really, there's no excuse not to use dedicated image hosting sites. No excuse at all.

GaylordWilshire · #**13157** Posted **Mar 12, 2013, 1:34 AM**

Well, with all due respect, I can't say I agree 100%, Scott--I know that when I started posting to this thread I was pretty much clueless about how to get an image I found or had on my computer onto the thread--it probably took the same sort of patient explanations to newcomers that you still come across here just to figure out what the little image icon was at the top here. And, to tell you the truth, in the interest of time, I have linked directly from one of the libraries even fairly recently. This has always been an informal thread, and, while I would love it if it could be archived and protected, that would take a lot of time and dedication (a few, God bless 'em, with the computer skills and interest required have made the effort to do so). My point is that it can be time-consuming, and if it is complicated for newcomers, well, they won't come. And while it may seem as though this is all I do, it's only a little of what I get done at my desk everyday. I'm lucky that I can turn to this screen anytime I like to post something that strikes my fancy, and I'm practiced enough now to get a post up and running quickly.... I don't see how this thread can be turned into a formal research tool with strict guidelines for submissions. Randomness is definitely part of its beauty.

Just my 2¢--or $10.

MichaelRyerson · #**13158** Posted **Mar 12, 2013, 2:05 AM**

Quote:

Originally Posted by Chuckaluck

Didn't I read similar musings when the thread approached page 500?

I don't pretend to know much about electronic preservation, but a change on any hosting site affects the thread too. In effect, aren't all "hosted" images hot linked? Ever notice when LAPL's server/s is/are down this site slows down waiting for images to upload or pages post incompletely? USC's site occasionally crawls at a glacial pace too. Just because the majority rely on Flickr or PhotoBucket doesn't ensure that their posting/hosting policies will always remain the same.

The best insurance is probably acting as your own host.

No, I believe the musings as we approached and then went through 500 pages had to do with the anticipation that a skyscraper limit might exist on individual threads at about 500 pages. We thought there was a chance we might attempt to log on one day and get nothing. I get early pangs of withdrawal even typing those words! And yes, I suppose you could make the case that even 'hosted' images are ultimately hot-linked and therefore subject to the potential vagaries of the host site but these host sites are commercial enterprises and are governed to some degree by the terms of use under which they collect our yearly subscription money. So could it happen? Sure it's possible but not likely. What is for sure is that sites like the USC digital archives absolutely do periodically shut down for maintenance or for a redesign. And when that happens, the integrity of this thread is deeply wounded. Everyone who posts here should do so in a way that protects the thread. Besides 'hot linking' violates the conditions of use we all 'agree to' when entering those sites.

kznyc2k · #**13159** Posted **Mar 12, 2013, 4:39 AM**

Quote:

Originally Posted by ethereal_reality

I've been intrigued by this large house northwest of downtown for quite some time.

gsv

The juxtaposition of the old wood frame house with the skyline of downtown Los Angeles evokes memories of classic noir.

gsv

The street in the foreground is Colton. The house faces a stub of an un-named dead end street.
__

Hey buddy, wanna buy this house and perhaps spare it from demolition? Asking price is a cool $1.28 mil

Link to Curbed LA

Also, one of the commenters noted that the house made an appearance in L.A. Confidential in the scene where high-class pimp Pierce Patchett is attending the groundbreaking of the Santa Monica Freeway. So I pulled up the movie and sure enough there it is:

FredH · #**13160** Posted **Mar 12, 2013, 4:55 AM**

O.K. So here we have a very attractive woman holding a lit cigarette and a butt ugly (five legged) dog, looking up at a no smoking sign:

lapl

The library has this description with the photo:

"Mrs. Bialac and dog, Patsy, encounter one of the more than 3000 warning signs now posted by the fire department throughout the closed areas of the city. Photo dated: July 8, 1948."

I had no idea who Mrs. Bialac may have been, so I searched for that name and came up with this:

lapl

"Pictured are Barbara Payton and then-boyfriend, Jerry Bialac at Hollywood's Mocambo nightclub. Photograph dated December 8, 1950."

BARBARA PAYTON! Yipes! Were these two Bialacs married? I have no idea. Does anyone know?