noirish Los Angeles

[odinthor]

Same light-string too, except they moved it from the parking lot to the building frontage.

[ScottyB]

Originally Posted by Lorendoc

ScottyB's Edward Hopper photo:


Beaudry's link above

amazingly still has the same font on the building's awning on S. Spring:


GSV

Once a parking lot, pretty much always a parking lot in DTLA.

Thanks for the follow-up Lorendoc! Great to see the letters are still there, and I think you're right about the lights, odinthor.....what a lovely relic.

[ethereal_reality]

.
First of all, I'd like to thank Beaudry for bringing our attention to this treasure trove of remarkable photographs.



I have a couple areas in this photograph that intrique me.




#1


detail

I initially thought the sign was over the road (like a gate) but now I see that it's actually next to the road. Any idea what the sign says?
I'm also intrigued by the steps on the slope. Why do you think this spot was chosen for the steps. Is it a bus stop?

(there's a sign or a very LARGE mailbox at the top of the steps.





#2.....What, pray tell, is the tower with the [white] rounded top? To me it looks like a RADAR DOME.
If you look closely you can see the metal structure that holds it up. . but I can't decide if it's on top of the white building or behind it.


detail


I don't see it on the map that Hoss kindly labeled for us.

.

[Lwize]

Originally Posted by Lorendoc

amazingly still has the same font on the building's awning on S. Spring:


GSV

A phone booth, with a phone and a handset?!

How old is this image?

[nadeau]

Originally Posted by ethereal_reality

.
First of all, I'd like to thank Beaudry for bringing our attention to this treasure trove of remarkable photographs.



I have a couple areas in this photograph that intrique me.




#1


detail

I initially thought the sign was over the road (like a gate) but now I see that it's actually next to the road. Any idea what the sign says?
I'm also intrigued by the steps on the slope. Why do you think this spot was chosen for the steps. Is it a bus stop?

(there's a sign or a very LARGE mailbox at the top of the steps.





#2.....What, pray tell, is the tower with the [white] rounded top? To me it looks like a RADAR DOME.
If you look closely you can see the metal structure that holds it up. . but I can't decide if it's on top of the white building or behind it.


detail


I don't see it on the map that Hoss kindly labeled for us.

.

I’d like to guess that the thing that looks like a radar dome is a sign on the roof of the white building. It looks like it has an image of a person with a white apron. Sorry for my lack of ability to make a circle on the aerial, but I believe the white building with the sign is visible near the right center edge of the aerial. It looks like a building with lots of parking spaces around it, and you can see the semi-circular shadow of the sign. I’m unable to see the stairs in the aerial, but there is an abandoned railroad bed between lumber yard and Huntington Drive, so maybe it was freight and public transit at one time. Since the right of way is named after Huntington, that would make sense. For the period, it does seem odd that they would have discontinued that railroad, but I don’t see any tracks.

[Martin Pal]

Thanks Beaudry and HossC for all that additional information!

Bark n Bite...LoL! I love the close up...you can see a customer or two in the joint. The aerial pinpointing the locations is great.

Originally Posted by Lorendoc

ScottyB's Edward Hopper photo

ScottyB, you are right about the photo's comparison to a Hopper painting. I love Hopper's work. FYI: Two of his paintings are recreated in the film Pennies from Heaven. One is the Nighthawks painting most people know, the other is this one which I saw in person once:

[HossC]

Originally Posted by ethereal_reality

#2.....What, pray tell, is the tower with the [white] rounded top? To me it looks like a RADAR DOME.
If you look closely you can see the metal structure that holds it up. . but I can't decide if it's on top of the white building or behind it.


detail


I don't see it on the map that Hoss kindly labeled for us.

That's McDonnell's Restaurant at 4700 Huntington Dr South.


serendipitism.blogspot.com

Here's a sugar wrapper (dated 1930).


www.icollect247.com

And part of a menu.


toliveanddinela.com

The restaurant is visible on the far right of the aerial I posted yesterday. It's at the center of the detail on the right below. I believe that the 1927 detail on the left below shows the "Old Bridge" mentioned on the menu above.


mil.library.ucsb.edu/mil.library.ucsb.edu

[ethereal_reality]

.
Oh my. . .

What was I thinking?

.

[HenryHuntington]

Originally Posted by nadeau

I’d like to guess that the thing that looks like a radar dome is a sign on the roof of the white building. It looks like it has an image of a person with a white apron. Sorry for my lack of ability to make a circle on the aerial, but I believe the white building with the sign is visible near the right center edge of the aerial. It looks like a building with lots of parking spaces around it, and you can see the semi-circular shadow of the sign. I’m unable to see the stairs in the aerial, but there is an abandoned railroad bed between lumber yard and Huntington Drive, so maybe it was freight and public transit at one time. Since the right of way is named after Huntington, that would make sense. For the period, it does seem odd that they would have discontinued that railroad, but I don’t see any tracks.

Nadeau, you've pretty much nailed #1. The abandoned railroad right-of-way (also quite visible in Hoss's aerial photo) was the trunk line that carried PE's Nothern District lines to Pasadena, Sierra Madre and Glendora. Rail passenger service here was discontinued 1951 due to the conversion of Aliso St. (where these lines entered DTLA) to full freeway standards. These photos were taken about four years later, so the rails and wire had been removed but the right-of-way was still intact. Much of it eventually was paved over to widen traffic lanes on Huntington Dr.

P.S., While I'm here, thanks to Beaudry for sharing a great find!

[ethereal_reality]

.
mystery location.

I recently happened upon this snapshot on eBay.

It shows a lonely bus stop at the Los Angeles City Limit.


eBay

I've been trying to make out the name of the motor lodge but it's next to impossible.


Here's a closer look at the sign and, what looks like, a gas station.


detail

and there's no name of the mail box. (clues are sparse)





The fairly nice building on the right [top photo] might possibly be the main building to the motor lodge.


detail

And as you can clearly see. . . the photograph was taken when the population of Los Angeles was only 1,808,579.

Does this area look familiar to anyone?

.

[GaylordWilshire]

Well, I can't tell you where this was taken...but the population of the city in the 1950 US census was 1,970,358...so it may have been shot not long before that figure was arrived at (or until the sign was updated). Anyway, the car is a Mercury, either a '49 (intro in April 1948), a '50, or a '51, all of which used the same hood ornament. Here's one on a '51:

[ethereal_reality]

Thanks GW. That's a start.





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When I first came across this amazing photograph I thought it was a hotel in Terre Haute, Indiana - when it fact - it is a photograph of the 'Terra Haute Hotel' in Los Angeles!


eBay

The long horizontal sign appears to have been white washed and it looks like the last word was "House" and not hotel.

It also appears the hotel is for sale.




The seller included this. . .


eBay

"Old Terra Haute Hotel on E. 1st St. in Los Angeles. Owned by my uncle Oscar & Grubb in the 1880s & 90s.
My youngest brother and cousins Florence & Oscar were all born there.

Ed, 1887

Florence, 1888

Oscar, 1890"


.

[odinthor]

LA Times, 9/9/1885



LA Times, 3/29/1887



LA CD 1888



LA Herald, 3/20/1905


This walk down First Street is interesting, and mentions the Terre Haute House in passing (sorry about the fragmentariness of the following):









All the above fragments, LA Herald 3/1/1889

As to the Armstrong family mentioned in the above, methinks the writer got the given name of the pater familias wrong. According to my notes, there had indeed been a James Armstrong in old L.A.; but he was the commander of the Savannah out in San Pedro Bay during the Yankee onslaught in 1846. The head of the household with Pinky and Kate etc. however was Edward R. Armstrong, saloon keeper in L.A. in 1870 etc., born in New York ca. 1817.

[HossC]

The 1886-1887 CD lists B H Harbert as proprietor of Terra Haute House at 125 & 127 E 1st Street. By 1888, Oscar E Grubb had taken over. He's still there in 1891, but the name has changed to Terra Haute Hotel and the address has become 227 E First Street. The last listing I found was 1895, when the name had reverted to Terra Haute House.

The 1887-1888 CD also lists the Terra Haute Dining Room (prop. E L Grubb) at 125 E First Street.

[ethereal_reality]

"Terre Haute House"

That explains the horizontal sign mystery. Mighty fine sleuthing, odinthor.

and thanks for the additional information, Hoss

.

[odinthor]

Golly! I thought the address 127 E. 1st seemed familiar! That was in due course the location of the other Poodle Dog restaurant, discussed in message 53180. A number of unsavory incidents (thefts, shopgirl being beaten by employer because she dared to ask for her pay, structure found unsafe) happened at that address over the years.

[HossC]

Originally Posted by HossC

The last listing I found was 1895, when the name had reverted to Terra Haute House.

I carried on looking through the CDs, and found extra entries for Terra Haute House up until 1899 (for some reason they didn't show up in the search). Oscar E Grubb continues to be listed at 227 E 1st Street until 1906, but only as furnished rooms or lodgings - Terra Haute House is not mentioned.

In 1907, the Greater Los Angeles Hotel is listed at 227½ E 1st, while Oscar E Grubb has furnished rooms at 103 E 2nd Street.

I didn't search many CDs after this, but Oscar E Grubb turns up in the 1910 CD as an assembler at the Industrial Electric Co (815 S Spring Street) whilst residing in Ocean Park.

[Martin Pal]

Originally Posted by ethereal_reality

detail

And as you can clearly see. . . the photograph was taken when the population of Los Angeles was only 1,808,579.

Does this area look familiar to anyone?

.
________________________________________________________________

Would the elevation of 320 ft. be any sort of a clue to finding the location? I'm assuming it's feet.

[Beaudry]

I think this one



is pretty cool, it's the Hotel Southland neon with the fins of the General Petroleum across the street.



]

6th and St Paul



See the neon sign behind Mike's Body and Fender? It says Pacific Dining Car.

[HossC]

There's even a picture of the Teris Drug Co in the collection.


serendipitism.blogspot.com

My 2013 post on the Hotel Teris can be found here.