DopplerFloodWatch 2010TripleX news from the front, i.e. via LA Historic-Cultural-Monument La Paloma, my 1907 Tudor-Craftsman: water in the laundry room, seeping through the balcony, and through the roof of the garage. One preservationist/restoration specialist who works on houses, mine included, basically said "I don't know why people get so worked up about preventing fire, when I've seen a hundred houses destroyed by water."

And that's something to say, in a city built in a desert. Damn you Chas Hatfield!!!

Love these, always love the Rex Arms, which was more ornate once until its streamlining, due in part I think to Wilshire's widening.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/7294653@N07/1389516175/

Another interesting photo of the Y.W.C.A. at 251 South Hill Street.



http://img600.imageshack.us/img600/7...ywca1918r1.jpg
usc digital archive






Earlier, Beaudry provided this VERY interesting link.
It's worth a look just to see the astonishing light well in this building.

As this link shows, the Y.W.C.A. eventually became the Hotel Belmont.

Thank you! You know I love everything to do with Temple Square and its environs. :)

I've since remembered this blog post by Larry Harnisch re: an old Nuestro Pueblo article about the U.S. Hotel, indicating it was, indeed, established before the Civil War. So it appears probable that those two photos could have been taken from the exact same vantage point in the U.S. Hotel, after all, 62 years apart.

I also note with interest that, in the 1925 photo, the majority of the Temple Block had already been razed for the construction of the new City Hall. I didn't realize before this that site preparations started as early as that...

-Scott

Hill Street & Court Street, 1943. A perfect place for a "noir" rendezvous.


http://img233.imageshack.us/img233/5...ourtst1943.jpg
ucla

Looking north on Grand Ave. from Fourth St. in 1913.


http://img193.imageshack.us/img193/2...elookingno.jpg
usc digital archive




For more information on the Hotel Fleur De Lis.

http://onbunkerhill.org/bryan_mansion#comment-29

I like how the first of these are shot from atop the old Shell building. (Now the site of that LA Self Storage structure at 6th & Beaudry what used to be a black-glass office building.) The big white building up Bunker Hill is the Alta Vista, former home of John Fante. The big white building at the end of the new highway is The Monarch Hotel. And the structure behind the Wellington is not long for this world... http://www.you-are-here.com/los_angeles/statler.html to be demolished in the coming months by Korean Air Lines.

With so much love in the LBC...
 

In the city, city of Long Beach --

-- so after I put up those motel images I figger'd I'd put up some more and then cogitated, well, aren't there a mess more o' those motels in the LBC? But when I commenced digging thru my Long Beach cards fer motels I kept coming up with too much amusing stuff not to share. Therefore. I must inundate you with Long Beach and its immediate, random environs as I see fit.

http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1407/...a5371b78_o.jpg
I love Boardwalk Empire, but how can/does their boardwalk compare to ours? Please! And look at those opal glass signs.

http://farm6.static.flickr.com/5283/...a10ff9eb_o.jpg

Bisby's Spiral Airship!! From Wapedia -- http://wapedia.mobi/en/The_Pike

The Pike was an amusement zone started in 1902 in Long Beach, California at the shoreline south of Ocean Boulevard with several independent arcades, food stands, gift shops, a variety of rides and a grand bath house. It was most noted for the "Cyclone Racer" (1930), a large wooden dual track roller coaster, built out on pilings over the water. The Pike operated under several names. The amusement zone surrounding the Pike, "Silver Spray Pier", was included along with additional parking in the post World War II expansion, it was all renamed Nu-Pike in the mid 60's, then renamed Queens Park before closure and demolition when the long-term contract with the city ran out in 1979.

Bisby's Spiral Airship built in 1902 had cars that were suspended underneath a track and could swing freely. The cars travelled up an inclined track, and then descended along a spiral track around a steel frame tower before returning to the station. This is commonly acknowledged as the first suspended roller coaster type ride.

http://farm6.static.flickr.com/5089/...3776eb9e_o.jpg

Now, of the Hotel Virginia:

http://farm6.static.flickr.com/5123/...8ddff0f8_o.jpg

...that's an entire thread unto itself. There's a whole world of postcards and letterhead and whatnot devoted to the Virginia, and rightfully so, but I won't go into that now. (This shot might be well included in the "LA at Night" album I put together once upon a time ago.) http://digitallibrary.usc.edu/assets...arch/CHS-14358

http://farm6.static.flickr.com/5083/...2540c9b1_o.jpg

Mmm. The Hotel De Luxe. Ocean at Locust. Scene of many a noir happening one can surmise. As is true with the preceding images? Don't try looking for them on Google Maps.

http://farm6.static.flickr.com/5088/...442ca172_o.jpg

Surf Motel, full-tile showers, vented wall heat, radios.

Here's some Loooong Beach. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GQycSM8pAmw If anyone tells you it's NSFW, you can throw up your signs and say "Pardon me, kind sir, but would you be so accommodating as to get the funyun out? Thank you."

http://farm6.static.flickr.com/5083/...94f2c9ea_o.jpg

Here's some more Loooong Beach http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rE_Y8wh-wOs though be advised I have a high tolerance for bad language and bad behavior; you may not. Click at your advised discretion.
And now, the Chace Inn:

http://farm6.static.flickr.com/5083/...5912248e_o.jpg


http://farm6.static.flickr.com/5284/...11180a90_o.jpg

HEmlock 6-8204

Sleep to the sound of the surf. Free television.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5ZIauKrL_b4

Also hit this http://farm6.static.flickr.com/5082/...93aedf0e_o.jpg

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5ZIauKrL_b4

http://farm6.static.flickr.com/5202/...87dddbf5_o.jpg

Ok, this one is on Long Beach Blvd. In the CPT. So sue me.

if you look just to the left of the roof of the monarch hotel, you can see "stuie k's", (oliver) brand new joint on it's perch at 4th and hope.


this post card is spookalicious! bring the kiddies to see the sunken gardens at the virginia...........creeps deluxe! i bet the desk clerk's dressed in black

i don't believe i have ever seen this particular image taken from the angels flight observation tower looking east.

The photo is undated, but i'm gonna guess maybe 1911, due to the hulburt building standing, but the Ferguson building not yet. (i think i read somewhere that the ferguson building was completed in 1912....)

http://digitallibrary.usc.edu/assets...CHS-44024?v=hr
Source: USC Digital Archive http://digitallibrary.usc.edu/assets...CHS-44024?v=hr

this image is from 1951 looking east at the west portal of the third street tunnel which is being cleaned......hey even noir needs a cleaning every now and then.........

http://digitallibrary.usc.edu/assets...148-019~2?v=hr
Source: USC Digital Archives http://digitallibrary.usc.edu/assets...148-019~2?v=hr

oh... and speaking of spooky night time postcards, guaranteed to scare the bejeesus out of any perspective tourists


http://digitalcollections.lmu.edu/cg...B=1&DMROTATE=0
Source: LMU|LA http://digitalcollections.lmu.edu/cg...B=1&DMROTATE=0

maybe someone thought this would scream on the rack "welcome to sunny los angeles" (me?... i hear moaning and chains rattlin'......:eek: )

Masters Pontiac -- since 1919!
http://farm6.static.flickr.com/5288/...a9f87fee_o.jpg

http://farm6.static.flickr.com/5127/...0c4e3fce_o.jpg

Like the KEHE/KFI building, the Ambassador, etc, 1545 Long Beach Blvd has been replaced by a school. And of Pontiac...

These are both incredible. I haven't seen them either til now. I guess USC has a backlog of images they're sneaking in on us! Which is why one should always keep poking around...

http://farm6.static.flickr.com/5207/...519f779b_b.jpg
3503 Atlantic Blvd, ph GA 4-3005
"Eat your favorite foods from South of the border surrounded by scenes of the bullfights, Mexican courtyards and of course, the siesta."

http://farm6.static.flickr.com/5129/...36370710_o.jpg
Welch's -- "Southern California's Most Beautiful Restaurant"
4401 Atlantic Blvd

Mytinger & Casselberry, International Distributors of Nutrilite Food Supplement, Long Beach, Calif.
http://farm6.static.flickr.com/5003/...f6ecd44d_o.jpg

In 1948, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration seized shipments of Nutrilite, then distributed by a California firm, Mytinger & Casselberry Inc. The FDA claimed that a booklet with the product made false claims that it would cure diseases. The distributor brought suit, claiming the seizures were unconstitutional. In 1950, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that the seizure was constitutional.

In 1951 the FDA again acted against Nutrilite, issuing a landmark order forbidding 15,000 door-to-door salesmen of the product from making "extravagant" claims for Nutrilite. The FDA prohibited claims that Nutrilite had value in treating 57 diseases, including "cancer, heart trouble, diabetes, arthritis and rheumatism." The FDA said that such claims could endanger the public health when made "in the privacy of the home." (Wikipedia)


Personnel Employment, Affiliated with Personnel Research and Development, 758 Long Beach Blvd
http://farm6.static.flickr.com/5289/...003cf666_o.jpg

Meanwhile, farther down the coast from Long Beach...
 

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2542/...2b1c6c49e2.jpghttp://farm3.static.flickr.com/2542/...2b1c6c49e2.jpg
Madame Whatever lived in house #3

http://bp1.blogger.com/_nHk4eRE8Qbc/...eskaca1918.jpgnewportbeachpostcards.com


http://jpg2.lapl.org/pics40/00054852.jpgLAPL http://jpg2.lapl.org/pics40/00054852.jpg


I don't think I had ever heard of Helena Modjeska--and frankly still wouldn't be much interested in her unnoirish self if not for her real estate on an island I'd also never heard of--before a friend sent me this L.A. Times article of December 5:

http://articles.latimes.com/2010/dec...-then-20101205

Christmas Parades
 

Downtown, 1929
http://jpg3.lapl.org/pics45/00072079.jpgLAPL http://jpg3.lapl.org/pics45/00072079.jpg


Downtown, 1940:
http://jpg1.lapl.org/pics43/00041014.jpgLAPL http://jpg1.lapl.org/pics43/00041014.jpg
http://jpg1.lapl.org/pics43/00041015.jpgLAPL http://jpg1.lapl.org/pics43/00041015.jpg



Hollywood Santa Claus Lane Parade, ca. 1950:
http://jpg2.lapl.org/pics03/00011451.jpgLAPL http://jpg2.lapl.org/pics03/00011451.jpg
Phil Harris and Alice Faye. (I'm assuming that these mini-Alices with them are their
daughters... if so, it allows me to boast shamefully of a personal brush with celebrity:
One of the girls and her husband lived across the street from me in New Orleans in
the early '60s. Of course, at age 8 or 9 I had no idea who her mother was, but
I do seem to remember a bit of neighborhood buzz once when Alice was
supposedly visiting.)


http://jpg2.lapl.org/pics03/00011444.jpgLAPL http://jpg2.lapl.org/pics03/00011444.jpg
William Bendix


http://jpg2.lapl.org/pics03/00011442.jpgLAPL http://jpg2.lapl.org/pics03/00011442.jpg
Jimmy Durante and Norma Deloris Egstrom,
aka Miss Peggy Lee. (I'd really rather
hear her sing.)


http://jpg2.lapl.org/pics03/00011453.jpgLAPL http://jpg2.lapl.org/pics03/00011453.jpg
Jack Benny


http://jpg2.lapl.org/pics03/00011450.jpgLAPL http://jpg2.lapl.org/pics03/00011450.jpg
Red Skelton


http://jpg2.lapl.org/pics03/00011445.jpgLAPL http://jpg2.lapl.org/pics03/00011445.jpg
Leo Carrillo


http://jpg2.lapl.org/pics03/00011441.jpgLAPL http://jpg2.lapl.org/pics03/00011441.jpg
Eddie Cantor. I love that BROADWAY-
HOLLYWOOD sign


Hollywood and Vine, ca. 1964:
http://jpg2.lapl.org/pics03/00011440.jpgLAPL http://jpg2.lapl.org/pics03/00011440.jpg

That looks like an old Utter-McKinley Mortuary, though that address isn't on my list of UMM chapels dating from 1953...

-Scott