Thanks for correcting the date mhdantholz.
Many of the photographs in the USC Archive are mislabeled. I obviously missed this glaring mistake.

That T-Bird, right was a real "c*nt wagon"---girls really paid attention when you pulled up in one of those. Power under the hood, big bankette seats---mm-m-m.
Question: With these little bucket seats and center-divider/console in cars today, how's a young guy on a date make his move ??

Check out that girl: The SUIT ! The HAIR !! The SHOES !!!
Be still my beating heart...

http://i699.photobucket.com/albums/v...ama1910sky.jpg

Just got this neat triple-postcard panoramic view of Downtown as viewed from the observation deck of Angels Flight.

I realize you can't see much detail in this thumbnail, but for a very nice 5733x1112, 300dpi enlargement, click here. I guarantee you won't be disappointed! (There's also a decent 2592x503, 72dpi image of the panorama available on my most recent blog post.)

I came up with a date of Summer 1910, based upon the fact that the second L.A. Times building has not yet been bombed, and the Hall Of Records appears to be in the very earliest stage of its construction. If anyone can provide a closer approximation, please do!

-Scott

I took the Angel's Flight many, many times in the 1950s---downtown L.A. was great for a young boy.
We moved in 1960, and when I finally got back 1972, while in the USMC, I was aghast: Nothing---I mean not even a shadow was left of the L.A. I knew and loved.
Thank you excabby, and especially ethereal_reality---God bless you and those who love you !

Pasadena Cycleway (a freeway for bicycles) in 1900. Made mostly of wood, the elevated cycleway was designed to run from the Hotel Green in Pasadena to the Plaza in Los Angeles, and was an attempt to speed up transportation and accommodate the booming bicycle craze at the time. In some areas the cycleway was planned to be 50 feet above the ground. The toll was going to be 10 cents for a one-way trip or 15 cents for a two-way ticket, or cyclist could take one of the trains back up the hill. The sudden popularity of automobiles quickly made the cycleway obsolete and the project was abandoned after only one and a half miles of the intended nine mile track was completed.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v1...cleway1900.jpg
looking south, ca.1900.
Pasadena Museum of History

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v1...iaCycleWay.jpg
Pasadena Museum of History

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v1...-cycle_way.jpg
Pasadena Museum of History

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v1...y/00061163.jpg
The Cycleway passes behind the Pasadena Grand Opera House on Bellevue at Raymond in 1900.
Pasadena Museum of History

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v1...ory/horace.jpg
Horace Dobbins, creator of the California Cycleway in 1900 showing off what would be the Cycleway's downfall, an automobile. Pasadena Museum of History
http://highlandpark.wordpress.com/20...rnia-cycleway/







And speaking of speeding up transportation, here's some early L.A. hot rod history.

The earliest hot rod parts stores.
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v1...ts_resized.jpg
George Wight’s Bell Auto Parts and Racing Equipment, established in 1923. Originally a junkyard, this building was built in 1928 at 3633 Gage Ave in Bell. The building still stands and I think there may be a bail bonds business occupying it now.
http://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/s...446547&page=13


http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v1...op_resized.jpg
Lee’s Speed Shop, opened in 1929, sharing space with a junkyard, at 3263 San Fernando Road in Los Angeles. The shop moved in 1933 to 4557 Alhambra Avenue. Closed in 1937 and moved to Oakland.
http://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/s...446547&page=13


http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v1...01_resized.jpg
Karl and Veda Orr’s Speed Shop in 1940 at 11140 Washington Place in Culver City. The shop quickly became a hangout for area hot rodders. It seems they closed the shop sometime in the 1950s, but reopened it on Sierra Highway in Mint Canyon, California in the 1960s.
http://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/s...446547&page=13


http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v1...ition-1948.jpg
The first annual Hot Rod Exposition was held in 1948 at the National Guard Armory in Los Angeles, California. 55,000 people visited the show during the three days it was held. The very first issue of Hot Rod Magazine was created as the program for the show. The whole show was the idea of Robert E. Petersen, he wanted to arrange the show in order to raise money to build a dragstrip. The actual dragstrip was never built.
http://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/s...446547&page=13

Actually, would have to be 1947 or later--note the dual trolley wire in the pic (sorry, multi-quote doesn't seem to be working). That is for the #3 trolley bus, which replaced the 3 streetcar line in 1947, when 5th and 6th Sts were converted to one-way operation.

*WHEN* was the last time you entered a store through an entrance WIDE-OPEN to the street ???

Well, mhdantholz, you need to get yourself down to the corner of Wilshire and Figueroa. Paul Hoffman will have one for you:

http://jpg2.lapl.org/pics08/00013931.jpg


The batwing rear window distinguishes the '36 and '37 Studebaker coupes. If Hoffman is out of stock, you might try checking one out at a car show:

http://lh4.ggpht.com/_zXN_GwdMYMo/TU...32118%20PM.jpg
http://lh4.ggpht.com/_zXN_GwdMYMo/TU...32118%20PM.jpg



http://lh4.ggpht.com/_zXN_GwdMYMo/TU...imstudecar.jpghttp://imcdb.org/vehicle_331681-Studebaker-Dictator-1936.html
Speaking of Studebaker batwing coupes, above is Porky Pig driving past one as he travels
east on Sunset toward Gower in 1940's You Ought to Be in Pictures. The Stude in this picture
has a rumble seat, as does the restored example in the picture below. (Btw, Chappell's Cafe
in Porky's picture was at 6100 Sunset. A Denny's is there now.)

http://lh3.ggpht.com/_zXN_GwdMYMo/TU...34610%20PM.jpg
http://lh3.ggpht.com/_zXN_GwdMYMo/TU...34610%20PM.jpg


And finally, a great shot north from just south of the Sunset/Gower intersection. What is the Churrigueresque-looking building at the
SE corner, now gone?
http://jpg1.lapl.org/pics39/00039221.jpgLAPL
http://jpg1.lapl.org/pics39/00039221.jpg

Was rummaging through the various and found this, and recalled, there was a post on the Chapel of the Chimes...

http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4096/...b96c6e11_b.jpg

Here, referred to not as CotC, but only as "Main Chapel, Los Angeles Crematory and Columbarium Association." 1605 Grover Street -- Grover becomes S. Catalina ca. 1935.

Interesting to compare the flickr photos in er's link to the interior here.

It further reads on its backside:

ANNOUNCEMENT: You and your friends are invited to join us in a series of Sunday afternoon (3 to 4) half-hour musical programs and short addresses on "Cremation -- The Fire-Wisdom Way, Ancient and Modern" by Well-Known Cremationists By Joint Auspices of Los Angeles Cremation Society and "Rosemary League of Loving Remembrance"

What I wouldn't give to have been there, I'm guessing early 20s? to hear those "wacky cremationists" with their nutty ideas. Who do they think we are, heathen Urnfields?

Around the side: Casket stands here & is lowered just as though it were going into a grave -- electric catafalque? Original to the 1903 structure? Too cool.

Answering my own question (post #2709)
 

http://jpg2.lapl.org/pics50/00059872.jpgLAPL http://jpg2.lapl.org/pics50/00059872.jpg

The Churrigueresque building at the SE corner of Sunset and Gower was the Columbia Drug Co., popular
with the cowboys of Gower Gulch who came to check out the competition, the girls, and the magazines at
its outdoor newsstand. Judging by the Mustang, it appears to have still been standing at least until the
mid '60s.

Porky Pig driving down Sunset made me smile. :)

Great find Mdiederi
A friend of mine, Dennis Crowley, was working on a project to restore the Cycleway before he passed away in 2008. The project is documented here:
http://www.californiacycleways.org/project.htm

Routine Mayhem and Vice in Old L. A.
 

http://lh3.ggpht.com/_zXN_GwdMYMo/TU...ptsclubbus.jpg

http://lh3.ggpht.com/_zXN_GwdMYMo/TU...0/sptsclub.jpg
In and out at the Sportsman's Club, 10011 S. Western


http://lh5.ggpht.com/_zXN_GwdMYMo/TU...firevt56th.jpg
Aftermath of fire at Vermont and 96th


http://lh3.ggpht.com/_zXN_GwdMYMo/TU...nty%20raid.jpg
Panty raid at USC


http://lh3.ggpht.com/_zXN_GwdMYMo/TU.../55mercpot.jpg
Imagine how many wigs could be tightened with a '55 Mercury trunkful of pot....


All pics: http://s589.photobucket.com/albums/s...les/?start=all

First of all, my minor in college was Art History and I STILL had to google "churrigueresque". ;)

The Columbia Drug Store looks like such a great place with it's unique architecture and outdoor book stand.
Using Google Street Views I recently "toured" the street I used to live on in West Hollywood.
I was delighted to see that the outdoor book stand at Hancock & Santa Monica Blvd was still in business.

http://img607.imageshack.us/img607/9...tandhancoc.jpg
google street views

Is this a rarity or are outdoor book stands more common than I remember?
In this case, the building is new and yet the book stand survived. I think that's great.

For you Red Car and LARY foamers out there----
 

Lot of streetcar pix. Click the active links at the far left of the table for more pics of each line.

http://www.uncanny.net/~wetzel/lary.htm#stats

Spring & Sunset

http://www.uncanny.net/~wetzel/SpringatSunset.jpg

9th and Main.

http://www.uncanny.net/~wetzel/9thMain.JPG

Beaudry and 6th.

http://www.uncanny.net/~wetzel/sixthstreet.jpg

San Pedro nr 8th.

http://www.uncanny.net/~wetzel/sanpedrostreet.jpg

Fifth and Olive

http://www.uncanny.net/~wetzel/5thatOlive.jpg

Historic Core at Sunset
 

Thanks to Eric.

http://blogdowntown.com/

If you keep Bunker Hill behind and to the right of you.....this view really hasn't changed much in years (excepting the Reagan State Building in the foreground and the lonely Transamerica, of course)

http://blogdowntown.com/

http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4103/...596078bd_b.jpg

MichaelRyerson, here is another shot that contains the Bellevue Arms Apartments. This is taken from Sunvue one street over.
http://digitallibrary.usc.edu/assets.../AAA-EN-106-34
http://digitallibrary.usc.edu/assets.../AAA-EN-106-28

I found something interesting here on Sunvue Circle (now Sunvue Place). There is a reference to the "Old Sisters' Hospital" on Sunset, right about where the old Metropolitan Water District building located. But he hospital was already gone by 1930.
http://digitallibrary.usc.edu/assets...EN-106-34?v=hr
USC

http://www.flickr.com/photos/zilf/12...3740/lightbox/

http://www.cardcow.com/images/set365/card00317_fr.jpg
Cardcow

And here is another view of the hospital from Sunset and Beaudry 1928
http://digitallibrary.usc.edu/assets...EN-28-185?v=hr
USC

Landslide
 

Aerial view showing a close-up of the top of the Elysian Park landslide, showing the 53-foot drop-off of the ridge road. The photo was taken on December 14, 1937, directly over the top of the landslide. Riverside Drive is located to the right below. This was caused by a broken water pipe.
http://jpg3.lapl.org/pics30/00064900.jpg
LAPL.ORG

http://jpg1.lapl.org/pics25/00032055.jpg
LAPL.ORG

View from Riverside Drive
http://jpg3.lapl.org/pics19/00029071.jpg
LAPL.ORG

Now here's one y'all haven't seen, I'm guessing, it being a snapshot from your average pile of thrift store snapshots.

http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4136/...0bf13c88_o.jpg

The only information we have is that it's a stamped Minox print, 16.8.67. So, who was shooting in Los Angeles with a foreign spy camera during the summer of love? And why is this guy in a robe and sandals in the middle of the Bradbury?