noirish Los Angeles

[HossC]

At 64, "Spanky" did better than most of his "gang". Here's a round-up of him and the others mentioned above:

George "Spanky" McFarland, October 2, 1928 – June 30, 1993, aged 64. Cardiac arrest.
Carl "Alfalfa" Switzer, August 7, 1927 – January 21, 1959, aged 31. Homicide (during an argument over $50).
Darla Jean Hood, November 8, 1931 - June 13, 1979, aged 47. Acute hepatitis/heart failure.
Billy "Froggy" Laughlin, July 5, 1932 – August 31, 1948, aged 16. Traffic collision.
Billie "Buckwheat" Thomas, March 12, 1931 – October 10, 1980, aged 49. Heart attack.

Robert Blake, currently 84.

[oldstuff]

Originally Posted by JimCraig

Please note odinthor's Mother is holding her gloves. In those days ladies of quality never went anywhere important without their gloves.

My Grandmother ALWAYS had her gloves and a hat. We had a family joke about "little ladies" wearing hats and gloves. She was born in 1880 when hats and gloves were the norm and wanted her daughters to be "ladies" and me too, but I was more resistant to the gloves and hats. I was more a jeans and t shirt person, possibly because the layers of nylon net that made girls dresses poof out in the 50's itched like crazy!

[tovangar2]

My older sister and I were also expected to be "little ladies". Shopping trips DTLA were marred by the hats and gloves requirement and the dreaded, itchy and scratchy petticoats. The polar opposite of my sister, who never seemed to damage or even soil her clothing, I was not "lady" material. My mother would pick through my pathetic collection of left-hand gloves (I'd lost all the right-hand ones) to try to find two that were less stained than the others. I would be instructed to hold these (à la odinthor's mom) to project the required "gracious" image, but I usually had them balled up in my sweaty fist, employing them to wipe my runny nose.

[odinthor]

Another facet of being genteel, along with the matter of gloves, I vividly remember how it felt here in So Cal when the department stores started ignoring the real or imaginary Sunday laws, and started being--gasp!--open on Sundays. We'd skulk out of the house and drive to a farther shopping center to lessen the chance that a neighbor would see us disgracing ourselves by shopping on a Sunday!

It took about six months to get past this feeling.

[Martin Pal]

Odds & Ends:

I met Spanky McFarland in Universal City at a home video trade show (VSDA) for the area.
I'm guessing they were releasing Our Gang on VHS? I got his autograph. At some point I got
Tommy "Butch" Bond's autograph, too.

Originally Posted by John Maddox Roberts

And now Spielberg plans to remake West Side Story. The mind reels.
_________________________________________________________________

I knew he had put that idea out there several years ago. Now it seems a casting call has gone out. Does anyone know WHY he wants to do this? I understand his screenplay of this version will be by his Munich and Lincoln collaborator, Tony Kushner. And ethnic casting is a priority. Even singing the lyrics in Spanish a probability. Still, I saw this film again last summer at AMPAS with George Chakiris and Russ Tamblyn in attendance, among others and the film is nearly flawless. Why would you want to tamper with success like that?



Oh, speaking of West Side Story, I met Rita Moreno at that same VSDA event mentioned above.
She was promoting her exercise tape.

Originally Posted by tovangar2

Hot, dry, dusty, gusting Santa Anas tonight. The palm trees are making that particularly ominous clattering sound.
_________________________________________________________________

Santa Ana winds drive me crazy.
So do remakes of great films.

[CityBoyDoug]

Originally Posted by odinthor

Another facet of being genteel, along with the matter of gloves, I vividly remember how it felt here in So Cal when the department stores started ignoring the real or imaginary Sunday laws, and started being--gasp!--open on Sundays. We'd skulk out of the house and drive to a farther shopping center to lessen the chance that a neighbor would see us disgracing ourselves by shopping on a Sunday!

It took about six months to get past this feeling.

Yes, I even eat food and do other things on Sunday. I have no shame.

[Lomara]

Originally Posted by odinthor

(Here's how in Photoshop: Image > Adjustments > Invert.)

For those without Photoshop, you can use the free image editing software GIMP to do this. https://www.gimp.org/

Colors > Invert

[Lomara]

Originally Posted by HossC

At 64, "Spanky" did better than most of his "gang". Here's a round-up of him and the others mentioned above:

George "Spanky" McFarland, October 2, 1928 – June 30, 1993, aged 64. Cardiac arrest.
Carl "Alfalfa" Switzer, August 7, 1927 – January 21, 1959, aged 31. Homicide (during an argument over $50).
Darla Jean Hood, November 8, 1931 - June 13, 1979, aged 47. Acute hepatitis/heart failure.
Billy "Froggy" Laughlin, July 5, 1932 – August 31, 1948, aged 16. Traffic collision.
Billie "Buckwheat" Thomas, March 12, 1931 – October 10, 1980, aged 49. Heart attack.

Robert Blake, currently 84.

Carl Switzer is buried in Hollywood Forever cemetery

Carl "Alfalfa" Switzer by Kimberly, on Flickr

[Ed Workman]

Originally Posted by CaliNative

Poor Alfalfa died young, in a hunting accident I vaguely recall.

Alphalfa died of a gunshot wound in Chatsworth. He got into a fight with a better marksman it is said

[Ed Workman]

Originally Posted by Lomara

For those without Photoshop, you can use the free image editing software GIMP to do this. https://www.gimp.org/

Colors > Invert

Another free and last I looked simpler program is Irfanview
It operates on many file types
It will invert and modify color
I have tried its resize function and that seems to turn the image to mush
A search for "freeware" should provide many choices
Photoshop is $$ and may be overkill for most folks
Photo Shop Elements may suit many folks
I am upset by Adobe's decision to make it a subscription.
Recent update versions appear to be aimed at teenies and their cellphone pix OMG!. The older tools are still in there, apparently somewhere, but relearning the drilldown is too painful to justify the new price structure. Online support was unable to explain the how to

[Ed Workman]

Originally Posted by John Maddox Roberts

And now Spielberg plans to remake West Side Story. The mind reels.

I saw the broadway version at the LA Philharmonic Aud - noir enough?
The dance scene of the Sharks v Jets street fight were cool- one's imagination did the fill-in.
The movie is awful- and what could even Spielberg do to change that?
Dancing while singing in real streets is to say at the least um, silly , awkward, embarrassing to view, unconvincing that gangs would actually do such.
My children have only seen the movie and gag at the mention of it, unprompted by me. [Although I do offer to put it on the teevee in their presence, simply to verify their gag reflex]
I can't blame them cuz it's in color, and they automatically reject any B&W movie with the possible exception of "Young Frankenstein"

[Lomara]

Originally Posted by Martin Pal

Odds & Ends:

I met Spanky McFarland in Universal City at a home video trade show (VSDA) for the area.
I'm guessing they were releasing Our Gang on VHS? I got his autograph. At some point I got
Tommy "Butch" Bond's autograph, too.

Back in the 70's, our local Jack In The Box had Jackie and Stymie from Our Gang/Little Rascals over for a signing. Why a Jack in the Box? I have zero idea, but it was close enough that my parents allowed me to ride my stingray bike over there and even across busy Imperial Highway to meet them. They gave me a signed photograph too, but I have lost track of it over the years. Maybe one day I will find it.

[HossC]

Originally Posted by Lomara

For those without Photoshop, you can use the free image editing software GIMP to do this. https://www.gimp.org/

Colors > Invert

Originally Posted by Ed Workman

Another free and last I looked simpler program is Irfanview
It operates on many file types
It will invert and modify color
I have tried its resize function and that seems to turn the image to mush
A search for "freeware" should provide many choices
Photoshop is $$ and may be overkill for most folks
Photo Shop Elements may suit many folks
I am upset by Adobe's decision to make it a subscription.
Recent update versions appear to be aimed at teenies and their cellphone pix OMG!. The older tools are still in there, apparently somewhere, but relearning the drilldown is too painful to justify the new price structure. Online support was unable to explain the how to

Maybe I should give GIMP another try, but I didn't get on with it the first couple of times I used it.

The best free paint program I've used is paint.net. It handles layers, level adjustments, resizing etc. You can make donations via PayPal if you like it, but you don't have to. The last update was just two weeks ago.

[odinthor]

Since we're talking about Palm trees--er, we were talking about Palm trees, weren't we?--looky here:


both, odinthor collection

The left-hand picture, I picked up on eBay quite some time ago. Unless vague memory deceives me, it was represented as being a view of Los Angeles (and I wouldn't have purchased it if it weren't). Likely it was originally out of a book or periodical telling some tale of old L.A.

I exercised to exhaustion the several brain cells I have which still work trying to figure out just what L.A. site in reality they were trying to show, when suddenly--quite some time ago--it struck me that the Palms seemed to have been modeled on the Palms in what I call the Aliso Mill view (on the right). "So what?" Well, yes--"so what" indeed; but I thought that perhaps y'all would like to see these two images in tandem, and that perhaps y'all might have some observations on same.

[Slauson Slim]

Originally Posted by ethereal_reality

esotouric, there were a lot of different chemicals in the canals back in the 1970s

...might help explain the hallucinations





Venice Beach 1970

howard gribble



Big Brother is watching.

howard gribble


Hiding in plain sight

howard gribble



more Venice 1970 snapshots HERE

sorry you got sick esotouric.

_

I remember being at Venice Beach at that time, free concerts. Bluesberry Jam, members of which would join PG&E and Canned Heat played there. The place crawled with LAPD. Not only on the rooftop but uniformed and plain clothes. And some carried cameras into the crowds. I recall one day two small old women screaming at the LAPD and calling them The Gestapo - lots of elderly folks would sit in the sun on the benches on The Speedway. At that time Venice was still pretty much a grungy dump, with junkies and losers. My mom told me it was a dump in the 1920s and 30s too.

[ethereal_reality]

As you no doubt know Slim, Venice was sketchy in the 1980s too.

It's the only place where I have seen a murder victim.

The young man was shot in the head beneath one of the picnic pavilions (shown below).


flickr

I'll never forget; there was a stream of blood all the way out to where the cement reaches the blacktop.

What's strange is...I don't remember what I did after that.

Did I turn around and go back home? (most likely)

Did I sunbathe and swim in the ocean? (probably not)

[Slauson Slim]

Venice was the first place I saw junkies nodding from Heroin. Passed out under the arches in front of that building Pacific Avenue, which at that time - 1966 - 70 - was a falling down ratty dump.

[ethereal_reality]

Originally Posted by tovangar2

Now I'm curious as to when and why Dexter (1870-1941) took over the Jacobs-Bond (1862-1946) house.
The two were close contemporaries and he predeceased her:

The Daily Mirror notes Jacobs-Bond "died at home".

It doesn't make much sense to me either t2.

As it says at the top, Carrie Jacobs-Bond was very attached to her home

to the point of naming her biography after the house


The End of the Road

Yes, that's right, she called her house 'The End of the Road' (Pinehurst Road dead-ends at her home)

Was the house on Pinehurst the location of her son's suicide? If so, maybe Jacobs-Bond began having bad memories and decided to move out.
(but the suicide happened many years earlier in 1931) so there's that
___




update:

The website Silents are Golden has Elliott Dexter living in the Jacobs-Bond house in the early to mid 1920s.

so if the dates are correct, the Dexters lived in the house briefly in the mid 20s. So did Carrie Jacobs-Bond move back in after their departure
and lived there until her death in 1946. (I'm going to go with this theory for now) until my next theory (see below)

Why did she leave her house in the 1920s? Maybe she didn't....perhaps the Dexters lived with her.



sidenote:

This same website has Elliott Dexter and his wife, Marie Doro, living in this Georgian in 1917.


1917 fan magazine movies silently

__

[Lwize]

The former ARCO on Olympic has been re-purposed as a Goodwill.


(GSV hosted by me)

[ethereal_reality]

Elliott Dexter's wife is very interesting looking.


Marie Doro.



odinthor, what plants do you see?
__

I think I see bluebells...