noirish Los Angeles

[ethereal_reality]

Originally Posted by robeach11

Hi! First post here...
29122 South Main Street in Carson is now a rectory of St. Philomena Catholic Church, which is next door (just north).
This location was known as Henri's Lauriat (a dive-ish bar from 1971 until the late 90's). The sign is rusted and faded, but readable.
As Carson wasn't incorporated until 1968, the area may have been loosely known as Torrance at the time of the original pic.

Interesting information robeach. I've never heard of Henri's Lauriat before. I'll have to check out that sign again*. Thanks for the tip.

...and welcome to NLA !
__________________


UPDATE: *There isn't a sign on the building. Are you sure you're looking at the right address robeach? The building in question is at 21922 S. Main St.....not 29122.

_

[ethereal_reality]

Originally Posted by Scott Charles

Aww, the poor little thing!

lol Scott Charlie....that sounds like something I'd say.

As a reminder: The shortest street in L.A. is Powers Place.


lacurbed

It is 13 feet long.

If you like, you can check it out HERE

[ethereal_reality]

1957 slide of the Hall of Justice Building, Los Angeles CA


EBAY

You can also see one of the temporary court buildings.




And if I'm not mistaken, this 1957 slide includes a glimpse of the old Amstoy Building.


EBAY

And as most of you already know, the large building on the right is the north side of Los Angeles City Hall. (looks like the gardeners/landscapers are hard at work)


_

[robeach11]

Originally Posted by Scott Charles

Do any of these help you out at all, Robeach?

CLICK ON EACH IMAGE TO SEE IT FULL SIZED:

FrameFinder

FrameFinder

FrameFinder

Some of the buildings present in the 1933 image are gone by the time of the 1941 images. When did Anna May live on Figueroa?

WOW Scott!! You did an amazing job with the aerial maps. Anna lived at the Figueroa address beginning around 1910. Lived in a few different places after her movie career began. But moved BACK to Figueroa at some point. I believe her father had a separate building made for her (or an existing structure modified) when she returned to that home. In the late 20's, she went to Europe. Her mother was hit and killed by a car in front of the home in 1930. The Sam Kee laundry was operated by her father until 1934, when he left for China.

[sadykadie2]

Originally Posted by ethereal_reality

"Amateur 35mm Slide-Photo Forrest Lawn Cemetery, Los Angeles 1953"


Ebay

The way the car are lined up I think this was taken during a funeral.




'mystery' car


detail

It kinda' looks German to me.

_

My husband thought it might be British

[robeach11]

Originally Posted by HossC

I don't know what dates Anna May Wong lived at these addresses, but (for the record) she was born in 1905 and died in 1961. Looking through the CDs, 351 S Flower was a Chinese/Oriental laundry from 1905 to 1922 (1905-1920 Wo Yick and 1921-1922 Kee Sing).

On the Baist maps (1921 below), the building looks long and thin. It was next door to the Westwood Apartments at 345 S Flower, but looking them up didn't yield any photos.


USC Digital Library

The only other time after that that 351 S Flower appears in the CDs is 1929, when it was John A Miller's auto park, so I assumed the building was gone (the auto park appears in other CDs at a slightly different address). Then I remembered this 1930 panorama. I've labeled three buildings where I can make out signs. At first I thought that the shape and position of the one I've labeled "Westwood Apts" matched the staggered appearance of 351 on the Baist map (above), but looking closer, the step is only in the roofline, so it looks like it's the Westwood and 351 did become a parking lot. I can't see 351 on the 1927 UCSB aerial either.


Detail from USC Digital Library



Looking at the 1921 Baist map, I think that 241 S Figueroa may be the dark, thin building above the "S" of your "Figueroa Street" label. There are pictures of the grade separations at Figueroa & Temple and Figueroa & First somewhere on the thread - 241 may show up in the background. I'll take a look.

I'm thinking the same thing. Right above the 'S'. Would be fantastic to find street level photos, too! The closest thing I've found is this spectacular drawing.

[sadykadie2]

Originally Posted by sadykadie2

My husband thought it might be British

Appears to be a 1940 Ford Anglia he thinks

[Scott Charles]

Originally Posted by robeach11

WOW Scott!! You did an amazing job with the aerial maps. Anna lived at the Figueroa address beginning around 1910. Lived in a few different places after her movie career began. But moved BACK to Figueroa at some point. I believe her father had a separate building made for her (or an existing structure modified) when she returned to that home. In the late 20's, she went to Europe. Her mother was hit and killed by a car in front of the home in 1930. The Sam Kee laundry was operated by her father until 1934, when he left for China.

Glad I could be of help, Robeach - I'm a fan of Ms. Wong.

In case you missed it, there are a couple of mistakes on my images - one, "Fremont" is spelled with only one E. Two, the street I labeled as "Mignonette" is actually Diamond Street. Thanks to Hoss for bringing those mistakes to my attention!

Also, the drawing in your post doesn’t show up on my computer, so here it is just in case:

[robeach11]

Originally Posted by Scott Charles

Glad I could be of help, Robeach - I'm a fan of Ms. Wong.

In case you missed it, there are a couple of mistakes on my images - one, "Fremont" is spelled with only one E. Two, the street I labeled as "Mignonette" is actually Diamond Street. Thanks to Hoss for bringing those mistakes to my attention!

Also, the drawing in your post doesn’t show up on my computer, so here it is just in case:

And that image didn't show up because I'm not too skilled haha!!
Yes I did see those street mistakes.
Again, thanks to you (and Hoss!).

For the 351 S. Flower address, it may be an underpass now? It's quite confusing as so many years have passed and so many changes.


I'm about 12 miles south of downtown in the South Bay area. I need to get to these areas on foot!

[ethereal_reality]

Thanks for finding the location Orth's Mayflower Warehouse Henry_Huntington and Noir Noir. I really appreciate it.

Originally Posted by Noir_Noir

As deadeye freeway construction goes, it was pretty much a bullseye - Orth's Mayflower Warehouse didn't stand a chance.

1967 -


mil.library.ucsb.edu - Flight AMI_LA_67B, Frame 1452

While snooping around in Pasadena I happened upon two things.



#1 Hub Cap Annie

I spotted this Quonset hut at 1446 E. Walnut St.

I imagine this is one of the hundreds of thousands of surplus Quonsets the government sold after World War II.

The V on front of the Qounset stands for Vapemastaz

GSV

"By the end of WWII, an estimated 150,000 units had been built around the world. Designed to serve 86 official uses, two basic sizes were offered:
the 20 and the 40. The 20 measured twenty feet by forty-eight feet, while the 40 (also called the “Elephant Hut”) stood forty feet wide by one-hundred feet long."
from DAHP



This particular Qounset previously housed Hub Cap Annie.

Here it is in 2009.


gooddayla.blogspot

and again, in 2011.


gsv

I'm snoopy curious, did any of you fine Pasadenians ever buy a hub cap from Annie?



#2 'Ghost Spur'

I couldn't help but notice a distinctive angle running southeast from the Hub Cap Annie Qounset. (it's quite short...pretty much ending at Marion Ave.)


google_earth

Does anyone know if this was, in fact, a rail spur? ...and if it was [a spur], what R.R. used it?

__

[Flyingwedge]

Originally Posted by HossC

I don't know what dates Anna May Wong lived at these addresses, but (for the record) she was born in 1905 and died in 1961. Looking through the CDs, 351 S Flower was a Chinese/Oriental laundry from 1905 to 1922 (1905-1920 Wo Yick and 1921-1922 Kee Sing).

On the Baist maps (1921 below), the building looks long and thin. It was next door to the Westwood Apartments at 345 S Flower, but looking them up didn't yield any photos.


USC Digital Library


Detail from USC Digital Library

I think I've marked the correct building below as 351 S. Flower in this c. 1916 image. The south wall of the Westwood
Apartments appears to be just north of 351, and the Herman Apartments are across the street and up the block a bit.
It looks like there is laundry hanging at the rear of the second story of 351 S. Flower:



CHS-5790 @ USCDL

[Lomara]

Originally Posted by Godzilla

I believe "ice doors" have been discussed on NLA before and think that they may also be a misplaced source for secret escape passage stories, especially by kids who would have been able to fit through them. Prior to the advent of affordable self-contained refrigeration, LA, like other communities, had regular ice delivery. Homes were built with ice delivery doors for that purpose. Some still remain, but the number must be dwindling. (Anyone know when regular horse powered ice delivery in LA ceased? Or any regular ice delivery? Post WW2?)

My guess would be ice delivery ended sometime around the late 30's/early 40's. In 1939 Frank Zamboni closed his block ice business when demand shrank once refrigeration became more affordable, then used his refrigeration equipment to build Iceland (ice skating rink in Paramount), He then later used military surplus jeeps and parts to build his first resurfacing machine in 1949.

https://zamboni.com/about/zamboni-archives/the-zamboni-story/

The Wikipedia article on refrigerators states:

"The introduction of Freon in the 1920s expanded the refrigerator market during the 1930s and provided a safer, low-toxicity alternative to previously used refrigerants."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Refrigerator

[HossC]

Originally Posted by robeach11

29122 South Main Street in Carson is now a rectory of St. Philomena Catholic Church, which is next door (just north).
This location was known as Henri's Lauriat (a dive-ish bar from 1971 until the late 90's). The sign is rusted and faded, but readable.
As Carson wasn't incorporated until 1968, the area may have been loosely known as Torrance at the time of the original pic.

Originally Posted by ethereal_reality

Interesting information robeach. I've never heard of Henri's Lauriat before. I'll have to check out that sign again*. Thanks for the tip.

...and welcome to NLA !
__________________

UPDATE: *There isn't a sign on the building. Are you sure you're looking at the right address robeach? The building in question is at 21922 S. Main St.....not 29122.

I think that robeach has the right place, but just made a couple of typos. 21922 S Main Street does have a "rusted and faded" sign, but it's by the parking lot, not on the building.


GSV

Here's a closer look.


GSV

The other typo was the name. It was actually Henri's Lariat. Here's an advert from the March 10, 1960 edition of the Torrance Press...


libarch.torranceca.gov (PDF file)

...and another from the April 21, 1966 edition of the Palos Verdes Peninsula News.


California Digital Newspaper Collection

The earliest mention I found of Henri's Lariat was an advert for a cocktail waitress in the May 13, 1957 edition of the Press Telegram - apply in person and see Bob after 8pm! I also found a passing mention in a 2011 article which was originally published in the LA Times Magazine. You can read "When Country Was King" at tksmith.net.

[HossC]

Originally Posted by ethereal_reality

#2 'Ghost Spur'

I couldn't help but notice a distinctive angle running southeast from the Hub Cap Annie Quonset. (it's quite short...pretty much ending at Marion Ave.)


google_earth

Does anyone know if this was, in fact, a rail spur? ...and if it was [a spur], what R.R. used it?

The earliest aerials of the area on the UCSB site are from 1928, 1938 and 1944. None of them appears to show a spur or right-of-way. I think it may be an old creek or similar. The image below is from 1944.


mil.library.ucsb.edu

[HossC]

Originally Posted by Scott Charles

Aww, the poor little thing!

Once upon a time you'd have found the Northwest Apartments at 327 North Beaudry Avenue (corner of Angelina Street). I posted the 1907 building permit and 1974 demo permit in post #34489.

Originally Posted by Wig-Wag

The property at the corner of Beaudry Avenue and Angelina Streets is now owned by the Edward R. Roybal Learning Center and the building is long gone.

[HossC]

Originally Posted by Scott Charles

FrameFinder

Here's a detail of one of the images taken before the grade separation of Temple and Figueroa, and it's looking straight down N Figueroa, past 241. We've seen it several times before. It's undated, but I'd guess at early 1930s. I've never zoomed in as far before on this photo, so I've never noticed the large white building with a roof sign in the distance. I think it's the now-demolished Hotel St Paul on W 6th Street.


USC Digital Library

I went through the 1931 CD to try and indentify the businesses we might be looking at. If you count four utility poles from the right, the sign behind it is for [John M] Foy's service station at 211 N Figueroa (more below). Next is the Pacific Peerless Weighing Machine Corp at 227 N Figueroa, before we get to Sam Kee's Chinese laundry at 241 N Figueroa. The 1930 CD lists 241 as Sam S Wong's Chinese laundry, which is the name of Anna May Wong's father. Moving right, we have the Claremont Apartments at 253 N Figueroa,
Humberto Celaya's grocery store at 257 N Figueroa (I'm guessing that this is the building with the Coca-Cola sign behid the right-most utility pole), the Raymond Apartments at 259 N Figueroa and the Raymond Inn Hotel at 301 N Figueroa. Just out of sight are the Reh Apartments at 317 N Figueroa.

I said that I'd return to Foy's. Here's a much better picture from 1931. It's been posted before, the last time being FredH's post #22139.


USC Digital Library

I can't find a demo permit for the laundry, but the current 241 N Figueroa, the Central District Health Center, was built in mid-1951.


GSV

[Godzilla]

Originally Posted by Lomara

My guess would be ice delivery ended sometime around the late 30's/early 40's. In 1939 Frank Zamboni closed his block ice business when demand shrank once refrigeration became more affordable, then used his refrigeration equipment to build Iceland (ice skating rink in Paramount), He then later used military surplus jeeps and parts to build his first resurfacing machine in 1949.

https://zamboni.com/about/zamboni-archives/the-zamboni-story/

The Wikipedia article on refrigerators states: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Refrigerator

As ubiquitous as refrigerators are today, this was not always the case. When first introduced, refrigerators were not the most affordable appliances and often bought on credit. Exactly when they became "affordable" and "mainstream" is blurry, similar to the practical extinction of daily horse and buggy use. Not that I disagree with your guess, but one of the set pieces on the early '50s Honeymooners sitcom was . . . an icebox. This prompted the question of Los Angeles' last commercial ice delivery service. Considering that ice is still commercially available today, albeit in bags, one supposes that there may be an icebox still in use along with a swamp cooler and crystal radio set. Somewhat related, I recall seeing a 1930 advertisement for an apartment that was equipped with a central refrigeration unit and presume that was a "built-in" feature.

By the 1930s, most residential homes were replacing ice boxes with refrigerators. However, not all households could afford the luxury of electric refrigerators, as indicated by the lower income family portrayed on the 1950s television show, The Honeymooners. Bus driver Ralph Kramden and his stay-at-home wife, Alice, shared a one bedroom apartment which had an old fashioned ice box in the kitchen.https://antiques.lovetoknow.com/antique-wooden-ice-box

Central Ice and Cold Storage Co. of Los Angeles developed the ice vending machine in 1931 and held a patent for the delivery door.

Ethel Schultheis slides 15 cents into a Central Ice and Cold Storage Co.'s Serv-Ice VM vending machine in Hollywood to buy a 25 lb. cake of ice sealed in wax paper. The outdoor vending maching at 12 ft. high by 8 ft. square dwarfs the woman.

Circa 1937
LAPL




LAPL

[Scott Charles]

Originally Posted by HossC

Here's a detail of one of the images taken before the grade separation of Temple and Figueroa, and it's looking straight down N Figueroa, past 241. We've seen it several times before. It's undated, but I'd guess at early 1930s. I've never zoomed in as far before on this photo, so I've never noticed the large white building with a roof sign in the distance. I think it's the now-demolished Hotel St Paul on W 6th Street.


USC Digital Library

I went through the 1931 CD to try and indentify the businesses we might be looking at. If you count four utility poles from the right, the sign behind it is for [John M] Foy's service station at 211 N Figueroa (more below). Next is the Pacific Peerless Weighing Machine Corp at 227 N Figueroa, before we get to Sam Kee's Chinese laundry at 241 N Figueroa. The 1930 CD lists 241 as Sam S Wong's Chinese laundry, which is the name of Anna May Wong's father. Moving right, we have the Claremont Apartments at 253 N Figueroa,
Humberto Celaya's grocery store at 257 N Figueroa (I'm guessing that this is the building with the Coca-Cola sign behid the right-most utility pole), the Raymond Apartments at 259 N Figueroa and the Raymond Inn Hotel at 301 N Figueroa. Just out of sight are the Reh Apartments at 317 N Figueroa.

I said that I'd return to Foy's. Here's a much better picture from 1931. It's been posted before, the last time being FredH's post #22139.


USC Digital Library

Wow, amazing stuff, Hoss!

[robeach11]

Originally Posted by ethereal_reality

Interesting information robeach. I've never heard of Henri's Lauriat before. I'll have to check out that sign again*. Thanks for the tip.

...and welcome to NLA !
__________________


UPDATE: *There isn't a sign on the building. Are you sure you're looking at the right address robeach? The building in question is at 21922 S. Main St.....not 29122.

_

You are correct! My bad. It's 21922. The sign is STILL standing just a few feet south of the building.

https://goo.gl/maps/nzx6svtduP92

google maps

[robeach11]

Originally Posted by Flyingwedge

I think I've marked the correct building below as 351 S. Flower in this c. 1916 image. The south wall of the Westwood
Apartments appears to be just north of 351, and the Herman Apartments are across the street and up the block a bit.
It looks like there is laundry hanging at the rear of the second story of 351 S. Flower:



CHS-5790 @ USCDL

WOW. WOW. WOW.
You guys are truly phenomenal. That would be the house Anna was born in. The Wong family moved about two years later to 117 Marchessault Street in Chinatown. Before heading to the Figueroa address in 1910.
The Marchessault location may (or may not) be still standing at 117 Paseo De La Plaza, right by the Old Plaza.