My post was about Automobile shows and the emphasis on design in those days.
Today the design of a car is nonexistent. We're all driving around in monotonous, dull motorized jelly beans.
Ah yes Harley Earl, the master of deception. Harley well understood what would sell cars and he was for the most part right. Give a car enough "pizazz" and the public will buy, even if what's underneath the "pizazz" is less than perfect. (I can say that because I own five examples from the Earl ran GM design studio)
And Doug you are 100% correct about the lack of unique automotive design, that went to heck in a hand basket with the end of the 1970s. While I own a 2014 Chrysler 300C with all the gadgets they offer for it, I drive a 1978 Lincoln Town Car on most days. It will draw a crowd at any gas station these days and lots of "thumbs up" on the highway, almost the attention getter of either of my '62 Oldsmobile Starfires. On the other hand the 300C is just another cookie cutter car that is very difficult to discern from a Mercedes, a Hyundai Genesis, and half a dozen others.
Last edited by Retired_in_Texas; Jun 9, 2014 at 5:27 AM.
Without the intent of engaging in an argument, the post WWII years through the mid 1960s were very exciting times. Most particularly if you were in you twenties, as the future looked limitless, and it pretty much was.
Aside from that bothersome threat of nuclear war and total annihilation. Duck and cover!
Aside from that bothersome threat of nuclear war and total annihilation. Duck and cover!
Yup there were those who chose to become paranoid over something they had no control over. Some of us chose to just ignore the gloom and doom crowd and preferred enjoying the moving forward with our lives. Appears that choice was the right one.
Perhaps he drove past the motor inn in the early 1970s before it's demise.
(Mr. Libeskind and his wife lived in Los Angeles at one point in time)
Struck me as reminiscent of the 1939 NY Worlds Fair Trilon. But even without the spire, the proportions and shape seem impressive. Hope there is a colored postcard out there.
Moving forward with your life in a '78 Lincoln. That's rich.... Sorry, you walked right into that.
Yeah, I guess I did. But back in the specific time reference it might have been a '32 Ford 5 window coupe with a 324 Olds with 6 Strombergs on an Offy log manifold running through a LaSalle transmission, a '55 Pontiac Star Chief 2dr hardtop, it might have been a '65 Mustang 2+2 with a high performance 289. One of my favorites was a '68 Ford LTD Brougham 390 4V with all the bells and whistles. And as "moving forward" provided things moved to T-Birds and Lincolns.
Last edited by Retired_in_Texas; Jun 9, 2014 at 8:18 PM.
The Pom-Pom closed and then reopened in 1930; Eugene Stark, who was all over L.A. with restaurants and cafés, took it over in early 1932.
Ate many a meal at Stark's in West Covina when Honeywell Marine Systems was doing the UNTS/T-45 navigator trainer -- a gigabyte of real-time storage in 1971. The Air Force had to build a special building to house it :-)
I think this 1954 aerial view shows the Santa Anita Motor Inn at the center. Santa Clara Street appears to have been under construction at the time. The 1972 aerial looks pretty similar, so I'm guessing the proposed extension mentioned in GW's LAT article never got built. Consistent with Chuckaluck's dates, the Santa Anita Motor Inn had gone before the 1977 aerial was taken.
Is the Willow tree, planted in the CT Plaza in 1938, by the beautiful Anna May Wong, with the opening of the new Chinatown, still in existance? It has been three or four years since my last visit, and I just don't recall if it was still there. I have checked online, but can find no further reference to it, since its planting?
About every two weeks, my wife and I usually go to the de facto Chinatown, of Monterey Park/San Gabriel for dim sum, and our specialty item, grocery shopping. However, now armed with a deeper understanding of the history of old and new (1938) Chinatown in the downtown; I may wander around a little more, and take greater note of some previously overlooked aspects--including the sole surviving Garnier Bldg.
Jenny Cho--Chinatown in Los Angeles/UCLA
ebay
I have been reading/researching deeper about her life, since first seeing her mentioned, in a couple of the old/new Chinatown L.A. history websites.
"But I'm not a cannibal!" protested pretty Anna May Wong, American-born Chinese movie actress, when she was served this bizarre luncheon plate at the Ford Motor pavilion at the New York World's Fair. The story goes back to Sept. 18, when Ford officials entertained judges and prizewinners of the China Essay Contest at a formal dinner. Miss Wong refused the lobster thermidor course, asking for a substitute. A waggish Ford official went to the kitchen, concocted a special sandwich of raw chicken legs and toast, and had it served to her. Later Miss Wong, a luncheon guest at the Ford pavilion ordered "anything but chicken." And this was what she got: One active live lobster, comfortable on a bed of shredded lettuce; one side of beef, raw; one whole fish, uncooked; and a mess of fragrant scallions. Her petite friend, Miss Tsing-Ying Tsang, a designer from Shanghai who studied her craft in Paris, is enjoying the joke just as much as Miss Wong is. A minute later, the Ford chef relented and served a mixed grill.
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