noirish Los Angeles

[rentatrip]

--------------------------------------------
the trough mentioned in the above article is the big huge water cement pond
in the middle of the street roughly 16 feet wide and over 30 feet long
.............................

[Flyingwedge]

Originally Posted by GaylordWilshire

Ran across this house while researching another and was astonished to find it still standing near the busy corner of Hoover & Pico...from the Times, April 12, 1903

And here it is on the left in 1940 . . . .



DW-1940-02-27-212 @ USCDL

[CityBoyDoug]

Originally Posted by rentatrip

Notice street car rails in corner bend ... these could be Horse Driven (PULLED)Trolley Car Tracks , THUS .... the raised cement water trough would be to give hitched trolley horses a drink of water at that spot , without any bother , ....A perfectly rational answer and obvious to most normal humans with an ounce of brains [/B]

Hey there ''Rentatrip"......who ever said that this thread is home to as-you- say..."normal humans". I'm sure those normal humans know all about horse troughs.

I took a quick look today at downtown LA. I did not see even one cement horse trough. I really miss those troughs [the horses miss them more.]. I think the LA City Council needs to seriously consider re-installing some horse troughs... immediately.
The city of LA should be kind to all horses.

[Scott Charles]

Originally Posted by Ed Workman

<<<....... the stereopticon would have to have side-by-side lenses instead of one-above-the-other lenses, just to make room for the shift lenses.>>>

Stereo/3D uses 2 separate images spaced laterally at roughly eye spacing [YMMV] so the lenses MUST be side by side taking or projecting. Photographs were made to be contact printed and viewed in the holder/viewer that allowed one's eyes to merge the two images into a , voila', 3D image. Other later methods use red and blue images viewed thru cheap 'spectacles'.

Absolutely true, Ed... however, the stereopticon wasn't a stereo (read: 3D) projector.

If you follow the link provided by HossC in his post, you can see that the “stereo” in stereopticon refers simply to there being two lenses - one on top of the other - nor were the viewers on the street expected to be wearing 3D glasses:

Wikipedia

The first lens projects an image. Then this image is faded out, while the image from the second lens is faded in - this allows the images to fade in and out, as opposed to the instant, hard switch that would occur when using only one projector.

When it comes to photography, the word “stereo” virtually always refers to a device that either captures or projects a 3D image... but not in this specific case!

Originally Posted by HossC

Here's a slightly clearer view of the same mystery object, still standing in 1926. Is it more than a water trough?


Detail of picture in USC Digital Library

Despite all the vintage pictures I've looked through, I still haven't figured out where Mr Miller kept his projector.

Very interesting, Hoss! A water trough for horses makes perfect sense (and God knows where the projector was located!).

Originally Posted by GaylordWilshire

Re horse troughs


LAT March 9, 1928

Nailed it, GaylordWilshire! Concrete evidence that it was a horse trough! Thank you!

[Scott Charles]

Originally Posted by rentatrip

Notice street car rails in corner bend ... these could be Horse Driven (PULLED)Trolley Car Tracks , THUS .... the raised cement water trough would be to give hitched trolley horses a drink of water at that spot , without any bother , ....A perfectly rational answer and obvious to most normal humans with an ounce of brains

I'm not certain whether or not I possess an ounce of brains, rentatrip, but I would no more expect a person from 2018 to recognize an urban horse trough any more than I'd expect a person from 1917 to recognize an electric car charging station. An utterly anachronistic object is hardly obvious to a person who has never seen one before.

I don't know how long it's been since you visited downtown LA, but I can assure you that horse drawn carriages are becoming a bit scarce in the area.

Originally Posted by rentatrip

--------------------------------------------
the trough mentioned in the above article is the big huge water cement pond
in the middle of the street roughly 16 feet wide and over 30 feet long
.............................

Wrong.

Your conveniently tiny image hides a fact that everybody here is already aware of - your arrow is pointing at a public toilet, not a drinking trough.

As seen from the north side. Men can be seen entering and leaving the underground restroom. You can even see the head of a man as he descends the stairs:

LINK

As seen from the south side (and a close-up of the very same image you just posted):

LINK

Here's a top-down illustration if you're still confused:

[ethereal_reality]

Speaking of horse troughs...


LOS ANGELES HERALD, APRIL 22, 1899

Poor old codger.

__

[CityBoyDoug]

Isn't LA a thoughtful city. The city fathers have provided two locations nearby each-other. One is for horses to get water and the other is where you can give water.

[ethereal_reality]

Originally Posted by Handsome Stranger

Yeesh...how 'bout some color correction? I bet this was Ektachrome, not Kodachrome.

That's a much needed improvement Handsome Stranger.


So I take it this slide is Ektachrome as well.


EBAY

At first I wasn't exactly sure where this snap was taken.


but if you look closely, you can see the Statler Hilton's rooftop sign.


DETAIL

I made an attempt to color-adjust the two detail pics. (the large pic wouldn't budge...color wise) I confess. I only used auto-correct.


The large building on the right is the newly constructed Union Oil Center.


DETAIL

[CaliNative]

Originally Posted by CityBoyDoug

Isn't LA a thoughtful city. The city fathers have provided two locations nearby each-other. One is for horses to get water and the other is where you can give water.

In some ways, these 1920s facilities were more progressive than today. Today due to lack of public restrooms some homeless are forced to relieve themselves in the streets. Can we have a return of a few public restrooms, not only for homeless but for all pedestrians in DTLA? In European cities public restrooms are everywhere. To guard against crime, they can place attendants in the larger facilities. I heard that Starbuck's new policy is to let anybody use their restrooms even if they don't buy anything. I suppose the homeless can use them if there are no available public facilities?

[Flyingwedge]

Originally Posted by HossC

Here's a slightly clearer view of the same mystery object, still standing in 1926. Is it more than a water trough?


Detail of picture in USC Digital Library

The fountain at Main, Spring, and Ninth is mentioned at the end of this article in the July 28, 1907, Los Angeles Herald:



CDNC


This fountain isn't what we see in your close-up, Hoss, but it seems to be in the same spot:




September 8, 1907, Los Angeles Times @ ProQuest via LAPL

[ethereal_reality]

Excellent find FW. I don't believe I've ever seen a horse and a man drinking together.




'mystery' vantage point.

This amateur photograph was taken by GIs on leave during WWII. I've been trying to figure out where the GI was (what building) when he snapped this pic.


EBAY

I could be wrong, but I think that slim dark area in the upper left corner might be a cornice.

I'm also curious about the extremely tall flue. Is it attached to the back of the church...or a building just beyond the church?

___





The GIs also took this snap of the Vine St. Brown Derby (& Satyr Book Store)


EBAY

I like the Satyr Book Shop's neon sign....especially the elongated Y in Satyr. (the S isn't quite as successful)

here's a closer look.

POINTLESS DETAIL


__

[Flyingwedge]

If I'm not mistaken, that church was on the SW corner of Hope and 8th. So I'd guess that the mystery photo looks
south on Hope from about 7th. But I wouldn't bet on it . . . .

[BillinGlendaleCA]

Originally Posted by CaliNative

In some ways, these 1920s facilities were more progressive than today. Today due to lack of public restrooms some homeless are forced to relieve themselves in the streets. Can we have a return of a few public restrooms, not only for homeless but for all pedestrians in DTLA? In European cities public restrooms are everywhere. To guard against crime, they can place attendants in the larger facilities. I heard that Starbuck's new policy is to let anybody use their restrooms even if they don't buy anything. I suppose the homeless can use them if there are no available public facilities?

You're right, it's not just the homeless; I've had to search out facilities when I go out on photoshoots and it's not easy in an urban environment.

[CityBoyDoug]

Originally Posted by BillinGlendaleCA

You're right, it's not just the homeless; I've had to search out facilities when I go out on photoshoots and it's not easy in an urban environment.

In a Canadian city there's a full time city employee who's only job is to locate public and store restrooms for bus drivers use on their daily routes.

[ScottyB]

Originally Posted by ethereal_reality

mystery street & mystery dog, Pasadena California [c.1910]


EBAY



A closer look at the boulevard.


detail

_______






_

Great photo album, very interesting! Looking the opposite direction from previous view:


I've been puzzling over this location....my first thought was Lucky Baldwin's Ranch (present-day Arboretum in Arcadia), but I can't place the streets or the rather unique streetlights; I can't find that layout in any of the maps I've looked. (Looks like a three digit address on the left palm.) Stumped!

[Otis Criblecoblis]

Originally Posted by Scott Charles

The camera/lens geek in me still wonders where the projector was placed. And how they overcame that keystoning, which would have been tremendous with the projector so close to the “screen”, and the screen being so much higher than the projector.

Perhaps the stereopticon had a matched pair of architectural shift lenses, which could raise the altitude of the projected image, without distorting it. Of course, the stereopticon would have to have side-by-side lenses instead of one-above-the-other lenses, just to make room for the shift lenses.

Scott, something involving view-camera movements seems to me to be the only way to achieve an undistorted projection--unless, of course, what was projected was distorted to compensate, or composed so as to mask the distortion. The fact that the area is rectangular implies a rectangular projection, which suggests an optical compensation.

I too am fascinated by the question. Now, where's my time machine?

[Otis Criblecoblis]

Originally Posted by Ed Workman

The Kodachrome process [. . ] put dyes into the emulsion in processing, instead of carrying the dyes IN the emulsion.
Dyes in the emulsion were short-lived, as demonstrated in the example.

In my admittedly anecdotal experience, Kodachrome slides in my family's collection exhibit negligible fading over the course of six or so decades, at least.

[. . . ]

Originally Posted by Ed Workman

IIRC UCLA has a restoration program but the color films of the late 40s early 50s are doomed.

But here, computer restoration would seem to be a godsend. Distorted as it is, judicious computer-correction of a faded print should prove quite effective, given that even a faded color print retains far more information than a monochrome print.

[Ed Workman]

Originally Posted by Otis Criblecoblis

In my admittedly anecdotal experience, Kodachrome slides in my family's collection exhibit negligible fading over the course of six or so decades, at least.

[. . . ]

But here, computer restoration would seem to be a godsend. Distorted as it is, judicious computer-correction of a faded print should prove quite effective, given that even a faded color print retains far more information than a monochrome print.

Well as is typical, my cryptic writing is unclear
YES Kodachrome is most stable, the E6 process is nearly so.
The differences are related to projection vs dark storage.
Congratulations to your dad for taking the pains to make lasting color pix

UCLA restoration has saved some films, I should have typed ,,,MANY films..
And I agree that there is a lot of information to use. I have scanned a couple of extremely faded Kodacolor negs and made passable pix- lots better than nothing!

ANd thanks for the Steripticon lesson youz guys

]
Regards Ed

[HossC]

Originally Posted by ethereal_reality

'mystery' vantage point.

This amateur photograph was taken by GIs on leave during WWII. I've been trying to figure out where the GI was (what building) when he snapped this pic.


EBAY

I could be wrong, but I think that slim dark area in the upper left corner might be a cornice.

I'm also curious about the extremely tall flue. Is it attached to the back of the church...or a building just beyond the church?

Originally Posted by Flyingwedge

If I'm not mistaken, that church was on the SW corner of Hope and 8th. So I'd guess that the mystery photo looks
south on Hope from about 7th. But I wouldn't bet on it . . . .

I'm going to guess that the photographer was in the YMCA building at 715 S Hope. That would mean that the building on the far right is the Los Angeles Gas & Electric Corp at 810 S Flower. The aerial below is from 1931, which is earlier than the e_r's photo, but all the main buildings are the same. I've marked the rough direction that the photographer was looking (and north for reference).


mil.library.ucsb.edu

Here's a similar angle from a higher elevation, this time from 1930. Notice that the Hotel Embassy is still the Hotel Trinity.


USC Digital Library

I posted a large version of the whole panorama here.

BTW. Here's a better view of the church at 8th and Hope. The smaller one on the left is the First Congregational Church at 845 S Hope, and the one on the far right is the First English Lutheran Church at 800 S Flower.

Photograph (high angle) of the Methodist Episcopal Church on the corner of 8th Street and Hope Street, showing surrounding area, April 1927.


USC Digital Library

[Handsome Stranger]

Originally Posted by ethereal_reality

So I take it this slide is Ektachrome as well.

Indeed. And...challenge accepted! (Tho the results are not 100% satisfactory.)



I'm a bit stunned by the lack of barriers between the opposite sides of the freeway. K-rails are one modern artifact I'm thankful for.

I enjoy doing this stuff and I only wish I could transition from my current disreputable line of work into film and video preservation. Anybody have any job leads for me?

BTW, thanks for the snap of the Vine St. Brown Derby & Satyr Book Store, ER. I have never seen it from this vantage point and did not know a porte-cochère was there!