noirish Los Angeles

[Chuckaluck]

Originally Posted by sopas ej

Aliso Street viaduct, early 1950s

USC archive

This of course is now the 101 freeway headed west into the LA Civic Center/downtown LA area. This photo really puts things into perspective for me, on how huge those gas storage tanks were. They look like they dominate the skyline. It's funny to me that those tanks basically were like a gateway into downtown when approaching from this route; I always associated the City Hall and the skyscraper skyline as being the visual focal point when headed this way. This would make a great "then" for a then and now. Looking at the lamp posts on the Aliso St. viaduct, I think it's a shame they couldn't have kept the old twin-pendant street lamps. This picture was also taken not too long after the Pacific Electric streetcar was abandoned through this area; you can see the curved right-of-way along the bottom left corner of the photo; the poles that held the trolley wires are still standing too at this point in time.

? ? ? ? ? ?

No address, date or subject identification.
Lapl

[Chuckaluck]

Wesson Buick, Los Angeles?
No address. Source misidentifies vehicle as '56. Believe it is a '59 Buick.

Lapl

"A Chevrolet 'Vega' as seen from the front of the vehicle." Believe it is a Facel Vega, '54-'62.
Lapl

[AlvaroLegido]

Originally Posted by Chuckaluck

1907 Employees at Los Angeles Trust, Probably not Baseball season.

The guy on the right looks way ahead of his time : the hairstyle, the double-breasted jacket, the loose trousers are 1940s noirish.

[Chuckaluck]

Undated. BUT, the address may be hidden in image!

Williamson Welding Works, 3416 S. Hill. Satellite shop: 5122 Melrose Ave.

Lapl


Central Garage??
Undated, no address or identification of subject. (Stubby Kaye cashes his first Shenanigan's royalty check and buys a car?)
Lapl



Stubby Kaye, '65 (Chosen 'Man of the Year' by the Serve-a-Child Chapter of the Children's Asthma Research Institute and Hospital.)
Lapl

[GaylordWilshire]

Vintage Los Angeles


Nice shot... can't help but be glad I was never stopped at a semaphore in front of this Buick on a rainy day....

[Chuckaluck]

No date, address or subject identification. Nevertheless, picture says 1000 words. (No one ever tripped over the spigot and hose at the foot of the front steps.)
Lapl

[GaylordWilshire]

Originally Posted by Chuckaluck

Wesson Buick, Los Angeles?
No address. Source misidentifies vehicle as '56. Believe it is a '59 Buick.

Lapl

Wessen Buick was at 1233 S Western Avenue... "Wessen on Western" was its slogan. The Buick above is a '59; I think we've seen this picture here before. It seems to me that the woman pictured may be a city councilwoman (if there were any then), or some other high-profile dame.

[FredH]

...and quite a "looker" too.


Los Angeles Times

"May 29, 1952: Arcadia City Treasurer Emma E. Hainer prepares to cut a ribbon opening the new Baldwin Avenue extension. Waiting patiently in the official car, from left, are Arcadia Mayor John. A. Schmocker and Los Angeles County Supervisors Herbert C. Legg and John Anson Ford.

The new one-mile highway connected Huntington Drive and Colorado Boulevard cost $225,000. Baldwin Avenue also connected to the new Los Angeles County Arboretum & Botanic Garden – then under construction."

[GaylordWilshire]

The southwest corner of West 7th and Westlake, 1928/2011


USCDL/GoogleSV

[rbpjr]

[QUOTE=kznyc2k;5990440]Looking at the aerial shots I've saved to my computer it is definitely in place by 1932

Would 116 South Hope Street be visible in this aerial?

[Chuckaluck]

Originally Posted by GaylordWilshire

Wessen Buick was at 1233 S Western Avenue... "Wessen on Western" was its slogan. The Buick above is a '59; I think we've seen this picture here before. It seems to me that the woman pictured may be a city councilwoman (if there were any then), or some other high-profile dame.

Thanks for filling in a blank or two, including a vowel.


Vintage plate frames from LA Dealers.
All fromEbay


Pantages adjacent - Pelton Motor Company? Dodge and Plymouth at Gower and Hollywood.

1936


1937
Bottom two=Lapl

[GaylordWilshire]

Originally Posted by Chuckaluck

"A Chevrolet 'Vega' as seen from the front of the vehicle." Believe it is a Facel Vega, '54-'62.
Lapl

Familiar background...

http://forum.skyscraperpage.com/show...postcount=6576

http://forum.skyscraperpage.com/show...postcount=9690

[tovangar2]

Originally Posted by GaylordWilshire

The southwest corner of West 7th and Westlake, 1928/2011


USCDL/GoogleSV

Hey, look at that. It's the Famous Cafe again: http://forum.skyscraperpage.com/show...ostcount=11010

[fhammon]

Originally Posted by tovangar2

Is this Madame Begon and her pretty property on Castelar (from e_r's post http://forum.skyscraperpage.com/show...ostcount=11733)?

eBay

Sorry to belabor this but the Mme Begon story was a minor obsession with me a couple of years ago.

I found the photo of her store captioned:

"View of Castelar Street looking north from the corner of Ord Street, showing the Spanish (Mexican?) Market, Los Angeles, ca.1900-1909.

I know for a fact this was an adobe structure. The Parisian building appears to have wood sides.

http://digitallibrary.usc.edu/cdm/si...id/25398/rec/1


"A Store at the North West corner of Ord and North Broadway, Madame Begon, circa 1895."

http://cdm16003.contentdm.oclc.org/c.../id/3656/rec/8

[tovangar2]

Originally Posted by ethereal_reality

Here is a vintage photo of the Elaine Apartments on Vine St. (at Fountain)


usc digital archive

I recently noticed a bunch of listing shots of Villa Elaine's courtyard and interiors online. They're below.
The Villa Elaine Apartments are also shown, inside and out, to good (and extensive) effect in the Ashton Kutcher vehicle A Lot Like Love (2005). The V.E. was built in 1925, designed by Lewis Arthur Smith, who also did the Vista Theater.

I lived a couple of blocks from the Villa Elaine in the late 70s. Then it was truly scary. A place to go to get killed. Now is is thoroughly hip with one-bedrooms going for about $1,550.

The AMPAS taking over the old Claud Beelman Don Lee-Mutual Broadcasting building (1948) half a block north has done wonders for this strip of Vine Street. It's now the Pickford Center: (http://www.oscars.org/academy/buildings/pickford.html).
The Villa Elaine, at 1245, is directly across from the site of the old Mandarin Market/Hollywood Ranch Market:
(http://forum.skyscraperpage.com/show...ostcount=11547).

Villa Elaine on the left, Pickford Center 1/2 block north and the advert-slathered Sunset Tower at Sunset & Vine on the right
(where the penthouse will set one back $25K per month):

gsv

The Pickford Center (Claud Beelman, 1948) 1313 Vine Street:

wiki

As e_r and MikeD already said, Orson Welles, Man Ray and John Hamilton /"Perry White" lived in the Elaine Apartments. LA Curbed claims Frank Sinatra lived there too.

Artist/Photographer Man Ray and his wife lived in #10, a ground floor, two-story unit. Ray liked his time in LA (1945-51),

“I explored the town. It was like some place in the south of France with its palm-bordered streets and low stucco dwellings … More cars of course … And I seemed to be the only one on foot, sauntering along leisurely, avoiding the more populated districts. One might retire here, I thought.”

But being the only pedestrian soon got to him,“I began to develop an inferiority complex. I went out shopping,” he admitted, and bought “a beautiful, streamlined, metallic-blue car.”

(quotes from hollywoodwalker.com)

Here is a Man Ray self-portrait with his Graham Hollywood Super-Charger
(musta looked nifty parked outside Villa Elaine):

nachtkabarett.com

The Villa Elaine Courtyard.
This is how one must keep banana trees pruned so they don't attract nesting rats:






Villa Elaine Interiors:


If one squints really hard, one can almost imagine the Mandarin Market across the street:




Listing pix above from LiveLovely.com


gsv

[fhammon]

Originally Posted by tovangar2

Hey, look at that. It's the Famous Cafe again: http://forum.skyscraperpage.com/show...ostcount=11010

Dang, you're good tovangar2. What an eye!

[tovangar2]

Originally Posted by fhammon

Dang, you're good tovangar2. What an eye!

Pfft. I know that block :-)

And quite apart from its personal significance to me, a lot of people know that block because the Famous Cafe was across from Langer's Delicatessen, which is still there (since 1947) at the SE corner of 7th & Alvarado. (Weirdly, Langer's site, pre-1947, was an establishment called the Famous Deli).

[GaylordWilshire]

Philip Mershon


We've seen various Freezers here before, and the Hollywood Flower Pot.

http://forum.skyscraperpage.com/show...postcount=9538

http://forum.skyscraperpage.com/show...ostcount=10857

http://forum.skyscraperpage.com/show...ostcount=11025


But I don't think we've seen that one of the Freezers became as the Hollywood Flower Pot. According to Philip Mershon, the Freezer at 1124 N Vine had become the florist by 1930. The Freezer was listed in the 1929 CD at 1124 N Vine; other sources corroborate Mershon's date and address for the 'Pot.

[DouglasUrantia]

Originally Posted by Chuckaluck

Pre conflagration? Source describes this as 1929 auto show before fire burned "showroom." Display looks more substantial than tenting , but hard to tell. Next time use car wax that is fire resistant. Lesson learned?
Lapl

We have seen this fire before. I believe the Car Show was relocated to the Shrine Exhibition Hall, that we see in these photos. The trucks were eliminated due to lack of floor space and of course there were no custom cars as they had all burned to a crisp. A lot of nice cars went up in smoke that day. The city fathers considered an ordnance banning car shows in 'tents'. I second that motion.

[tovangar2]

eBay

Originally Posted by fhammon

Sorry to belabor this but the Mme Begon story was a minor obsession with me a couple of years ago.

I found the photo of her store captioned:

"View of Castelar Street looking north from the corner of Ord Street, showing the Spanish (Mexican?) Market, Los Angeles, ca.1900-1909.

I know for a fact this was an adobe structure. The Parisian building appears to have wood sides.

http://digitallibrary.usc.edu/cdm/si...id/25398/rec/1

You're not belaboring the subject at all. I cannot tell if the building in the first photo is actually on a corner. It may be the second building along in the bottom photo after the corner store was built (?) or even, more likely, out of shot to the right. She had a store, bakery, restaurant and living quarters, which may have been in adjoining buildings. (Just guessing.)

Nice, short thingy on LA's Frenchtown, in case anyone else is interested: http://www.kcet.org/socal/departures...ench-town.html