THE STORY OF HOLLYWOODLAND
 
by Gregory Williams

From the moment of its inception, Hollywoodland defined the lifestyle known as “living in the Hollywood Hills.” With a steady stream of publicity, it acquired and retained the adjective “famed.” A lot of this is due to the huge metal sign crowning the tract, the neighborhood landmark.

Originally it read “Hollywoodland,” but missing its last four letters, what started as a real estate promotional stunt has become the international symbol for the Hollywood film industry. On any day, tourists stand smack in the middle of Beachwood Drive, having their pictures taken with it.

It’s hard to figure a giant flashing electric sign as a classy touch, but in the twenties, the developers attracted the sophisticated and artistic crowd they intended. “Hollywoodland, one of the show places of the world” is how they saw their 500 acre subdivision. To their credit, they sensitively laid out Hollywoodland. A charming small town feeling has presided for close to seventy years. 

The draw of the place? A lot has to do with location. Longtime resident Irene Wyman remembers these hills and canyons back to 1915, before Hollywoodland appeared. “It was so lovely with the oak trees, holly bushes, greasewood, and poppies. Ferns grew under the trees and by the little streambeds. Up in Ledgewood Canyon, we found two natural springs with overhanging rocks. We would crawl back to the small basins where the springs dripped down to pools and drink the cool water.”

For all of us kids growing up here in the fifties and sixties, the undeveloped area of Hollywoodland opened our imaginations. We explored the canyons like real frontier, building forts on unfinished tract roads and mining for quartz in a canyon filled with rocks spilled over from the grading of Mt.Lee.
Jannette K. Mathewson, living here as a little girl in 1924, loved the foxes,  “and their almost nightly playtime on our porch. The great cowboy artist, Charles M. Russell, was also enthralled watching them.” Coyotes and cottontails, deer, squirrels, possums, raccoons, lizards, and tarantulas still make their homes with us. Unfortunately, the foxes have disappeared. According to some natural scientists, the coyotes ate them. No wild animal living here can escape this area, with Mt. Lee and neighboring Griffith Park now completely surrounded by city and freeways.

Another draw to Hollywoodland, expressed in the developer’s phrase “freedom of the hills” applies to residents of the area lucky enough to live and work within the canyon. An artist, writer, or musician can hole up with creative work, yet remain close to the rest of the world. When our father, Dino, moved us here in the fifties, our neighborhood included painter Edward Biberman who lived across the street, painting scenes of Southern California, and writer Aldous Huxley, who lived and worked down the hill from us. (Mr. Huxley’s long, thoughtful walks at that time often included my four-year-old sister.) My grandfather, Alex Williams, had been here since the beginning of the tract with ownership of the commercial property at the west gate. At one time or other, everyone in the family got to live and work in the canyon, dispensing with the need for a daily commute. It was a treat.

Undoubtedly, Hollywoodland’s strongest appeal lies in the original homes of the tract. Part “kitsch,” part beauty, they range from a vine-covered cottage you just know houses seven dwarves, to Normandy castles fit for royalty. That the original Hollywoodland homes offer suitable settings for Hollywood period movies seems appropriate. Most retain an elegant aesthetic to them; how they are situated on the hillsides, how they present themselves to spectators. They were laid out by thoughtful, artistic people who, it seems, wanted to create an environment of beauty, not tract housing as we know it today.

Much has changed as new houses have appeared in the neighborhood over the decades. Architectural restrictions were lifted when the developers bowed out in the forties, and since then, people build houses to suit their own tastes. Some houses are great; some are awful. When land was cheap in the sixties, platform homes perched on steel stilts became the architectural rage. It was an inexpensive way of construction, which is no longer allowed by the Los Angeles building code. The eighties trend of “mansionization,” building large homes that fill their lots, seems like a half-hearted attempt to recapture some of Hollywoodland’s past glory. As the new houses go up, the spaciousness that marked the development disappears.

Still, a sense of community remains. The commitment from seventy-five years of homeowners blesses the neighborhood with its own vitality and character. The future is secure as people discover charms originally voiced by the developers in 1923. As Los Angeles congests, the uniqueness of this area becomes more pronounced, where you can still hear the hooting owl or the howling coyote, where you can step outside your door and witness a beautiful sunset.

HOLLYWOOD TIMELINE

by Steve Grant and Jay Teitzell

1888 – A bucolic hillside area populated by citrus farmers is given the name “Hollywood” by Harvey Henderson Wilcox and his wife, Daeida, as part of a residential development. It is Daeida who selects the name after she meets a lady on a train whose summer home is called Hollywood.

1903 – At an election held November 14, the residents of Hollywood vote to incorporate as an independent city.

1910 – Independence is short-lived. The community votes to annex to the growing city of Los Angeles in order to assure a reliable water supply. (To this day, Hollywood is a community within the City of Los Angeles.)

1911 – Albert Beach paves the way to the Hollywood Hills and names “Beachwood Drive” after himself.

1916 – May 16 – Hollywood participates in the world celebration of William Shakespeare’s 300th birthday. A star-studded performance of “Julius Caesar” is mounted in the huge outdoor natural amphitheater at the top of Beachwood Drive (where the Beachwood Market and Village is now).

1923 – February – Developers Woodruff and Shoults conceive of “Hollywoodland” as a neighborhood of “superb environment without excessive cost on the Hollywood side of the hills.”

1923 – The construction of Lake Hollywood Reservoir commences in order to provide the burgeoning city with water and pressure. The Lake is first filled in 1925.

1924 – The “Hollywoodland” sign is constructed at a cost of $21,000 atop Mt. Lee. Thirteen 50-foot letters and four thousand 20 watt light bulbs pronouncing, in classic advertising phonics, “Holly”… “wood”… “land”… Hollywoodland.”"

1929 – The stock market crashes and the Depression dashes developers’ plans for extending Hollywoodland farther east. The limits of our neighborhood are essentially set.

1931 – The Hollywoodland “bus,” a Model A Ford, is the first public transportation
serving the hilly neighborhood from the Hollywood 3 flats.

1932 – Peg Entwistle, despondent over her lackluster acting career, jumps to her death from one of The Hollywoodland Sign’s 50-foot letters.

1933 – Where The Humpty Dumpty Store previously stood, The Beachwood Market now opens its doors for the first time.

1934 – On New Year’s Day, torrential rains flood the Hollywoodland canyons with mud and debris.

1935 – The now-familiar Griffith Park Observatory appears on the horizon in neighboring Griffith Park.

1938-39 – Bugsy Siegel opens a Speakeasy at the Castillo del Lago mansion on Hollywoodland’s Durand Drive.

1944 – Hollywoodland developers deed the land north of Mulholland Highway (including The Hollywoodland Sign) to the City of Los Angeles. Later, it becomes part of Griffith Park.

1949 – The Hollywoodland Sign, originally built to last only 18 months, is in total disrepair (and all the light bulbs have long-since been stolen). The City begins removing it but is halted by a public outcry Ð the citizens have come to love the symbol. Instead, the sign is refurbished and shortened to “Hollywood.”

1952 – The Beachwood Market expands after purchasing the Safeway Market next door.

1956 – Scenes from the classic film, “Invasion of the Body Snatchers,” starring Kevin McCarthy, are shot in front of The Beachwood Market and Village.

1958 – Chef Milton Pinkney takes command of the kitchen of the Beachwood Coffee Shop.

1961 – May – A hillside brushfire damages 30 Hollywoodland homes and destroys 24 more including that of Aldous and Laura Huxley of Deronda Drive.

1962 – February – Torrential rains once more flood canyons with mud and debris. Cars are carried downhill by the force of the waters.

1962 – July – “Home Magazine” features the geodesic dome of thick plastic sheets built on Durand Drive. The owners are notorious for being “well-tanned.”

1978 – The second restoration of the sign begins, led by prominent celebrities and city officials. Cost is $27,000 per letter using sheet metal and a steel framework. The public contributes significantly.

1998 – January 7 – The Hollywoodland Homeowners Association kicks off the 75th Anniversary of Hollywoodland with a gala screening of “Titanic” at the Vista Theatre, newly restored to its 1920′s splendor. Many attend in period dress – one gentleman wearing a vintage tuxedo with seaweed filigree.

1998 – October – “The Village Plaza” (originally called “The Village Green”) is dedicated in front of The Beachwood Market. This public area and “micro park” is the culmination of 10 years planning, fundraising and lots of hard volunteer work.

1998 – December – “The Hollywoodland Storycookbook” is released commemorating the 75th anniversary of Hollywoodland.

Venice is a beachfront neighborhood on the Westside of Los Angeles, California, United States. It is known for its canals, beaches and circus-like Ocean Front Walk, a two-and-a-half-mile pedestrian-only promenade that features performers, fortune-tellers, artists, and vendors. Venice was home to some of Los Angeles’ early beat poets and artists and has served as an important cultural center of the city.

HISTORY

Venicewas founded by tobacco millionaire Abbot Kinney in 1905 as a beach resort town, 14 miles (23 km) west of Los Angeles. He and his partner Francis Ryan had bought two miles (3.24 km) of oceanfront property south of Santa Monica in 1891. They built a resort town on the north end of the property called Ocean Park, which was soon annexed to Santa Monica. After Ryan died, Kinney and his new partners continued building south of Navy Street in the unincorporated territory. After the partnership dissolved in 1904, Kinney built on the marshy land on the south end of the property, intending to create a seaside resort like its namesake in Italy.

When “Venice of America” opened on July 4, 1905, Kinney had dug several miles of canals to drain the marshes for his residential area, built a 1,200-foot (370 m)-long pleasure pier with an auditorium, ship restaurant, and dance hall, constructed a hot salt-water plunge, and built a block-long arcaded business street with Venetian architecture. Tourists, mostly arriving on the “Red Cars” of the Pacific Electric Railway from Los Angeles and Santa Monica, then rode Venice’s miniature railroad and gondolas to tour the town. But the biggest attraction was Venice’s mile-long, gently sloping beach. Cottages and housekeeping tents were available for rent.

The town’s population increased; it annexed adjacent housing tracts and changed its official name from Ocean Park to Venice in 1911. The population (3,119 residents in 1910) soon exceeded 10,000; the town drew 50,000 to 150,000 tourists on weekends.

Attractions on the Kinney Pier became more amusement-oriented by 1910, when a Venice Scenic Railway, Aquarium, Virginia Reel, Whip, Racing Derby, and other rides and game booths were added. Since the business district was allotted only three one-block-long streets, and the City Hall was more than a mile away, other competing business districts developed. Unfortunately, this created a fractious political climate. Kinney, however, governed with an iron hand and kept things in check. When he died in November 1920, Venice became harder to govern. With the amusement pier burning six weeks later in December 1920, and Prohibition (which had begun the previous January), the town’s tax revenue was severely affected.

The Kinney family rebuilt their amusement pier quickly to compete with Ocean Park’s Pickering Pleasure Pier and the new Sunset Pier. When it opened it had two roller coasters, a new Racing Derby, a Noah’s Ark, a Mill Chutes, and many other rides. By 1925 with the addition of a third coaster, a tall Dragon Slide, Fun House, and Flying Circus aerial ride, it was the finest amusement pier on the West Coast. Several hundred thousand tourists visited on weekends. In 1923 Charles Lick built the Lick Pier at Navy Street in Venice, adjacent to the Ocean Park Pier at Pier Avenue in Ocean Park. Another pier was planned for Venice in 1925 at Leona Street (now Washington Street).

For the amusement of the public, Kinney hired aviators to do aerial stunts over the beach. One of them, movie aviator and Venice airport owner B. H. DeLay, implemented the first lighted airport in the United States on DeLay Field (previously known as Ince Field). He also initiated the first aerial police in the nation, after a marine rescue attempt was thwarted. DeLay also performed many of the world’s first aerial stunts for motion pictures in Venice.

By 1925, Venice’s politics became unmanageable. It’s roads, water and sewage systems badly needed repair and expansion to keep up with its growing population. When it was proposed that Venice be annexed to Los Angeles, the board of trustees voted to hold an election. Those for annexation and those against were nearly evenly matched, but many Los Angeles residents, who moved to Venice to vote, turned the tide. Venice became part of Los Angeles in November 1925.

Los Angeles had annexed the Disneyland of its day and proceeded to remake Venice in its own image. It was felt that the town needed more streets – not canals – and most of them were paved in 1929 after a three-year court battle led by canal residents. They wanted to close Venice’s three amusement piers but had to wait until the first of the tidelands leases expired in 1946.

In 1929, oil was discovered south of Washington Street on the Venice Peninsula. Within two years, 450 oil wells covered the area, and drilling waste clogged the remaining waterways. It was a short-lived boom that provided needed income to the community, which suffered during the Great Depression. The wells produced oil into the 1970s.

Los Angeles had neglected Venice so long that, by the 1950s, it had become the “Slum by the Sea.” With the exception of new police and fire stations in 1930, the city spent little on improvements after annexation. The city did not pave Trolleyway (Pacific Avenue) until 1954 when county and state funds became available. Low rents for run-down bungalows attracted predominantly European immigrants (including a substantial number of Holocaust survivors) and young counterculture artists, poets, and writers. The Beat Generation hung out at the Gas House on Ocean Front Walk and at Venice West Cafe on Dudley. Police raids were frequent during that era

Venice and neighboring Santa Monica were hosts for a decade to Pacific Ocean Park (POP), an amusement and pleasure-pier built atop the old Lick Pier and Ocean Park Pier by CBS and the Los Angeles Turf Club (Santa Anita). It opened in July 1958, in Santa Monica. They kept the pier’s old roller coaster, airplane ride, and historic carousel but converted its theaters and smaller pier buildings into sea-themed rides and space-themed attractions designed by Hollywood special-effects people. Visitors could travel in space on the Flight to Mars ride, tour the world in Around the World in 80 Turns, go beneath the sea in the Diving Bells or at Neptune’s Kingdom, take a fantasy excursion into the Tales of the Arabian Nights on the Flying Carpet ride, visit a pirate world at Davy Jones’ Locker, or visit a tropical paradise and its volcano by riding a train on Mystery Island. There were also thrill rides like the Whirlpool (rotor whose floor dropped out), the Flying Fish wild mouse coaster, an auto ride, gondola ride, double Ferris wheel, safari ride, and an area of children’s rides called Fun Forest. Sea lion shows were performed at the Sea Circus.

Since attendance at the park was too low to justify winter operation, and with competition from Disneyland, Knott’s Berry Farm, and Marineland, it was sold after two seasons to a succession of owners, who allowed the park to deteriorate. Since Santa Monica was redeveloping the surrounding area for high-rise apartments and condos, it became difficult for patrons to reach the park, and it was forced into bankruptcy in 1967. The park suffered a series of arson fires beginning in 1970, and it was demolished by 1974. Another aging attraction in the 1960s was the Aragon Ballroom that had been the longtime home of The Lawrence Welk Show and the Spade Cooley Show, and later the Cheetah Club where rock bands such as the Doors, Blue Cheer, & many other top bands performed. It burned in the 1970 fire. The district around POP in the southside of Santa Monica is known as Dogtown. It is a common misconception that Dogtown is in Venice, but the original Z-boys surfing and skateboarding shop was and is still on Main St. in Santa Monica. Venice and Santa Monica were home to pioneering skateboarders the Z-Boys, as profiled in the documentary film, Dogtown and Z-Boys. It is little known that POP pier was actually completely in Santa Monica; it started at the end of Ocean Park Blvd and extended to the line where Venice meets Santa Monica.

Producer Roger Corman owned a production facility, the Concorde/New Horizons Studio, on Main Street, where many of his films were shot. This facility was razed to build the Venice Art Lofts and Dogtown Station lofts.

DEMOGRAPHICS

As of 2008, the population was estimated to be around 40,885. The median household income was $67,057, making it one the wealthiest neighborhoods in the city. The racial and ethnic composition in Venice in 2008 was White (63.9%), Latino (22.2%), African American (5.6%), Asian (3.7%), and Other (4.6%).

ATTRACTIONS & NEIGHBORHOODS

Venice is today one of the most vibrant and eclectic areas in Los Angeles and it continues a tradition of liberal social change involving prominent Westsiders. Venice Family Clinic is the largest free clinic in the country.

The Venice Farmers’ Market, founded in 1987, operates every Friday morning from 7–11 a.m. on Venice Blvd at Venice Way.

72 Market Street Oyster Bar and Grill was one of several historical footnotes associated with Market Street in Venice, one of the first streets designated for commerce when the city was founded in 1905. During the depression era, Upton Sinclair had an office there when he was running for governor, and the same historic building where the restaurant was located was also the site of the first Ace/Venice Gallery in the early 1970s and, before that, the studio of American installation artist Robert Irwin.

Many of Venice’s houses have their principal entries from pedestrian-only streets and have house numbers on these footpaths. (Automobile access is by alleys in the rear.) However, like much of Los Angeles, Venice is also well known for traffic congestion. It lies 2 miles (3.2 km) away from the nearest freeway, and its unusually dense network of narrow streets was not planned for modern traffic. Mindful of the tourist nature of much of the district’s vehicle traffic, its residents have successfully fought numerous attempts to extend the Marina Freeway (SR 90) into southern Venice.

Venice Beach includes the beach, the promenade that runs parallel to the beach (“Ocean Front Walk” or just “the boardwalk“), Muscle Beach, the handball courts, the paddle tennis courts, Skate Dancing plaza, the numerous beach volleyball courts, the bike trail and the businesses on Ocean Front Walk. The basketball courts in Venice are renowned across the country for their high level of streetball; numerous NBA players developed their games or are recruited on these courts.

Along the southern portion of the beach, at the end of Washington Boulevard, is the Venice Fishing Pier. A 1,310-foot (400 m) concrete structure, it first opened in 1964, was closed in 1983 due to El Niño storm damage, and re-opened in the mid-1990s. On December 21, 2005, the pier again suffered damage when waves from a large northern swell caused the part of the pier where the restrooms were located to fall into the ocean.

The pier remained closed until May 25, 2006, when it was finally re-opened after an engineering study concluded the pier was structurally sound.

The Venice Breakwater is an acclaimed local surf spot in Venice. It is located north of the Venice Pier and Lifeguard Headquarters and south of the Santa Monica Pier. This spot is sheltered on the north by an artificial barrier, the breakwater, consisting of an extending sand bar, piping, and large rocks at its end.

OAKWOOD

The Oakwood portion of Venice, also known as Ghost Town and the “Oakwood Pentagon,” lies inland from the tourist areas and is one of the few historically African American areas in West Los Angeles; however, Latinos now constitute the overwhelming majority of the residents. During the age of restrictive covenants that enforced racial segregation, Oakwood was set aside as a settlement area for blacks, who came by the hundreds to Venice to work in the oil fields during the 1930s and 1940s. After the construction of the San Diego Freeway, which passed through predominantly Mexican American and immigrant communities, those groups moved further west and into Oakwood where black residents were already established. Whites moved in Oakwood during the 1980s and 1990s.

The Venice Shoreline Crips and the Latino Venice 13 gangs, which are under a shaky truce, continue to remain active in Venice. By 2002, numbers of gang members in Oakwood were reduced due to gentrification and increased police presence. According to a Los Angeles City Beat article, by 2003, many Los Angeles Westside gang members resettled in the city of Inglewood.

By the end of the 20th century, gentrification had altered Oakwood. Although still a primarily Latino and African-American neighborhood, the neighborhood is in flux. According to Los Angeles City Beat, “In Venice, the transformation is… obvious. Homes are fetching sometimes more than $1 million, and homies are being displaced every day.” Author John Brodie challenges the idea of gentrification causing change and commented “… the gunplay of the Shoreline Crips and the V-13 is as much a part of life in Venice as pit bulls playing with blond Labs at the local dog park.” Xinachtli, a Latino student group from Venice High School and subset of MEChA, refers to Oakwood as one of last beachside communities of color in California. Chicanos and Latinos of any race make up over 50% of Venice High School’s student body.

EAST VENICE

East Venice is a racially and ethnically mixed residential neighborhood of Venice that is separated from Oakwood and Milwood (the area south of Oakwood) by Lincoln Boulevard, extending east to the border with the Mar Vista neighborhood, near Venice High School. Aside from the commercial strip on Lincoln (including the Venice Boys and Girls Club and the Venice United Methodist Church), the area almost entirely consists of small homes and apartments as well as Penmar Park and (bordering Santa Monica) Penmar Golf Course. The existing population (primarily composed of Caucasians, Hispanics, and Asians, with small numbers of other groups) is being supplemented by new arrivals that have moved in with gentrification.

A housing project, Lincoln Place, built by the Housing Authority of the City of Los Angeles is currently in the midst of an extensive legal battle between past and present tenants and the owner, AIMCO. The developer, which acquired the property in 2003, plans to demolish it and build a mixed-use condominium and retail structure on the site. As of 2010, the housing developer AIMCO has settled with tenants and agreed to reopen the project and return scores of evicted residents to their homes and add hundreds of below-market-rate units to the Venice area.

VENICE & ART

Venice has always been known as a hangout for the creative and the artistic. In the 1950s and 1960s, Venice became a center for the Beat generation. There was an explosion of poetry and art. Major participants included Stuart Perkoff, John Thomas, Frank T. Rios, Tony Scibella, Lawrence Lipton, John Haag, Saul White, Robert Farrington, Philomene Long, and Tom Sewell. In the 1970s, prominent performance artist Chris Burden created some of his early, groundbreaking work in Venice, such as Trans-fixed.

GOVERNMENT & INFRASTRUCTURE

Local government

The Los Angeles Fire Department operates Station 63, which serves Venice with two engines, a truck, and an ALS rescue ambulance.

Los Angeles Police Department serves the area through the Pacific Community Police Station at 12312 Culver Boulevard, Los Angeles, CA 90066, and a beach sub-station at 1530 W. Ocean Front Walk, Venice, CA 90921.

Los Angeles County Lifeguards

Venice Beach is the headquarters of the Lifeguard Division of the Los Angeles County Fire Department. It is located at 2300 Ocean Front Walk. It is the nation’s largest ocean lifeguard organization with over 200 full-time and 700 part-time or seasonal lifeguards. The headquarter building used to be the City of Los Angeles Lifeguard Headquarters until Los Angeles City and Santa Monica Lifeguards were merged into the County in 1975. The department is commonly referred to by Angelenos as the Baywatch Lifeguards.

The Los Angeles County Lifeguards safeguard 31 miles (50 km) of beach and 70 miles (110 km) of coastline, from San Pedro in the south, to Malibu in the north. Lifeguards also provide Paramedic and rescue boat services to Catalina Island, with operations out of Avalon and the Isthmus.

Lifeguard Division employs 120 full-time and 600 seasonal lifeguards, operating out of three sectional headquarters, Hermosa, Santa Monica, and Zuma beach. Each of these headquarters staffs a 24-hour EMT-D response unit and are part of the 911 system. In addition to providing for beach safety, Los Angeles County Lifeguards have specialized training for Baywatch rescue boat operations, underwater rescue and recovery, swift water rescue, cliff rescue, marine mammal rescue and marine firefighting.

County, state and federal representation

The Los Angeles County Department of Health Services SPA 5 West Area Health Office serves Venice.

The United States Postal Service operates the Venice Post Office at 1601 Main Street and the Venice Carrier Annex at 313 Grand Boulevard.

PARKS & RECREATION

The Venice Beach Recreation Center, nominally located at 1800 Ocean Front Walk, comprises a number of facilities sprawling between Ocean Front Walk and the bike path, Horizon Ave to the north, and N.Venice Blvd to the south. The installation has basketball courts (unlighted/outdoor), several children play areas with a gymnastics apparatus, handball courts (unlighted), tennis courts (unlighted), and volleyball courts (unlighted). At the south end of the area is the famous muscle beach outdoor gymnasium. In March 2009, the city opened a sophisticated $2,000,000 skate park on the sand towards the north. While not technically part of the park the Graffiti Walls on the beach side of the bike path in the same vicinity.

The Oakwood Recreation Center is located at 767 California Ave. The center, which also acts as a Los Angeles Police Department stop-in center, includes an auditorium, an unlighted baseball diamond, lighted indoor basketball courts, unlighted outdoor basketball courts, a children’s play area, a community room, a lighted American football field, an indoor gymnasium without weights, picnic tables, and an unlighted soccer field.

The Westminster Off-Leash Dog Park is in Venice.

VENICE & MOVIES

Dozens of movies and hundreds of television shows have used locations in Venice, including its beach, its pleasure piers, the canals and colonnades, the boardwalk, the high school, even a particular hamburger stand. While it is neither possible nor desirable to list every movie which features scenes shot in Venice, the following films show views of the neighborhood which are interesting in the context of its history and culture:

• 1914– Kid Auto Races at Venice (Charlie Chaplin)
• 1920– Number, Please? (Harold Lloyd) Number, Please? at the Internet Movie Database
• 1921– The High Sign (Buster Keaton) The High ‘Sign’ at the Internet Movie Database
• 1923– The Balloonatic (Buster Keaton) The Balloonatic at the Internet Movie Database
• 1927– Sugar Daddies (Laurel and Hardy)
• 1928– The Circus (Charlie Chaplin)
• 1928– The Cameraman (Buster Keaton) The Cameraman at the Internet Movie Database
• 1958- Touch of Evil (Orson Welles) – Shot entirely in Venice except for one indoor scene, selected by Welles as a stand-in for a fictional run-down Mexican border town.
• 1961– Night Tide (Dennis Hopper, Linda Lawson, written and directed by Curtis Harrington) – Shot entirely in Venice and shows the deteriorated nature of the area in the 1950s.
• 1991– The Doors (Val Kilmer, directed by Oliver Stone)
• 2010- Valentine’s Day (Jessica Alba)

Griffith Observatory is in Los Angeles, California. Sitting on the south-facing slope of Mount Hollywood in L.A.’s Griffith Park, it commands a view of the Los Angeles Basin, including Downtown Los Angeles to the southeast, Hollywood to the south, and the Pacific Ocean to the southwest. The observatory is a popular tourist attraction with an extensive array of space and science-related displays.

3,015 acres (12.20 km²) of land surrounding the observatory was donated to the City of Los Angeles by Colonel Griffith J. Griffith on December 16, 1896. In his will Griffith donated funds to build an observatory, exhibit hall, and planetarium on the donated land. As a Works Progress Administration (WPA) project, construction began on June 20, 1933, using a design developed by architect John C. Austin based on preliminary sketches by Russell W. Porter. The observatory and accompanying exhibits were opened to the public on May 14, 1935. In its first five days of operation the observatory logged more than 13,000 visitors. Dinsmore Alter was the museum’s director during its first years; today, Dr. Ed Krupp is the director of the Observatory.

EXHIBITS

The first exhibit visitors encountered in 1935 was the Foucault pendulum, which was designed to demonstrate the rotation of the Earth.[3] The exhibits also included a twelve-inch (305 mm) Zeiss refracting telescope in the east dome, a triple-beam coelostat (solar telescope) in the west dome, and a thirty-eight foot relief model of the moon’s north polar region.

Col. Griffith requested that the observatory include a display on evolution which was accomplished with the Cosmochron exhibit which included a narration from Caltech Professor Chester Stock and an accompanying slide show. The evolution exhibit existed from 1937 to the mid 1960s.

Also included in the original design was a planetarium under the large central dome. The first shows covered topics including the Moon, worlds of the solar system, and eclipses.

During World War II the planetarium was used to train pilots in celestial navigation. The planetarium was again used for this purpose in the 1960s to train Apollo program astronauts for the first lunar missions.

The planetarium theater was renovated in 1964 and a Mark IV Zeiss projector was installed.

RENOVATION & EXPANSION

The observatory closed in 2002 for renovation and a major expansion of exhibit space. It reopened to the public on November 3, 2006, retaining its art deco exterior. The $93 million renovation, paid largely by a public bond issue, restored the building, as well as replaced the aging planetarium dome. The building was expanded underground, with completely new exhibits, a café, gift shop, and the new Leonard Nimoy Event Horizon Theater. The Café at the End of the Universe, an homage to Restaurant at the End of the Universe, is one of the many cafés run by celebrity chef Wolfgang Puck. One wall inside the building is covered with the largest astronomically accurate image ever constructed (152 feet long by 20 feet (6.1 m) high), called “The Big Picture” (http://bigpicture.caltech.edu), depicting the Virgo Cluster of galaxies; visitors can explore the highly detailed image from within arm’s reach or through telescopes 60 feet (18 m) away. The 1964-vintage Zeiss Mark IV star projector was replaced with a Zeiss Mark IX Universarium. The former planetarium projector is part of the underground exhibit on ways in which humanity has visualized the skies.

Since the observatory opened in 1935, admission has been free, in accordance with Griffith’s will. Tickets for the show Centered in the Universe in the 290-seat Samuel Oschin Planetarium Theater are purchased separately at the box office within the observatory. Tickets are sold on a first-come, first-served basis.

Children under 5 are free, but are admitted to only the first planetarium show of the day. Only members of the observatory’s support group, Friends Of The Observatory, may reserve tickets for the planetarium show.

Centered in the Universe features a high-resolution immersive video projected by an innovative laser system developed by Evans and Sutherland Corporation, along with a short night sky simulation projected by the Zeiss Universarium. A team of animators worked more than two years to create the 30-minute program. Actors, holding a glowing orb, perform the presentation, under the direction of Chris Shelton.

A wildfire in the hills came dangerously close to the observatory on May 10, 2007.

On May 25, 2008, the Observatory offered visitors live coverage of the Phoenix landing on Mars.

VISITING GRIFFITH OBSERVATORY

Admission to the building and grounds of Griffith Observatory is free of charge, excluding some of the shows for a minimal price at the planetarium. The Observatory is open five days a week. There is a small parking lot next to the Observatory. Additional parking is along the steep road leading up to the observatory. Parking is free of charge.

There are photo opportunities and scenery at and around the Observatory, with views of the Pacific Ocean, the Hollywood Sign and Downtown Los Angeles. Ideal for tourist destination, field trips, dates and outings with the family and friends.

FILMING LOCATION

The observatory was featured in two major sequences of the celebrated James Dean film Rebel Without a Cause (1955); a bust of Dean was subsequently placed at the west side of the grounds.

It has also appeared in a number of other movies:

The Phantom Empire (1935)

Phantom from Space (1953)

War of the Colossal Beast (1958)

The Cosmic Man (1959)

The Spy with My Face (1964)

Flesh Gordon (1974)

Midnight Madness (1980)

The Terminator (1984)

Dragnet (1987)

Earth Girls Are Easy (1988)

The Rocketeer (1991)

Devil in a Blue Dress (1995)

The People vs. Larry Flynt (1996)

The End of Violence (1997)

Bowfinger (1999)

House on Haunted Hill (1999 remake)

Queen of the Damned (2002)

Charlie’s Angels: Full Throttle (2003)

Transformers (2007 live-action film)

Yes Man (2008)

Terminator Salvation (2009)

Valentine’s Day (2010) (In the opening scene of credits in the theater version a quick shot of the Observatory is shown)

Television

The Observatory has appeared in episodes of the following TV shows:

• 24 (Day 1 3:00–4:00 pm; aired on March 19, 2002)
• Adventures of Superman (first episode, as Jor-El‘s laboratory on Superman’s home planet Krypton; some other episodes, as the Metropolis observatory.)
• Alias (“The Coup”)
• Angel (episode “Are You Now or Have You Ever Been,” with Angel wearing a red jacket in homage to James Dean’s Rebel Without a Cause character).
• Beverly Hills, 90210 (“Rebel with a Cause”)
• Buffy the Vampire Slayer (episode “Shadow“)
• Brothers and Sisters (“The Road Ahead”)
• CHiPs
• Dragnet (“The LSD Story” aka “Blueboy” episode)
• Danny Phantom (The Amity Park Observatory modeled on The Griffith Observatory.)
• Jonas L.A. (Date Expectations)
• The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson (appears at the beginning of the opening title sequence, 2009 to present)
• MacGyver (pilot episode)
• Melrose Place (“Till Death Do Us Part”)
• Millionaire Matchmaker (Shown in random episodes)
• Mission: Impossible (opening pilot episode)
• Moonlight
• Quantum Leap (“Goodbye Norma Jean”)
• Keeping up with the Kardashians on E! show shots of Griffith Observatory on a regular basis.
• Remington Steele
• Rocky Jones, Space Ranger
• Star Trek: Voyager (two-part episode “Future’s End“)
• The Man from U.N.C.L.E
• 90210 show shots of the Observatory many times.
• The New Adventures of Wonder Woman between 1977 and 1979.
• The Simpsons (duplicated as Springfield Observatory)
• The Wonder Years.
• 2010 MTV Video Music Awards. Linkin Park performed their single “The Catalyst” at the Observatory.

Other media

• Was a filming location for the music video for “Rush Rush” by Paula Abdul, which starred Keanu Reeves and was directed by Stefan Würnitzer. This video was based on Rebel Without a Cause.

• An image of the observatory is shown in a 2Pac music video, To Live And Die In L.A.. The video pays homage to Los Angeles and its best known landmarks.

• Some interview segments with rock musician Ringo Starr for the Beatles Anthology video were conducted on the observatory grounds during the early 1990s.

It is assumed to be in Grand Theft Auto V, after being seen in the second trailer

(The following was excerpted from the Los Angeles Times, December 23, 2012, by Kate Linthicum. The original articles is titled, “L.A. City Hall is one of painter’s masterpieces”)

Joe Nicoletti started out painting houses in New Jersey. These days, he paints Los Angeles City Hall.

Since a major renovation of the historic building began nearly 20 years ago, Nicoletti has been the city’s go-to guy when a skilled hand is needed to restore a frieze or touch up a mural.

His most recent assignment — repainting the elaborately decorated ceiling of the Main Street lobby — took the 50-year-old Santa Monica resident two weeks and eight assistants to complete. His crew toiled at night, the better to stay out of the way of city bureaucrats, and Nicoletti livened the workspace with the sounds of Ella Fitzgerald, Frank Sinatra and the like. Around midnight, they would break for “lunch,” usually takeout from downtown eateries such as Pete’s Cafe or Cole’s French Dip.

The last night of the job, Nicoletti and some members of his crew were finishing up a few final details. Some cracked plaster needed repairing, and a small section of gold didn’t look quite rich enough. Nicoletti had brought several sheets of gold leaf that he hoped would do the trick.

“It’s $1,700 an ounce,” he said, waving the sheets like little flags. The gold is also edible, he added. “You can sprinkle it on some soufflé.”

He was standing atop precarious-looking scaffolding. An assistant, Luke Adkins, steadied the apparatus down below as Nicoletti excitedly pointed out noteworthy patterns in the ceiling’s design. “This is a medallion, that’s a ziggurat, and I think this is a cartouche,” he said.

Then he dabbed some glue, pressed the gold leaf into place and gently peeled off the backing, as if applying a temporary tattoo.

“That is sweet,” Adkins called up. “That is very nice. Man, you nailed it.”

Nicoletti smiled.

His company, Chameleon Paintworks, has done custom jobs at downtown’s Millennium Biltmore Hotel, an 89-year-old historic landmark, and for celebrity clients including Quentin Tarantino and Sting.

But there’s something special about City Hall, he said. Over the years he has painted its hallways, ceilings and even the City Council chambers. He plans to bid on future contracts for restoration work in the building’s rotunda and other areas.

“I’m really proud of this building,” he said. “I like it a lot.”

A 1955 Chevrolet Cameo Carrier

The main character in three of my novels, all of them about to be released —  Shades of Blue, 459-Framed in Red, The Purple Hand — and the forthcoming He Blew Blue Jazz, LAPD cop Mike Montego, drives a sweet Chevy Cameo Carrier. Here’s some background on one of the blue bow-tie’s most interesting vehicles.

Boasting V-8 power, automatic transmission, two-tone paint, and deluxe interior, the 1955 Chevrolet Cameo shortened the distance between car and truck. Although not a big seller, it set the stage for other stylish trucks – Ford’s Styleside, Dodge’s Sweptside, and Chevy’s own Fleetside quickly followed suit.

Stylist Chuck Jordan, later to become GM Vice-President of Design, had originally envisioned a one-piece cab-bed bodied pickup, but engineers were concerned over the sheet metal distorting due to torsion-stress on the frame. It was decided that the clean look could still be achieved with a conventional cab/bed combination. Fiberglass panels were added to Chevy’s existing steel cargo-box, saving the expense of the tooling process required for steel panels. This also allowed the truck to be brought into production quicker. Besides, fiberglass was convenient; Chevrolet had recently given Molded Fiberglass Products Company a $4 million contract to manufacture Corvette bodies.

The tailgate of the Cameo also used a fiberglass outer panel, with latches mounted inside and supported by retractable cables. The middle of the rear bumper hinged downward, accessing the hidden spare tire compartment. Unique chrome-plated taillights capped off the clean, uncluttered bed.

1955 Chevy Cameo

The smooth-sided bed of the 3124 series Cameo seemed to perfectly complement Chevy’s new Task Force Series line of trucks. Its 114-inch wheelbase carried a 6.5-foot-long cargo bed, which shared the same 5,000 pound G.V.W. as the 3100 and 3200 series half-ton trucks. Base motor was the durable 235-cid six-cylinder, with Chevy’s new 265-cid V-8 optional. Five transmissions, including an automatic, were available. Chrome bumpers, chrome grille, and full wheel covers, optional on other models, were standard on the Cameo.

All first-year Cameos were painted two-tone white and red. Inside, the upholstery was also two-tone, and came with arm rests, dual sun-visors, a cigarette lighter, chrome interior door knobs, and a large wrap-around rear window. Priced 30% higher than their standard half-ton truck, Chevrolet sold 5,220 Cameos in 1955.

1956 Chevy Cameo

With the exception of a few minor trim items, 1956 Chevrolet trucks remained the same as 1955 models. Despite low production numbers, the Cameo was carried over, now offered in several two-tone paint schemes. Base price was $2,150, while a standard half-ton pickup listed at $1,670. Cameo truck production for 1956 was 1,452.

1957 Chevy Cameo

Along with Chevy’s other pickup models, the Cameo received a new grille in 1957. V-8 engine displacement increased to 283 cubic-inches, with power output at 185-bhp. Cameo production rose to 2,244 units.

1958 Cameo Carrier

Industry-wide adoption of quad headlights, along with a larger front grille, were highlights of the 1958 re-design for all Chevrolet trucks. Ford’s Styleside pickup, introduced in 1957, had smooth outer bed-walls and sold for much less than the Cameo. Chevrolet countered with their new Fleetside, with an all-steel cargo-box larger than the Cameo’s. With just 1,405 produced for the year, Cameo production stopped in early 1958.

NOTE: Mike Montego’s pickup truck is white with red trim. The interior is red-and-white, tuck-and-rolled Naugahyde, a customized look.

The San Fernando Valley (locally known as “The Valley“) is an urbanized valley located in the Los Angeles metropolitan area of southern California, United States, defined by the mountains of the Transverse Ranges circling it. Home to 1.76 million people, it lies north of the larger and more populous Los Angeles Basin.

Nearly two thirds of the Valley’s land area is part of the city of Los Angeles. The other incorporated cities in the valley are Burbank, Glendale, San Fernando, Hidden Hills and Calabasas.

Geography

The San Fernando Valley is about 260 square miles (670 km) bounded by the Santa Susana Mountains to the northwest, the Simi Hills to the west, the Santa Monica Mountains and Chalk Hills to the south, the Verdugo Mountains to the east, and the San Gabriel Mountains to the northeast. The northern Sierra Pelona Mountains, northwestern Topatopa Mountains, southern Santa Ana Mountains, and Downtown Los Angeles skyscrapers can be seen from higher neighborhoods, passes, and parks in the San Fernando Valley.

The Los Angeles River begins at the confluence of Calabasas Creek (Arroyo Calabasas) and Bell Creek (Escorpión Creek) at Canoga Park High School beside Vanowen Street in Canoga Park. Those creeks’ headwaters are in the Santa Monica Calabasas foothills, the Simi Hills’ Hidden Hills, Santa Susana Field Laboratory, and Santa Susana Pass Park lands. The River flows eastward along the southern regions of the Valley. One of the river’s two unpaved sections can be found at the Sepulveda Basin. A seasonal river, the Tujunga Wash, drains much of the western facing San Gabriel Mountains and passes into and then through the Hansen Dam Recreation Center in Lake View Terrace. It flows south along the Verdugo Mountains through the eastern communities of the Valley to join the Los Angeles River in Studio City. Other notable tributaries of the River include Dayton Creek, Caballero Creek, Bull Creek, Pacoima Wash, and Verdugo Wash. The elevation of the floor of the valley varies from about 600 ft (180 m) to 1,200 ft (370 m) above sea level.

Most of the San Fernando Valley is within the jurisdiction of the city of Los Angeles, although a few other incorporated cities are located within the Valley as well: Burbank and Glendale are in the southeast corner of the Valley, Hidden Hills and Calabasas are in the southwest corner, and San Fernando, which is completely surrounded by Los Angeles, is in the northeast valley. Universal City, an enclave in the southern part of the Valley, is unincorporated land housing the Universal Studios filming lot. Mulholland Drive, which runs along the ridgeline of the Santa Monica Mountains, marks the boundary between the Valley and the communities of Hollywood and the Los Angeles Westside.

Services

• The Los Angeles satellite administrative center for the valley, The Civic Center Van Nuys, is in Van Nuys. The area in and around the Van Nuys branch of Los Angeles City Hall is home to a police station, municipal and superior courts and Los Angeles city and county administrative offices. Northridge is home to California State University, Northridge (originally named San Fernando Valley State College).
• Many branches of the Los Angeles Public Library are located in the Valley.
• For independent libraries see “Incorporated Cities (independent)” in the “Municipalities and districts” list below.
• Los Angeles Police Department, Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department, and independent valley city departments.
• Los Angeles Fire Department, Los Angeles County Fire Department, Burbank Police Department, and independent valley city departments.
• City of Los Angeles Neighborhood Councils.

History Pre-statehood

The Tongva, later known as the Gabrieleño Mission Indians after colonization, and the Tataviam to the north and Chumash to the west, had lived and thrived in the Valley and its arroyos for over 8,000 years. They had numerous settlements, and trading and hunting camps, before the Spanish arrived in 1769 to settle in the Valley.

The first Spanish land grant in the San Fernando Valley (or El Valle de Santa Catalina de Bononia de los Encinos was called ‘Rancho Encino’ (present day Mission Hills on the Camino Viejo before Newhall Pass), in the northern part of the San Fernando Valley. Juan Francisco Reyes built an adobe dwelling beside a Tongva village or rancheria at natural springs, but the land was soon taken from him so a Mission could be built there. Mission San Fernando Rey de España was established in 1797 as the 17th of the twenty-one missions.[6] The land trade granted Juan Francisco Reyes the similarly named Rancho Los Encinos, also beside springs (Los Encinos State Historic Park in present day Encino). Later the Mexican land grants of Rancho El Escorpión (West Hills), Rancho Providencia and Rancho Cahuenga (Burbank), and Rancho Ex-Mission San Fernando (rest of valley) covered the San Fernando Valley.

The Treaty of Cahuenga, ending the Mexican-American War fighting in Alta California, was signed in 1847 by Californios and Americans at Campo de Cahuenga, the Verdugo Family adobe at the entrance to the Cahuenga Pass in the southeast San Fernando Valley (North Hollywood). The 1848 Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo ended the entire war.

Statehood and beyond

The valley’s climate is not as some describe, a desert, and originally was naturally a “temperate grasslands, savannas, and shrub lands biome” of grassland, oak savanna, and chaparral shrub forest types of plant community habitats, along with lush riparian plants along the river, creeks, and springs. In this Mediterranean climate, post-1790s European agriculture for the mission’s support consisted of grapes, figs, olives, and general garden crops.[7] In 1874 dry wheat farming was introduced by J. B. Lankershim and Isaac Van Nuys and became very productive for their San Fernando Homestead Association that owned the southern half of the Valley. In 1876 they sent the very first wheat shipment from both San Pedro Harbor and from the United States to Europe.

20th century

Aqueduct

Through late 19th century court decisions, Los Angeles had won the rights to all surface flow water atop an aquifer groundwater beneath the Valley, without it being within the city limits. San Fernando Valley farmers offered to buy the surplus aqueduct water, but the federal legislation that enabled the construction of the aqueduct prohibited Los Angeles from selling the water outside of the city limits. This induced several independent towns surrounding Los Angeles to vote on and approve annexation to the city so they could connect to the municipal water system. These rural areas became part of Los Angeles in 1915. Concurrently and perhaps pre-aware, the Los Angeles Suburban Homes Company, a syndicate led by Harry Chandler, Hobart Johnstone Whitley, president of the company, James B. Lankershim, and Isaac Van Nuys, extended the Pacific Electric Railway (Red Cars) through the Valley to Owensmouth (now Canoga Park and West Hills) and laid out plans for roads and the towns of Lankershim (now Toluca Lake), Van Nuys, Marian (now Reseda) and Owensmouth. The rural areas became annexed by Los Angeles in 1915. The growing towns voted for annexation – for example: Owensmouth (Canoga Park) in 1917, Laurel Canyon and Lankershim in 1923, Sunland in 1926, La Tuna Canyon in 1926, and the incorporated city of Tujunga in 1932 – more than doubling the size of the city. A fictionalized story based on these events is told in the 1974 film Chinatown.

The Aqueduct water shifted farming from wheat to irrigated crops such as corn, beans, squash, and cotton; orchards of apricots, persimmons, and walnuts; and major citrus groves of oranges and lemons. They continued until the next increment of development converted land use, with post-war suburbanization leaving only a few enclaves, such as the ‘open air museum’ groves at the Orcutt Ranch Park and CSUN campus.

Developments

Also the advent of three new industries in the early 20th century – motion pictures, automobiles, and aircraft – spurred urbanization and population growth. World War II production and the subsequent postwar boom accelerated this growth so that by 1960, the valley had a population of well over one million. Los Angeles continued to consolidate its territories in the San Fernando Valley by annexing the former Rancho El Escorpión for Canoga Park-West Hills in 1959, and the huge historic “Porter Ranch” at the foot of the Santa Susana Mountains for the new planned developments in Porter Ranch in 1965. The additions expanded the Los Angeles portion of San Fernando Valley from the original 169 square miles (438 km) to 224 square miles (580 km) today.

Six Valley cities incorporated independently from Los Angeles: Glendale in 1906, Burbank and San Fernando in 1911, Hidden Hills in 1961, and Calabasas in 1991. Universal City is an unincorporated enclave that is home to Universal Studios theme park and Universal CityWalk. Other unincorporated areas in the Valley are Bell Canyon.

Northridge earthquake

The 1994 Northridge earthquake, struck on January 17 and measured 6.7 on the Richter Scale and produced the largest ground motions ever recorded in an urban environment and caused the greatest damage in the United States since the 1906 San Francisco. Its epicenter was located between Arminta St. and Ingomar St. just east of Reseda Blvd. under the community of Reseda. The death toll was 57, and more than 1,500 people were seriously injured. A few days after the earthquake, 9,000 homes and businesses were still without electricity; 20,000 were without gas; and more than 48,500 had little or no water. About 12,500 structures were moderately to severely damaged, which left thousands of people temporarily homeless. Of the 66,546 buildings inspected, 6% were severely damaged (red tagged) and 17% were moderately damaged (yellow tagged). In addition, damage to several major freeways serving Los Angeles choked the traffic system in the days following the earthquake. Major freeway damage occurred as far away as 25 miles (40 km) from the epicenter. Collapses and other severe damage forced closure of portions of 11 major roads to downtown Los Angeles.

This was the second time in 23 years that the San Fernando Valley had been affected by a strong earthquake. On February 9, 1971, a magnitude 6.6 event struck about 20 miles (32 km) northeast of the epicenter of the 1994 event. The 1971 earthquake caused 58 fatalities and about 2,000 injuries. At the time, the 1971 earthquake had been the most destructive event to affect greater Los Angeles since the magnitude 6.3 Long Beach earthquake of 1933.

Parks and recreation

The San Fernando Valley is home to numerous neighborhood ‘pocket parks,’ city parks, Recreation areas, and large Regional Open Space preserves. Many preserves are maintained as public parkland by the National Park Service’s Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area, the California State Parks, and local county and municipal parks districts.

Small garden parks and missions

• CSUN Botanic Garden
• The Japanese Garden
• The gardens at Adobes
• The Orcutt Ranch Horticulture Center
• The Leonis Adobe
• The Andrés Pico adobe
• Los Encinos State Historic Park
• Mission San Fernando

Recreation areas

• Griffith Park, located at the southeastern end of the valley in the Hollywood Hills.
• Sepulveda Dam recreation area
• Hansen Dam recreation area
• Los Angeles River, there are parks of various sizes along the part of the river located in the Valley

Mountain open-space parks

• O’Melveny Park above Granada Hills
• Rocky Peak Park
• Santa Susana Pass State Historic Park
• Chatsworth Park South
• Sage Ranch Park
• Bell Canyon Park
• El Escorpión Park
• Upper Las Virgenes Canyon Open Space Preserve
• Deukmejian Wilderness Park
• La Tuna Park
• Brand Park
• Verdugo Mountains Open Space Preserve
• Marvin Braude Mulholland Gateway Park
• Wilacre Park
• Laurel Canyon Park
• Topanga State Park
• Backbone Trail System
• Juan Bautista de Anza National Historic Trail

Economy

The Valley is home to numerous companies, the most well known of which work in motion pictures, music recording, and television production. The former movie ranches were branches of original studios now consisting of CBS Studio Center, NBCUniversal, The Walt Disney Company (and its ABC television network), and Warner Bros.

The Valley was previously known for advances in aerospace technology and nuclear research by companies such as Lockheed, Rocketdyne and its Santa Susana Field Laboratory, Atomics International, Litton Industries, Marquardt, and TRW’s predecessor Thompson Ramo Wooldridge.

Adult entertainment

The Valley became the pioneering region for producing adult films in the 1970s and since then has been home to a multi-billion dollar pornography industry, earning the monikers “Porn Valley” and “San Pornando Valley”. The leading trade paper for the industry, AVN Magazine, is based in the Northwest Valley, as are a majority of the nation’s adult video and magazine distributors. According to the HBO series Pornucopia, nearly 90% of all legally distributed pornographic films made in the United States are either filmed in or produced by studios based in the San Fernando Valley.

Rail and air

Metrolink commuter rail has two Valley lines, the Antelope Valley Line and Ventura County Line, connect the Valley and beyond to downtown Los Angeles and south, becoming one line at the Burbank station.

Amtrak‘s Pacific Surfliner long distance rail line has stops at Glendale, Burbank Airport station, Van Nuys, and Chatsworth station, before proceeding on to Ventura County, Santa Barbara, and Northern California or Union Station and San Diego.

The California High-Speed Rail Authority is planning two stations in the Valley, one in downtown Burbank and the other in Sylmar with an initial section of the railroad possibly opening in 2020.

The Valley’s two major airports are Bob Hope Airport and the Van Nuys Airport. The Van Nuys – Airport FlyAway Terminal provides non-stop scheduled shuttle service to LAX and back to the Valley, with parking.

Valley independence and secession

Many neighborhoods of Los Angeles in the San Fernando Valley have ‘seceded’ from one another in the form of renaming and reforming known community boundaries. Groups are motivated by the desire to disassociate themselves from undesirable connotations that some communities have inherited and, in the process, increase property values. Lake Balboa broke away from Van Nuys. Valley Village separated from North Hollywood. Valley Glen included portions of both Van Nuys and North Hollywood. West Hills and Winnetka separated from Canoga Park. Porter Ranch seceded from Northridge. Arleta broke off from Pacoima but failed to establish its own ZIP code. The new separatist districts are so in name only; none of them gained any governmental authority, and they remain districts within the City of Los Angeles, merely with new names.

Demographics

According to the 2010 San Fernando Valley U.S. Census report, the population of the San Fernando Valley is 1.77 million. Of the population 41.1% were non-Hispanic white, 42.0% were Hispanic or Latino, 3.8% were African Americans and 10.7% were Asian. The largest cities located entirely in the valley are Glendale and Burbank. The most populous districts of Los Angeles in the valley are North Hollywood and Van Nuys. Each of the two cities and the two districts named has more than 100,000 residents. Despite the San Fernando Valley’s reputation for sprawling, low-density development, the valley communities of Panorama City, North Hollywood, Van Nuys, Reseda, Canoga Park, and Northridge, all in Los Angeles, have numerous apartment complexes and contain some of the densest census tracts in Los Angeles.

Latinos and non-Hispanic whites are nearly even in numbers. In general, communities in the northeastern and central parts of the Valley have the highest concentration of Latinos. Non-Hispanic Whites live mainly in the communities along the region’s mountain rim and in the northwestern, western, southwestern, southern, and southeastern sections of the valley, including the Shadow Hills neighborhood.

Asian Americans make up 10% of the population and live throughout the valley, but are most numerous in the city of Glendale and the Los Angeles communities of Chatsworth, Panorama City, Northridge, Porter Ranch and Granada Hills. Another large ethnic element of the populace is the Iranian community with 200,000 people living mainly in west San Fernando Valley such as Tarzana, Calabasas, Woodland Hills, Encino, & Sherman Oaks. The valley is also home to a large Jewish community, with a large part of its population in the North Hollywood and Valley Village areas. The city of Glendale has a large Armenian community. African Americans compose 3.8% of the Valley’s population, living mainly in the Los Angeles sections of Lake View Terrace, Pacoima, Reseda, Valley Village, Van Nuys, and Northridge.

Poverty rates in the San Fernando Valley are lower than the rest of the county (15.3% compared to 17.9%). Nevertheless, in eight San Fernando Valley communities, at least one in five residents lives in poverty.

The Pacoima district of Los Angeles is widely known in the region as a hub of suburban blight. Other San Fernando Valley communities, such as the Los Angeles sections of Mission Hills, Arleta, and Northridge, have poverty rates well below the regional average.

Many wealthy families live in the hills south of Ventura Boulevard.

1962 is right in the temporal sweet spot of my Mike Montego novels — Shades of Blue, 459-Framed in Red, The Purple Hand, and He Blew Blue Jazz. Here are a few fun facts about this swingin’ year...

1962 Tidbits

Tobacco: Philip Morris introduced “Marlboro Country” to advertise its top filter-tip cigarette against R. J. Reynolds’ Winston brand. The cowboy theme will make Marlboro the leading brand worldwide.

Lt. Co John H. Glenn, Jr., Marine Corps pilot, became the first American in orbit February 20th when he circled Earth three times, covering 81,000 miles at an altitude of 160 miles in the Mercury capsule Friendship 7.

President Kennedy on February 14^th announced that U.S. military advisers in Vietnam would fire back if fired upon.

Supreme Court on March 26^th backed “one-man one-vote” apportionment of seats in state legislatures.

Europe’s Arlberg-Orient Express goes out of service May 27^th after nearly 79 years of operation between Paris and Istanbul; and the Simplon-Orient Express ends service as well. Both have been victims of the airplane that has cut travel time between the cities to two hours.

Economic, Finance, and Retailing: K Mart discount stores are opened by the 63-year-old S.S. Kresge Co., whose five-and-ten-cent stores are losing money. By 1977 Kresge sales will be second only to those of Sears, but Wal-Mart will pass it in the 1980s.

The first Wal-Mart store opens July 2^nd at Rogers, Arkansas. Retail merchant Sam Moore Walton, 44, had run a Ben Franklin store with his brother James at Bentonville; Sam proposed a chain of discount stores in small towns; Ben Franklin dismissed the idea and Walton goes into business for himself. His chain will surpass sales of Sears, Roebuck by 1991.

Food and Drink:  Diet-Rite Cola, introduced by Royal Crown Cola, is the first sugar-free soft drink to be sold nationwide to the general public. The cyclamate-sweetened cola will soon have powerful competitors.

First U.S. communications satellite is launched in July.

Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring launches the environmental movement.

James Howard Meredith, 29, an Air Force veteran, became the first black student at University of Mississippi, “Old Miss,” October 1^st after 3,000 troops put down riots. His admission was ordered by a federal appellate court and upheld by the Supreme Court.

President Kennedy revealed A Soviet offensive missile buildup in Cuba October 22nd. He ordered a naval and air quarantine on shipment of offensive military equipment to the island nation. Kennedy and Soviet Premier Khrushchev reached agreement on October 28 on a formula to end the crisis. Kennedy announced November 2^nd that Soviet missile bases in Cuba were being dismantled.

Cigar smokers are the chief U.S. victims of President Kennedy’s embargo on trade with Cuba. U.S. cigar sales exceed six billion per year with 95 percent of Cuban cigars rolled and wrapped in U.S. plants, but without Cuban tobacco cigar sales will fall to 5.3 billion per ear by 1976 despite population growth.

Sports: Ohio golfer Jack William Nicklaus, 22, wins the U.S. Open by defeating Arnold Palmer in a playoff.

Sonny Liston wins the world heavyweight boxing title September 25^th. Now 28, he knocks out Floyd Patterson in the first round of a championship bout at Chicago.

New York Yankees win the World Series by defeating the San Francisco Giants 4 games to 3.

Technology: Electronic Data Systems (EDS) is founded by Dallas salesman H. (Henry) Ross Perot, 32, whose data processing firm will make him a billionaire.

Polaroid Corp. introduces color film invented by Edwin H. Land. The high-speed film produces color prints in 60 seconds (Polaroid’s black-and-white film produces prints in 10 seconds).

Films: Roman Polanski’s Knife in the Water; David Lean’s Lawrence of Arabia; Sidney Lumet’s A Long Day’s Journey Into Night; John Ford’s The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance; Sam Peckinpah’s Ride the High Country; François Truffaut’s Shoot the Piano Player; Akira Kurosawa’s Yojimbo; Perter Ustinov’s Billy Budd; Hiroshi Imagaki’s Chushingura; George Seaton’s The Counterfeit Traitor; Blake Edwards’ Days of Wine and Roses; Pietro Germi’s Divorce—Italian Style; Luis Buñuels The Exterminating Angel; John Huston’s Freud; Tony Richardson’s The loneliness of the Long Distance Runner; John Frankenheimer’s The Manchurian Candidate; Artgyr Oebb;s The Miracle Worker; Kon Ichikawa’s The Outcast; Richard Brooks’ Sweet Bird of Youth; Robert Mulligan’s To Kill a Mockingbird; Robert Aldrich’s What Ever Happened to Baby Jane?; and, Ingmar Bergman’s Winter Light.

Music — Popular songs: “Those Lazy, Hazy, Crazy Days of Summer” by Hoagy Carmichael; “Days of Wine and Roses” by Henry Mancini (title song for film about alcoholism); “Dream Baby” and “Leah” by Roy Orbison; “Ramblin’ Rose by Noel and Joe Sherman; “Roses Are Red, My Love” by Al Byron and Hugh Evans’ “The Wanderer” by Ernest Maresca; “I left My Heart in San Francisco” by George Cory; “The Lonely Bull” by California trumpet player-vocalist-composer Herb Alpert, 27; “Surfin’ Safari” by the Beach Boys Brian Wilson, 20, Dennis Wilson, 17, Mike Love, 21, Al Jardine, 19, and Carl Wilson, 25.

According to mythology, in Hellenistic astrology, the sign of the ram was associated with the golden winged ram that rescued Phrixos and his sister Helle from the altar where they were to be offered as a sacrifice to Zeus. The golden ram carried them to the land of Colchis, but on the way Helle fell into the sea and drowned.

When Phrixos arrived at Colchis he sacrificed the ram to Zeus and presented the Golden Fleece to his father-in-law, the King of Colchis. The fleece was then hung upon a sacred oak and guarded by a dragon until rescued by Jason and the Argonauts.

The myth recounts that Zeus was so moved by the ram’s fate that he gave it the greatest honor of being moved to the heavens.

Thus, the astrological sign of Aries, the ram.

I was born in April under the sign of the ram, a couple of days before the heavenly sign of Taurus the bull. Mother, bless her heart, told me that she had willed me to be born on a Sunday. She never explained why, and she didn’t mention astrology. Well, I arrived at 1:36PM  on a Sunday afternoon. She said I wanted to come days earlier, but she got her way.

Could that explain why I tend to be impatient?

The ruler of Aries is Mars, the Roman god of war. Mars represented military power as a way to secure peace; Mars had a love affair with Venus. I hesitate to comment on how that might have affected me, however, upon thinking of Venus considered a detriment in the Aries sign, I wonder. I’ve been wedded four times, although my last wedding, in 1989 to Barbara Kay, worked. Perhaps, like John Gray’s book, Men are from Mars, Women Are from Venus: The Classic Guide to Understanding the Opposite Sex, suggests, it must have been a Venus-Mars matter regarding my first three unsuccessful marriages. No further comment.

Although the zodiac element of Aries is fire, I am rarely passionate about things, although I often seethe below the surface whenever faced with intolerant people. Perhaps I’m fierier than I care to admit.

Another Aries quality is cardinal. I am not certain I know what bearing that might have on me, only that deep scarlet is my favorite color.

Under Aries, the exaltation is the Sun. Well, I do like living in a sunny clime. And now I’ve settled in Mexico. Thankfully, Barbara loves the area, and the people, too.

Anyway, most of my life I’ve paid little attention to the astrological sign I was born under, yet, as I grew older and thought about events in my life, brought about in large by my behavior, I thought about Aries and the ram sign. I compared what I’d experienced in life to what people who specialized in horoscopes wrote, like the late Sydney Omarr. Often, I found I could fit what astrologists claimed to some little event that had occurred to me that particular day. It was easy to read into their comments only what I wanted to see.

Having said that, I don’t know if there is a connection to the alignment of planets with my actions, but I have heard that we humans generate energy that can cause things to happen. I say “things,” because I can’t put a label to it. I’ll leave that to the specialists.

I recall, however, when I was a youngster riding the red car into Hollywood from my foster home in the San Fernando Valley, seeing a large billboard on Cahuenga Boulevard; it was located where the winding pass became Highland Avenue. It displayed a pair of clasped hands along with the words: Prayer Changes Things.

I’ve thought about the energy thing and have wondered whether there truly is power in prayer to change things. I’ve read when people mentally concentrate in unison on a specific thing, that the sought result has happened.

Anyway, astrology and phenomena that can’t easily be explained fascinate me.

And then I should mention numerology. I’m not well versed in it, but when it comes to numbers, my favorite is 48. I think that came from being born in the fourth month when the U.S.A. was made up of 48 states. Also, World War II ended when I was eight years old.

However, I can’t say the number 48 has ever been a lucky number for me.

And that’s all I have to say about that.

(Originally published in the Palisades Post online, January 3, 2013, by staff writer Reza Gostar)

Negotiating traffic on Sunset Boulevard and PCH may be challenging for police officers on the ground, but not for officers piloting the airborne units of the Los Angeles Police Department’s Air Support Division (ASD).

These elite helicopter units have become legendary not only in movies like ‘Blue Thunder’ and ‘Terminator 2,’ but also on the streets where they are often referred to as ‘ghetto birds’ by the criminals they chase.

Somewhere over southeast L.A. on December 20, LAPD Pilot David Swanson is flying a AStar B-2 helicopter to the scene of a potential robbery. The victim’s neighbor has spotted the two suspects, Swanson tells a Palisadian-Post reporter who is along for the ride.

Tactical Flight Officer Renee Muro, a veteran LAPD officer and one of only seven women in the ASD, is listening to several police radios simultaneously as she coordinates the response. In less than four minutes, the helicopter arrives at its destination and, down below, neighbors are peeking out of their homes to see what all the commotion is about.

Swanson keeps the helicopter at 600 to 700 feet in elevation as he circles the perimeter. This is standard practice for LAPD helicopter pilots, who avoid hovering in one place. They keep the aircraft moving because in case of an emergency, such as a malfunction, there needs to be enough wind speed built up for the blades so the pilot can attempt to land. News media helicopters fly 500 feet above the police to avoid interfering with any activity.

On the streets below, the scene is chaotic. Curious neighbors have started to come out of their homes, adding to the number of bodies visible by air. Suddenly, Muro, who is not using binoculars, spots two pairs of sneakers underneath one of the home’s overhangs and quickly coordinates with the officers on the ground. Within minutes, the two suspected robbers are placed in custody.

Not three minutes go by before Muro picks up another call over the radio’this time a gunshot victim. The helicopter is again the first to arrive and quickly directs the first responders to the victim.

‘This is a known gang and drug area,’ Swanson says, adding that it is unlikely that any witnesses will come forward. After he and Muro canvas the perimeter, the calls begin to slow and the helicopter sweeps over congested freeways to Venice, and then to Pacific Palisades.

‘I landed there once when I had engine trouble,’ says Swanson, pointing down to the Field of Dreams at the Palisades Recreation Center. He was one of the units that responded to a burglary call at a home on Alma Real Drive last August. (The Post ran a photo of the downed helicopter.)

Established in 1956 by a group of Korean War veterans, the ASD units are in the air 20 hours a day patrolling L.A.’s 470-plus square miles of steel, chaparral and concrete landscapes. ‘We try to be as proactive as we can,’ said Lt. Phillip Smith, assistant commanding officer.

‘The helicopters get up to 140-150 miles per hour,’ Smith said. ‘If I leave the deck here [at the LAPD Hopper heliport near Union Station] and get a call way out in Chatsworth, it’s probably going to take me seven or eight minutes but that can still seem like forever when you have an officer screaming for help.’

Separated by the Santa Monica Mountains, there are two police helicopters patrolling at any given time. One works the San Fernando Valley and the other handles everything south of the Cahuenga Pass, Smith said, noting that rapid response is the reason why the helicopters remain in constant flight.

‘We are a force multiplier’that’s really what we do,’ Smith said. ‘We do the job of between six and eight police cars out there. ‘

Smith said that ASD helicopters are able to quickly determine if indeed there was a crime and whether or not additional units are needed. ‘Our big thing is getting to the scene and offering some security, and painting a visual picture for the officers responding.’

The Air Support Division, which averages more than 300 police car pursuit calls a year, currently operates 19 helicopters, including 14 Eurocopter Astar B-2s, four Bell Jet Rangers, and one recently acquired Bell Uh-1H (Huey) that is replacing an older one that retired about four years ago. The Huey is used by the division’s special flights section for special operations, which involve such missions as rapelling Special Weapons and Tactics officers onto the tops of buildings and other operational activities, Smith said.

The ASD staff and personnel include 35 police officer pilots, 10 sergeants who are pilots, three lieutenant pilots, 28 tactical flight officers, which totals to about 100 staff members, counting civilian employees and support staff. Some officers serve as both tactical flight officers (TFOs) and pilots, Smith said. However, all of the TFO and pilots have to serve as regular patrol officers for at least five years before being considered for a position in the elite division.

How effective is the ASD? Of the 51,000-plus incidents that the ASD responded to last year, ‘probably 16,000 times we were the first on scene,’ said Smith, who moonlights for the security firm ACS in the Palisades once a week.

Many aspects of the ASD’s missions are classified, such as their special radiological equipment (which can be used to detect terrorist activity), monitoring for environmental dangers, and high-altitude surveillance flights, which involve multimillion-dollar cameras and other equipment.”

The helicopters are also equipped with the famous ‘Nightsun’ spotlight, which is linked to the helicopter’s 360-degree infrared camera system that is mounted underneath the aircraft. During night patrols, the spotlight can be activated to track the camera’s position, which is remotely controlled by the tactical flight officer inside the helicopter.

However, the officers themselves are the most valuable aspect of the arsenal. Accumulating thousands of hours of flight time a year (about 18,000 hours in 2011), the ASD pilots are some of the most experienced aviators in the world. Subsequently, the ASD trains multiple other agencies from around the country, including foreign allied military units in their use of special police tactics, especially the ‘Nightsun’ spotlight. The instruction room is located on the aircraft carrier-size heliport on top of the Piper Technical Center in downtown.

Yet, despite all the technical gadgetry and their elite status as one of the largest and most sophisticated airborne law enforcement forces in the nation, the ASD’s humble motto exemplifies their commitment and attitude to the job: ‘The mission is the same, only the vehicle has changed.’

(The New York Times is always a great source of news and (usually) thoughtful commentary on literary matters. I thought this brief overview of the differences between the two main types of paperback books out there — mass market and trade — might be of interest to readers and authors alike. So with the indulgence of our friends at the Times, here it is — and by the way, be sure to check out the Times’ various best-seller lists at the end of this post).

Besides being somewhat larger in size, trade paperbacks are generally printed on more expensive paper and with sturdier binding. Because they are more expensive to produce they are higher in price and often (not always) printed in smaller numbers. Unlike mass-market paperbacks, which are usually sold on racks, trade paperbacks are sold in bookstores (“to the trade”) and are shelved with their spines facing out, like hardcovers. Sometimes they are sold on display tables, lying flat so that customers can respond to their cover art. Trade paperbacks may be originals, which are not preceded by a hardcover edition, or reprints of hardcovers. A trade paperback, in short, is the book you’d want to be reading if you were sitting at Les Deux Magots and Simone de Beauvoir was looking straight at you.

In recent years, the distinction between mass-market and trade paperbacks has been eroding. So while content and genre no longer determine whether a book is a mass-market or trade paperback, the book’s size, the quality of its paper, the way it is displayed, its price, the way it is distributed and the place it is sold all go into the definition. R. R. Bowker, the company that assigns International Standard Book Numbers (ISBNs) to books published in the United States, has developed codes and identifiers that define which books are trade paperbacks and which are mass-market.

You may still wonder why we decided to separate the mass-market and trade best-seller lists. The reason is that mass-market books — no surprise — tend to sell in larger numbers than trade. A list based on the number of copies a paperback sells will usually be dominated by mass-market. (Similarly, advice and self-help books sell more than most general nonfiction, and they dominated the nonfiction best-seller list until they got their own property in 1984.) But the Book Review — like most review media — focuses on trade fiction. These are the novels that reading groups choose and college professors teach. On the paperback best-seller list for Sept. 16, the week before we switched to the new system, only 7 of the 15 entries were trade fiction, but the new list of Sept. 23 presents 20 trade paperbacks. The seven books that made the list the week before, including “The Kite Runner” and “The Alchemist,” are still there, near the top of the list. But now there’s also room for Irène Némirovsky’s “Suite Française” and Kiran Desai’s “Inheritance of Loss.” And there’s a fuller listing for mass-market novels and paperback nonfiction as well.

by PAT CONNELLY

Sgt. II, Pat Connelly retired from the LAPD in 1996.  He was elected to the Los Angeles Police Revolver and Athletic Club (LAPRAAC ) Board of Directors, and presently serves in the retirement position. A member of the Baker to Vegas Race Committee, Connelly was appointed the “Official B to V Team Coach & Coordinator.”

A while back, I went to the Police Academy in Elysian Park to attend a LAPRAAC Board of Directors meeting. I walked past the security office and up the road to the Chief Daryl F. Gates Lounge. Making my way, I passed between the familiar stone walls on each side of the roadway. My walk brought back memories of the first time I did so, over 46 years ago.

Before the Watts Riots in August 1965, I joined the LAPD Reserve Corps. My training commenced on a Saturday morning in the Academy gym. Greeting our class were Officer Les Jenkins and Sergeant George Morrison (the late Morrison retired at the rank of Commander). Both men were spit and polish; standing tall in Class A uniforms, impressing all 30 members of a nervous and unsuspecting recruit reserve class.

The first thing Sgt. Morrison did after mustering the class, was speak about the heritage and history of the Los Angeles Police Academy, and the role that LAPRAAC played in its development.

Starting at the two rock pillars supporting the arcing Police Academy sign, the two men in blue took us on a tour of the grounds. As we walked along, Sgt Morrison pointed out different structures, landscaping, and memorable and historical landmarks. He spoke softly, and the steady tempo of his words radiated his strong sense of pride. It was obvious he was honored to be a member of the LAPD, as well as a member and in his day a noted athlete in LAPRAAC.

Sgt. Morrison explained the rock formations that divide the narrow roadway and then stated, “As you can see,, the walls are made of slabs of concrete, broken chunks of sidewalk brought up here in 1935 by trustees and a cadre of police officers. I will say more on this project later.”

As we walked, he told us the Academy’s history and how it became what it was on that day in 1965 and still is today.

In 1926, Chief James Davis was instrumental in the development and the formalizing of training for officers. The first such training was held in an armory downtown, where officers were instructed in all aspects of criminal justice and street police training. However, no firearms training was provided, except for a makeshift firing range behind the Lincoln Heights station. Today, it is known as Hollenbeck Station.

In 1931, Chief Davis set his sights on obtaining an area in the City of Los Angeles that would provide a formal shooting range for firearms instruction, qualification (including a bonus shoot) and shooting practice. Griffith Park was first suggested, but subsequently disapproved by the Recreation and Parks Commission. An alternative site in Elysian Park, consisting of 21 hillside acres, was then selected and approved; the rugged land was situated above Chavez Ravine.

Chief Davis put out a call throughout the Department for any officers skilled in building, and in electrical and plumbing installation. Sgt. Henry Fricket, assigned Lincoln Heights Station, was the first officer to answer the call. He applied his expertise in carpentry, constructing a 25-yard enclosed pit area, target frames, and firing points. The Department finally had a place to improve one’s shooting skills with the newly approved .45 caliber revolver. Officer Ronald French was the first range master.

In early 1931, eight officers formed a competitive pistol (revolver) team. The “Bulls Eye” shooting specialists were Chief James Davis, and Officers Stanley Stone, Jack Bartley, Joe Dircks, Bud Buchanan, R. J. Ward, J.J. Engbecht, and Mark Wheeler. The team was the first of many championship pistol teams to earn prestige and national fame for the Department and LAPRAAC.

The 25-yard range design and construction was professionally laid out and so complete that it was chosen as the venue for the 1932 Summer Olympic Games pistol competition.

In the fall of 1934, the Los Angeles Police Revolver and Athletic Club filed and obtained legal status. It then took on the responsibility of maintaining the Academy grounds. Under the supervision of Chief Davis (at the time he was President of the LAPRAAC Board of Directors), Sgt William H. Parker, also a lawyer, was assigned to draw up the necessary documents. Sgt. Parker would later become Chief of Police and rebuild what had been a corrupt entity into a professional police department, respected throughout the world. A bust of Chief Parker, commemorating his contributions during his long and distinguished career, currently stands in an honored spot on the Academy grounds.

Once the legal paperwork was approved, signed and delivered, the “club” started focusing on recreational and athletic outlets for its membership.

Officer Fred Eberhart obtained the services of the Department of Forestry. This action brought pine trees and shrubs to the Academy that stand today. Club members supervised 400 trusties that were put to work constructing the rock garden, landscaping, and building the pair of entry pillars and high walls traversing up the hill alongside the Academy roadway. The walls, made of rock and concrete chunks, had been pedestrian walkways on both sides of Ventura Boulevard in the San Fernando Valley.

Tons of concrete from the sidewalks torn out for road widening, utilizing a federal worker program (WPA) during the Depression, were transported to Elysian Park. In addition, the Department of Fish and Game donated 200 quail, 18 gray squirrels, and many fish to create a natural habitat within the hillside rock garden and its several waterfalls and shaped pools.

The first building constructed at the Academy had been an Olympic Village mess hall, located in Baldwin Hills during the 1932 Summer Games. It now is called the Chief Daryl F. Gates Lounge. Club members disassembled the building and reassembled it at its present location. After its completion, a large pool and athletic field and track were constructed across the street.

To cover the cost, members of the Department donated 1% of one month’s salary.

The Academy’s first graduating class of forty recruits, numbers 1-36, called their group “Club 40.” A plaque is on display honoring their place in Academy history. A photograph of class members is on the wall in the public café. The first female class graduated ten years later, in 1946.

The indoor gymnasium was constructed in 1935 at a cost of $181,000. Included in the project were a stage, a locker room, handball courts, administrative offices, billiards room, barbershop, beauty salon, steam room, and a massage alcove. A licensed masseur was available.

Officer Bob Burke (retired LAPRAAC Club Athletic Director) revealed a legendary story about a closet in the Academy Commanding Officer’s office. At one time it opened to a wet bar, designed and constructed for the comfort (possibly on and off duty) of Chief James Davis. Burke says if one looks hard, one will see a piece of the old liquor cabinet still in the office.

Only months after the start of WW II, police recruits in training lived on the grounds; they were allowed to go home on the weekends. A barracks type bunkroom was set up in the present day lounge. A small, separate, square-shaped building just inside the wall near the security office, is where meals were served. That area and the barbeque pit are still present. The building used to be the Law Instructor’s Unit; it currently is leased to a commercial real estate business.

A consultant for the residents’ living and training needs was Melvin Furbish, a retired Marine Corps general. General Furbish patterned discipline of the recruits after his beloved Corps. He included the class “A” uniform style worn today by the Department, and still worn by the USMC.

Another Academy landmark is the concrete seating area on the athletic field. The long and tiered seating, three levels high, is located behind home plate, where LAPRAAC’s baseball team plays. Many Department participants were former college and semi-professional baseball players. They played other local pro teams, including the Hollywood Stars and the Los Angeles Angels, as well as university teams from USC and UCLA. The LAPD diamond-field hardball athletes have won their fair share of games.

On March 3, 2013, the Department baseball team will have been playing continuously for 100 years.

A former member of a LAPRAAC post-WWII baseball team was my watch commander at West Valley Division (1967), Lt. Frank Mullins. At the age of 48, he participated on the Department’s long distance running/relay team, sponsored by LAPRAAC. Frank retired out of Robbery-Homicide Division, RHD. He loved to talk about the Club’s all-star team and how proud he was to wear the LAPD logo on his baseball uniform.

Frank’s baseball-playing name was “Moon” Mullins. He got his nickname playing shortstop as a member of the Chicago Cub’s farm team, the Vancouver Canucks. His moniker is not to be confused with 1959 Dodger, Wally Moon. However they did have one thing in common: hitting a home run, a short distance over a high fence.

Moon claimed he mastered his swing with a flick of his wrist, often hitting a very high pop fly over the Academy’s 50-foot-tall right field fence. The arcing balls would either bounce onto the road and roll down to Chavez Ravine, or would splash into the pool. An unlucky class recruit, usually on discipline, had the task of retrieving each ball.

Lieutenant Frank “Moon” Mullins, a Medal of Valor winner, passed away in 2010. He is another part of Academy history.

Sergeant George Morrison ended his Academy history lesson and tour where it started an hour earlier. He closed by stating (I believe with a tear), “Don’t ever take this place for granted. Be respectful of its history and legacy and be thankful for all the Department personnel who funded, sacrificed, and labored to make this place unique in American law enforcement, along with its notable athletic history. Now you can enjoy a place to recreate, increase your physical fitness, and have family and partner privacy. Complementing all we have seen today, you too, can proudly wear a sports competition uniform displaying the logo LAPD/ LAPRAAC.”

The police call box, or callbox, is a metal box containing a special-purpose direct line telephone or other telecommunications device. Before the introduction of two-way radios, some police agencies installed call boxes at various street locations as a way for beat officers to report to their dispatch office.

In 1852, Dr. William Channing and Moses G. Farmer developed the first practical fire alarm system, utilizing the telegraph system. Two years later, they applied for a patent for their “Electromagnetic Fire Alarm Telegraph for Cities.”

In 1855, John Gamewell of South Carolina, purchased regional rights to market the fire alarm telegraph. He obtained the patents and full rights to the system in 1859.

During the Civil War, the government seized the patents. John F. Kennard subsequently bought the patents and returned them to Gamewell.

In 1867 the two men formed a partnership, Kennard and Co., to manufacture the alarm systems. The Gamewell Fire Alarm Telegraph Co. was established in 1879.

Gamewell call box systems were installed in 250 cities by 1886, growing to 500 cities by 1890.  A new factory was opened in Newton Upper Falls, Massachusetts. By 1910, Gamewell had gained a 95% market share.

Today the company is called Gamewell-FCI (Fire Control Instruments), and is owned by Honeywell Automation and Control Solutions. They develop self-programming, networked, and sophisticated voice evacuation systems.

The following blogpost was written by Terry Denton. As a recently arrived resident of Mexico, I found it well worth sharing.

The Media’s Myopia

If you look up myopia in the free dictionary.com you will find it defined as ” . . . a visual defect in which distant objects appear blurred because their images are focused in front of the retina rather than on it; nearsightedness.”  What you won’t find there, but probably should, are pictures of almost every major U.S. cable and broadcast news network.

Most of us have long since figured out that the 24-hour news cycle demands a relentless stream of drama dripping, nerve-jangling “Breaking News” alerts every half-hour. God forbid eyeballs should be allowed to wander. That reality is unfortunate on a number of levels, but nowhere more so than here where an entire noble nation is callously maligned.

Just to be clear, I am not suggesting that the media “has it in for” Mexico. Not at all. This is not another rant against media bias. What I do maintain, however, is that in their insatiable thirst for the salacious, Mexico and its 112 million proud people are in the minds of the media – assuming they bother to think about such things at all – unfortunate collateral damage. Just like the definition above, the media’s image of Mexico is blurred precisely because their focus is on one relatively small, admittedly ugly reality and thus falls woefully short of the retina of responsible reportage.

As an unrepentant lover of Mexico, I confess it is hard not to take this personally. What if day after day you had to read gross exaggerations, half-truths and outright, and often outrageous, lies about someone you cherished? You don’t need to respond to my rhetorical question because we both know that it would make your blood boil. So imagine how I feel, laboring away in the vineyards of travel and being subjected to a flood of negative news reports about Mexico, a country of incredible beauty, rich history and some of the finest people God ever planted on this planet.

The Three Metrics That Matter

Let’s turn our attention to three practical metrics you can use for measuring the safety of Mexico.

Metric One:  Geography

Allow me to share a couple of realities that seldom get mentioned by the media.  The first is the fact that the vast majority of the security problems in Mexico are restricted to towns along the border and a few other scattered sites. It is worth noting that Mexico has over 2500 municipalities, and security problems have been concentrated in just 18 of them. You probably won’t run across this embarrassing little jewel either, embarrassing to the US that is. It almost makes you question the wisdom of staying at home.

The second fact rarely discussed is the immense size of Mexico (roughly the size of Western Europe) and the distances between historical hot spots and resort cities. Take a look at the map below. You may be surprised to discover that it is roughly 1000 miles from Juarez to Cancun, and almost 800 miles from Tijuana to Cabo San Lucas. How head-scratchingly strange we here in the U.S. would find it if a potential visitor from a foreign country shared with us that he was apprehensive about visiting San Diego because he had heard of a recent ugly incident in New Orleans.

Metric Two:  Statistics

Here are a few interesting facts you probably have not heard in the media:

1)              The Mexican Ministry of Tourism revealed that 2011 was a record-breaking year for tourism with 23.4 million international travelers visiting Mexico in 2011.

2)              The Mexican Ministry of Tourism announced that 4.99 million international tourists visited Mexico between January-April 2012, representing an increase of 5.3 percent compared to the same period in 2011.

3)              Mexico is currently rated 10^th in the world rankings for most international visitors, and has publicly set a goal to be in the top 5 by 2018.

4)              There are currently no US travel advisories in place for popular tourist destinations like Cancun, Cozumel, Playa del Carmen, Riviera Maya and Tulum, the Riviera Nayarit, Cabo San Lucas, Puerto Vallarta, Guadalajara, San Miguel de Allende, Leon or even Mexico City.

Metric Three:  Experience

If you were to ask me the number one reason I believe Mexico is safe I would say it is based on my own personal experience. I have been traveling there for over 25 years, multiple times many years, without ever once being threatened or harassed. My story is but one of millions as the statistics above corroborate.

If you would like to hear some real stories from real people talking about the real Mexico, just visit the Mexico Taxi Project. These are unscripted comments from consumers just like you on their way home from the airport upon returning to the US. OK, there may be a couple of folks in those clips still feeling the negative effects of over-indulgence but hey, hangovers don’t reach the threat threshold set for this blog post.

SUMMARY

I hope I have demonstrated that striking Mexico off your list of vacation destinations based solely on money driven media reports is, dare I say it, illogical, irrational and well, myopic. The real shame is that you are depriving yourself of one of the most value centered travel experiences available anywhere in the world. Mexico has world-class hotels, incredible dining, exciting activities and rich traditions, all tendered to the world by humble masters of unparalleled service.

Unfortunately, this poor blogger doesn’t have a prayer by himself of making the least dint in the news coverage of Mexico. Unbowed and undeterred, however, I shall keep on lending my own voice to many others crying in the wilderness. I shall attend Mexico, I shall defend Mexico, I shall recommend Mexico!  My only hope is your decision, fellow traveler, when it is made, will be based on a basic grasp of geography, a familiarity with a few simple statistics and a confident reliance on the consistent testimony of a legion of travelers to Mexico with irrefutable firsthand knowledge.

Whatever you eventually decide, I will fully respect your decision. But please—and again I say please, don’t let a myopic media’s thirst for mayhem rob you of experiencing one of the world’s great treasures. Take if from one who knows, you will be the poorer for it.

After over 60 years of service, on Tuesday, January 15th at 2 PM, the Los Angeles Police Department closed the tinted, large glass doors for the last time to its headquarters in Parker Center, located downtown at 150 North Los Angeles Street.

Originally called the Police Administration Building (PAB), groundbreaking for the Center occurred on December 30, 1952, and construction was completed in 1955. The architect was Welton Becket. The building combined police facilities that had been located throughout the Civic Center area. The location was previously home to the Olympic Hotel.

The PAB was a state of the art facility, and the envy of other police departments across the nation. So great was the demand for public tours that the Department assigned policewomen full-time for the first year to give tours several times a day.

It was later renamed in honor of Chief William H. Parker, who died in office on July 16, 1966 from a heart attack. Chief since 1950, he helped establish the LAPD’s reputation as a world leader in law enforcement.

Soon after his death, the Los Angeles City Council renamed the building “Parker Center.” The building was one of the sites of unrest during the 1992 Los Angeles riots, following a not-guilty verdict for the four police officers involved in the Rodney King matter.

A MEDIA STAR

Probably Parker Center’s greatest early notoriety began with the fifth season in 1955 of the television drama by Jack Webb’s Mark VII Productions, Dragnet, and again in the late 1960′s when the show returned to TV, this time in color.

This was only the start. The PAB appeared in several establishing shots for the Perry Mason TV series between 1958 and 1966. This was followed by the popular NBC drama Hunter that also used the building in its sixth and seventh seasons, as did the TNT series The Closer. Parker Center is also featured as one of the main locations in Police Quest: Open Season, the fourth installment of the Police Quest series, a 1993 PC video game by Sierra Entertainment.

Parker Center is often mentioned in the novels of the Harry Bosch series, written by Michael Connelly.

Featured as a backdrop in countless other movie and television features over the decades, Parker Center was a place where the line between art and real-life truly blurred.

At times art imitated life, and at times life imitated art in the fictional and real life dramas that unfolded at Parker Center. High profile investigations took place there, and it was not unusual for occasional big-name celebrities to be booked into the Parker Center Jail—tagged “the glass house” by arrestees because of its large glass-walled holding tanks—on anything from minor charges up to homicide.

It also was the scene of occasional public protests and raucous police commission meetings. If the PAB’s walls were to talk, how much they would have to say!

NEW HEADQUARTERS

With time, the Parker Center became outdated and was in need of expensive seismic retrofits. After considering a number of downtown sites for a new facility, the city council selected a property directly south of City Hall, Caltrans‘ former Los Angeles headquarters. Ground was broken for the new building in January 2007. It was dedicated on October 24, 2009.

Since 2009, Parker Center continued to house portions of the Department’s Scientific Investigations Division (SID). This division has since been transferred to the nearby C. Erwin Piper Technical Building.

Until recently LAPD’s Robbery – Homicide Division operated from a Parker Center annex.

The heliport at the new facility is marked with an ‘H’. The Parker Center’s heliport was marked with a ’5′.

CIRO’S

Ciro’s (also known as Ciro’s Le Disc) was a nightclub in West Hollywood, California, at 8433 Sunset Boulevard, on the Sunset Strip, opened in January 1940, by entrepreneur William Wilkerson. Herman Hover took over management of Ciro’s in 1942 until it closed its doors in 1957. Hover filed for bankruptcy in 1959, and Ciro’s was sold at public auction for $350,000.

Ciro’s combined an overdone baroque interior with an unadorned exterior, and became a famous hangout for movie people of the 1940s, 1950s, and early 1960s. It was one of “the” places to be seen, and guaranteed being written about in the gossip columns of Hedda Hopper and Louella Parsons.

Among the galaxy of celebrities who frequented Ciro’s were Marilyn Monroe, Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall, Frank Sinatra, Ava Gardner, Sidney Poitier, Anita Ekberg, Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz, Joan Crawford, Betty Grable, Marlene Dietrich, Ginger Rogers, Ronald Reagan, Dean Martin, Mickey Rooney, Cary Grant, George Raft, George Burns and Gracie Allen, Judy Garland, June Allyson and Dick Powell, Mamie Van Doren, Jimmy Stewart, Jack Benny, Peter Lawford, and Lana Turner (who often said Ciro’s was her favorite nightspot) among many others. During his first visit to Hollywood in the late 1940s, future President John F. Kennedy dined at Ciro’s.

In the 1960s, Ciro’s became a Sunset Strip rock and roll club, and was the only major venue to make such a transition while keeping its original name. The Byrds got their start there in 1964. Accounts of the period (reproduced in the sleeve notes to The Preflyte Sessions box set) describe a “church-like” atmosphere, with interpretive dancing. The club also served as the host during the recording of the 1965 Dick Dale album “Rock Out With Dick Dale: Live At Ciro’s.”

Co-founder Wilkerson also opened other nightclubs on the Sunset Strip such as Cafe Trocadero, and later The Flamingo in Las Vegas.

The site of Ciro’s became The Comedy Store in 1972.

Notable performers

• The Byrds
• Cab Calloway
• Carmen Cavallaro
• Nat King Cole
• Desi Arnaz
• Xavier Cugat
• Dick Dale and the Del-Tones
• Sammy Davis Jr.
• The Doors
• Katherine Dunham
• Duke Ellington
• Benny Goodman
• Mitzi Green
• Merv Griffin
• Hildegarde
• Herb Jeffries
• Lisa Kirk
• Abbe Lane
• Gypsy Rose Lee
• Peggy Lee
• Joe E. Lewis
• Martin and Lewis
• Rose Marie
• Freddy Martin
• Tony Martin and Cyd Charisse
• Janis Paige
• Johnnie Ray
• Harry Richman
• Lili St. Cyr
• Hazel Scott
• Kay Thompson and The Williams Brothers
• Charles Trenet
• Dinah Washington
• Mae West

THE TROCADERO 

In West Hollywood, California, the Cafe Trocadero was the center of jitterbug craze in the 1930s. Today, a ” new” Trocadero stands as a nightclub at 8610 Sunset Boulevard on the Sunset Strip. A black tie, French-inspired supper club, the original Trocadero, now demolished, was considered the jewel of the Strip in the 1930s, and became synonymous with stars, starlets, movie producers, and fun. Founded by William R. Wilkerson in 1934, the successful publisher of The Hollywood Reporter who owned other nightclubs nearby on the Sunset Strip like Ciro’s and LaRue. It was also the scene of many famous movie premiere parties. There was a mid 1940s low-budget film about the Trocadero and its history starring Ralph Morgan which bore little resemblance to reality.

Among the celebrities who frequented the Trocadero were Fred Astaire, Bing Crosby, Cary Grant, Myrna Loy, Jackie Gleason, Henry Fonda, Judy Garland, Lucille Ball, Desi Arnaz, Jean Harlow, and Norma Shearer. The Trocadero was featured in the 1937 movie, A Star is Born starring Janet Gaynor and Fredric March. That same year, vaudevillian and Three Stooges manager Ted Healy died shortly after a fight in the parking lot, allegedly at the hands of fellow contractee Wallace Beery and MGM studio executive Eddie Mannix. A 2004 documentary film claimed that Healy’s assailants were actually Wallace Beery, gangster Pat DiCicco, and DiCicco’s cousin Albert “Cubby” Broccoli.

Actress/comedienne Thelma Todd, who died mysteriously in December 1935, spent an evening at the Trocadero at a party thrown by Ida Lupino and her father Stanley. Todd had formerly been married to Pat DiCicco, and was angry that he had shown up there with another actress, Margaret Lindsay. The party was one of the last times she was seen alive.

The dance club was parodied in the 1938 Warner Bros. cartoon, Porky at the Crocadero. The club also received a brief mention, via actual film footage, in 1944′s What’s Cookin’ Doc?.

PHOENIX — By 1953, Anthony Joslin’s parents had saved $3,000, and earmarked it for sending their son to college. But Mr. Joslin was able to pay for his own tuition, room and board at North Carolina State University after winning a scholarship for the 1/12-scale car model he designed and built.

Like millions of other teenage boys from 1930 to 1968, Mr. Joslin entered the Fisher Body Craftsman’s Guild, an annual car-building and design competition sponsored by General Motors, which asserted that eight million teenagers participated in the guild.

Mr. Joslin and many other guild alumni gathered here last weekend for a reunion, sharing their stories and the model cars they have cherished all these years.

The models are worthy of being cherished. They are futuristic visions of the highway from the 1950s and ’60s, much like a miniature version of General Motors own Motorama dream car shows. Typically, a young man spent 700 to 800 hours creating his scale-model car from wood or plaster or in a few cases, from metal.

In the early years of the guild, boys were challenged to use a set of plans they were provided to build an elaborate scale model of the horse-drawn coach that was Fisher Body’s emblem. Fisher Body manufactured car bodies for all General Motors divisions.

In the early years of the guild, the goal was to identify young men with those skills that might be employed in making cars.

After World War II, it was future car designers the company sought, and thus the original 1/12th-scale models.

At North Carolina State, Mr. Joslin studied industrial, not automotive design, and afterward had a career designing instruments, computers and other products for Hewlett Packard.

For Paul Tatseos, winning a Craftsman’s Guild scholarship not only enabled him to go to college, but also to attend the Art Center College of Design in Pasadena, Calif., a school known for its automotive design program. After college, Mr. Tatseos worked as a designer at G.M. for 35 years.

Mr. Tatseos grew up in Boston. “My father said, ‘You live within walking distance of M.I.T. and Harvard and you’ve decided you want to go to college in California?’” Mr. Tatseos recalled at the reunion.

The scholarship program had an even more striking impact on the Simone family from Providence, R.I. e brothers Jerry, Eugene and Anthony all entered and won scholarships. Jerry Simone spent five years as a designer at Ford before going to pharmacy school. After college, Eugene Simone worked for 45 years at Merrill Lynch. Anthony Simone became a teacher and international school administrator, working around the world and at the United Nations.

“Our father was a tool-and-die maker,” Anthony Simone said at the reunion.

“Mother and father always said we were going to college, but that there was no money in the till for it,” Eugene Simone added.

But with the scholarships they won for their car design and building skills, the Simone sons were able to attend college.

The Fisher Body scholarships benefited the boys who won and their families as well. With Mr. Joslin attending college on his scholarship, his parents could use the money they’d saved to buy the only house they ever owned.

Why shouldn’t books have soundtracks?

Certainly the Mike Montego series deserves one. If the cool tunes of the early Sixties turn your crank, pour yourself something appropriate, lower the lights, make yourself comfortable, and listen in to this publisher’s overview of Shades of Blue, 459-Framed in Red, and The Purple Hand, featuring the marvelous music of artists such as Ella Fitzgerald, Louis Armstrong, Johnny Mathis, Ritchie Valens, and Ray Charles.

Oh, yeah!

BONUS! Mike Montego Radio

When someone talks about “West Coast jazz” or “cool jazz,” they’re almost invariably referring to a style performed by jazz musicians in California (and primarily in Los Angeles) in the ’50s and early ’60s. As opposed to the hard-bop sound dominant on the East Coast during that time, the West Coast sound was a bit mellower and more lyrical, with blended harmonies and — broadly speaking — more interest in composition and arrangement than improvisation.

So starts a cool bit on National Public Radio’s website — an article called West Coast Cool: the Jazz Sound of ’50s California.

Check it out!

My life-long love of music was fueled by the fact that, growing up in Hollywood, I was constantly exposed to some amazing talent.

Like Nino Tempo.

I went to Hollywood High with Nino, who originally hailed from New York. He and his older sister, April Stevens (their birth name, by the way, was Lo Tiempo),  went on to become one of the hottest acts in the early ’60s.

Signed as a duo with Atco Records, they had a string of Billboard hits and earned a Grammy Award as “best rock & roll record of the year” for the single “Deep Purple”. “Deep Purple” was originally released as a “B-side” by legendary producer Ahmet Ertegun, who was dubious of Tempo’s belief that it would be a hit, calling it “the most embarrassing thing” the duo had ever recorded. When the “A-side” song, “Paradise”, flopped, Ertegun relented, and the song achieved notability as the longest running hit B-side, a title it carried for 21 years. The version I’ve posted above is from an American Bandstand broadcast of the era.

Music journalist Richie Unterberger has described the later song “All Strung Out” as Nino Tempo & April Stevens’ “greatest triumph”, declaring it “one of the greatest Phil Spector-inspired productions of all time”. For years following their charting singles, the duo continued recording, but failed to achieve continued sales success.

However in March 1973 they scored a #5 hit in the Netherlands with “Love Story” on A & M Records, two years after Andy Williams took that same song to #13 in the Dutch Top 40.

Watching and listening to this old clip from the most popular music program of the era brings back a flood of memories.

I haven’t been able to ascertain what they’re up to these days — or even if they’re still with us. I do know that they were inducted into the city of Buffalo’s Musical Hall of Fame in 1999. And  that in November, 2007, Nino performed Amazon Moon (formerly Bahia Manhattan, from his Nino album) at Carnegie Hall at the request of the great Mike Stoller, who labeled Nino’s version of that song one of his all-time favorites. On an evening hosted by Rob Reiner, designed to pay tribute to Stoller and his songwriting partner, Jerry Leiber, Nino was joined on stage by the likes of Natalie Cole, Ben E. King, Sally Kellerman and the late Marvin Hamlisch.

Not bad for a kid from Hollywood High.