If you had driven from the start of Route 66 in Chicago, by the time you got the intersection of Doheny Drive and Santa Monica Boulevard, you were nearly there. Santa Monica beach was just a few miles away but I’m sure that motorists who found themselves entering Beverly Hills were bound to take a detour to see if any Hollywood movie stars were roaming around in the wild. This photo was taken some time in the 1940s so I was pleased to see that the building on the left with the Seagram’s billboard is still around.

See also: Long Empty Building From WeHo’s Streetcar Era May Get a New Life

Bill D says: “My old stomping grounds. Yes, late 1940s – “Tri-lite” signals were “new” – replaced the Acme Semaphore signals. I delivered newspapers on Doheny Dr, between Beverly and Burton Way. Just to the left and behind the picture here was Karls Market – a super market before the term was coined. I traveled on those streetcar tracks many times. This was where Melrose Ave. met Santa Monica Blvd. A stones throw to the left and behind the picture was the Marquis Theater, which became the Academy of Motion Pictures site for the year 1947. How do I know? My family and I lived about 500 feet to the southeast. Route 66 well traveled – worked in a cafe on Santa Monica Blvd. Grandparents lived on Route 66 (Huntington Dr. in Monrovia). When in the Army, I had a car very much like the one in the foreground (mine was a Ford, seafoam green). The tall double-globe street lamps were very common all along the L.A. route – poles made with artificial granite cast concrete. Four blocks south was the famous Chasen’s restaurant. To the right and behind the picture is the Troubadour rock club.”

The same view in March 2019: