Some intrepid early motorist was keen to nab the bragging rights of being the first person to drive through the Hill St Tunnels in downtown Los Angeles in September 1913. From what we can see in this photo, the tunnel was far from being finished. I can’t imagine the suspension on that automobile was great (or even existed) so that would have been one heck of a bumpy ride.
Tony V. says: “There were two Hill Street tunnels. Seen here is the twin bore tunnel that went from First Street to Temple Street; cars and pedestrians used one bore while street cars used the other. Another Hill Street tunnel went from Temple to Sunset Boulevard. It was a single bore tunnel.”
On Urban Diachrony I found this pair of images showing the Hill Street Tunnels, looking north on Hill Street from First Street in 1954 and 2014.
In the second image, the colored light is above a sign that reads “Keep to Right”. The electric line (to Sunset via another tunnel) has at this point been decommissioned and both sides of the tubes are devoted to one-way auto traffic…inbound on the hill side, outbound on the downtown/courts side. The soon-to-come demolition would first close the outer route, requiring vehicles to follow a shoofly detour around the site. The inbound (ex-railway) side would come after. Very telling that they had to put a “No Parking” sign on the middle faces for the slightly mal-adjusted drivers, or were they just the typical seasonal tourists with “good ’nuff” on their minds? Any rate, Disney would take care of this kind of thrill soon when Mr. Toad’s Wild Ride would go into the abuilding theme park a few miles out past the orange groves.
If I’m reading the script on the radiator correctly, that’s an old Maxwell. Wonder if Jack Benny wound up buying it 20 years later? 🙂
You’re one up on me MMM. I’ve never even heard of a the Maxwell brand!
Got me on that spotting. I thought it began “St” or “El”, but it looks like script fer sure and IIRC that’s what Maxwell used earlier on. Did find a Maxwell wrench a few months back and surprisingly in the old script style with the foundry mark too. Perhaps Mr. Benny would like to get it back, if he’s not too cheap.
I believe it to be a Studebaker touring car from right around the year the photo was taken, 1913 give or take. Virtually all cars even back then in fact did have suspensions that were leaf spring based and could support significant suspension travel requirements. That being said the ride was still rough. This was necessary as they had to traverse bumpy early roads, often simply of compacted and deeply rutted dirt. You can see the leaf springs running front to back on both sides right below the bottom corners of the radiator shell (grill).
The two black & whites are both Fords, and the visible Fordor looks to have a Mainliner name in chrome with perhaps the V-8 crest ahead of it for the engine option. Fully slab-sided with rocket tail lights (?) it might have the late flathead (’52-’53) or perhaps the new Y-block for ’54 models. Car behind it has lights on the roof too, but what’s with the paint…coroner in town?