You’d never know it, but these six people were picking poppies at what is now around the intersection of Woodbury Rd and Lake Ave in Altadena, north of Pasadena. I don’t know if this was a poppy farm or these people were randomly picking poppies because there was nobody around to stop them…except perhaps the people in the horse-drawn buggy in the background. This photo was taken in 1895, so naturally these people were dressed from neck to ankle in layers of Victorian clothing—not exactly comfy gardening wear, if you ask me.
The photographer who took the vintage photo was facing the mountains so this gives us a rough idea of what that view looks like today. This image is from December 2020.
The autocolorizer did a pretty good job of bringing this photo to life.
I must say that it does look a bit like a contrived scene captured for publicity photographs of the era. At the same time, there are many rail lines already in the area and new local services being added constantly, so that these folks might only be a few steps off from a connection to one of the big hotels over by Fair Oaks in Pasadena. We already see some structures beyond by the foothills, and maybe far more out of frame. This is the era when Thaddeus Lowe is starting to open his destination resorts up in the hills thereby. [And, for more useless trivia, the writer’s home in Stand By Me was a structure that would be built nearby in those neighborhoods below the incline zone.]
This is located a few blocks from my chiropractor’s office. It definitely has changed since 1895.
Probably could say it definitely has changed since 1985.
There was a red car stop called Poppyfields.
Very aptly names!