About a week ago, I posted a 1954 photo of Hollywood Blvd with the huge metal Christmas trees rigged up along the sidewalks. Here’s a similar one but taken earlier in December 1945, so this would have been the first Christmas after the war. We’re looking east from Highland Ave toward the Hollywood Theater, so the Hollywood Hotel would have been behind the photographer. It shows how festive the street looked lit up at night with all those trees.
I thought the auto-colorizer did a pretty good job bringing this one to life.
The Hollywood Theatre is still there, but now operates as the Guinness World Records Museum, which is one of those places I can imagine many locals go to. I’ve lived here since the mid-90s and I’ve never bothered. This image is from April 2019.
Given how many of these tress were produced to line the boulevard I’ve got to wonder if any still exist. Certainly someone must have saved a few from being scrapped. Hopefully proof of their continued existence will pop up to surprise us one day, much like the Garden of Allah sign.
I have always wondered what happened to these trees, too. They were pretty huge. When you see a photo of someone next to them on a ladder I’d surmise they were 10-12 feet high or more. Since they were so big and made of metal and stored outside all year round, I’m guessing none of them have survived, though I’d love to be wrong about that. In December of 2011 a portion of Hollywood Blvd. was transformed into Christmas, 1949, for the filming of scenes for the movie Gangster Squad. I don’t know if they were recreated or not, but these trees were part of the background.
And thanks, MT, for posting this photo. I’m always on the lookout for one of these Hollywood Christmas photos I haven’t seen before. I love that there’s a P.E. car making an appearance in the center!
If you jump over the photo I linked in the main text, you’ll see a photo that someone later sent me of them in storage in Burbank. You’ll see how HUGE they actually are!
The Hollywood theater always reminds me of the time, back in 1949 or 50, when I went, one evening, with my parents to that theater and when we came out we were met with the most beautiful sight. Huge snow flakes were falling all around. I was amazed! Could there be a more perfect place to be on that special night? The normal bright lights of the city were enhanced many timed over. That night LA got about a 5 inch covering of snow. Waking up the next morning I looked out to see our place all covered in snow. I was living at a riding academy where my Dad was manager and it was a wonderful sight. The stable, paddock and all the grounds covered in a thick blanket of snow. There was an old unused car parked near the house, and as I looked around, a cat, that had been sleeping in it jumped out of the window and when it hit the snow, it went a little crazy jumping high all the way to the barn. By noon that day, all the snow had melted and life went back to normal. But for those few minutes, coming out of the theater in Hollywood, I was in a different world. Real Hollywood magic!!
Ah! You were there for the famous LA snowfall of 1949! Lucky you!
Yes, indeed! And for a native born Californian, it was quite an experience. I later attended collage in Indiana, and snow was not so much fun after a couple of seasons. Richard – –