Until I found this photo, I didn’t know that War Loan Drives sometimes took the form of a parade, but Angelenos sure turned out in droves to watch this one down Broadway in downtown Los Angeles. This is the intersection of 7th Street, where the Loew’s State Theatre played movies all night to accommodate wartime shift workers. The day this photo was taken (in 1944) “Laura” was playing, which is surprising because Lowe’s was an MGM theater and “Laura” was a 20th Century-Fox production. If you look closely to the right, you can see a 5-lamp street light (known as an “electrolier”) with 4 of its 5 bulbs blacked-out on top like the one I posted a couple of days ago.

It’s impossible for me to recreate the 1944 photo, but here’s what the Loew’s State Theatre looked like in September 2021. Like many old theaters in downtown LA, it is now a church.