Color photo of the Brown Derby restaurant, 3377 Wilshire Blvd, Los Angeles, circa early 1940s
The grainy style of this photo of the original Brown Derby restaurant at 3377 Wilshire Blvd makes me wonder if it’s actually a frame from an old film. But color photos of the Derby are a little on the rare side, so I snap them up whenever I can because it makes the long-gone place seem all the more real. Someone told me that the car parked closest to the front door is probably a 1940 Buick, so I’m calling this circa early 1940s.
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Brown Derby restaurant on Rodeo Drive at Wilshire Blvd, Beverly Hills, 1938
In this 1938 photo from Life magazine, we can see the third Brown Derby restaurant at Wilshire Blvd and Rodeo Drive in Beverly Hills. This Derby opened in 1931 so by this time, it had become a well-established member of the Beverly Hills restaurant scene. Rodeo Drive is the one running diagonally through the photo. It gives us a glimpse of how low-key it was back then—pretty much like any other street in America.
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Tagged Aerial photographs, Beverly Hills, Brown Derby, Restaurants, Rodeo Drive
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A lone motorist overlooks a relatively barren Laurel Canyon in Hollywood, 1913
In this photo from 1913, a lone motorist has driven to a spectacular lookout spot that give him a panoramic vista that takes in Lauren Canyon, the Hollywood hills, and the barely-developed San Fernando Valley in the distance. I guess he wasn’t completely alone because someone was there to take the photo, which is a good thing, because if that touring car of his broke down, I doubt AAA would or could come to his rescue.
Looking east along Hollywood Blvd from Schrader Blvd, toward the Hillview apartment building in 1930
In this 1930 photo, we’re looking east along Hollywood Blvd from around Schrader Blvd. That apartment building on the left is the Hillview, built in 1917 by Paramount’s Jesse L. Lasky and his brother-in-law, Sam Goldwyn. It was the first apartment building to allow those moving picture actors to live in Hollywood, a bold move at a time. Notice that there are no traffic lanes painted along the boulevard, which must have made the prevailing rule: Survival of the bravest.
The Hillview is still there. This image is from April 2019:
Looking west across the front lawn of the Beverly Hills Hotel to the Pacific Electric station on Sunset Blvd, Beverly Hills, circa 1915
This photo shows us how far Beverly Hills has come. This photo is circa 1915, and shows the front lawn of the Beverly Hills Hotel, which would have been open for a couple of years. The street at the bottom left hand corner is Sunset Blvd, and that little structure on the far left was the then-new Pacific Electric Railway station. (Pacific Electric ran the famous Red Car streetcars of L.A.) Beyond that are the empty fields of Beverly Hills, patiently waiting for the rich and famous to discover them.
Roughly that same view in March 2017
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Tagged Beverly Hills, Beverly Hills Hotel, Hotels, Streetcars
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La Reina Theater, 14626 Ventura Blvd, Sherman Oaks, California, circa late 1930s
In this photo, we’re treated to the La Reina Theater at 14626 Ventura Blvd in Sherman Oaks lit up at night. The double bill was “Trade Winds” a United Artists picture starring Fredric March and Joan Bennett, and “Thanks for Everything” a 70-minute program filler from 20th Century-Fox starring Adolphe Menjou, both of which came out late December 1938. But what really caught my eye is the end of the marquee where it says “THURSDAY FREE 1939 PACKARD.” Did some lucky moviegoer that week go home with a brand new Packard automobile?
The La Reina is still around, but these days it’s a spa. This image is from May 2019. I’m pleased to see that the terrazzo in the foyer is still intact.
Inside the Los Angeles Theatre, 615 South Broadway, downtown Los Angeles, 1931, the year it opened
When you go to the movies these days, you buy a ticket, maybe get some popcorn, and then you go find a seat. But back in 1931, when the Los Angeles Theatre opened at 615 S. Broadway, downtown L.A., a night at the movies was more than just catching the latest Charlie Chaplin flick. In this photo we’re seeing the walnut-paneled basement lounge, where you could go for some refined socializing before or after the show. Or during it. One report I read said that there was a periscope-like system of prisms that relayed the film, allowing patrons to watch the film on a secondary screen. There was also a ballroom, a smoking room, a ladies’ lounge with sixteen private compartments, each finished in a different marble, and a soundproof “crying room” where parents could escape with crying children so as to not spoil the show for their fellow moviegoers. Now that’s what I call civilized.
Ventura Boulevard running through the future site of Sherman Oaks in the San Fernando Valley, circa 1920
Ventura Boulevard is the main commercial strip that runs through the San Fernando Valley. Approximately 18 miles long, it is the world’s longest avenue of contiguous businesses. But back in circa 1920 when this photo was taken, it was a two-lane road through open country. This part of Ventura Blvd is running through Sherman Oaks, named after one of the first land owners named General Moses Hazeltine Sherman (how’s that for a name???) who bought 1000 acres, which he subdivided in 1927. Nowadays, or course, virtually every square inch of the land in this photo is covered with suburbia.
This satellite photo shows us what Sherman Oaks looks like in 2020:
Marquee of the soon-to-open Warner Bros. Theater, 6433 Hollywood Blvd, Hollywood, 1928
This shot of the Italianate beaux arts Warner Bros. Theatre at 6433 Hollywood Blvd was taken just before its official opening on April 26, 1928. The marquee reads “Watch for the Grand Opening” which was for the studio’s early Vitaphone talkie “Glorious Betsy.” In 1953, it reinvented itself as the Warner Cinerama with a huge new curved screen, which involved taking out more than 1000 seats. But it was worth it because “This is Cinerama” played for 115 weeks and grossed nearly $4 million.
The theater is still there. In 1968 it was renamed it the Hollywood Pacific, but is no longer in use. This image is from April 2019:
Judging from those two motorcars parked out front of 8947 Sunset Blvd, this photo of a furniture store on the corner of Hilldale Ave was probably taken around 1936. What struck me about shot isn’t the building but the empty land around it. These days, every square inch of that land is super-valuable but back then I can see only three houses and the closest one isn’t too impressive. I wonder if it even saw the end of the 1930s.