The Hollywood Hotel stood on the northwest corner of Hollywood Blvd and Highland Ave from February 1903 to August 1956, and for most of those 53 years, it was a Hollywood landmark. But it was also a place that was usually photographed in black and white, so to find a color shot is always a joy. This one was taken in 1954, when it was only a couple of years away from facing the wrecking ball. It would have started to fall into disrepair by now, and unable to compete with other, newer hotels who were able to offer private bathrooms. However, in this photo at least, she still looks like a grand old dame, if you ask me.
Susan M says: “It really smelled in there toward the final decade. It had severe dry and wet rot. Apparently, the mold was hard to deal with in the wood inside and out. A lot of the paying customers asked for their money back due to feeling sick from the mold and smells. Apparently the long drawn out demise found a lot of corners being cut like how to tent the place to get rid of termites. Folks used to claim it would fall off its wooden foundation with the next Santa Ana winds.”
This is roughly the same view in July 2022:
Although the Chaplin name is synonymous with Hollywood, Angelenos of the early 1920s also associated it with aviation. Charlie’s half-brother, Syd, was also an aviator who had his own airfield (on the northwest corner of Wilshire and Fairfax) and commercial airline. In 1919, he started the first regularly scheduled seaplane service from Wilmington on the mainland to Santa Catalina Island, famously “26 miles across the sea.” By this stage, there was regular and comfortable steamship service out to Catalina, so frankly, I don’t know that I could be in enough of a rush to take my chances on an aircraft like that. Apparently most people agreed with me—the service only lasted a couple of years.
Until I posted a photo last December of 
Here we have a shot of the marquee of the Warner Bros. Theatre at 6433 Hollywood Blvd telling Angelenos to “Watch for the Grand Opening.” That opening took place on April 26, 1928, so I’m guessing this shot was taken circa early 1928. I love the intricate filigree across the top of the marquee and those two Grecian urns at either end, promising future patrons a movie-palace experience.
In 1937, when this photo was taken, Angelenos probably thought nothing of seeing the striking 
What we’re looking here is new technology coming to Los Angeles on the cusp of a new century. This was Los Angeles’ first telephone pay station which opened at 228 S. Spring St in downtown Los Angeles, which was the original home to the Pacific Telephone and Telegraph Company. This photo was taken in 1899 when the first telephone line between San Francisco and LA had just opened, allowing Angelenos to call San Francisco for 50 cents a minute, which is roughly the equivalent of about $15 a minute today.
Having endured three months of torrential rain, instant hailstorms, and atmospheric rivers (whatever they are) all us Angelenos can identify with the raincoated traffic cop in this photo looking south down a wet Broadway toward the Los Angeles Theatre in downtown LA. If it were me, I’d be ducking into that Owl Drug store for a coffee and a Danish or I’d head into the Los Angeles Theatre to see “Day Time Wife” starring Tyrone Power and “Rulers of the Sea” with Douglas Fairbanks Jr., which is how I know this shot was taken during Hollywood’s greatest year: 1939.
This is the short of shot I really love coming across as it gives us a gritty feel for what it was like to be walking the streets of Hollywood in times gone by. We’re looking south down Vine St from Hollywood Blvd on the night of June 7, 1951. That neon-lit awning on the right belongs to the Melody Lane diner on the northwest corner of Hollywood and Vine. Across the street is the Broadway Hollywood department store, and across the street we can see the distinctive hat-shaped neon sign for the Brown Derby. I do wonder what the headlines are on the newspapers that the kid is selling next to the semaphore traffic light.
Here’s a photo of something we don’t see in Los Angeles anymore: a sign for Studebaker automobiles. But drivers passing through the intersection of Figueroa St and Pico Blvd near (what is now the LA Convention Center) would have seen it from blocks away – especially if it lit up at night, which I assume it did. And I’m sure that huge clock came in handy for people who didn’t carry around a watch, which in the 1920s, when this photo was taken, was probably handy.
From Dave DeCaro’s glorious 