From the always-interesting DaveLandWeb comes this photo taken when “Giant” was playing Grauman’s Chinese Theatre on Hollywood Blvd. It’s interesting that the name of the movie’s director, George Stevens, is as big as Elizabeth Taylor, Rock Hudson, and James Dean, and that the name of the author whose novel the movie was based on, Edna Ferber, is almost as big. The movie had a 10-week run there: October 18 to December 24, 1956. From the white metal Christmas tree we can see attached to the pole at the right, I’m guessing this photo was taken near the end, before “Anastasia” came in for an 8-week run.
These days, the Rose Bowl athletic stadium in Pasadena is known not just as a college football (and soccer) venue, but for its annual New Year’s Day Tournament of Roses Parade. This photo was taken in 1922, the year the stadium was built. It opened on October 28, 1922 (the first Rose Bowl game was on January 1, 1923) but it’s starting to take form, so I’m guessing this was taken over the summer. And if this photo is anything to go by, the place was built using mulepower!
In this icon-in-the-making photo, we’re seeing the Los Angeles City Hall under construction. At this point, the building’s form had taken shape, so the Angelenos seen here had a taste of what their new city hall was going to look like. This photo was taken from Bunker Hill, which doesn’t exist now in the way it did back then, nor does the Hall of Records building we can see in front of City Hall, but I can’t imagine there’ll ever be a time when the L.A. skyline doesn’t feature that famous silhouette. City Hall was dedicated on April 26, 1928, so I’m guessing this shot is from late 1927 or early 1928.
I don’t know when this photo of the Ambassador Hotel was taken, or who took it. But I like to think it was someone out for an evening stroll, all gussied up in their snazzy clothes after an evening dinner and dancing at the Cocoanut Grove nightclub. Maybe they’d been to see Benny Goodman perform, or Lena Horne, or Martin and Lewis. And now they were returning to their hotel room and looked back to take this photo. I do wonder, though, about that lone white chair on the lawn. Was it always there?
I don’t know what was being celebrated on this night in 1928 when fireworks filled the skies over Santa Monica Bay, but it must have been a glorious sight to see in person.
On December 12, 1942, the football teams for Los Angeles’s two major colleges—USC and UCLA—faced off for a game at the Coliseum, south of downtown. Before the game, a captured Japanese midget submarine was paraded around the grounds to what looks like was a packed stadium. It was just after the 1st anniversary of the attack on Pearl Harbor, so I would imagine that emotions ran high in the crowds of Angelenos we can see here.
I’ll take any opportunity to post a color photo of Carthay Circle Theatre, a particularly lovely movie palace, which stood at 6316 San Vicente Blvd from 1926 to 1969. The marquee is advertising a Billie Burke picture called “Live with Mother” co-starring Carl Benton Reid. The caption in this photo said it was from 1953, but I can find no movie with that name, nor any movie that Billie Burke and Carl Benton Reid were in together, so that one’s a mystery.
In this 1968 photo, we’re looking west along Wilshire Blvd outside the Brown Derby restaurant at Alexandria Ave. It’s a shame that the sign is blocking our view from seeing the hat-shaped roof, but it’s interesting to know that at some point they added “Original” to the sign. In the background, we can see the signs for the about-to-be-built bland office tower that replaced the wonderfully atmospheric Chapman Park Hotel. But at least the tower of the Wilshire Christian Church (known today as Oasis Church) at Normandie Ave is still with us.
Los Angeles has more than its fair share of iconic buildings (L.A. City Hall, Capitol Records, Griffith Observatory, Disney Concert Hall, Grauman’s Chinese, Hollywood Bowl, to name a few) but there is nothing like the Theme Building that stands in the middle of L.A. International Airport. Work started on this striking building in 1957 and by the time this photo was shot, it unique form had taken shape, so I’m guessing the date is 1960 or ‘61. I also love how the street lamps were laid out in preparation for them being hoisted into place. It makes for such a dramatic photo.