Iconic L.A.: Angel's Flight

CLOSED FOR nearly a decade after a German tourist died in an rail-related accident, Angel Flight, literally rises again. Today marks it's first day open to the public since 2001. The funicular, which rises up Bunker Hill connected the Broadway entertainment and business corridor to the "Hill." According to Kevin Roderick's site, L.A. Observed "Let's return to the days when the funicular originally called the Los Angeles Incline Railway was an integral part of Downtown life. Passengers paid a penny (later a nickel) to ride Olivet and Sinai between 3rd and Hill streets and the neighborhood of hotels and rooming houses on Bunker Hill." His full post relating the history of the two rail cars, Olivet and Sinai, that scale the steep grade and boast a mix of Arcadian and Utopian views of Los Angeles here.

The above piece, called "Angels Flight," was painted in 1931, by artist and architect Millard Sheets, a Claremont native. Sheets reinterpreted many L.A. street-scapes and this one hangs at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. You don't need a Way-back machine when you have these. This is John Fante's L.A.

-- L.G.

illustration credit: LACMA Collections Online