The "Anti-Tour" -- Beneath the Myths

WE HAVE REACHED the part of the semester where we are now looking at remapping, re-imagining L.A. in a different way. The boosters had their moment; so too, the writers from elsewhere. The historians arrived with expectations; the fiction writers with dreams that soured then shriveled. We've read journalists who have tried to crawl under the myth, read voices from those who have lived their lives along the margins of the official L.A. story. Now, the city is again remapped as the L.A.'s core has become valuable. With gentrification comes "erasure" add to it lives behind walls, lives in a bubble. What happens then to community and the stories communities create and re-tell? What will L.A. be if is "written over" yet again? What are the stories you plan to tell about your L.A.?

A postscript on Norman Klein...
In the late 80s, word got around about Norman Klein and something he began to call his "Anti-Tour." A critic and urban historian and theorist who teaches at California Institute of the Arts, had begun taking his classes on "anti-tours." Klein had purchased a crumbling vestige of a grand house in Anglelino Heights (which is a small neighborhood that is Echo Park adjacent) and word had it that it was a former gang house, which meant that sometimes slow moving cars would slink by at any given time. He writes of that time:
"It took twelve years to restore [the house]. . . . [I] discovered I had a lifelong fascination with high urban decay and with gradual uncovering of urban ruins. By 1986, I was running a series of lectures about the level of public neglect and bad faith in Los Angeles, entitled, "Beneath the Myths." I started taking students on what I called anti-tours. I would stop at locations where no building existed any longer, tell them what had been there once: a movie studio, a whorehouse, whatever. We would get out, look around and agree it was gone all right. I showed them as many interiors as I could find, but only if they were inhabited; no museum artifacts allowed."

Those lectures were the working notes and foundation for his book, The History of Forgetting

-- L.G.
photo caption : from Norman Klein's "L.A. Slideshow"

"We Tell Stories . . ." : Norman Klein

"In 1974, when I first moved to the neighborhoods west of downtown Los Angeles, I was soured by the omens I sensed there. One vacant store had been a kosher butcher shop in the fifties now with a rusted sign, but very similar to the dismal store my father had run in Brooklyn for thirty years. In an utter reversal of Proust sipping tea, I remembered the smell of raw meat in the sawdust on the floors, the armies of cockroaches under the display cases, the look of chicken guts stuck to the sides of garbage pails out back.

I learned that across the street from my apartment on Glendale Boulevard, Tom Mix used to ride a horse to work from his ranch in Mixville (now a Hughes market shopping Center). But no recognition could be found anywhere that the entire film industry had once been centered there (1912-192). It was clear that the city of Los Angeles would never announce formally that the movie business had started in what was now, forgettably a "Mexican" neighborhood. At first, the sheer neglect left me dreary, reminding me of family repression during my own childhood. It took at least a year for me to realize how much vitality existed west of downtown."

-- Norman Klein
-- from The History of Forgetting



(photo captions: edendale and mixxville
photo credit: lapl archives)

Old Los Angeles TV Special

A QUICK NOTE for anyone interested in seeing the Los Angeles of the past: KCET has a re-occurring documentary special narrated by veteran broadcaster (now deceased) Ralph Story, called "Things That Aren't Here Anymore"- Los Angeles edition. There is also a second part which is fittingly titled, "More Things That Aren't Here Anymore". I haven't seen either yet, but my Grandparents were overly enthusiastic about how it made them feel and wouldn't stop ranting about the memories that it inspired of times past. The T.V. schedule can be found on KCET's website. I couldn't find the DVD anywhere but the networks website (even on Amazon), where it is quite expensive, but here is a description of the film:

"Los Angeles’ golden past: couples crowding the dance floor at the Cocoanut Grove…the sounds of Jazz and Rhythm and Blues filling the nights on Central Avenue…a romantic glice aboard an Angel’s Flight. In those early years, you could wake up to the mouth-watering aroma of fresh baked bread delivered by the Helms Bakeries…have countless thrills at Pacific Ocean Park and bask in the glories of Hollywood at Schwab’s. From the 1920s to the 60s, these well-loved icons helped define the colorful character of Los Angeles. Although many of these relics of the past are no longer with us, they’re certainly not forgotten. "Things That Aren’t Here Anymore" brings it all back in this memorable video scrapbook filled with personal photographs, film clips, home movies and reminiscences gathered from the attics and collective memories of Angelenos who shared their personal experiences of the things they saw and the places they enjoyed. Veteran broadcaster Ralph Story is your guide on this remarkable journey!"

I'm working on appropriating the funds for the set and possibly bringing it to class?

-- Greg Boss

LA Heritage Day

FOR THOSE OF you looking for inspiration -- the intersection where past meets present and converse -- this might be an event for you. This weekend is L.A. Heritage Day hosted by the City of Los Angeles. Admission is Free! And will be held at the Heritage Square Museum, near the Pasadena Freeway. A little bit about the museum from their website:

A living history museum reflecting the settlement and development of Southern California from the Civil War to the early 20th Century, Heritage Square Museum offers visitors a look into the everyday lives of Southern Californians at the close of the 19th Century.

Guided tours of the museum are supplemented by special events, such as Museums of the Arroyo Day®, which take our guests back in time to the era where electricity was a novelty, a trip to the beach was often a full-weekend activity, and manners were distinctly different from those of today.

The eight historic structures located at the museum, constructed during the Victorian Era, were saved from demolition and serve as a perfect background to educate the public about Southern California's early development. From the simplicity of the Octagon House to the opulence of the Perry Mansion, the Museum provides a unique look at the lifestyles of the people who contributed so much to the development of modern Los Angeles.

The event will go from 11am to 4pm at Heritage Square Museum. This event is for anyone who has an interest in Los Angeles, history. Over 75 heritage organizations will have displays and booths set up -- Pink's hot dogs (Sorry, Michael. Sadly, no Phillipe's) will be for sale.

For those who want to go "green": There is a free shuttle from the Gold Line "Heritage Square Station" to the event at the museum, and secure bicycle parking will be provided at Heritage Square. Parking will also be available.

Vanished L.A.: Venice Beach in Cisco Pike

I HAD HOPED to screen this little time capsule of L.A. but we may run out of time before it's all done. But here's a little taste. Take a look at what Venice looked like circa early '70s -- the canals, the walk streets . . .

-- L.G.

Vanished L.A.: "The Great Room"

"The great room, over one hundred feet in length and seventy-five feet in width, was a sunburst of light. Great crystal chandeliers blazed from a dozen vantage points, while softer and smaller lights were placed along the four sides of the room. ... The perfection and symphony of the great room held the guests spellbound upon their arrival. As the stately ladies and gentlemen entered the salon the pause each made at the threshold as with intense interest they swept the salon with their gaze was noticeable.” (LA Times, October 1911. Grand Opening- Alexandria Hotel)

LIKE MOST people today, I’d be lying if I said that I had had ever heard of the Alexandria Hotel in Downtown Los Angeles, prior to last weekend. Somehow, I had managed to find myself walking past transients, through dark glass doors that opened into the marble lobby of a century’s old Los Angeles hotel. Built in 1906 in its current location, the corner of 5th and Spring St., the hotel, much like the Titanic on the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean, is a mere ruin of the elegance that it once beheld. There is no flowing red carpet to greet an entrance, no butler to take your bags (or trunks), no shoeshine boy to polish your shoes and there are no Hollywood starlets cascading down wooden stairs.

Today, there are only mere remembrances of the golden age; signed photos of silent movie stars the likes of Greta Garbo, Charlie Chaplin and Humphrey Bogart line faded walls. In 1912, a story in the L.A. Times stated that, “What Union Square was to old New York, what Forty-second street is to the present metropolis, and what the vicinity of the Cort Theater is to San Francisco, the Alexandria mezzanine seems to be to theatrical Los Angeles... Hardly ever does the day pass in which some nationally-known actor or actress does not linger in the low settees or pause at the golden rail, looking down into the lobby below”. During its heyday between 1911 and 1922 the Hotel was the grandest location in all of Los Angeles. It housed a million dollar carpet in the lobby, a world famous stained glass Tiffany Skylight, and the premier Ballroom in the western United States. The ballroom, which came to be known as “The Palm Court”, “The Grand Ballroom” and The “Franco-Italian Dining Room” saw speeches by Presidents William Howard Taft and Woodrow Wilson. It was this room where Paul Whiteman, later to be known as the “Jazz King” got his start in 1919. Charlie Chapman, D.W. Griffith, Mary Pickford and Douglas Fairbanks formed United Artists Pictures there in 1919 also. The staircase of the hotel is rumored to be the staircase famously used in “Gone with the Wind”. Sadly though, with the introduction of the Millennium Biltmore hotel in 1923 the hotel slowly lost its grandeur and faded into memories now since lost. Today the hotel is a near ruin, rooms are boarded closed, nailed shut; the deep red staircase is tattered, the carpets and ornaments long since sold, and the grand ballroom is empty. The rooms that are today available, are rented as low-income apartments. If you’ve any imagination or appreciation for times past and old architecture, I strongly suggest wandering down Spring Street, through glass doors and into the Alexandria. The clash between new and old, while sad, is amazingly beautiful.

-- Greg Boss

(photo credit: Greg Boss)

Vanished L.A.: The Exiles

A FRIEND of mine tugged my coat about this one. The Exiles is a 1960 documentary profiling a Native American community that sprouted up in Bunker Hill in the late 50s early 60s in downtown Los Angeles. The film was a project put together by a USC student and was "lost" for many years until some footage showed up in a sprawling documentary about the region that screened around town a few years ago -- Los Angeles Plays Itself, directed by Thom Anderson. The Exiles, made by Kent Mackenzie, was never released theatrically and by most accounts was never seen in its entirety. Anderson's film led to a search for what was else the Mackenzie family might have had stored away. This was part of the bundle of lost L.A. jewels. Last night you saw Mackenzie's USC thesis film, "Bunker Hill 1956." What follows is the trailer for The Exiles. For any of you curious about the nuances of what L.A. used to be should go out and rent if not own this. A beautiful pause on a moment that was about to pass.

-- L.G.

-- L.G.

Bukowski Court: Almost Vanished L.A.

WHILE WE'RE the subject of Bukowski, this story had his fans up-in-arms. The little bungalow where the author wrote "Post Office" was almost razed. At the 11th hour, the City of Los Angeles moved to protect it as a historical landmark, but this story isn't unfamiliar. This is how much of L.A. history is erased, quickly, quietly and under the cover of night.
-- L.G.

(photo: Charles Bukowski's Hollywood house
photo credit: from LAist)

Vanished Los Angeles: The Ambassador Hotel

TAKE A LOOK: Hidden L.A. is beginning a series of clips of the once grand, star-studded Ambassador Hotel. Legend has it that Zelda Fitzgerald (F. Scott's wife) lit her lingerie on fire in one of the bungalow bathtubs; history has recorded it, that it was the site of one of America's shocking tragedies -- the assassination of Robert F. Kennedy. After that moment, the hotel, once one of the jewels of Wilshire Boulevard, went into steep decline. By the 1980s it was run-down-at the heels and musty but still evoked an air of elegance -- great bones, you know. For most of its final years, before it was closed to the public in 1989, razed in 2006, (after a protracted battle) the site was often rented out for filming (Hoffa, Forrest Gump, Pretty Woman, L.A. Stories). But truly, if you were quiet enough, you could hear the ghosts dancing in the old grand ballrooms or sitting in the rose garden adjacent to the Palm Bar where natty Korean businessmen and East Hollywood types, with their chipped black-lacquered nails and bed-hair, shared barstools. L.A. at it most old-world-swank and stately. It's one of my most special pieces of L.A. history, lost.

Gone.

-- L.G.

top photo caption: entrance to the Ambassador Hotel

top photo credit: www.hollywoodheritage.org

photo credit: Diane Friedman, from the website, Location Managers Guild of America

bottom photo caption: One last look at the Ambassador, shot from the fire escape of the Gaylord Apartments, February 15, 2007