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M&M Market (NW corner of Moorpark & Coldwater Canyon) #signgeeks #signporn #signage #neon #vintage #sfv #LosAngeles by @esotouric
Gentle Reader. . .
We got some exciting news from the Los Angeles Public Library this week: there are so many holds for Kim's neo-noir novel The Kept Girl that additional copies have been ordered to satisfy the demand. So if you're on the waiting list, you can expect to be immersed in lost Los Angeles before too long. Of course, you can also get an autographed copy direct from us, with no waiting.
We're also delighted to see the Streamline Moderne preservation efforts of independent historians Kate Eggert and Krisy Gosney get amplified by a Los Angeles Conservancy action alert. A few weeks ago, when we interviewed Kate for our podcast, the general consensus was that the building was doomed to fall to the wrecking ball. But through a concerted social media effort and energetic networking, this dynamic duo has raised consciousness about a remarkable building, built bridges between the developer and preservationists, and given us a model for how anyone can protect the landmarks they care about. Send in your email of support for preserving the structure, if you haven't already, and watch this space for more news as it happens.
We're back on the bus this weekend with a tour of Raymond Chandler's city, the downtown and Hollywood locations that shaped his character and his fiction. And our snack break is noir-themed gelato from Scoops. Join us, do!
Upcoming Tours & Happenings
Join us for a journey from the downtown of Chandler's pre-literary youth (but which always lingered at the fore of his imagination) to the Hollywood of his greatest success, with a stop along the way at Tai Kim's Scoops for unexpected gelato creations inspired by the author. We'll start the tour following in the young Chandler's footsteps, as he roamed the blocks near the downtown oil company office where he worked. See sites from Lady in the Lake and The Little Sister, discover the real Philip Marlowe (Esotouric's exclusive scoop, and the inspiration for Kim's novel The Kept Girl), and be steeped in noir LA.
Come on a century's social history tour through the transformation of neighborhoods, punctuated with immersive stops to sample the varied cultures that make our changing city so beguiling. Voter registration, citizenship classes, Chicano Moratorium, walkouts, blow-outs, anti-Semitism, adult education, racial covenants, boycotts, The City Beautiful, Exclusion Acts and Immigration Acts, property values, xenophobia, and delicious dumplings–all are themes which will be addressed on this lively excursion. This whirlwind social history tour will include: The Vladeck Center, Hollenbeck Park, Evergreen Cemetery, The Venice Room, El Encanto&Cascades Park, Divine's Furniture and Wing Hop Fung.
Come discover the secret history, and the fascinating future, of a most beguiling neighborhood. This is not a tour about beautiful buildings–although beautiful buildings will be all around you. This is not a tour about brilliant architects–although we will gaze upon their works and marvel. The Lowdown on Downtown is a tour about urban redevelopment, public policy, protest, power and the police. It is a revealing history of how the New Downtown became an "overnight sensation" after decades of quiet work behind the scenes by public agencies and private developers. This tour is about what really happened in the heart of Los Angeles, a complicated story that will fascinate and infuriate, break your heart and thrill your spirit. Come discover the real Los Angeles, the city even natives don't know.
You are invited to be part of a transformative downtown experience. The Sunday Salon is the free monthly gathering of our creative consortium LAVA – The Los Angeles Visionaries Association. From noon to 2pm, at Les Noces du Figaro on Broadway, we hope you'll join L.A.'s most innovative artists, writers and performers to enjoy good company, hearty comfort food, and presentations from fascinating LAVA Visionaries. This month, Sean J. O'Connell, author of Los Angeles's Central Avenue Jazz, talks about Charlie Parker's descent into L.A.'s 1940s jazz world, and Soror Lilya of the Ordo Templi Orientis shares insights into how to live a Magickal life. After the Salon, Richard Schave leads one of his free Broadway on My Mind walking tours (free, reservations required).
From the founding of the city through the 1940s, downtown was the true center of Los Angeles, a lively, densely populated, exciting and sometimes dangerous place. After many quiet decades, downtown is making an incredible return. But while many of the historic buildings remain, their human context has been lost. This downtown double feature tour is meant to bring alive the old ghosts and memories that cling to the streets and structures of the historic core, and is especially recommended for downtown residents curious about their neighborhood's neglected history.
On this guided tour through the Beverly Hills of the early 20th Century, Crime Bus passengers thrill as Jazz Age bootleggers run amok, marvel at the Krazy Kafitz family's litany of murder-suicides, attempted husband slayings, Byzantine estate battles and mad bombings, visit the shortest street in Los Angeles (15' long Powers Place, with its magnificent views of the mansions of Alvarado Terrace), discover which fabulous mansion was once transformed into a functioning whiskey factory using every room in the house, and stroll the haunted paths of Rosedale Cemetery, site of notable burials (May K. Rindge, the mother of Malibu) and odd graveside crimes. Featured players include the most famous dwarf in Hollywood, mass suicide ringleader Reverend Jim Jones, wacky millionaires who can't control their automobiles, human mole bank robbers, comically inept fumigators, kids trapped in tar pits, and dozens of other unusual and fascinating denizens of early Los Angeles.
Go East, young ghoul, and visit Boyle Heights, where the Night Stalker was captured and a mad dad ran amok. Roam the hallowed lawns of Evergreen, L.A.'s oldest cemetery and home of some memorable haunts and strange burials. Visit East L.A., where a deranged radio shop employee made mince meat of his boss and bride–and you can get your hair done in a building shaped like a giant tamale. Explore the ghastly streets of Commerce, where one small neighborhood's myriad crimes will shock and surprise. Visit Montebello, for scrumptious milk and cookies at Broguiere's Farm Fresh Dairy washed down with a horrifying case of child murder.
AND FINALLY, LINKS!
Mural, mural on the wall… not anymore. (Please don't deface our landmarks, rock band people.)
The Call of the (Red) Wind.
Q&A (and Raymond Chandler map illustration reveal) with The Kept Girl cover artist Paul Rogers.
An impressive plan to fund restoration of Coxhead's magnificent Epiphany Church in Lincoln Heights.
Googie no more.
The man with the movie reels
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yrs,
Kim & Richard
Esotouric
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