Dec. 30, 1935: For this installment of Rediscovering Los Angeles, Times artist Charles Owens and columnist Timothy Turner visit Los Angeles’ former Masonic Hall, a building from the 1870s on Main street “on the east side just south of the Plaza.” Unlike the later series by Owens and Joseph Seewerker, published in book form as “Nuestro Pueblo,” these features were never reprinted. It’s interesting to note that even in the 1930s, Los Angeles was being rediscovered.
And here we find it at 472 N. Main St, courtesy of Google’s Street View.
Advertisements
In 2005 I attended an exhibition in the Pico House, in the Plaza de la Pueblo de Los Angeles, honoring Christine Sterling who 75 years earlier, (1930), was the energy behind the effort to save the Avila Adobe, Olvera Street, and the remnants of the square from the planned destruction prior to the building there of Union Station. According to that exhibition this was the first preservation effort in Los Angeles. I would think that your Charles Owens drawings were a collateral result of that then “new” idea. I am always curious if you or Mary Mollory know who Christine Sterling was.And, yes, I’m getting old: am I repeating myself?
LikeLike
A 1957 view from the Herald Examiner collection, in the USC Archives. Beyond are the Merced Theatre and the Pico House. http://digitallibrary.usc.edu/cdm/ref/collection/p15799coll44/id/48116
LikeLike