Note: This is an encore post from 2006.
Sept. 30, 1907
Los Angeles
Who says research can’t be any fun? I wonder what the WCTU would say about five dozen liquor jugs.
Dr. J.Z. Quack? Not a reassuring name, is it?
Bonus factoid: In French, it’s “Voyez le brick geant que j’examine pres du wharf.”
“None Shall Escape” in The Film Daily, 1944.
Note: TCM is airing “None Shall Escape” on Sunday night to honor Marsha Hunt. Here’s an encore of Mary Mallory’s post from earlier this year.
On Friday, April 27, the TCM Classic Film Festival presents the rarely screened 1944 film “None Shall Escape,” a thoughtful film ahead of its time, as relevant today as when it was produced. The first film to depict the Holocaust as well as to examine post World War II and the punishment of Nazis for their war crimes, it features an appearance by its legendary star Marsha Hunt, who has fought for justice and honor for all for decades. Sadly, it depicts many of the same hateful attitudes once again on the rise.
In 1943, Columbia Studios hired German exile writer Alfred Neumann, author of historical novels and the 1928 silent “The Patriot,” as a scriptwriter. Neumann’s writings had been banned in Germany by the Nazis, forcing him to flee to America, where he arrived in 1941. Following the maxim of writing what you know, Neumann created a story detailing the Nazis mistreatment of those it overpowered, and their ultimate punishment for it, the first to predict American victory and the triumph of good over evil. Screenwriter Lester Cole, one of the Hollywood Nine blacklisted for his beliefs, adapted the story for the screen.
Mary Mallory’s latest book, “Living With Grace: Life Lessons from America’s Princess,” will be released June 1.
Note: This is an encore post from 2005 and originally appeared on the 1947project.
“Now I can catch up with my reading!”
So does Miss Althea Warren—surrounded by 1,811,000 books—regard her retirement next Wednesday as city librarian of Los Angeles. She, as 13th librarian dating back in a series to 1872, will be replaced by Harold Louis Hamill, 39, of Kansas City.
Looking back over her 14 years as head of the Los Angeles system with its 40 branches, Miss Warren sketched the different trends in the public’s reading and chuckled over some of the traits of early librarians.
Note: This is an encore post from 2006.
Sept. 28, 1907
Los Angeles
Members of the Los Angeles Motorcycle Club have written to officials in support of a measure banning loud exhaust pipes on motorcycles.
“The motorcycle club says that it has been making a direct crusade against open mufflers and that all members of the club are forbidden to open their cycle mufflers within any city or town limits,” The Times said.
“We wish it generally understood that those riders of motorcycles making this ‘popgun’ noise, which causes so many complaints, are not members of the Los Angeles Motorcycle Club,” the group said.
Note: This is an encore post from 2006.
Sept. 27, 1907
Los Angeles
Ringling Bros. manager Charles Davis said farewell to Los Angeles, leaving $50 ($1,026.18 USD 2005) and some choice words for local authorities.
Child welfare officer Robert W. Reynolds spent several days attending the circus to ensure that there were no performances by underage children (The Times is a bit vague, saying younger than 16 in one story and younger than 12 in another).
Sept. 26, 1947: You can buy a new Colt semiauto for $65 ($712.59 USD 2018) in .38 Super or .45, or a Smith and Wesson (presumably a Model 10) in .38 Special for $56.50 ($619.40) USD 2018.
Note: This is an encore post from 2006.
Sept. 26, 1907
Long Beach
Marco Vessella, conductor of Long Beach’s Royal Italian Band, has had nothing but trouble with Special Officer W.D. Cason after firing him from his job as ticket taker.
On one September evening, Vessella and a young lady were waiting for a streetcar when Cason taunted him, calling him “spaghetti face” and “a longhaired dago.”
Vessella was an extremely popular and respected musician in Southern California. The Times said: “Vessella clings to no past traditions, is a follower of no particular school and is not an exclusive nationalist. He plays with equal facility representative compositions of French, German, Italian, English and the best American composers.
Note: This is an encore post from 2006.
Sept. 25, 1907
Los Angeles
Meet Joe Gans, a boxer whose name once echoed among fans of the ring now buried in the dusts of sporting history. Gans may well have been one of the finest fighters whoever lived—among sportswriters, he inspired long and lofty stories about his artistry in dispensing with an undistinguished opponent. But Gans puzzled the men who tried to capture him in words; not a braggart, nor a thug. He was thoughtful and at heart, mournful, they said.
Gans was training at Lucky Baldwin’s ranch in Arcadia for a match with Jimmy Burns at the Pavilion—20 rounds.
In the early 1920s, Hollywood was booming. The adolescent film business had blossomed from a small by-the-seat-of-the pants mom and pop operation into a major industry backed by Wall Street, which was turning the large companies into international conglomerates. At the same time, major stars saw their compensation explode, especially if they owned their own production companies and received profit participation. Superstars like Douglas Fairbanks, Mary Pickford, Harold Lloyd, and Charlie Chaplin and executives like Joseph Schenck and Thomas Ince earned more in yearly salaries than important financial, professional, and business leaders.
To acknowledge their place in the Hollywood pantheon, many of the industry’s leaders constructed elaborate mansions and showplaces outshining even that of actual royalty. Pickford and Fairbanks reigned at Pickfair, Lloyd built the magnificent Greenacres, and Frances Marion and Fred Thomson established their Enchanted Hill. Producer Thomas Ince followed along, constructing his own impressive hacienda, one that hearkened back to the glorious early days of California called “Dias Dorados.”….
Mary Mallory’s “Living With Grace” is now on sale.
This week’s mystery movie has been the 1993 picture “The Joy Luck Club.” This is much more recent than the usual mystery movie, but I decided to do it after reading an essay by Los Angeles Times movie critic Justin Chang on the film’s 25th anniversary. I thought that the film was probably too recent and too well-known for a mystery movie but that the powerful images would make an unusual week. I probably won’t do this again, but I hope it was entertaining.
Note: This week coincided with a massive computer failure. The great majority of my data is backed up and safe. The main problem is getting my essential legacy software and hardware (a scanner that handles transparencies and negatives) to run, even though they were just fine on Windows 10 on the old computer. The dust is still settling, but so far the major loss is the legacy blogging software (by Microsoft, I might add) that I have used for years. I think I have found an alternative, but there is a learning curve to it.
Note: This is an encore post from 2005 and originally appeared on the 1947project.
And how do the young men of Los Angeles indicate their interest in a young woman? Do they court her with roses or candy or mash notes? In fact, ardent suitors have found that there’s no better way to a woman’s heart than with the hood ornament from a 1946 or 1947 Buick.
It seems the chrome-plated circles make perfect bracelets and victimized Buick owners are writing furious letters to The Times.
“I casually began counting Buicks and noting how many did not have the rings in a two-mile drive along Beverly and down Fairfax and found that 13 out of 17 Buicks have lost their rings from the hood ornament,” wrote Bill Gilholm of Hermosa Beach. “Is it a gang doing this for profit or are they just kids trying to be funny?”
Note: This is an encore post from 2006.
Sept. 24, 1907
Los Angeles
A First Day in Los Angeles
Roving, roving, ever restless, drifting
On from strand to strand.
Have I seen the years slip by me,
Seeking for the promised land.
From the palm trees of Jamaica and
The Golden Spanish main.
To the gray and sullen northland when
The snow was on the plain.
But today I cease from roaming and
My soul is well content—
For the gypsy came among you and
He pitches his world-worn tent.
But the old desire was silenced for he
Found his long-sought rest.
In the City of Angels, in the
Sunset of the West.
Walter Adolf Roberts
557 Crocker St., Los Angeles.
Note: This is an encore post from 2005 and originally appeared on the 1947project.
Janet Flanner, during her many years in Paris as European correspondent for the New Yorker magazine, picked up the French love of epigrams. Genet, as she is known to the magazine readers, tried this out yesterday on a Town Hall audience at the Biltmore.
“The United States was the richest country in the world—that’s dandy. Now it is the only rich country in the world, which is terrible.”
Note: This is an encore post from 2006.
Sept. 23, 1907
Los Angeles
A crowd of 2,000—the faithful and the doubters—gathered at Echo Park Lake as black evangelist the Rev. J.L. Griffin prepared to baptize five believers in the cold water. Children climbed in the trees to get a better view, while other people watched from rowboats.
The rite was supposed to begin at 4 p.m., but several of the people were delayed and Griffin, who had been holding tent revival meetings in Los Angeles all summer, addressed the increasingly impatient throng.
Note: This is an encore post from 2005 and originally appeared on the 1947project.
And then he was gone as if he had never been here at all. The hundreds of people who threw themselves at his feet to kiss the hem of his robes or simply to occupy the chair where he had been sitting were nothing but a memory.
He was Avak Hagopian, a somber 20-year-old from Kharadag in Azerbaijan, and working in Tehran as a mechanic—or a goldsmith—the stories vary. He paused one day as he was about to bring down a mallet and was struck with a vision, a vision that returned twice more. With faith in God, he would cure the sick, the blind and the diseased. The young man with the dark, intense eyes grew a beard and let his hair flow to his shoulders. He became “Avak the Healer” or “Avak the Great,” performer of miracles.
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Note: This is an encore post from 2006.
Sept. 22, 1907
Los Angeles
She was 34 and a successful businesswoman. He was a 19-year-old bellboy at the Hollenbeck Hotel.
Emma and George Lloyd were married and for a time were quite happy, with Emma running her milliner’s shop at 2132 Downey Ave., and George getting a job as a waiter in an Eastside restaurant.
Note: This is an encore post from 2006.
Sept. 21, 1907
Los Angeles
It is one thing to know in the abstract about racial intolerance at the turn of the 20th century and quite another to have to read it in the daily paper. I will spare you the long quotes in pidgin Chinese dialect, but trust me, they make the Charlie Chan movies look like models of multiculturalism.
ladailymirror.com 