For the steampunk fan on your gift list, you might consider “Walking Your Octopus,” with wonderful illustrations by Brian Kesinger. I had an opportunity to chat with Brian at the Cartoon Expo and scored a signed copy.
Available from Brian Kesinger and Skylight Books
Here’s Thursday’s mystery woman, courtesy of Christopher McPherson.
The Times marks the end of Prohibition with a front page cartoon by Edmund Waller “Ted” Gale, who quit in 1934 and went to the Examiner in a dispute over The Times’ editorial policies.
Dec. 5, 1933: With the passage of the 21st Amendment by Utah, the 18th Amendment is repealed, ending Prohibition. The Paris Inn offered lunch for 75 cents “with a big glass of wine” and the Bowery, Grand at 9th, advertised “Eastside Beer on tap.” The Times reported that WCTU speaker Justice Fidus E. Fish, 79, dropped dead after completing a speech.
Beverly Hills screenwriter Sidney Lazarus and his wife, Maud, 522 Palm Drive, are found dead in the back seat of their car, which was left running in the garage with a hose from the exhaust through the floor board and into the vehicle.
“The writer had placed his arm about his life mate and she nestled her head on his shoulder as they died,” The Times said. Authorities were alerted when Mrs. Sol Schiff, 2005 La Salle Ave., received a note. According to friends, the couple had been having health problems.
Lazarus was 43.
In the Theaters: “Roman Scandals” at Grauman’s Chinese; “Elysia” at Tally’s Criterion, Grand and 7th.
Joan Crawford and Franchot Tone deny rumors that they are engaged.
A nationwide effort targets the “itinerant unemployed” from sneaking rides on trains or hitchhiking. Los Angeles’ notorious “bum blockade” was attempted in 1936.
Today’s holiday gift suggestion is the latest biography from Eve Golden, “John Gilbert: The Last of the Silent Film Stars.”
The Daily Mirror likes to support its local independent bookstore whenever possible. But if you’re not close to a good local bookstore, “John Gilbert” is available from TCM and Amazon (both print and Kindle, and something called “Audible.”)
Before you watch TNT’s “Mob City” tonight, read these items from The Times about what Police Capt. William H. Parker was actually doing in the 1940s.
Parker served in the Army during World War II and was discharged in November 1945. On July 25, 1947, Parker was named head of the LAPD Traffic Division. By December 1947, Parker had attained the rank of inspector. He became head of Internal Affairs in May 1950 and became LAPD chief Aug. 2, 1950.
As I have noted before, by the time Parker became LAPD chief, Bugsy Siegel had been dead for three years.
Where was Mickey Cohen when Parker became chief? Traveling across the U.S. with John Stompanato.
And if the name Robert Gilmore in the Dec. 12, 1946, story seems familiar, you’re right. Regardless of what you may read elsewhere, “Severed” writer John Gilmore’s father was a traffic officer at this time.
And here is Wednesday’s mystery chap, courtesy of writer Christopher McPherson.
I was given a box of material that was cleaned out of the old press room at the LAPD’s Parker Center headquarters, sometimes called “the cop shop.” The box was a jumble of press releases, photographs, artists’ sketches and other items dating from the late 1960s to the early 1980s. I am organizing and cataloging the material and I’ll be posting selected items on a weekly basis.
The “Remorseful Rapist” is one the oldest items in the “cop shop files,” dating from 1965, as reflected by the LAPD case number DR 65 594-262.
Whenever I’m asked about my favorite books on Los Angeles, my first recommendation is “Nuestro Pueblo,” a selection of features by Times artist Charles Owens and writer Joseph Seewerker that appeared in The Times. I went through all of them when the blog was at latimes.com, so I won’t repeat them now, but if you’re a fan of Rediscovering Los Angeles, which was illustrated by Owens with commentary by Timothy Turner, you may enjoy “Nuestro Pueblo.” Unfortunately, Rediscovering Los Angeles was never published in book form and has languished in obscurity.
“Nuestro Pueblo” is long out of print and the prices have gone up since I started writing about it, with some dealers asking more than $100 for a copy. A patient shopper can still find a copy for less than $20, however. One of my favorite tools for finding out of print books is bookfinder.com, which shows wide price range on copies of “Nuestro Pueblo.”
And what are your gift recommendations for this holiday season?
And for Tuesday, we have a mystery lady, courtesy of writer Christopher McPherson.
Yes, Eve, it’s Lilyan Tashman. Honest!
Jan. 20, 1936: For this installment of Rediscovering Los Angeles, Times artist Charles Owens and columnist Timothy Turner visit a Chinese laundry on Figueroa near Temple.
Turner writes:
It was a busy hive before John Chinaman cut off his pigtail, back when he had the quaint custom of taking a huge mouthful of water and spraying it over the bone-dry clothes before he applied the iron. This traditional custom was finally broken by threats and pleadings of municipal health officers, who accomplished the substitution of a tin mechanical sprayer.
“Chinatown,” anyone?
If you enjoy Mary Mallory’s columns (and our survey shows that readers do) you might like this anthology of Hollywood Heights called “Hollywoodland: Tales Lost and Found.” It’s available for the Kindle, but don’t forget that Amazon has a free app so you can read it on a PC or on an iPad.
Here’s Monday’s mystery chap, courtesy of writer Christopher McPherson. The annoying black box is where our mystery fellow thoughtfully signed his photo.
Update: Yes, this is William Bakewell (d. 1993), who appeared in “All Quiet on the Western Front.”
The San Fernando Valley has experienced a great evolution over the last several centuries from bucolic fields to economic powerhouse. Quiet and peaceful for years, it served as Southern California’s breadbasket for decades until Angelenos looked to its empty vistas as places to escape harsh, city life. What had been a vast agricultural and ranching engine eventually became hedgerows of homes and factories.
For centuries, Indians lived here peaceably until the Spanish arrived and claimed the land, later establishing the San Fernando Rey Mission in 1797. Indians and settlers farmed and ranched the land on behalf of the mission, until Isaac Lankershim and Isaac Newton Van Nuys purchased 60,000 acres on July 2, 1869, and established the San Fernando Homestead Assn., later reorganized as the Los Angeles Farm and Milling Co. In 1888, Lankershim established the Lankershim Ranch Land and Water Co. to subdivide the land, starting the migration of Americans to this rich undeveloped area.
Mary Mallory’s “Hollywoodland: Tales Lost and Found” is available for the Kindle.
We are being bombarded by stories about Black Friday and Cyber Monday, with videos of long lines at stores and the attendant consumer frenzy.
The L.A. Daily Mirror prefers a more subdued approach to buying gifts during the holiday season. Here’s proof that an ideal retro gift can be practical and inexpensive. It’s the Parker T-Ball jotter, which has changed very little since this 1957 ad.
You can pick one up at most office supply stores for about $8. We like ours with the gel refill, medium point. Perfect for doing the New York Times crossword puzzle.
What’s on your shopping list? If you have a good gift idea, share it with us.
Jack Webb and William Conrad phone in their answers to the L.A. Daily Mirror Reader Survey.
Update 2: Today’s the last day to express your thoughts in the Daily Mirror Reader Survey. And stay tuned for the results.
Update: More than 100 L.A. Daily Mirror readers have taken the survey and the results are most gratifying! I’m going to run it a few more days for any stragglers in the crowd, but I suspect I have already received the bulk of responses.
So far, the most essential item is the mystery photo, which I assumed, but it’s nice to have some data to show just how popular it is.
Readers — a lot of them — would like book reviews. And so would I, but the challenge is finding the time to do them, as in our oft-repeated lament: “So many stories, only one Larry Harnisch.”
I’ll publish more detailed results when the survey closes in a few days. And thanks for reading!
I have asked for readers’ feedback in the past, but I have never gone so far as to conduct a survey. This is my first attempt at writing a poll, so if I have omitted one of your favorite features or blogs, it’s entirely an oversight.
What we’re looking for is what works and what we could do better. There’s an open question at the end where you can write to us.
The L.A. Daily Mirror Reader Survey is open through December and results will be posted in January.
CLICK HERE to take the L.A. Daily Mirror Reader Survey.
And thanks!
Note: This is a post I originally wrote for the 1947project in 2005. I’m reposting it for newer readers.
CAIRO, Nov. 30. (AP) With Arab bitterness mounting in the Middle East, Syrian demonstrators set fire to the United States Legation in Damascus today.
The Arab League’s secretary general declared his people will never permit the United Nations to partition Palestine.
A reliable source here said King Ibn Saud of Saudi Arabia has agreed to contribute the oil revenues of his kingdom—paid to him by American oil companies and estimated at $18 million a year—to support Arab military forces to fight partition.
There was no indication the Arabs planned immediate military action, but six Jews were killed and 16 wounded in Palestine outbursts today.
In Damascus, 6,000 youths, dominated by Moslem brotherhood members, marched to Government House and asked for arms and a jihad (holy war). Premier Jamil Mardam Bey told them:
“President (Shukri) Al-Kuwatly approves your demands because partition threatens not only Syrian independence but the very being of all Arab nations.”
Note: This is a post I wrote in 2006 for the 1947project and I’m reposting it for newer readers.
Nov. 29, 1907
Oh Those Shriners: Recall, if you will, the grisly train wreck that killed a large number of Shriners returning from their convention in Los Angeles. It seems that one of them, George F. Hageman, inadvertently touched off a legal dispute between two belles of Reading.
Sarah Reber and Maude Weber went before the court insisting that each of them was the rightful heir of the bachelor, who was “tall and handsome and very popular with the fair sex,” The Times says. Both women claim that Hageman “spent his last evening in Reading with them” before he left for the Shrine convention and made promises of $12,000 in stock.
The court awarded the stock to Reber.
The City Beautiful: By the way, this postcard of Broadway and 7th reflects one of Charles Mulford Robinson’s complaints in drafting a design for downtown Los Angeles: all the low awnings along the streets. (Note the Orpheum Theatre).
Nov. 29, 1983: Bridget Marie Hicks was a 17-year-old girl with two children and apparently too many problems.
A worker at the South-Central Multi-Purpose Child Development Center found her hanging from a tree. Police said Bridget, a student at nearby Locke High, tied a jacket to a tree limb and hanged herself.
Bridget’s father told the late George Ramos: “She was not the type of person to take her own life. I can’t believe it.”
And some family speculated that she had might have been killed.
But friends said she was “despondent over personal problems,” Ramos wrote.
The Times never followed up on this story, so we know nothing more about Bridget. She would be 47 now and her children would be about 30 and 31.
I’m always looking for Oviatt items and here’s a jacket that has been listed on EBay, with bids starting at $149.99.
And not just any jacket. This one was tailored for future President Lyndon Johnson.
For the record: As Wayne Selover points out, the EBay listing took the LBJ Oviatt’s label from an online photo gallery. In other words, we were apparently quoting ourselves. Thanks, Wayne. We should read more closely even if it is Thanksgiving morning!
Here’s a traditional roast turkey recipe from the “Every-Day Cook-Book and Family Compendium,” written about 1890 by Miss E. Neill. Be sure your fire is bright and clear and watch out for the gall-bag.
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