| This rather nice postcard of the Examiner Building on South Broadway has been posted on EBay. The name of Julia Morgan is usually attached to the building, but this card also credits J. Martyn Haenke, a name I don't recognize. The large windows showing the press line were covered during a prolonged strike in the 1960s and since the demise of the Herald Examiner, the building has been converted to a variety of film sets. Bidding starts at $9.99, but there is a reserve. |
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“Crash!” The Foundry
When they confide this dream you wonder whether to break it bluntly or gently that writing is difficult, lonely work requiring great discipline and that the rewards are usually meager unless, of course, they hit big with, say, a cookbook. Well, this is to report that a group of disillusioned pros meet regularly in a home in Beverly Hills and parcel out TV ideas on the basis of "You do that one, I'll do this one." It's strictly hack work but they sell them. There's quite a market for western and private eye "originals," you know. They call it the Foundry. ::
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THE NEW semester has started but Derrill Place, English teacher at Glendale College, is still smiling over a thing that happened the last of last semester. Students in his class in Children's Literature fastened their final exam papers together with pastel-colored diaper pins. ::
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Last May a Douglas F-3D, a jet fighter, retired by the Navy after heroic service in Korea, was enthusiastically promoted — free — by the Lakewood park department. It was brought from Litchfield , Ariz., and set up in Del Valle Park. Hardly had the dedicatory oratory concluded when a massive wave of thrilled youngsters swarmed all over it. They had continued to crawl in, out and over it day after day. Only problem was that here's a 10-foot drop from the center of the fuselage to the ground, a hazard to reckless youth. So last Dec. 22 the city council ordered the plane fenced off. Now the problem is what to do with 45,000 pounds of airplane. Lakewood officialdom is welcoming suggestions. ::
A LATE-SLEEPING writer who moved recently to a new home off the Sunset Strip was awakened the other morning by the woman across the street saying sharply, "Patrick, take your daddy's Oscar out of the sandbox and bring it back in the house!" With the Academy Awards only a few weeks away, he thought the committee ought to know. ::
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ALTHOUGH he covers the courthouse, reporter Chester Washington had never made it to the witness chair, until the other day when he testified for a doctor, his Sunday golf companion, who was seeking a divorce. Asked what effect the wife's conduct had on the doc, Chester said, "It made him nervous and was detrimental to his golf game." The divorce was granted and presumably Chet will not demand a stroke-a-hole handicap. ::
MISCELLANY — A Hollywoodian is driving bartenders nuts. He goes into bars and orders warm beer. When bartenders say all their beer is cold he reminds them that gourmets consider 58 degrees the proper temperature for drinking . . . Maybe movie actors don't deserve to be paid for the showing of their old films on TV, Leon Luk observed, but they do seem entitled to damages. |
Yanqui Go Home – After Touring Cuba
I cite you the above as just one of the little paradoxes of the world in which we live. While Fidel Castro flexes his minuscule muscles in front of TV cameras and rages that he could, by the hair of his chinny-chin-chin, blow all us yanquis in, his tourist department, a few blocks down the street, is bending every effort to lure us to the romantic isle that fought and won a rebellion against Burma-Shave ads. The headlines quote Fidel's "Yankee Go Home" fury. But a few pages back, in the travel section, there is the ad copy of a Cuban Avenida de Madison type coaxing us to come play in Caribbean sunshine.
While the neurotic heads of government fume and fuss at each other, their respective promoters of tourist trade go blithely along pretending, perhaps actually believing, that every thing is just fine and the welcome mat is out. Even with that free drink, it's hard to imagine that any American in Cuba could relax knowing that any moment there might be a burst of machine-gun fire down the street. But maybe I've got this thing figured all wrong. Maybe the idea has what we in the ad game call negative appeal. And if that's the point, I'd like to offer some copy which we can throw into the mill and see if it turns up grist. For example: TAKE THAT ONCE IN A LIFETIME HOLIDAY
Visit the exotic Cuba while the WAR CRIME PURGE is still in season. Matinees daily, including Sunday. Special excursion buses and free balcony seats for the tourists. Guaranteed three death sentences daily. Watch the defectors squirm!
The Russian Intourist Bureau has worn out the pitch about co-operative farms, Lenin's tomb and the Bolshoi ballet. You know? It's got no zing. Why not something like this: WINTER IN CARNIVAL TIME IN SIBERIA
For a never-to-be-forgotten, off-the-beaten-track vacation, take our specially priced budget tour and spend two glorious weeks in the Siberian wastes. Itinerary includes an authentic chase by hungry wolves and a visit to a genuine salt mine. See the slave laborers filling shakers! Even our good neighbor to the south could go along with the idea. The Departmento de Turismo of Mexico has, I think, overdone the bit about the Floating Gardens of Xochimilco. I mean, I've been there. And they're stagnant. If they want to entice the Yankee dollar, why not a half-page ad in, say, the Christian Science Monitor, reading: LOOKING FOR A CONVERSATION STARTER?
Overcome those dreadful lags in dinner table small talk. Rise above the rut of cocktail party chitchat. Be the center of attention. Spend a THRILL-PACKED, ALL-INCLUSIVE week end in the TIJUANA JAIL.
Or, a quarter-page in the Police Gazette: SEE THE WILD TRIBES OF MEXICO COME TO UNTAMED ACAPULCO
Mingle with the natives in their natural habitat — lying in front of their quaint, candy-striped, Abercrombie & Fitch cabanas, sipping their mystical tribal potion. Gordon's ginebra y Schweppes tonic, and cavorting unashamedly on the sun-bleached sands in their Rose-Marie Reid bikinis. Of course, if every body else is going to do it, we might as well. We could offer foreign tourists a holiday trip to such landmarks as Jimmy Hoffa's birthplace, a public audience with Gov. Faubus and a guided tour of the Chicago police department. Then we could whisk them by air-conditioned bus to Washington and the Harris Committee hearings on payola, to which I will undoubtedly be invited because, you know, Burma-Shave, Gordon's ginebra and Schweppes tonic. |
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| Feb. 3, 1941 – Hedda Hopper praises Dalton Trumbo. Yes, that Dalton Trumbo: “Those chronic fault-finders, who are always screaming about bad adaptations of best sellers, must be gnashing their teeth over 'Kitty Foyle.' All praise to Dalton Trumbo and Sam Wood, who transformed a dull book into one of the best pictures of the year."” |
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| Feb. 3, 1980: Al Martinez wrote a very clever obituary on TV host Jack Bailey, who died at the age of 72. |
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Times Sports Editor Paul Zimmerman takes a look at the appeal of Mexican boxers in Los Angeles.
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| Feb. 3, 1960: A Gallup poll examines patterns in voting among women, who are expected to outnumber male voters for the first time, and finds that they may offer some hope for Republicans. It will be interesting to see what effect, if any, Gallup finds among women voters favoring Sen. John F. Kennedy (D-Mass.). |
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| Oct. 5, 1938: Joe Seewerker and Charles Owens visit Point Fermin. And if your memory’s good, you’ll recall another item they did while they were there.
Note: The original run of Nuestro Pueblo ended in 1939. I’m going back and picking up the ones I missed in 2008-09. Readers often ask whether Nuestro Pueblo was ever published. The answer is yes, back in 1940. You can find copies here>>> My suggestion is that if you want one, get it now because there’s always the risk that collectors will drive the price out of reach, as happened with Charles Stoker’s “Thicker ‘n’ Thieves” ($503? Get real!) or Leslie T. White’s excellent but extremely rare “Me, Detective” (read it, even if you just get it from the library). |
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| Sept. 28, 1938: Charles Owens re-creates a scene he discovered in the Arroyo Seco when he arrived in Los Angeles in 1908 – an outdoor kitchen. The original run of Nuestro Pueblo ended in 1939. I’m going back and picking up the ones I missed in 2008-09. |
| “Don’t Forget a Pair of Pliers,” by Frank King. We’re not quite brave enough to make “Savory Nut Roast” in the Daily Mirror test kitchens. I think the tomato sauce is the deal-breaker. Anybody care to try it and give a report?
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Feb. 2, 1920 – Jane Dixon writes: “A new world for woman to conquer — the world of politics. “Politics have been, since the days of Roman senators and even antedating the toga, the prerogative of man. “The woman who essayed a personal opinion on politics at a dinner table or in drawing-room conversation was looked upon by males as being a menace to peaceful domestic happiness and was forthwith cut from the list of 'women my wife should know.' “It was not considered delicate or feminine for a woman to understand too much about the political affairs of her community, her country or her world at large, any more than it was for her to smoke cigars and converse on the virtues of the several brands in favor. Such worldly knowledge and argumentative chatter was for the men of the family. “As always, the old order changeth." Dixon profiles Marguerite L. Smith, elected as a Republican to the New York Assembly, and Ellen O'Grady, appointed as a deputy New York police commissioner. In case you don’t recognize the name Jeannette Rankin, she was first woman elected to Congress, and represented Montana. And she did the fox-trot divinely!
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| Los Angeles Times file photo
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| Charles Dillon evidently mailed this photo of Glenn Curtiss’ plane to The Times in 1938. A century after the Aviation Meet, the photo is finally published on the Internet. |
| This photo, probably taken in the 1880s, showing a couple in front of a house, has been listed on EBay. The photo is credited to the studio of Haneman and Clark, but I can’t locate any information about it in The Times.
Of course, that small palm tree in front of the house is going to get huge. And that’s a beautiful horse. Bidding on the photo starts at $35, which seems a bit steep to me for an undated image in which neither the people nor the address is identified. As with everything on EBay, people should review the item and the vendor carefully before submitting a bid. |
Mystery of Missiles
 One of the problems of those who guide our missile program is making it understandable to earth-bounders. In other words, translating complex scientific data into ordinary terms. Toward this end former newspaperman Chris Clausen, now with Caltech's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, conducts monthly symposiums for reporters who cover the sky. Even then it doesn't all come through.
The situation is not helped by confusion in the Pentagon. Take the case of the Agena B space satellite system, now being checked out at Lockheed's Missiles and Space Division test base at Santa Cruz. When the time came recently to name the project, a phase of Agena B, to put a camera reconnaissance satellite up there to see what Mr. K.'s boys were doing, the Pentagon became nervous. The political implications were obvious. The project was successfully called Big Brother, Pied Piper, Sentry, Midas and finally simply project WS-117A. The papers, having no such inhibitions, dubbed it Spy in the Sky and the Super Snooper.
A press handout which explained how the Agena B works stated the testing was to locate and correct potential trouble under space flight conditions before the bird is sent to Vandenberg to be fired.
It pointed out that the sensitive satellite was almost human in its reactions, stating,"The missile can move a fraction of an inch during these tests, fooling it into thinking it is actually flying. In fact, it can go anywhere but up."
It was also stated that the Agena can turn itself on and off in flight and its re-start mechanism was explained. Despite the briefing, the message apparently didn't come through to a San Francisco paper, which headlined, "Turnabout Rocket Revealed!" Someone somehow got the idea the missile could be landed on the moon, wound up again like a top and flown back to earth. ::
They'll go through Newhall, Bakersfield, Fresno, Modesto, Sacramento and Auburn to Donner Pass, where the final runner will hand the aluminum, kerosene-burning torch, which must be renewed every half hour, to a skier who, with other skiers, will carry it triumphantly to the valley of the squaws. This ceremony, the carrying of the torch, doubtless was impressive when the Grecians started the games but it seems an awful waste of energy today. I have a three-word suggestion which would release the teams of state Highway Patrolmen who will accompany the runners, clearing traffic and insuring their safety: one motorcycle rider. ::
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JUST UNLUCKILY ::
AT RANDOM — As if life weren't complicated enough, a postal card notice of a luncheon for L.A. yacht-men tomorrow asks, "Are you using an alkyd-fortified epoxy polyester ultraviolet-absorbent acrylic plastic urethane catalyzed paint or varnish on your boat?" If you aren't, obviously you're out of it . . . A lady named Kathleen who participated in last week's mothers' March of Dimes came upon a man on her beat with empty pockets who asked, "Say, could I charge a $1 contribution to my Bankamericard?" The answer was no.
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Tall Man Considers Cellmate, Dr. Finch
The ex-cellmate's name was Finch. Dr. R. Bernard Finch. "When you move into a new tank," he was telling me, "you sort of cool it for a while. You observe. You listen. You figure out where you fit in." The tall man's voice was soft, deep. It had an educated quality which wasn't misleading. In his 30-odd years, he had matriculated in some of the nation's foremost colleges and prisons. "But that's not the way it was with Finch," he continued. "When he came into our cell, his attitude was, 'I'm here, boys. Things are going to revolve around me.' " They were together in Cell 8, Tank 12D-1.
"I'd been there a while. I was next in line for a bunk. But Finch had only been there a few hours when he bought the bunk that I was going to get from a guy who was just about ready to be released. "For $2, he bought it." The tall man dragged on his cigarette. "Finch had an amazing lack of tolerance," he went on. "The first day, he complained about the ashtrays, other people's conversations, lots of little things. "He'd say, 'Can't we get rid of those smelly ashtrays?' or he'd interrupt somebody else's conversation with, 'Do we have to listen to that malarkey all day long?' "I know he was under a strain," he added, "but in prison, who isn't?" As we talked, it became apparent that Dr. Finch had annoyed the tall man more than he had annoyed his other cellmates. I suggested to my visitor that maybe he was oversensitive about the doctor — a little bit jealous. He surprised me by agreeing. "Quite possibly, that's true," he said, "I was the only one who had any flare-ups with him. Some of the others remarked behind his back. 'Who does he think he is?' But he didn't really seem to bother them. "A lot of men in the tank would go to him with their ailments. He seemed to take a real interest in each case. He was almost over-willing to be of some benefit to them. He'd diagnose them — even tell them what kind of medicine to take. "Later on," the man added, "I worked in the jail clinic. There, some of the doctors and nurses indicated that they were getting a little tired of having prisoners from Finch's tank demanding a specific medication which Finch had recommended." The doctor, my visitor said, wasted no time in displaying a photo of Carole. "It was a newspaper photo. He had it in a frame made out of tinfoil from cigarette packages and he hung it from the springs of the bunk above him. At night, he'd look at it, study it before he went to sleep. "I asked him about it and he said, "It's not too good of a picture of her, but it's the best I've seen in the newspapers.' " "Actually," the tall man went on, lighting another cigarette, "Finch's attitude changed a lot while he was in there. For example, one day he took it upon himself to throw away one of the two ashtrays we had hanging from the bars. It was just a milk carton that had been trimmed down. I had an argument with him about that. "A couple of days later, he made an ashtray for me. He lined it with foil." My visitor went on: "Another time, I took him aside and talked to him about what I called a lack of tolerance on his part. He Turned On the Charm
"In jail, you should try to get along with everybody. I told him that in prison, you're just another number. What you were on the outside doesn't matter. It's how you get along on the inside. "He listened. He seemed to appreciate my criticism. I noticed that he observed me after that — the way I mixed with the other men. How I got along. He watched me for almost half a day. "Then, he tried it himself. He turned on the charm. "There's one thing about this guy Finch," the tall man concluded. "When he wants to turn it on, he sure knows how."
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| Feb. 2, 1980: Glassblower Nathan Prusan can’t believe people actually collect neon signs and want them in their homes! |
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| Feb. 2, 1940: Now here’s an interesting line from Hedda Hopper, who is normally a real flag-waver. “Gold Star Mothers are steering clear of 'The Fighting 69th.' Most of them won't see the picture, even on a pass, saying their sons died for no good reason and, but for a lot of cheers, they'd be plain mothers, not Gold Star Mothers today.” |
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| Feb. 2, 1960: Dr. R. Bernard Finch took girlfriend Carole Tregoff on a waterskiing trip with his wife. Now that’s chutzpah. |
February 1, 1920: The purity squad raids a party at the home of former Mayor Arthur Harper. Continue reading
| Roy Knabenshue’s dirigible at the Aviation Meet.
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| January 1910: The Aviation Meet is viewed primary for its accomplishments with airplanes, and the balloonists tend to be overlooked. This photo (possibly by Sawyer and Dwyer, the handwriting on the back is in an old-fashioned, elaborate cursive that is hard to read) shows Roy Knabenshue in a “government dirigible.” At right, Dick [Francis?] gives the order to lift off.
Knabenshue started dirigible passenger service in Pasadena in 1913, using a field at Marengo Avenue and Ipswich Street, his obituary says. He died in 1960 at the age of 83.
March 7, 1960: Roy Knabenshue dies.
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A. Victor Segno sends out a success wave. Note the beautiful hair. Isn’t this great? A. Victor Segno, one of my favorite Los Angeles con men who sent out “success waves” for $1 a month, had his book on mentalism translated into German! I wonder if “How to Have Beautiful Hair” was also published in other languages. The book, listed on EBay, is $9 under Buy It Now. |
Different Way to Lose
He proposes windows for reverse betting where the suckers could select and support the horses that finish last, next to last and third from last. Win, place and show in reverse. After all, he points out, the craps tables in Vegas have "don't pass" markings for customers who prefer to bet with the house. He is certain reverse betting would get a tremendous play because so many horse players have shown such a remarkable talent for picking them that way. However, he wishes to emphasize that horse owners should continue to try to win the regular way. Otherwise, his idea could become more confusing than it sounds. ::
"The thing I noticed most," he replied wistfully. "was that signing my name on motel registers didn't cause quite the same reaction it did 40 years ago." ::
IN CONTEMPT ::
HERE AND THERE the language is being punched around again. A Wilshire Blvd. store had a sale on ladies' loose-fitting sweaters which it advertised as "Better Bulkies" . . . A small grocery store on Sunset Blvd. has the contradictory name, Superette . . . And the west side market had a big "Steakarama Sale." ::
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AT RANDOM — Oops, the Reader's Digest article "My Fight for America's First Birth-Control Clinic" by Margaret Sanger is condensed from the magazine Together . . . A man whose driver's license was revoked recently asked for a hearing, which he is entitled to do under the law, and the other day he received a notice in the mail that his hearing has been granted and giving the date. He is happy about the opportunity to tell his story but he wishes the envelope from the MVD didn't have imprinted, ""Has your driver's license expired?" . . . As Sheldon White sees it: Miss Eva Marie Saint, pretty obviously ain't.
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(NEWS ITEM)- Cuba's push to receive tourist travel to the island has blossomed into a full day for free. The Cuban Tourist Commission is now offering hotel accommodations, a drink, dinner, floor show, golfing privileges and race track admission free for one day to all Americans vacationing in Havana.
