No, money is a means to an end that has become worshipped in a sick society as an end in itself. Greed and the cultural decline that accompany it are the results.
i look at those burning houses like a testament, we don't see burning houses for eminent/public domain. There is something missing in this documentary besides ever changing landscapes.
I lived there when LA was starting the change. I remember when City Hall could be seen, the tallest building...the then when it was hidden. Angels flight in the 50s was fun! I remember a nighttime party when one could reserve the streetcar for the evening. So sad to see all the classics gone.
Sadly, a lot of the post-World War II development in downtown L.A. was driven by the automobile. Sure, there was a need for public buildings (the courthouses, the County Hall of Administration, and the Music Center), but look at all the land that was taken for parking lots. The trolley lines that still existed in the 1940's and 50's could've been upgraded with new equipment, and entire blocks of old buildings would've been saved. There might not have been the need to build the 110 Freeway south of the 101. Then, the remaining buildings on Bunker Hill could've been seismically retrofitted and renovated as needed. We didn't need to lose nearly all of those historic buildings.
The Castle from Bunker Hill was beautiful. I loved LA, but it didn't love me back. Should've stayed a little bit longer, it was the best time of my life. Lived the summer of 1981 at the top of that old apt bldg down from Sidewalk Cafe. Thanks from this lonely old man for giving me a smile.
I love LA. I love hopping on my motorcycle or car and driving around all over the city! I love the sights and sounds. The shopping, restaurants and bars! It’s a freakin’ blast! I can’t understand why people wouldn’t love it. Boring, dull squares!
The Bunker Hill segment is very poignant. Imagine growing up in a neighborhood that has been completely obliterated in the name of "progress." All those vestiges of your childhood and early life totally erased from the Earth. Really haunting and sad!
Huell was the gold standard, pun intended, of California History. We would get properly shot documentary which means no stupid screen tinting and no extraneous mood shots. And we would for sure not get millennial politics.
@@encinobalboa oh shut up. It's not millennial politics, it's people finally having a heart for the city and its history. It's just that it's easier for you to disregard this as some youngins stupid diatribe because you don't want to acknowledge problems in the city.
Mark & Emy Shibukawa us too, and Pershing square at Christmas time was like what I thought New York city was as a child. Oh and Hollywood at Christmas time !
I loved the Central Market! In the fall time my mom and my sisters used to go purchase the candied fruit for her fruitcakes.. Mom makes a mean fruitcake.. Now I have to go to Farmers Market to purchase the fruit.
@@albertalbert5612 Yes and Yes, exactly what Albert Albert said. Kinda knew I'd prob never call L.A. home again when we came dn to visit fam/friends & discovered we'd been gentrified out of Highland Park, Grand Central Mkt & Clifton's Cafeteria! At least Carnitas Michoacan was still itself.
I grew up in L.A. and it has changed so much in the 20 years since I moved away. I wish I could have seen it when my Mom & Dad first arrived there from Idaho and Texas.
I remember one night, driving downtown with my grandparents, to watch one of the great old houses on Bunker Hill burn. So very sad. The LA I grew up in is not the same.
TraRob-EastSide exactly what I was thinking! I was like... ok so what’s the point besides that you’re an explorer who takes pictures? I was confused after his scenes played.
"Like... looking for new shots I guess", "Because, Like, there's just like weird people in the metro like, so I put my headphones on, like, then I take my headphones off, Like.. So I don't miss my stop, like"
10:43 my mom lived on Bunker Hill back then too, and she's still alive today. I road The Original Angel's Flight many times until it was closed in 69 as a child. I'm nostalgic, I see no positive progress destroying the past for the for the future.
I rode the original Angels Flight back in 1968 only once before it closed down. Can't even recognize it any more by driving through the tunnel where it once stood.
All those old House's and buildings gone all for tall skyscrapers . They should have kept these historic homes and buildings relocate them in another part of the city. I wish we still have those old red cars . Are air quality would be cleaner . We wouldn't have to take a bus . Trolleys don't break down like a bus and car do. The city should be ashamed of it self.
They've been preserved in certain pockets - they're in Westwood Village, downtown Hollywood, the Historic Core (the parts which haven't been gutted), and in really odd places you wouldn't guess...I remember taking a picture of a house that looked like a complete slum one night, but the architecture suggested that it had been built between 1910-1930. There's history in Los Angeles in the strangest little places. Oh! And Santa Monica.....Santa Monica collectively fought to preserve the mid-century suburban architecture of the residential neighborhoods in the 70s and 80s....there is also mid-century residential architecture in Playa Del Rey and Venice. I constantly gravitated to those places for years. I was even fascinated by the shitty motels on Century Blvd for a short period of time ,overlooking the crack dealers around to spend a couple of nights at the Airport Motel....that big Travelodge on the corner there on Century was built by an old Hollywood actor and his wife in the 1940s and you can tell if you actually stay inside one of the rooms. There are some cool places left in L.A. I think people should fight for every bit of it.
i so agree with you about everything. came here in 1951 with my parents from europe. my mom and i would take the red car from downtown to venice for my lessons at meglen studios. i miss all these historic homes and buildings. i make art about them which i exhibit in museums and galleries.
I'm the same age as Gordon who lived on Bunker Hill in the Castle. My parents moved from Indianapolis in 1948 to Van Nuys, bought a stucco house near Roscoe and Sepulveda. Unlike Gordon's house, that house is still there; the whole neighborhood is still there and recognizable. Funny what gets kept and what doesn't.
I lived at Bunker Hill Towers for eight years, and loved it. For a sense of what Bunker Hill was like in the '40s, read "Dreams from Bunker Hill," by John Fante. Easy, enjoyable read
So sad and So Awesome at the same time, I too came from a small community on South Eastern Lake Erie just north of Toledo Ohio where I was born, but grew up in a once upon a time place much like Venice, Luna Pier Michigan, Once known as Lakewood Village ( where I grew up) in the early 1900's till the 1964( City of Luna Pier incorporated,) It was a Summer Retreat for the hard working wealthy business people of their day. It had five Lagoons and a Harbor with a Yacht Club known as the Lakewood Club on 14th Street,( I lived on 12th St.) Many good memories flood my minds eye thinking about it. Off of the I-75 Highway North to Detroit in Monroe County off the Shores of Lake Erie exit Luna Pier Road to the Lake was a Pier that stretched out into the Lake of which it bares it's Name in the 1920's was a Summer Attraction for the whole family my Dad shared stories of when he was a boy growing in Monroe his family would go there for summer fun and later in his 20's would play drums for a Big Band Group on the Pier. He had many stories of a once thriving community, but again as time went buy and business's would move out the fun came to a halt. In 1950 the Old Pier was vandalized and burned down the stilts that once carried it's weight and glory! In the 1960's it became a thriving urban City with its public Lighting and new Sewer Plant Utilities and Flood Control Channels( the five lagoons and old harbor). The Noreaster Storms off the Lake would flood the City for days( 1974, 1977 & 78 of what I remember). After High School I moved to Los Angeles to work for family and this is where I have called home for the past 38 years and raised a family of my own (Burbank) and now working for the City of LA. I have loved the City of Angels from day one and haven't ever wanted to go anywhere else. But retirement is fast approaching now and the times are still changing and I will so have to say good bye (to be closer to Kids and grandkids) and not by choice, it will be hard to leave but I have other places and other family to visit and see, but Los Angeles will always be forever be my HOME!.
I'm proud and honored to have grown up in Venice, unfortunately gentrification pushed us out in the 90's! my memories of the canals were different, in the 70's and 80's the canal were a very dangerous place lots of drugs and gangs, it looked nothing like it does now! Venice was a great place and I still go back at least once a month because I miss it. I now live in Long Beach and it kind of reminds me of the old Venice, but it not the same! Real Venice forever!
Saw an episode of Perry Mason last week - It was the last tester episode in glorious colour - That featured Angel Flight ! - it was amazing to watch ! - Nice to see it still working ! Thanks for sharing SB - British Isles
I lived in a 100 year old industrial warehouse turned into my living working loft. for 18 years me and my girlfriend created all kinds of art and machines and instruments for film TV and concerts. The building had 60 foot beams in the ceilings and walls, lumber no long available in those lengths as those trees as well are long gone, But long story short Trammel Crow Company bought the property rudely and unceremonious told us to get the hell out with little time to scramble for a new situation. This of course ruins several other peoples businesses while their stuffed suits came in and said this is so cool now get out and proceeded to bulldoze the entire block to make way for expensive hideous condos for thousands a month rent for millennial wankers. All while claiming they provide "housing" striping the real life out of the entire downtown. Greed kills art once again. but alas all anyone really cares about is maximizing profits and money. The mindset of a cancer.
Yeah, your nothing new,you had your space for a time, now the “wankers” have their time. History is what we remember, then forget, 100 years from now, who cares ?
@@KingSlimjeezy I have seen more greedy weasel boy s(um bags here than anywhere else I have been and I have been all over the world and in almost every state in the USA... it seems California attracts them like flys... they will sell their own grandma to a glue factory to get rich.
Lived in topanga in the 80s, then Venice Beach in early 90s, change was a constantly evolving thing, was happy for the time I had, I don’t recognize it now, but I’m sure there were old guys who didn’t recognize it in my time
As an historic preservationist from the Midwest, it has been only within the last ten years that I had heard about and then learned about Bunker Hill and it’s fight to survive. Your segment on the neighborhood was superbly written and edited and completely heart wrenching. One could tangibly feel the lament of it’s loss as your storyteller recalled his living memories of the place. I’d say if ever there was a better made presentation to support the need for preserving history, I don’t know what it would be. Thank you for sharing the lesson.
The auto industry alongside the oil and the tire industry supplanted the most efficient train system in it's time. Here in Los Angeles we haven't recovered instead of putting in trains we put in toll roads. Just so everyone can continue to be screwed
Very sad what they did to old LA, they destroyed it's old neighborhoods, they didn't develop the existing and very excellent rail transit system, but instead they destroyed it, and they promoted urban sprawl and paved over of Southern California with freeways. What a tragedy!
Yes, you're absolutely right. The Pacific Electric Railroad, which was privately owned, could've been taken over by the MTA/County of Los Angeles. (The P.E. was on the brink of bankruptcy at the time.) Many of the tracks and rights-of-way still existed well into the 1950's; our public officials just needed to invest in new trolley cars and upgrade the electrical system as needed. Most of the P.E.'s cars were old and pretty beaten up, so those had to be replaced.
My Boozing buddy went to LA for a few weeks holiday - He brought some Photographs back of various areas - But after looking at venice beach ! - I feel in love with those homes around Venice Canals -Ha ! - My best mate flew half way around the world ! - And stayed in LA with his workmates brother ! - Who turned out to be my wifes cousin ? - Who's living there - But we didnt know until seeing him on my pals photographs ? Thats fate for you ! Thanks for sharing this viideo ! SB - British Isles
It’s amazing the amount of hatred that an historical video brings out in people. Reading the comments feels like sitting in a bar full of the losing and the lost.
He kept so many unique little personal artifacts from his past, and keeps them locked up in a glass cabinet in his home. But clearly he's not going to live forever. What's going to happen to it all when he's gone? Will his children and grandchildren inherit it? And, what happens when they're all gone? How long will that stuff stay preserved in a special little protected collection somewhere? Unless it's eventually donated to a historical trust or museum, it's more than likely destined for a landfill. Sadly. Where almost all of the rest of the artifacts from those particular contexts ended up. It's heartbreaking, the passage of time and the value we place on seemingly unremarkable objects, beloved only by the ones with distinct prior connections of their own with the artifacts. As time marches steadily and relentlessly forward, the past is being systematically erased from existence and concepts such as nostalgia are reserved for the select few who had personal experiences of their own with it. But, once those people are gone, that tie is severed irrevocably forever. Fortunately we have the technology to preserve a majority of what once was in the form of digital photographs and video footage. TH-cam itself, I imagine, will eventually become a repository in its own right for recording for posterity. I suppose that's a small but significant silver lining after all. 👍
RADIUM CLOCK In San Diego, in the 1800s, the entire Rancho Agua Hedionda was sold for $4,000. Nowadays, the city of Carlsbad, CA occupies that space and a single home will cost you 1 million dollars.
They tore down the huge sandhill by my house we used to sled at in the winter and put a highway in. Now you can't really access the "beer cave" from the early 1900's beer storage. Pretty neat...kids on that street now have no idea it's there.
So many beautiful, priceless buildings destroyed or leveled. Los Angeles should have kept to the plans of old Los Angeles. Keeping the old homes would have saved affordable housing and decrease homelessness. Los Angeles lost the grander which attracted most of the Tourists who flocked here. We lost a plethora of small businesses along the Santa Monica Air-Line and within Santa Monica.
The homes in the Venice canals have changed over the years - most significantly in the past 15 years or so. Many of the small plots now have multi-level, modern luxury homes. I'm surprised that it wasn't mentioned that the gentleman in the video is living in one of the only remaining original bungalows.
I lived by 7th and Witmer was a child back in the mid 70s I got a glimpse of some of the older homes being just removed after being vacant and abandoned for years I would say and I also got to see some buildings go up too I can tell you that some of those older houses were very well crafted unlike today’s homes of just flat surfaces no character or dedication put into them at all
I also remember some of those homes in the early to mid seventies. I remember as a child back then,telling my brother that the houses looked like haunted houses.
Since this film’s narrator failed to tell the real story about the building of the Venice Canals, I will. Mr. Abbott Kinney was a very progressive man for his era, and he deliberately hired black men to build those canals at a time when blacks were not welcomed in that area. These workmen lived right next door to Venice in a vibrant community called Oakwood, in homes that Mr. Abbott Kinney built for them. Mr. Kinney always welcomed blacks to participate in the lifestyle he created for others. He knew what he was doing and was determined to do it. When he died, he left his Venice home to one of his black employees. I find it shameful that KCET chose to “whitewash” this important piece of Los Angeles history in this video. Revisionism be dammed.
This was nice, but too much music. I mean, one guy was talking and suddenly he was cut and music just played as you see his mouth moving for like 15 seconds. Why?
A fun time capsule film that features some of those old steep hills, especially Bunker Hill, is the late-period noir Kiss Me Deadly. The film, which really is a trip even today, makes very atmospheric use of the old stairs and funiculars.
I dreamed of California as a kid while growing up in Cleveland. It wasn't easy to get here. Life gets in the way...jobs, etc. Been coming to California for 15 yrs. Lived in the redwoods of West Sonoma County for 6 yrs and now live down the street from the beach in Newport Beach. Dream fulfilled.
The land originally belonged to Native Americans. It was colonized by the Spanish. Mexico won their independence from Spain and took control of California from Spain. Mexico then sold California and the southwest to the US after the Mexican American war. The US paid Mexico for California in the treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo. If anyone has a land claim, it's the native tribes not Mexico.
My family lived in Bunker Hill area in the late 50s. I was born there in 1957. We moved from there in 1960 to Boyle Heights. My mother, Now 94, Still remembers Angels Flight. Yes, It was a slum.
The photo at 10:18 shows, circa 1965, some final mopping up of Bunker Hill. You can see on the left how the grading has been done for the Dodger Stadium parking lot off in the distance.
Tony B. online Actually, the Coconut Grove of the Ambassador Hotel is the only structure they haven’t torn down for the repurposing. The Coconut Grove still stands as the renovated Broadway style theater of Robert F. Kennedy Community School.
Much of the states west of the Mississippi sold rail ways to Big Automobile companies. Auto companies did away with much of the rail ways forcing people to purchase cars.
Wow. The Angelinos of the 1950s really hated their city. Walt Disney built his park 35 miles away. Walter O'Malley built Dodger Stadium away from downtown and even positioned the outfield in the opposite direction. The streetcars were torn out. Seems like a schizophrenic period of time when we had a city that was growing yet its citizens did not seem to care to encourage it at the same time.
Venice needs wider roads. In GTA 5 the Vespucci canals (Venice) have a very convenient 2 way street surrounded by the canal waters but in real life LA it is a crappy 1 way street which is so inconvenient and nonsensical. It makes you drive around the block longer to get to your house which is so impractical
Stalin said "It's not the votes that count, it's who counts the votes." We don't actually live in a Democracy anymore, there is only the residue of an old Democratic system still lingering but the state of Democracy has been almost completely commandeered by something else.
Look at the start of the video. Where did all of those old cars go? This tunnel was a storage for towed cars for many years (30's-60's). Who took the cars? Did they go to Cuba?
Does anyone know when this series was originally released? The Venice canals (those that didn’t disappear earlier) are unrecognizable now… the funky, artistic, spirit that I first encountered in the mid-seventies (and I still see in the video), and the small houses and cottages, have been replaced by high-money residents and mega-mansions.
2022,....Great video! That being said, this is happening all over the USA, even in towns & cities that had their historic architecture mostly intact up until the 1970s. The idea of preservation and integration, of old buildings with new, was never a consideration. Complete neighborhood demolition occurred when various interstate throughways were built. Its too bad that in the quest for modernization, that it results in the complete erasure of past architectural accomplishments.
Those empty underground stations and tunnels that connect would be a good resource to build out semi-long term housing for the homelessness issue LA is currently having.
![SAFEPLANET - ดาวเคราะห์ [ THE PLANET ]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/4X1XL3I_k3c/mqdefault.jpg)
Broke my heart when he said “you wave at the people in the other cart when you pass by... nobody there today.” *stares*
That’s everywhere. Every generation less friendly.
absolutely, seeing him re-tell memories of a bygone era at Pershing Square was heartbreaking as well.
:((((( how different everything must be for him
My Papa was born in LA in 1906. Thanks for sharing so many memories
19:00 his love for our city is remarkable, thank you for helping keep the memories and history alive.
I'm the person who put all the blue tape on those walls to show an exit path. This is so cool to see😀
Well done APOC 310 Sir !
Why?
elsizzle2000 I was doing a structural review of the tunnel and permit required an marked exit path.
@@seekwrage thank you for telling me. I'm always curious about many things. Any ghosts or spooky vibes down there?
elsizzle2000 no I haven’t experienced anything yet. I’ve been down there more than a dozen times throughout the old offices, restrooms and msc areas.
It is actually sad to see a beautiful city erased and replaced by a stark environment in contrast
I lived in Los Angeles for 29 years it seemed money was the driving force behind everything. History just got thrown in the garbage.
money is the driving force everywhere... except for portland
No, money is a means to an end that has become worshipped in a sick society as an end in itself. Greed and the cultural decline that accompany it are the results.
Yes, best to leave up rat-filled tenements, Yup.. uh huh
i look at those burning houses like a testament, we don't see burning houses for eminent/public domain. There is something missing in this documentary besides ever changing landscapes.
Khayyam1048 yes the Roman Empire is a testimony to that narrative
I lived there when LA was starting the change. I remember when City Hall could be seen, the tallest building...the then when it was hidden. Angels flight in the 50s was fun! I remember a nighttime party when one could reserve the streetcar for the evening. So sad to see all the classics gone.
All of my Grandparents lived in LA ...My folks met on a Red Car #33 . We found that car at the lovely Perris Trolly Museum !
“Bulldozed in the name of progress”-six of the saddest words
You can spin it many ways. Mud flood.
It's the American way!
Sadly, a lot of the post-World War II development in downtown L.A. was driven by the automobile. Sure, there was a need for public buildings (the courthouses, the County Hall of Administration, and the Music Center), but look at all the land that was taken for parking lots. The trolley lines that still existed in the 1940's and 50's could've been upgraded with new equipment, and entire blocks of old buildings would've been saved. There might not have been the need to build the 110 Freeway south of the 101. Then, the remaining buildings on Bunker Hill could've been seismically retrofitted and renovated as needed. We didn't need to lose nearly all of those historic buildings.
The Castle from Bunker Hill was beautiful. I loved LA, but it didn't love me back. Should've stayed a little bit longer, it was the best time of my life. Lived the summer of 1981 at the top of that old apt bldg down from Sidewalk Cafe. Thanks from this lonely old man for giving me a smile.
I love history and watching this hurts ... that castle was one beautiful home every home in that time.. was beautiful it's so sad...
There are thousands still around just like it. Huge monstrosities with lots of tiny rooms.
I love LA. I love hopping on my motorcycle or car and driving around all over the city! I love the sights and sounds. The shopping, restaurants and bars! It’s a freakin’ blast! I can’t understand why people wouldn’t love it. Boring, dull squares!
Really glad found this channel.
I grew up in Los Angeles in the 60’s and 70’s. This film is sad and depressing.
"The absence is a presence..." love that.
The Bunker Hill segment is very poignant. Imagine growing up in a neighborhood that has been completely obliterated in the name of "progress." All those vestiges of your childhood and early life totally erased from the Earth. Really haunting and sad!
This is what happened to my home Denver. Its terribly sad.
Man... this doc could really use Huell's touch!
Hi! I'm Huell Howser and this is,
Reshaping L.A., Part of California’s Gold.
I miss Huell. Loved his shows!
Huell was the gold standard, pun intended, of California History. We would get properly shot documentary which means no stupid screen tinting and no extraneous mood shots. And we would for sure not get millennial politics.
@@encinobalboa oh shut up. It's not millennial politics, it's people finally having a heart for the city and its history. It's just that it's easier for you to disregard this as some youngins stupid diatribe because you don't want to acknowledge problems in the city.
@@ganginfr4923 Great debate tactic, "oh shut up"! Socialism is your only prospect. Sad, very sad.
Love that guy
AWESOME I LOVE HISTORY!! ESPECIALLY MY CITY OF LOS ANGELES!!!
me too
I used to ride on Angel's Flight every time my dad used to take me to the Central Market. It was the highlight of my day! 💕 😁👍
Mark & Emy Shibukawa us too, and Pershing square at Christmas time was like what I thought New York city was as a child. Oh and Hollywood at Christmas time !
Loved the old central market. ..now it's infested with hipsters .
Doesn't have the same feel....same with Cliftons
I loved the Central Market! In the fall time my mom and my sisters used to go purchase the candied fruit for her fruitcakes.. Mom makes a mean fruitcake.. Now I have to go to Farmers Market to purchase the fruit.
I used to do the same with my mom as a kid. Great memories of Angels Flight and the Grand Central Market .
@@albertalbert5612 Yes and Yes, exactly what Albert Albert said. Kinda knew I'd prob never call L.A. home again when we came dn to visit fam/friends & discovered we'd been gentrified out of Highland Park, Grand Central Mkt & Clifton's Cafeteria! At least Carnitas Michoacan was still itself.
I grew up in L.A. and it has changed so much in the 20 years since I moved away. I wish I could have seen it when my Mom & Dad first arrived there from Idaho and Texas.
I remember one night, driving downtown with my grandparents, to watch one of the great old houses on Bunker Hill burn. So very sad. The LA I grew up in is not the same.
I wonder if the house you saw burn was The Castle.
Imagine how stunning it would be to see all those beautiful historic houses on Bunker Hill, instead of these sky-scraping business buildings
I'm from Akron Ohio. I love local history and how cities used to be and how they are now. This production is amazing. Thanks for sharing.
The young guy with the backpack brought absolutely ZERO to the story.
The castle was def set ablaze by developers....bastards
TraRob-EastSide exactly what I was thinking! I was like... ok so what’s the point besides that you’re an explorer who takes pictures? I was confused after his scenes played.
"Like... looking for new shots I guess", "Because, Like, there's just like weird people in the metro like, so I put my headphones on, like, then I take my headphones off, Like.. So I don't miss my stop, like"
That young guy with the backpack and camera is hope for the future,he's interested in the past,not just stuck on his cell phone!
@@slvrbaq HAHA! I skipped him everytime i saw his interview. He was annoying.🤦
@Phil Graves WELL SAID BRO!👍🏽
10:43 my mom lived on Bunker Hill back then too, and she's still alive today. I road The Original Angel's Flight many times until it was closed in 69 as a child. I'm nostalgic, I see no positive progress destroying the past for the for the future.
NEW THINGS HAVE NO CHARACTER NO CHARM
True but at least there's new push to bring street cars, but too late for the grand old homes.
in the name of progress. what they call progress today is criminal.
Lets see the mission that was demolished to build those houses in the 1880's.
I rode the original Angels Flight back in 1968 only once before it closed down. Can't even recognize it any more by driving through the tunnel where it once stood.
I just love these series... thank you so much KCET for bringing them to us! Absolutely fascinating to learn about the past of this city.
All those old House's and buildings gone all for tall skyscrapers . They should have kept these historic homes and buildings relocate them in another part of the city. I wish we still have those old red cars . Are air quality would be cleaner . We wouldn't have to take a bus . Trolleys don't break down like a bus and car do. The city should be ashamed of it self.
Gilbert Valadez some they actually did preserve and relocate to Highland Park called Heritage Park.. Now go see them.
They've been preserved in certain pockets - they're in Westwood Village, downtown Hollywood, the Historic Core (the parts which haven't been gutted), and in really odd places you wouldn't guess...I remember taking a picture of a house that looked like a complete slum one night, but the architecture suggested that it had been built between 1910-1930. There's history in Los Angeles in the strangest little places. Oh! And Santa Monica.....Santa Monica collectively fought to preserve the mid-century suburban architecture of the residential neighborhoods in the 70s and 80s....there is also mid-century residential architecture in Playa Del Rey and Venice. I constantly gravitated to those places for years. I was even fascinated by the shitty motels on Century Blvd for a short period of time ,overlooking the crack dealers around to spend a couple of nights at the Airport Motel....that big Travelodge on the corner there on Century was built by an old Hollywood actor and his wife in the 1940s and you can tell if you actually stay inside one of the rooms. There are some cool places left in L.A. I think people should fight for every bit of it.
Yes, How very true.
i so agree with you about everything. came here in 1951 with my parents from europe. my mom and i would take the red car from downtown to venice for my lessons at meglen studios. i miss all these historic homes and buildings. i make art about them which i exhibit in museums and galleries.
Like with Houston had street cars but street cars are coming back. Could say the street cars should have never left, but better late than never
I'm the same age as Gordon who lived on Bunker Hill in the Castle. My parents moved from Indianapolis in 1948 to Van Nuys, bought a stucco house near Roscoe and Sepulveda. Unlike Gordon's house, that house is still there; the whole neighborhood is still there and recognizable. Funny what gets kept and what doesn't.
One of my best friends lived in Bunker Hill Towers. It had a beautiful view of Downtown LA.
I lived at Bunker Hill Towers for eight years, and loved it. For a sense of what Bunker Hill was like in the '40s, read "Dreams from Bunker Hill," by John Fante. Easy, enjoyable read
So sad and So Awesome at the same time, I too came from a small community on South Eastern Lake Erie just north of Toledo Ohio where I was born, but grew up in a once upon a time place much like Venice, Luna Pier Michigan, Once known as Lakewood Village ( where I grew up) in the early 1900's till the 1964( City of Luna Pier incorporated,) It was a Summer Retreat for the hard working wealthy business people of their day. It had five Lagoons and a Harbor with a Yacht Club known as the Lakewood Club on 14th Street,( I lived on 12th St.) Many good memories flood my minds eye thinking about it. Off of the I-75 Highway North to Detroit in Monroe County off the Shores of Lake Erie exit Luna Pier Road to the Lake was a Pier that stretched out into the Lake of which it bares it's Name in the 1920's was a Summer Attraction for the whole family my Dad shared stories of when he was a boy growing in Monroe his family would go there for summer fun and later in his 20's would play drums for a Big Band Group on the Pier. He had many stories of a once thriving community, but again as time went buy and business's would move out the fun came to a halt. In 1950 the Old Pier was vandalized and burned down the stilts that once carried it's weight and glory!
In the 1960's it became a thriving urban City with its public Lighting and new Sewer Plant Utilities and Flood Control Channels( the five lagoons and old harbor). The Noreaster Storms off the Lake would flood the City for days( 1974, 1977 & 78 of what I remember).
After High School I moved to Los Angeles to work for family and this is where I have called home for the past 38 years and raised a family of my own (Burbank) and now working for the City of LA.
I have loved the City of Angels from day one and haven't ever wanted to go anywhere else.
But retirement is fast approaching now and the times are still changing and I will so have to say good bye (to be closer to Kids and grandkids) and not by choice, it will be hard to leave but I have other places and other family to visit and see, but Los Angeles will always be forever be my HOME!.
Time changes everything, when I’m old I guarantee you that stuff we have today will be forgotten or changed in a major way.
@ 13:40 He Really Cares About Those Houses God Bless You Sir
You should come to the Southern California railroad museum.
Our Barn one is dedicated to Los Angeles railroad history
I'm proud and honored to have grown up in Venice, unfortunately gentrification pushed us out in the 90's! my memories of the canals were different, in the 70's and 80's the canal were a very dangerous place lots of drugs and gangs, it looked nothing like it does now! Venice was a great place and I still go back at least once a month because I miss it. I now live in Long Beach and it kind of reminds me of the old Venice, but it not the same! Real Venice forever!
Saw an episode of Perry Mason last week - It was the last tester episode in glorious colour - That featured Angel Flight ! - it was amazing to watch ! - Nice to see it still working !
Thanks for sharing SB - British Isles
I lived in a 100 year old industrial warehouse turned into my living working loft. for 18 years me and my girlfriend created all kinds of art and machines and instruments for film TV and concerts.
The building had 60 foot beams in the ceilings and walls, lumber no long available in those lengths as those trees as well are long gone, But long story short Trammel Crow Company bought the property rudely and unceremonious told us to get the hell out with little time to scramble for a new situation. This of course ruins several other peoples businesses while their stuffed suits came in and said this is so cool now get out and proceeded to bulldoze the entire block to make way for expensive hideous condos for thousands a month rent for millennial wankers. All while claiming they provide "housing" striping the real life out of the entire downtown. Greed kills art once again. but alas all anyone really cares about is maximizing profits and money. The mindset of a cancer.
Well bro, LA is cancer. So I don’t know what you expected lol
Yeah, your nothing new,you had your space for a time, now the “wankers” have their time. History is what we remember, then forget, 100 years from now, who cares ?
@@KingSlimjeezy I have seen more greedy weasel boy s(um bags here than anywhere else I have been and I have been all over the world and in almost every state in the USA... it seems California attracts them like flys... they will sell their own grandma to a glue factory to get rich.
@@jrnymn14 so basically you are one of them.
Lived in topanga in the 80s, then Venice Beach in early 90s, change was a constantly evolving thing, was happy for the time I had, I don’t recognize it now, but I’m sure there were old guys who didn’t recognize it in my time
As an historic preservationist from the Midwest, it has been only within the last ten years that I had heard about and then learned about Bunker Hill and it’s fight to survive. Your segment on the neighborhood was superbly written and edited and completely heart wrenching. One could tangibly feel the lament of it’s loss as your storyteller recalled his living memories of the place. I’d say if ever there was a better made presentation to support the need for preserving history, I don’t know what it would be. Thank you for sharing the lesson.
I sure hope that they properly archive those old photos. It would be ashamed if they were to become lost.
michellecalling.
At my age i would volunteer to digitize those photos for a year or so !
Those pictures were not meant to be looked at....pretty silly statement.
The auto industry alongside the oil and the tire industry supplanted the most efficient train system in it's time. Here in Los Angeles we haven't recovered instead of putting in trains we put in toll roads. Just so everyone can continue to be screwed
Nobody wants to ride a train. We all want to drive to our job get a bite to eat and drive home that’s why they went out of business.
@@senilejoe7932 my wife and I drive over to the metro station to go to downtown LA. We are a modern city.
Thank you for documenting and sharing history
One episode, I am hooked. What a beautiful film.
Lost LA is my favorite program.
Very sad what they did to old LA, they destroyed it's old neighborhoods, they didn't develop the existing and very excellent rail transit system, but instead they destroyed it, and they promoted urban sprawl and paved over of Southern California with freeways. What a tragedy!
Yes, you're absolutely right. The Pacific Electric Railroad, which was privately owned, could've been taken over by the MTA/County of Los Angeles. (The P.E. was on the brink of bankruptcy at the time.) Many of the tracks and rights-of-way still existed well into the 1950's; our public officials just needed to invest in new trolley cars and upgrade the electrical system as needed. Most of the P.E.'s cars were old and pretty beaten up, so those had to be replaced.
These guys are bringing great memories back to life thanks guys 👍😀
My Boozing buddy went to LA for a few weeks holiday - He brought some Photographs back of various areas - But after looking at venice beach ! - I feel in love with those homes around Venice Canals -Ha ! - My best mate flew half way around the world ! - And stayed in LA with his workmates brother ! - Who turned out to be my wifes cousin ? - Who's living there - But we didnt know until seeing him on my pals photographs ? Thats fate for you !
Thanks for sharing this viideo ! SB - British Isles
It is so sad to see how badly LA has devolved over the past 20 years. Such a rapid and decisive decline.
It’s amazing the amount of hatred that an historical video brings out in people. Reading the comments feels like sitting in a bar full of the losing and the lost.
Or, you could just watch the video and not READ the comments... that's one way to get around feeling lost and a loser.
Music soundtrack was perfectly Los Angeles!! Great job!
Thank you for showing information and visuals about Bunker Hill. I knew little about it.
Please show us more about ancient LA!
He kept so many unique little personal artifacts from his past, and keeps them locked up in a glass cabinet in his home.
But clearly he's not going to live forever. What's going to happen to it all when he's gone?
Will his children and grandchildren inherit it?
And, what happens when they're all gone?
How long will that stuff stay preserved in a special little protected collection somewhere?
Unless it's eventually donated to a historical trust or museum, it's more than likely destined for a landfill. Sadly. Where almost all of the rest of the artifacts from those particular contexts ended up.
It's heartbreaking, the passage of time and the value we place on seemingly unremarkable objects, beloved only by the ones with distinct prior connections of their own with the artifacts.
As time marches steadily and relentlessly forward, the past is being systematically erased from existence and concepts such as nostalgia are reserved for the select few who had personal experiences of their own with it.
But, once those people are gone, that tie is severed irrevocably forever.
Fortunately we have the technology to preserve a majority of what once was in the form of digital photographs and video footage.
TH-cam itself, I imagine, will eventually become a repository in its own right for recording for posterity.
I suppose that's a small but significant silver lining after all. 👍
$100,000 bought you a nice mansion back in the day.
RADIUM CLOCK In San Diego, in the 1800s, the entire Rancho Agua Hedionda was sold for $4,000. Nowadays, the city of Carlsbad, CA occupies that space and a single home will cost you 1 million dollars.
@1Jvelocity99 shoes were only a can and 2 pennies
Great stuff... thanks for sharing!
20:50 that beat fire
It is! That's Matt Glass from HCT.Media right there. He made all the music for this segment.
They tore down the huge sandhill by my house we used to sled at in the winter and put a highway in. Now you can't really access the "beer cave" from the early 1900's beer storage. Pretty neat...kids on that street now have no idea it's there.
So many beautiful, priceless buildings destroyed or leveled. Los Angeles should have kept to the plans of old Los Angeles. Keeping the old homes would have saved affordable housing and decrease homelessness. Los Angeles lost the grander which attracted most of the Tourists who flocked here. We lost a plethora of small businesses along the Santa Monica Air-Line and within Santa Monica.
The homes in the Venice canals have changed over the years - most significantly in the past 15 years or so. Many of the small plots now have multi-level, modern luxury homes. I'm surprised that it wasn't mentioned that the gentleman in the video is living in one of the only remaining original bungalows.
I definitely got the impression from things the residents said that there are precious few that remain.
I miss living in Venice. Beautiful place to live.
So much we don't know but see on daily basis, just to pass it & call it another day gone.
I lived by 7th and Witmer was a child back in the mid 70s I got a glimpse of some of the older homes being just removed after being vacant and abandoned for years I would say and I also got to see some buildings go up too I can tell you that some of those older houses were very well crafted unlike today’s homes of just flat surfaces no character or dedication put into them at all
I also remember some of those homes in the early to mid seventies. I remember as a child back then,telling my brother that the houses looked like haunted houses.
Since this film’s narrator failed to tell the real story about the building of the Venice Canals, I will. Mr. Abbott Kinney was a very progressive man for his era, and he deliberately hired black men to build those canals at a time when blacks were not welcomed in that area. These workmen lived right next door to Venice in a vibrant community called Oakwood, in homes that Mr. Abbott Kinney built for them. Mr. Kinney always welcomed blacks to participate in the lifestyle he created for others. He knew what he was doing and was determined to do it. When he died, he left his Venice home to one of his black employees. I find it shameful that KCET chose to “whitewash” this important piece of Los Angeles history in this video. Revisionism be dammed.
Thank you for that Gold Nugget Information!
Amazing this man should get more praise just like jack daniels
Yep im familiar with the oakwood section 😀
@ SighDown
Thank you! Well done!
Let's hope it was a loss due to time constraints or mere ignorance of the producers.
I didn't know that, thanks for sharing.
Fun Fact in the early 20th century , Los Angeles had the Longest streetcar system in the World at over 1000 miles.
😃😃😃😃😃😃😃😃😃😃💖💖💖💖💖💖💖
THAT FIRE AT THE CASTLE! SEEMS QUITE SUSPICIOUS, EH?
This was nice, but too much music. I mean, one guy was talking and suddenly he was cut and music just played as you see his mouth moving for like 15 seconds. Why?
lol
Really enjoyed this. Thank you!!!
A fun time capsule film that features some of those old steep hills, especially Bunker Hill, is the late-period noir Kiss Me Deadly. The film, which really is a trip even today, makes very atmospheric use of the old stairs and funiculars.
One of the best weekend amateur videos I have seen. You should try to get this on some kind of syndication.
4th generation Angelino, travelled the country / world and I wouldn't live anywhere else.
I dreamed of California as a kid while growing up in Cleveland. It wasn't easy to get here. Life gets in the way...jobs, etc. Been coming to California for 15 yrs. Lived in the redwoods of West Sonoma County for 6 yrs and now live down the street from the beach in Newport Beach. Dream fulfilled.
You just don't know any better, traveler or not.
nico napo I'd give anything to live in L.A. but I'm stuck in Texas.
LA my beautiful City welcoming the world. 😍
Really? Where the hell did you go?
I love America's history, are lifes loaded of feelings. It's very sad what happened. People without memories and respect has no life.
The houses on trailers - 10:18 Wow! Angel's Flight - 10:21 , 10:27
The GM street car conspiracy definitely had something to do with it
The butthurt urban planners who regret not having the power over how people live their lives makes me smile...
Very interesting, also for someone from Germany
SnipzSmooth every place has its buried history my friend.
The land originally belonged to Native Americans. It was colonized by the Spanish. Mexico won their independence from Spain and took control of California from Spain. Mexico then sold California and the southwest to the US after the Mexican American war. The US paid Mexico for California in the treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo. If anyone has a land claim, it's the native tribes not Mexico.
So is Berlin
Is it me or the one guy that was reminiscing about Angels Flight Trolley looked sad? 😪🤔
My family lived in Bunker Hill area in the late 50s. I was born there in 1957. We moved from there in 1960 to Boyle Heights. My mother, Now 94, Still remembers Angels Flight. Yes, It was a slum.
The photo at 10:18 shows, circa 1965, some final mopping up of Bunker Hill. You can see on the left how the grading has been done for the Dodger Stadium parking lot off in the distance.
In 1997 while doing work for AIG I got a personal tour of the fabulous Ambassador Hotel. The idiots bulldozed it in the 2000s very sad loss for LA
Tony B. online Actually, the Coconut Grove of the Ambassador Hotel is the only structure they haven’t torn down for the repurposing. The Coconut Grove still stands as the renovated Broadway style theater of Robert F. Kennedy Community School.
@@whathell6t that's great to know!
Much of the states west of the Mississippi sold rail ways to Big Automobile companies. Auto companies did away with much of the rail ways forcing people to purchase cars.
Thank god we aren’t all jammed into urban towers like the planners all wanted!!!
Why cant the city utilize the abandoned spaces, somehow make it livable for the homeless, instead of using it for absolutely nothing.
Marion Steam shovel! That’s some history
Màry Ann and the steam shovel?? Was my favorite book when I was very young!
I love LA though I don't live there anymore it got way to crowded for me
Hope you don't vote democRAT
Wow. The Angelinos of the 1950s really hated their city. Walt Disney built his park 35 miles away. Walter O'Malley built Dodger Stadium away from downtown and even positioned the outfield in the opposite direction. The streetcars were torn out. Seems like a schizophrenic period of time when we had a city that was growing yet its citizens did not seem to care to encourage it at the same time.
It's all Politics and Progress.
sad about bunker hill but i think as time goes by we learn more about historic preservation and get better at it
I love this show.
Imagine if... things where left alone with cable cars and respected what was Los Angeles in it's best Days
Venice needs wider roads. In GTA 5 the Vespucci canals (Venice) have a very convenient 2 way street surrounded by the canal waters but in real life LA it is a crappy 1 way street which is so inconvenient and nonsensical. It makes you drive around the block longer to get to your house which is so impractical
Stalin said "It's not the votes that count, it's who counts the votes."
We don't actually live in a Democracy anymore, there is only the residue of an old Democratic system still lingering but the state of Democracy has been almost completely commandeered by something else.
This never was a democracy, its a republic.
Commandeered by an international banking cartel
👍👏😊 Thanks for showing
*VENICE~ Any place with the word NICE in it, has to be a great place to live!!!*
the subway is now an apartment complex the shape is still there but its blocked out its a dog park now
Look at the start of the video. Where did all of those old cars go? This tunnel was a storage for towed cars for many years (30's-60's). Who took the cars? Did they go to Cuba?
That was neat.
it so very very sad the old Los Angeles is gone with the wind.........
Politicians, lobbyist stopped (and destroyed) public transportation in LA.
Sherman, Torrance all would be disappointed...
Does anyone know when this series was originally released? The Venice canals (those that didn’t disappear earlier) are unrecognizable now… the funky, artistic, spirit that I first encountered in the mid-seventies (and I still see in the video), and the small houses and cottages, have been replaced by high-money residents and mega-mansions.
Good documentary I love Los Angeles I hate to see the historic stuff go they're so beautiful why tear them down😢😔😞
2022,....Great video! That being said, this is happening all over the USA, even in towns & cities that had their historic architecture mostly intact up until the 1970s. The idea of preservation and integration, of old buildings with new, was never a consideration. Complete neighborhood demolition occurred when various interstate throughways were built. Its too bad that in the quest for modernization, that it results in the complete erasure of past architectural accomplishments.
Is there an episode 2 online?
Those empty underground stations and tunnels that connect would be a good resource to build out semi-long term housing for the homelessness issue LA is currently having.
The Films The Indestructible Man and 1950 version on M have extensive footage shot on Angels flight and Bunker Hill