Gentle reader,
There are some historic spaces in Los Angeles where we have been privileged to explore, but can’t easily bring tour groups. But with a cell phone in our pocket, we’re able to document these special places and share them virtually.
So if you sign up for Sunday’s walk through 147 years of cultural history at Evergreen Cemetery in Boyle Heights, you won’t get to poke your head inside the old cremation ovens in the basement of the Ivy Chapel. It’s just too cramped a space, and packed with gear used by the cemetery crew.
You will, however, get to know some of the incredible souls who rest forever in the soil of the Eastside’s oldest and largest burial ground, including one cult leader, one assassin, a gaggle of carnie kin, a bold and reckless aviator, the forgotten victims of a ghastly train crash and a sweet guy who taught cats to read the future.
And after a very rainy winter, the old trees are looking exceptionally lovely, and providing homes to a wide variety of birds, including a kestrel who is quick as a whip.
It’s a tour very close to our hearts, and we’d love to see you there, so join us, do!
Yours for Los Angeles,
Kim & Richard
Esotouric
Are you on social media? We’re on Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, Mastodon, Threads, Bluesky, Substack Notes, TikTok and Reddit sharing preservation news as it happens.
Our work—leading tours and historic preservation and cultural landmark advocacy—is about building a bridge between Los Angeles' past and its future, and not allowing the corrupt, greedy, inept and misguided players who hold present power to destroy the city's soul and body. If you’d like to support our efforts to be the voice of places worth preserving, we have a tip jar and a subscriber edition of this newsletter, vintage Los Angeles webinars available to stream, in-person tours and a souvenir shop you can browse in. We’ve also got recommended reading bookshelves on Amazon and the Bookshop indie bookstore site. You can share this post to win subscriber perks. And did you know we offer private versions of our walking and bus tours for groups big or small? Or just share this link with other people who care.
UPCOMING BUS & WALKING TOURS
• Evergreen Cemetery, 1877 (Sun. 8/4) • Know Your Downtown L.A.: Tunnels To Towers To The Dutch Chocolate Shop (Sat. 8/17) • Broadway: Downtown Los Angeles’ Beautiful, Magical Mess (Sun. 8/25) • Raymond Chandler’s Noir Downtown Los Angeles (Sat. 8/31)• Alvarado Terrace & South Bonnie Brae Tract (Sat. 9/7) • Highland Park Arroyo (Sat. 9/21) • The Real Black Dahlia (Sat. 9/29) • The Run: Gay Downtown L.A. History (Sun. 10/13) • Evergreen Cemetery, 1877 (Sun. 10/27) • Westlake Park Time Travel Trip (Sun. 11/3)
CLOSELY WATCHED TRAINS
The march by Hotel Cecil tenants to Los Angeles City Hall asking that officials act to make the derelict building habitable was one of the most moving protests we’ve ever been part of. Here’s a fantastic wrap up by Shawn Smith, who brought the hopeful yellow banner, and coverage by LAist and ABC7. We live streamed the march (with a mini Main Street tour by Kim) and public comment (part 1 and part 2), though the audio is better on the city’s feed. The tenants were very brave to speak up, and they’re worth listening to. Fix the Cecil!
Marilyn Monroe house landmarking update: a code violation complaint for “construction done without permits or inspections,” perhaps the filled in pool, is now under investigation by LADBS.
Capital & Main eviscerates City Hall's toothless home share enforcement scam in an infuriating exposé. Criminals have turned our RSO buildings into illegal hotels citywide. This one even "won" a Grammy nomination! L.A. needs a mass squatter takeover of stolen housing.
RIP 6401 Camellia Ave, North Hollywood. Just flipped for $1.2 M in May as a developer's dream, the vacant house fire is the neighbors' nightmare. No corner house is safe when upzoning rules the land.
San Antonio is far ahead of L.A. requiring salvage when old buildings are demolished and in honoring its gay history. Here, CD 1 councilmember Eunisses Hernandez has done nothing to save the Silver Platter—& the law is on its side. Call her City Hall office and ask her to take a stand! As of July 21, the bar is once again open and welcomes you!
The new Venice Heritage Museum looks like a kick. Let us know if you stop in.
The Arby's Hollywood sign is safe! The Cultural Heritage Commission has sent a letter warning the owners against demolition, alteration or removal while the process plays out. So refreshing to see the CHC initiate a landmark nomination—by popular demand!
But Reddit "urbanists" are incensed the Arby's sign might be saved, and we're clapping back: "We're not amateurs—unlike the housing "experts" whose bad takes are contributing to displacement of vulnerable Angelenos. You gotta spend a lot of time in academia to get the skill set we use in our work, and a lot of time in the streets and policy trenches to know what to do with it."
We got a tip from Shelby Grad in the Los Angeles Times: the beautiful Gothic lamps on the 7th Street Bridge have been stolen! Sure enough, another historic span is now dark and ugly. LAPD dissolved the metal theft unit in 2019 and we're all paying for it. The new Heavy Metal Task Force is making some busts. But we have lost so much, including irreplaceable grave markers, historic monuments and streetlamps, and it should never have happened.
Stop everything and watch this lyrical 28 minute dronescape of the neon scaffold signs of Hollywood and Koreatown. The Artery LA is doing such important documentary work, giving us Los Angeles as the birds see her. Now let's light 'em all up again!
Yamashiro is back on the market as a development opportunity—building around the landmark restaurant and the RSO apartments that have operated as illegal hotel beds for years. Hoping it finds a better steward.
As seen on Empty Los Angeles: RIP 119-121 N Mathews and the poor soul who died inside the boarded up RSO duplex. Flipped in January for $1.3 M to a Thomas James Homes (the artesian spring killers) associated LLC as an ED-1 redevelopment site. Now forever a tomb.
Also on Empty Los Angeles: a lovely 1927 Spanish Revival mansion, a designated contributor to the Hancock Park HPOZ with a Mills Act preservation contract, derelict, boarded up and suffering unpermitted work. The neighbors want to know why and so do we. Trouble is nothing new at this address.
Lost signs and altered landmarks are old friends in this sweet music video from Modern Time Machines.
Ghost Building: The El Mirador Apartments (2015), about the 1929 West Hollywood landmark held empty for spite is one of our most read blog posts ever. 3215 days later, we can share this bittersweet update: the El Mirador is reopening! May it be a happy home again.
RIP 1432 N. Detroit off Sunset (1920-2024). Flipped in May 2023 for $1.5M as a redevelopment site, the latest in the vacant house fire epidemic. We're all paying for this, in lung damage and LAFD costs.
Digging this video from Carnage Asada for "Psychedelic Experiment," filmed in Northeast LA with ruined and still intact landmarks providing a backdrop for a very bad trip. Record release party 8/23 at Artshare.
Demolition by neglect: vacant Hollywood Playhouse (1905) set on fire, destroyed. Now the owner seeks city perks to upzone the parcel. They should be required to include a theater in the project!
Epic trolling by former Los Angeles City Councilmember Mike Bonin, who sat on the dirtiest City Hall horse shoe in a century and never said a peep about the blatant corruption on display—just voted yes to advance Jose Huizar's racketeering motions. Yuck.
We've been posting a lot of depressing demolition footage, and are sorry to fill your head with ugliness. It needs to be documented, but this is not the death of Los Angeles. We truly can steer this civic ship back to gentle seas. It's happening. Join us 8/13!
Here's something you won't see on Sunday's Evergreen Cemetery walking tour