Face To Face With the Black Dahlia's Ghost edition

Gentle reader...

Hallowe'en has come and gone, and with it a week packed with sweetly sinister press clippings for our scrapbook.

We spoke with Vice, Matter and The Frame about Elisa Lam's strange death in the Hotel Cecil's water tank (back in the news thanks to the new season of American Horror Story), and were featured in a New York Times Travel section article about Touring the Dark Side. We were also pleased to see The Daily Breeze pick up our LAVA scoop on the endangered Port of Los Angeles Archives.

On Hallowe'en day, we got a trick and a treat when a resident of a Black Dahlia murder suspect's home unexpectedly climbed aboard our tour bus to share personal experiences with a ghostly female figure. When asked what this wraith looked like, our visitor pointed straight at a tour guest who had dressed for the occasion as the Real Black Dahlia herself, Beth Short!

Tomorrow night, we'd love to see you at the Million Dollar Theatre on Broadway, for a packed night of noir Los Angeles history, all for the benefit of the coolest funicular we know, Angels Flight Railway.

And on Thanksgiving, we hope you can join us for an intimate no-host LAVA gathering at Clifton's Cafeteria, finally reopened after four years of restoration work. For details or to RSVP, click here.

Are you an ebook fan who doesn't carry a Kindle? Then you'll want to know that Kim's 1920s mystery novel The Kept Girl is now available in all formats, direct from Esotouric Ink.

We're back on the bus on Saturday with Raymond Chandler's Los Angeles, a journey from jazz age excess to Hollywood hissy fits, with some beautiful writing crafted along the way. We've got a very special guest riding along who true Chandler fans won't want to miss. So join us, do!

RECOMMENDED READING

Offering a redreshing take on iconic Los Angeles novelist Raymond Chandler, Victor Verney's slim volume of criticism and biography looks at the author through the particular filter of his little understood wartime service. After settling in Los Angeles, Chandler enlisted in the Canadian Expeditionary Forces, a branch of service that saw terrible combat in France. Chandler was the sole survivor of his unit, and the guilt and shock haunted him and snakes its way through his life and work. A coda to the book covers our discovery of Chandler's lost comic operetta and speculates on the reasons the Chandler Estate might not want it to be staged.

COMING SOON

RAYMOND CHANDLER'S L.A. - SAT. 11/7... Follow in the young writer's footsteps near his downtown oil company offices to sites from The Lady in the Lake and The Little Sister, meet several real inspirations for the Philip Marlowe character and get the skinny on Chandler's secret comic operetta that we discovered in the Library of Congress nearly a century after it was written. Plus a stop at Scoops for noirish gelato creations and a visit to Larry Edmunds Bookshop. (Buy tickets here.)

BLOOD & DUMPLINGS - SAT. 11/14... Forget Hollywood, babe, 'cause the quintessential L.A. town is definitely El Monte, its history packed with noirish murders, brilliant thespians, loony Nazis, James Ellroy's naked lunch and the lion farm that MGM's celebrated kitty called home. See all this and so much more, including the Man from Mars Bandit's Waterloo, when you climb aboard the daffiest crime tour in our arsenal, and the only one that includes a dumpling picnic at a landmark playground populated with fantastical giant sea creatures. (Buy tickets here.)

ECHO PARK BOOK OF THE DEAD - SAT. 11/21... New on our calendar, a crime bus tour meant to honor the lost souls who wander the hills and byways of the "streetcar suburbs" that hug Sunset Boulevard. See seemingly ordinary houses, streets and commercial buildings revealed as the scenes of chilling crimes and mysteries, populated by some of the most fascinating people you'd never want to meet. Plus a visit to Sister Aimee Semple McPherson's exquisite Parsonage, now a museum. (Buy tickets here.)

LAVA's THANKSGIVING GATHERING AT CLIFTON'S CAFETERIA - THURS. 11/26... Join us and the history loving LAVA community to enjoy your holiday meal, or dessert and coffee on your way to grandmother's house, in a reserved space at the historic Clifton's Cafeteria. No host food and drink. Space is limited, so reservations are essential.

RICHARD'S 47th BIRTHDAY BUS TOUR OF THE PALOS VERDES PENINSULA - SAT. 11/28... Pack a picnic lunch (we’ll supply the birthday cake and coffee) and join us for an all-day outing exploring the history, landscape and built environment of the Palos Verdes Peninsula. This is a one-time only special event bus adventure that will never be repeated. (Get more info and buy tickets here.)

PASADENA CONFIDENTIAL - SAT. 12/5...The Crown City masquerades as a calm and refined retreat, where well-bred ladies glide around their perfect bungalows and everyone knows what fork to use first. But don't be fooled by appearances. Dip into the confidential files of old Pasadena and meet assassins and oddballs, kidnappers and slashers, black magicians and all manner of maniac in a delightful little tour you won't find recommended by the better class of people. (Buy tickets here.)

HOTEL HORRORS & MAIN STREET VICE - SAT. 12/12... Through the 1940s, downtown was the true city center, a lively, densely populated, exciting and sometimes dangerous place. But while many of the historic buildings remain, their human context has been lost. This downtown double feature tour is meant to bring alive the old ghosts and memories that cling to the streets and structures of the historic core, and is especially recommended for downtown residents curious about their neighborhood's neglected history. (Buy tickets here.)

2016 tours include: The Real Black Dahlia (1/9), Charles Bukowski's L.A. (1/16), The Lowdown on Downtown (1/23), Eastside Babylon (1/30), South Los Angeles (2/7), Raymond Chandler's L.A. (2/13), Weird West Adams (2/20) and Boyle Heights & the San Gabriel Valley.

LAVA'S FORENSIC SCIENCE SEMINAR - SUN. 1/17

Four times a year, we gather in the teaching crime labs of Cal State Los Angeles under the direction of Professor Donald Johnson to explore the history and future of American forensic science. Your $36.50 ticket to Detective's Casebook: L.A. Bombing & The Making of A Serial Killer benefits graduate level Criminalistics research. For more info, click here.

OUR HISTORIC L.A. PODCAST

In the latest edition of You Can't Eat the Sunshine, we're back from hiatus with a bang as we talk shop with restoration architect Brian Kite and peep inside the wild 1950s diary of Clifton's Cafeteria camera girl Vilma. Click here to tune in.

AND FINALLY, LINKS

The creative spirits of the Villa Carlotta act up when the Hollywood Arts Council throws a party on their graves.

Tall new neighbors proposed for our beloved Crossroads of the World.

The pier people.

Mourning California.

Too hip to die, viva Ebony/Jet!

As the starchitect hogs the spotlight, the river laughs.

The historic Formosa Cafe, recently ruined by clueless management, pledges a return to its vintage style--but wants fans to pay for it.

Now in Los Angeles thanks to the Wilde-tastic Clark Library: a century's letters from one Chelsea house.

On Vincent Price, arts educator and East L.A.'s great cultural benefactor.

SUPPORT OUR WORK

If you enjoy all we do to celebrate and preserve Los Angeles history and would like to say thank you, please consider putting a little something into our digital tip jar. Your contributions are never obligatory, but always appreciated.

yrs,
Kim and Richard
Esotouric