Two Iconic Los Angeles Ladies Have Left Us: saying goodbye to the Melrose Witch & our viral blogging grandma Cutie

Gentle reader...

Some women have IT, that particular quality that draws the eye and sparks the imagination. When you see them, you're captivated and intrigued, and maybe a little intimidated. How can she be so confident and original? What goes on in her mind?

One such woman was Suzan Strauss, better known to Angelenos of a certain age as the Lava Lady or the Melrose Witch. For decades, this stately figure stalked the streets of Hollywood in her magnificent costumes, always color coordinated from platform shoes to ankle-length trousers or skirt to stiff shoulder wrap. Her skin was orange, her hair greased black and massaged into a point, and while her gait appeared sloooooow as molasses, she really got around. It was said she lived in a house clad in black lava rock, that she had been a model and kept wildcats as pets. If you dared to say hello to her, as Kim once did at the Fairfax High School flea market, her painted face would relax into a soft smile, and she would return the greeting, somehow giving nothing of herself away.

In the days before widespread internet use, Lava Lady sightings and speculation spread at parties and bus benches. When she left Los Angeles, it took some time before her absence was widely noted. Her black lava house was painted beige. Fans speculated that she had died, or returned to her home planet. But in time the world became more wired, and images circulated of a familiar figure a continent away. Suzan Strauss had landed in Wellington, Florida, where she was known as the Wellington Witch, and every bit a beloved object of fascination as in Los Angeles.

Suzan Strauss (1930-2016) died in Wellington this month, and fans and friends mourn her passing. We certainly won't see her like again.

Closer to home, and not quite so mysterious, our family has lost our amazing, larger-than-life grandmother Barbara "Cutie" Cooper (1917-2016) at just a few months shy of a century.

Esotouric was a brand new tour company when we moved Cutie and her beloved husband Harry to Boyle Heights, and they joined us on many early bus adventures. Seeking something fun we could do together in their apartment, and wanting to share their charm with a wider audience, we launched The OGs blog, featuring Cutie's advice column and popular Yelp reviews and the pair's sweetly barbed banter. They were bemused but tickled to become internet celebrities with fans all over the world. After Harry died, Cutie worked through her grief in storytelling, which became her memoir Fall in Love For Life: Inspiration from a 73-Year Marriage. It's hard to conceive of life without Cutie, but it's a balm to know that, thanks to our creative collaborations, her humor, grace and memory live on.

We're back on the bus this Saturday with the Hollywood! crime bus tour, featuring some magnificent architecture and weird and terrible tales of dreams gone sour. Just added to our January 2017 calendar: arson detective Ed Nordskog's presentation on the Hollywood Fire Devil case. Join us, do!

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RECENTLY TOURED

Ruined beach cottage awaiting restoration,
Crystal Cove State Beach Historic District.

LAVA'S FORENSIC SCIENCE SEMINAR - SUN. 12/11 & 1/22

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. On December 11, 2016 join us for The Spider-Man Bandit & The Artificial Human Head: Breakthroughs in Crime Scene Investigation. Track a fearless cat burglar/killer through the decades, as his 1970s-era crimes are exposed when the cold case unit tests old DNA. Then learn about new research in blunt force injury, with a chance to perform a hands-on assault on a head built for breaking. Your $36.50 ticket benefits graduate level Criminalistics research. For more info, click here. Then on January 22, 2017, arson detective Ed Nordskog shares his most fascinating recent case, The Hollywood Fire Devil. Click here to reserve.

RECOMMENDED READING

Gene Sculatti was in the first wave of rock writers, when the genre was inventing itself on the wheels of teenage fans' mimeograph machines. He went on to curate the essential cultural touchstone manual The Catalog of Cool and great pocket histories while quietly crafting some astonishing folk art of his own. Just out is Tryin' To Tell A Stranger 'Bout Rock and Roll, a compilation of 50 years of his pop criticism, and it's a funny and insightful time travel trip, from fake Dylans to bubblegum, lost Lennon tapes to a deep dive with Dion.

COMING SOON

HOLLYWOOD! - SAT. 10/1... This new tour reveals the unwritten history of the sleepy suburb that birthed the American dream factory, a neighborhood packed with fascinating lore and architectural marvels. You won’t see the stars’ homes or hear about their latest real estate deals, but we’ll show you where some colorful characters breathed their last, got into trouble that defined the rest of their lives and came up with ideas that the world is still talking about. So for unforgettable stories you won’t hear on anyone else’s Hollywood tour, climb aboard and tour Cross Roads of the World (Robert V. Derrah, 1936) and much more. (Buy tickets here).

PEREIRA IN PERIL: LACMA CAMPUS (1965) - THURS. 10/6... Free (with RSVP) walking tour to raise consciousness about William Pereira's endangered museum structures and the unexplored possibilities of restoring rather than demolishing this mid-century modern compound. (Reserve your spot here).

ECHO PARK BOOK OF THE DEAD - SAT. 10/15... 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. Featuring the Hillside Strangler, the Bat Man's Love Nest and a visit to Sister Aimee Semple McPherson's exquisite Parsonage, now a museum. (Buy tickets here).

RAYMOND CHANDLER'S LOS ANGELES - SAT. 10/22... 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.)

THE REAL BLACK DAHLIA - SAT. 10/29... Join us on this iconic, unsolved Los Angeles murder mystery tour, from the throbbing boulevards of a postwar Downtown to the quiet suburban avenue where horror came calling. After multiple revisions, this is less a true crime tour than a social history of 1940s Hollywood female culture, mass media and madness, and we welcome you to join us for the ride. This tour always sells out, so don't wait to reserve. (Buy tickets here.)

LAVA SUNDAY SALON / WALKING TOUR - SUN. 10/30... Our free (with RSVP) cultural lecture series recently relaunched on the basement level of Grand Central Market. For the October Sunday Salon, it's a talk and a walking tour combined, as architect and historian Alan Hess & our Richard Schave shine a light on the closest Pereira in Peril structure, the architect's 1973 corporate headquarters for Times Mirror Square.

Additional upcoming tours: Weird West Adams (11/5), Eastside Babylon (11/12), Charles Bukowski's L.A. (11/19), Special Event: Richard's Birthday Bus Tour of Long Beach & the South Bay (11/26), Pasadena Confirdential (12/3) and Hotel Horrors & Main Street Vice (12/10).

OUR HISTORIC L.A. PODCAST

Episode #115, Hollywood Book Culture & Downtown’s Chimney Swifts, we talk about the golden age of bookshops with film historian Bob Birchard, then visit the Ornithology section of the Natural History Museum for an insider's look at Vaux' swifts, tiny travelers who nest in landmarks. Click here to tune in. New: find stories on the map!

AND FINALLY, LINKS

Lost Dutch Chocolate Shop mural found in the new Batchelder: Tilemaker exhibition at the Pasadena Museum of History.

Some action spurred by the vandalism of Angels Flight Railway: the city seeks a steward for its neglected neighbor, Angels Knoll.

Some acts, while perfectly legal, are crimes. Demolishing Ray Bradbury’s house, for instance.

Periera in Peril: Time is running out for William Pereira’s modernist legacy.

The only Barney's Beanery that can be taken apart like a kid's toy is Ed Kienholz' installation. This plan stinks!

Kim's musings on favorite crime scenes and memorable L.A. miscreants.

yrs,
Kim and Richard
Esotouric