Update 7/4/2026: At dusk on America’s 250th birthday, LAFD responded to a trash fire that spread to 1559 East 22nd Street, one of three vacant, historic cottages that have pending demolition notices but no record of the required notification sent out to Curren Price in Council District 9. The fire was quickly knocked down, but only after flames reached the roof. LAFD reports that firefighters extinguished the blaze in 18 minutes, preventing any extension into the structure. These are three nice houses that could be moved to Altadena and restored rather than left empty to burn or be torn down for a mysterious redevelopment project.
Gentle reader,
Had things gone according to plan earlier this month at the Clara Shortridge Foltz Criminal Justice Center in Downtown Los Angeles, we’d be writing up a full week of court reporting on the D.A.’s public corruption case against sitting councilmember Curren Price (charges: embezzlement, perjury and conflict of interest) and you’d have a good understanding of the allegations and evidence that might next proceed to trial by jury.
But nothing went according to plan.
We’ve been hoping to read something that might shine a light on the mysterious non-hearing. However, while members of the press were present, there has been no coverage about Curren Price’s delayed pre-trial hearing at all.
Is it any wonder Los Angeles is so ravaged by unchecked corruption?
So we’ll tell you what happened in court—and because it’s all a bit anticlimactic and uncertain, will end with a couple of scoops that are anything but, and an opportunity for you to ask the City to fix something that is very broken.
But before we put on our crime reporter’s hats, like this cute little number Torchy Blane is sporting, a little Esotouric tour news:
• Our walk for Richard’s birthday through the National Register Districts of Alvarado Terrace and the South Bonnie Brae Tract was postponed on account of rain, and has been rescheduled for January 31.
• By popular demand, a new Christmas week date (12/20) has just been added for Know Your Downtown L.A., featuring a rare visit to the Batchelder tiled interior of the Dutch Chocolate Shop, plus two turn of the century hotel basements with nefarious and alluring tunnel systems. We expect this one to sell out, so sign up soon.
• Tours are now listed through April, including walks that celebrate silent film locations, lost and surviving Bunker Hill architecture, a visit to the mummified Old West outlaw Elmer McCurdy museum in West Adams, Olvera Street preservation pals, Hollywood Noir, Valentine’s Day in Angelino Heights and much more.
• And for the holiday season, we’ve got a special offer that’s just the thing for the L.A. lover who already has everything: purchase four walking tour gift certificates, and get an additional ticket for free, which you can gift or use yourself.
And now, back to the courthouse that sits kitty corner from City Hall and the expected start to a week-long, hotly anticipated pre-trial hearing in the public corruption case of The People of the State of California vs. Curren de Mille Price Jr.
Unlike recent Federal prosecutions of Councilmembers Jose Huizar and Mark Ridley-Thomas, this case is brought by the District Attorney, with evidence considered by an investigative Grand Jury comprised of local citizens who have a vested interest in Los Angeles.
On the chance that the Dodgers would win the World Series and hold a parade, all Downtown courthouses had been closed on Monday, November 3. This meant Price’s hearing was rescheduled to begin on Tuesday, November 4.
We arrived early at the Department 42 courtroom on the 3rd floor for the 8:30am bell, and watched the hallway fill up, first with a smattering of reporters, then a wave of witnesses, uniformed cops waiting to go into other courtrooms, press and observers.
There was a palpable buzz that had been absent at prior hearings. It definitely seemed as if, more than two years after Price was indicted, we’d finally get to hear Deputy District Attorney Casey Higgins make his case, and we’d cleared our calendar to be available all week and into the next.
When Price arrived, he was closely shadowed by a large man, all in black with a spiderweb elbow tattoo and tan boots, who appeared to be acting as a bodyguard.
This was the Councilmember’s first public appearance since October 1, when he collapsed at a press event for the outrageously costly and fiscally irresponsible Convention Center expansion project in his district, and was taken away by ambulance.
In the crowded hallway, in a blue suit with a “9” lapel badge representing the district he’s alleged to have sold out, Price appeared hale and hearty, and warmly greeted numerous people who were waiting to be allowed into the courtroom.
When the bailiff finally opened the door, we snagged spots on the far left, with a clear view of Price and his two attorneys on the right side, the D.A.’s prosecutor and investigator on the left. The small courtroom was soon packed full.
And then, under the gimlet eye of the bailiff, we waited… waited… and waited some more. The door to Judge Sean D. Coen’s chambers was open, but no movement or sound could be perceived.
An hour passed. Price took a potty break and returned. A woman’s phone went off, she had no idea how to silence it, and Richard helped her. Kim stopped reading County Supervisor John Anson Ford’s fascinating biography to exchange pleasantries with the man sitting next to her, civil rights attorney Chris Martin. He eventually volunteered that he is running for Price’s seat.
The wait dragged on, and it began to feel surreal. Court isn’t supposed to be like this on a scheduled hearing date. Was the judge ill? Was the clock broken? A man began to pray audibly. The bailiff didn’t shush him.
At 10:10am, Deputy District Attorney Casey Higgins stood up and remarked on the delay. At 10:21am, all the lawyers were called into Judge Coen’s chambers. At 10:25am, the bailiff told everyone to get out because another hearing needed the courtroom.
Exiting, we could see the lawyers standing in front of the judge’s desk, their body language appearing stressed, but the judge himself was still out of sight.
We asked a reporter in the elevator lobby what was going on; she didn’t know, but guessed the case might resume after lunch. The press liaison for the D.A.’s office said she wasn’t sure, either.
We stepped out onto the Temple Street plaza to stretch our legs, and saw Price’s attorney Michael Schafler leaving. “What’s happening?” “We’ll be back December 11, same courtroom.”
Deputy D.A. Casey Higgins soon followed and confirmed the date, noting that instead of a week straight of daily pre-trial testimony, it would now likely be spread out. (It is not clear what effect, if any, this might have on Higgins’ upcoming prosecution of the decade old public corruption case against former Los Angeles County Assessor John “Rodriguez” Noguez and others.)
So we left, perplexed. It didn’t make sense. Everything had been ready to go in that courtroom, which was full of self-identifying witnesses prepared to be sworn in and questioned. Higgins seemed surprised and a bit irked.
What had happened to stall the case? Could it have something to do with the City Attorney’s office and its ongoing efforts to withhold the Councilmember’s communications, and those of his wife Del Richardson (not now nor ever a City employee), under a claim of attorney-client privilege?
We couldn’t help wonder if something happened that judge hadn’t expected, and his response was to leave the defendant, and everyone else, to stew for half the morning.
So what do you think? Did Judge Coen give Curren Price detention? Or was it just a Kafkaesque procedural glitch produced by the court itself? We wish we knew!
Then for the first time since his medical incident on October 1—which the office spokesperson said was merely due to dehydration—the day after this non-hearing, Price finally (physically) returned to work in City Hall. (He had been putting forward motions signed by other CMs, allocating large sums to various purposes.)
So that’s the non-story of the non-hearing. And by reading this far, you’ve earned your first scoop. Curren Price isn’t the only member of his family presently enmeshed in an expensive legal battle related to these allegations.
Price’s wife Del Richardson, whose professional work for the benefit of real estate developers, the Los Angeles Housing Department (LAHD) and Metro is central to the charges against Price, is both suing and being counter-sued by the buyers of her namesake company Del Richardson & Associates.
Richardson, represented by Charles J. McLurkin (and initially also by Jamie T. Hall) of Channel Law Group—the same firm representing the Crane Boulevard Safety Coalition in its case over councilmembers’ use of prepared scripts in the PLUM Committee land use hearings and vanishing Google chats citywide—alleges she is owed more than $394,236.26 for the sale of the business and her employment contract, and that the buyers have been doing unpermitted work on the Inglewood office building she still owns, which is currently for lease for $7500/mo.
Buyers Taureen Gordon and Greenwood Seneca LLC represented by David G. Halm of Quintairos, Prieto, Wood & Boyer, P.A., allege that Richardson “willfully, knowingly, and intentionally, withheld… her knowledge of her and her husband’s misconduct so that [they] would proceed with the Purchase Agreement [and] Employment Agreement.”
Their countersuit alleges Fraud, Breach of Contract, and Unjust Enrichment.
After Curren Price’s June 2023 indictment, the buyers claim DRA’s business saw a 75% decline in revenue as well as the rescinding of a $7 Million LAHD contract (they allege by action of the D.A.’s office, which seems unlikely), and that several large real estate developer clients informed them that they could not work with Del Richardson.
The business Taureen Gordon and Greenwood Seneca LLC purchased in 2021 no longer operates as Del Richardson & Associates; the drainc.com URL now resolves to the Seneca Real Estate Services website, and contracts have been updated. DRA’s slogan, “a heart for the people, a mind for the business,” remains in use.
The conflict is unlikely to be resolved anytime soon: a Final Status Conference is scheduled for 4/30/2027, which gives court watchers plenty of time to read up on this complicated suit and countersuit. Select filings are embedded below.
The second scoop concerns the epidemic of boarded up historic housing held vacant by speculators, the frequency with which housing is demolished with no approved new project, and an unexplained gap in the public notification system intended, by ordinance, to give citizens the opportunity to save buildings from the dump.
It also raises questions about how well Curren Price is representing his constituents while facing serious and costly legal challenges that could send him to prison for many years, supporting his wife in her legal battles, and supervising a Deputy Chief of Staff who is himself running for the Council seat while facing ethics charges for undisclosed lobbying activity.
Federal Judge David O. Carter just described the revelation that the Lincoln Safe Sleep Village camping site in Price’s district has been operating at half capacity, despite contractor Urban Alchemy billing the City for all 88 campsites, as “obvious fraud,” and the City’s attempt to prevent the court from learning about the discrepancy as potentially “contemptuous” (see page 123 here).
Starting in July 2024, after LADBS failed to properly notify Councilmember Traci Park and the Brentwood neighborhood council equivalent about the planned demolition of Marilyn Monroe’s house—which led to an international uproar, a council initiated landmark nomination and costly legal challenge, and to us and other preservationists receiving subpoenas from the property owners’ attorneys—we’ve been filing public records requests to get LADBS letters to council offices about proposed demolitions.
Until this week, when our standard, simple request was not filled due to claimed “unusual circumstances,” these letters have always been provided in a timely fashion.
And until last month, despite what happened in Brentwood, we believed we were receiving all such letters that LADBS sent out, and were hopeful that every demolition application was memorialized with a letter.
But it appears LADBS is still keeping some demolitions of historic buildings secret.
After the Eaton and Palisades Fires, the letters informed our efforts to identify historic houses that might be moved into the burn zone to replace homes that were lost. We have found dozens of them.
Frequently after wrapping up a walking tour, we’ll go out to photograph demo threatened houses and then pass the information on to Morgan Sykes Jaybush at Omgivning, who is leading the Historic House Relocation Project.
We try to know about all historic houses with a pending date with the bulldozer. So we were surprised to get a message last month from preservation pal linlorienelen, letting us know about three charming early 20th century cottages she had discovered on East 22nd Street between Compton and Hooper Avenues in South Los Angeles. Two of them had demolition application signs posted—though illegally placed behind locked gates, too far from the sidewalk to be legible.
Checking LADBS, we confirmed permits were indeed sought to demolish two original Edwardian era cottages in the Dalton Orange Grove Tract that was developed by Frederick P. Dalton (1876-1939) just east of the land his father George (1836-1899) had laid out with orchards: 1563 East 22nd Street (1905) (document 1, document 2) and 1567 East 22nd Street (1907) (document 1, document 2).
But when we searched all public records received from LADBS since July 1, 2024, something was missing: demo applications sent to Curren Price’s office!
That couldn’t be right; South Los Angeles is lousy with demolitions. No documents had CD9 in their filenames, so we searched again for documents containing the City Hall office room number listed on Price’s official City website.
Bingo! Whoa! How had we missed all these CD9 demolition notices?
But they weren’t CD9 demolition notices!
Curren Price has falsely listed another Councilmember’s room number at cd9.lacity.gov, and our search for “Room 430” returned demolitions proposed in City Council President Marqueece Harris-Dawson’s district.
(Parenthetically, the public used to be able to visit the 4th floor of City Hall, but after Jose Huizar was raided by the FBI and photos circulated of agents in branded jackets cleaning out his office, a guard station was installed at the elevator lobby, where citizens are turned away. Lobbyists and developers, presumably, know the password, and are directed to the correct office.)
A search for LADBS letters sent to the correct CD9 room number, (420, natch) returned exactly one demolition application notification, to tear down the 4-car garage behind a 1922 rent stabilized multi-family building on West 42nd Street.
We had to go back in time on the Internet Archive to find Price’s true room number.
Shortly after he was elected in 2013, Price launched a private website not hosted on the lacity.gov machine, branded with his office slogan, The New Ninth.
For a decade, the website at www.the-new-ninth.com has functioned as the primary portal where constituents receive information, and it is still prominently featured on the Councilmember’s official Facebook page and YouTube channel.
But should a resident of CD9 follow Curren Price’s direction and click on The New Ninth website today, they’ll find it has been hijacked by a Vietnamese gambling page (employeeretention.io), and could be exposing them to malware. No contact information or constituent services to be found.
It all seems pretty amateurish for someone whose salary + benefits exceed a quarter of a million dollars a year, and suggests Price’s attention isn’t on serving the people.
So we went down to East 22nd Street to see for ourselves, and encourage anyone in the neighborhood to swing by and check if these cottages are still standing.
After digging through public records (with some help from linlorienelen), here’s what we’ve been able to figure out is going on down there.
On 3/29/2023, contiguous lots on both sides of East 22nd Street at Compton Avenue changed hands in two large, consolidated transactions to what appears to be the same buyer.
On the north side, the three boarded up houses, the small vacant parcel to the east and the large vacant parcel to the west sold for $8.5 Million to NOCHA 1 LLC. On the south side, the active machine shop, warehouse and vacant lots sold for $7 Million to NOCHA 2 LLC. Both LLCs are managed by Raymond Saviss.
There are no demolitions presently sought on the south side. On the north side, only two of the three houses in our video have pending demolitions, while permitting drags on for a proposed NEW 7 STORY WITH ROOF DECK 179 UNITS (100% AFFORDABLE HOUSING) MIXE-USE APARTMENT TO INCLUDE 5 STORY TYPE IIIA APARTMENT OVER 2 STORY TYPE IA PARKING, PER 12.22.A.25/AB2345/AB1763.
Someone on the block told linlorienelen the City owns the land and plans to build affordable housing. The City is not the owner. Nocha 1 LLC’s project was submitted to the Planning Department in April 2023, two months before Price was indicted. There is no public record showing if the council office is involved with the project.
If there’s an affordable housing project planned for East 22nd Street, that’s fine with us. What’s not fine is that three fine Edwardian cottages that could be homes for Altadenans who might not otherwise be able to return to their burned lots don’t have all the rights afforded them under the Los Angeles municipal code and the California Public Records Act, and according to the neighborhood informant, are set to be demolished in January. This can’t happen!
So here’s our ask: please send an email to Councilmember Curren Price (councilmember.price@lacity.org), all his City Council colleagues, and to LADBS GM Osama Younan (osama.younan@lacity.org). A sample message is below, and you can tweak it to be more personal.
To: osama.younan@lacity.org, councilmember.hernandez@lacity.org, Councilmember.Nazarian@lacity.org, councilmember.blumenfield@lacity.org, contactCD4@lacity.org, councilmember.yaroslavsky@lacity.org, councilmember.padilla@lacity.org, councilmember.rodriguez@lacity.org, councilmember.harris-dawson@lacity.org, councilmember.price@lacity.org, cd10@lacity.org, councilmember.park@lacity.org, councilmember.Lee@lacity.org, councilmember.soto-martinez@lacity.org, Councilmember.Jurado@lacity.org, councilmember.mcosker@lacity.org
Subject: Do not approve demolitions of the historic East 22nd Street houses in South Los Angeles and fix the demo notification problem
Dear Councilmembers and GM Younan,
I am writing to you about the early 20th century houses at 1559 East 22nd Street, 1563 East 22nd Street and 1567 East 22nd Street, Los Angeles, CA 90011 in Council District 9.
Demolition applications have been filed but not approved for #1563 (application permit #24019-20000-04179) and #1567 (application permit #24019-20000-04180). #1559 is also presumed threatened by NOCHA 1 LLC’s not yet approved new affordable housing project (application permit #23010-10000-01470).
However, public records requests submitted to LADBS seeking all demolition notification letters sent to all council offices did not include these addresses. In fact, it appears only one demolition notification letter has been sent by LADBS to CD9 since July 2024.
Further, the notices are posted behind locked gates and too far from the sidewalk to be read. They still need to be properly posted close to the sidewalk for the required one month period.
Therefore, the requirements of the Demolition Notification Ordinance and the California Public Records Act have not been followed and these demolitions cannot be approved until they are.
Historic wooden houses are in high demand by Eaton Fire survivors who are working with architects to move demolition threatened houses to their cleared lots. I am asking that LADBS not approve these demolitions until it has properly notified the Council Office, surrounding residents and the South Central Neighborhood Council, and ensured proper sign posting, to give these homes a fair chance to be preserved.
Further, due to the failure to provide the East 22nd Street demolition notification letters in response to a public records request, I am asking that LADBS changes its policy to immediately publish online all applications to demolish historic buildings, so that the public has an opportunity to be properly notified in a timely fashion.
Finally, I ask the Councilmembers to initiate a motion that the City not approve the demolition of any historic residential structure before a new project is approved.
Sincerely, [your name]
As of Friday night, the pretty houses are still standing, with a lot of life in them yet. Let’s give them a hand so these and other useful houses don’t end up in the dump.
Two months ago, Councilmember Katy Yaroslavsky, Chair of the Budget and Finance Committee, rose to warn her colleagues that a vote for the Convention Center expansion project risked bankrupting the City. Curren Price, who represents the site, replied let’s instead get the shovels and go full speed ahead.
Nowhere in Yaroslavsky’s remarks was any mention of the serious charges hanging over Price’s head, or the question of if he is capable of honestly representing his constituents. More than two years since Price was indicted, no Councilmember dares utter the word “corruption.”
They could hold a line, but the gentlemen’s agreement is too powerful.
Until the ethical elected and appointed officials and civic workers are willing to look in the mirror and see that their silence is empowering the destruction of Los Angeles, and have the courage to join the gadflies who volunteer their time to demand accountability, transparency and honest government, we’re cooked.
It bums us out to see the Los Angeles Times give gadfly Eric Preven such a prominent obituary (as did CityWatch LA, where he had a column, and Deadline) while doing such a lousy job of holding those in power accountable.
Confidential to the owner of the Los Angeles Times: we learned of the Del Richardson lawsuits from a courthouse tip, the same way your paper’s reporters got the stories that mattered for Angelenos for well over a century.
We wish we didn’t have to do their work, but out of love for Los Angeles, we 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, Nextdoor and Reddit sharing preservation news as it happens. New: some of these newsletters are on Medium, too.
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, 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. And did you know we offer private versions of our walking tours for groups big or small? Or just share this link with other people who care.
UPCOMING WALKING TOURS
• The Real Black Dahlia (11/22) • Hollywood Noir (11/29) • Hotel Horrors & Main Street Vice (12/6) • Westlake Park Time Travel Trip (12/13) • Know Your Downtown L.A. (Saturday, 12/20) • Miracle Mile Marvels & Madness (Sunday, 12/21) • Human Sacrifice: The Black Dahlia, Elisa Lam, Heidi Planck & Skid Row Slasher Cases (12/27) • Evergreen Cemetery, 1877 (1/24) • Alvarado Terrace & South Bonnie Brae Tract (1/31) • Hollywood Noir (2/7) • Angelino Heights & Carroll Avenue (2/14) • Raymond Chandler’s Noir Downtown L.A. (2/21) • Weird West Adams & Elmer McCurdy Museum Visit (2/28) • Film Noir / Real Noir (3/7) • Bunker Hill, Dead and Alive (3/21) • Christine Sterling & Leo Politi: Angels of Los Angeles (4/4) • John Fante’s Downtown L.A. (4/11) • Early Hollywood’s Silent Comedy Legends (4/18) • Downtown Los Angeles is for Book Lovers (4/25)
CLOSELY WATCHED TRAINS
RIP to attorney Robert Silverstein, who took the Hollywood Millennium fight to the California Supreme Court, and exposed how City Council and Eric Garcetti’s Planning Department and Department of Building and Safety were prepared to put Angelenos’ lives at risk if enough money was on the table.
We are grateful for his work, and believe that if the Los Angeles Times had given it the coverage it deserved, Hollywood would not today be a blighted zone of vacant properties hoarded by speculators.
Recommended reading for anyone who thinks Silverstein took cases on out of some “Nimby” (the term is a slur) desire to pull up the ladder on anyone who doesn’t already own property in Los Angeles: this July 2017 feature story in The Real Deal, which explains that his motivations were not to stop development in the City, but to put a block under the wheel of corruption that was depriving citizens of any say in how their communities grew and changed, and causing grave harm to the most vulnerable Angelenos, low-income and senior renters in hyper-gentrifying neighborhoods like Hollywood.
Soon after this story was published, two of the chief architects of that corrupted land use system were facing Federal charges. But while Jose Huizar and Ray Chan sit in their respective prison cells, nothing has changed in Los Angeles City Hall.
Angelenos are still deliberately kept in the dark about the City’s pro-developer land use agendas—like moving forward with demolition approvals despite a successful landmarking of the rent stabilized Mellenthin Birdhouse Apartments—and council offices are infamously unresponsive and sometimes actively hostile towards their constituents.
In Council District 11 on the westside, communication between the neighborhoods and Mike Bonin’s office was particularly poor, which we believe contributed to the failure to note and correct the lengthy period during which the reservoirs meant to provide fire suppression for Pacific Palisades were offline. It can take years to rebuild frayed relationships to form a working partnership.
We hope Robert Silverstein’s passing will inspire other lawyers to take on land use cases in the public interest, to speak out against the corrupted system that benefits politicians and donors at the expense of a functional, affordable and beautiful City, and to demand better from those who call themselves our leaders.
Thanks, Robert. We learned a lot from your arguments, and from the community of L.A. angels who fought by your side.
On Tuesday at 9:30am (agenda), the Board of Building and Safety Commission hears an appeal from Angelenos for Historic Preservation seeking to protect the landmarked Barry Building, former home of Dutton’s Books, from the billionaire Munger family’s attempts to demolish it for no new project. Public comment is only taken in person, or you can submit your comment online at https://bit.ly/LABBSC2020. More info here. Bonus link: Robert Silverstein’s and his colleagues spoke up for the Barry Building in 2020.
Also on Tuesday at the 3pm Charter Reform hearing, Mike Callahan alerts us to the disturbing attempt to hand power to declare historic landmarks to the Planning Director. He instead urges we follow San Francisco’s model and return this power to the Cultural Heritage Commission, and has a sample email and talking points here.
The Rudolph Valentino / Doris Duke house Falcon Lair was demolished in 2006 but Wallace Neff’s original garage / apartment survived. Demo was recently sought—but now the whole compound is back on the market, with garage intact!
YES! Office of Historic Resources has accepted Hollywood Heritage’s landmark application for Hollywood Center Motel, calling out the immediate risk of demolition by neglect by an owner who wants to tear it down. The Cultural Heritage Commission takes it up on 12/4. Meanwhile, the compound remains unsecured, and we’re urging people to contact councilmember Hugo Soto-Martinez (instructions here), and to be careful around the property, where a trespasser was recently filmed throwing rocks.
Empty Los Angeles highlights vacant Franklin Village housing. The Carmen Ave. co-living pod with reported home-shares is across from the illegal Airbnbs in RSO units Robin Urevich reported on last December. Where is the City Attorney?
Burbank preservation pals: there’s an opening on the Heritage Commission to serve through July 2026. How refreshing to see an open call for an important position that is entirely the Mayor’s purview in Los Angeles.
A new homeless shelter is planned in Cheviot Hills amid a federal fraud investigation. When the shill buyer/seller’s name was announced, we remembered how Silver Lake tenants were terrorized. It would be good to see some of these bad actors stopped from buying multi-family properties after a certain number of proven violations.
Featured in Google Arts & Culture’s virtual Route 66 Rewind road trip: Chicken Boy, in his natural habitat, the Broadway Theater District. (Which if you ask us is the real end of the Mother Road!) The California visual resource section is a kick.
Our Kim Cooper shared weird tales of real life Los Angeles mummies on LAist’s Morning Edition, lovely Willa Rhodes and dastardly Elmer McCurdy (who you’ll meet on the 2/28 Weird West Adams tour, which starts at his namesake museum).
Help! 946 Menlo Ave. (1908) is a lovely Edwardian house zoned as a hotel, whose owner wants to demolish or flip it as a tear down. How about moving her to Altadena instead?
Fascinating story from Joel Rosenblatt in the Gazetteer SF about Burlington Hotel owner Simone Shah’s efforts to remodel the Red Vic hotel on Haight Street and some insights into why she sued Lisa Kwon for her Airbnb reporting in Los Angeles.
A rare South LA bungalow court with its original built-ins has hit the market. These cozy early 1920s multi-family properties were built quickly and flipped as investments, and 100 years later they’re still such nice places to live.
Bunker Hill historian (and Angels Flight operator) Nathan Marsak debunks the myth that Big Oil and GM killed L.A.’s streetcar. Maybe the real conspiracy is all the misinformation spewed by people who should have known better.
Here’s a rare and thrilling piece of lost Los Angeles theater signage: the animated Follies showgirl demonstrating a legs akimbo headstand who once caught the eye at 4th & Main Streets. We’ll explore the burlesque district on the Hotel Horrors & Main Street Vice tour on 12/6. Source: LAPD Foot patrol, ca. 1947-1950, L.A. City Archives.