The treasures of Los Angeles are yours to save

and the thrill of saving them is a kick you can't buy!

Gentle reader,

L.A. landmarks get lost when locals stop looking—so please don’t ever stop.

Often, we’ll get tipped off to an unfolding historic preservation crisis because someone who cares about a cool old building in their neighborhood spies a green demolition fence going up, or strange guys in suits walking the parcel, or hears from a neighbor that the new landlord is aggressively trying to get the rent controlled tenants out by paying much less than the law requires.

Old buildings disappear fast when profit is the motive, because the investors who specialize in destroying historic properties are highly skilled in moving so quickly that blindsided locals barely realize there’s a threat before it’s too late to act. And even when the city is supposed to protect tenants, those investors can confidently predict that it probably won’t.

But sometimes, citizens can make all the difference. Helping them chart a path and get the word out is often where we come in.

We’ve been tracking attacks on L.A.’s built environment since we started Esotouric—the international drama around Charles Bukowski’s East Hollywood bungalow was sparked in July 2007, after we spotted a Craigslist ad advertising the key location on our tour about the writer’s life as a tear down. It got pretty weird from there, but the rent controlled bungalow complex was saved—even though at least one unit does appear to be illegally listed as an Airbnb rental.

After this wild landmarking campaign, we were hooked on the thrill of saving places. Here are some of the special places on our advocacy list. Among them is Angels Flight Railway, the tiny Bunker Hill funicular where you’ll find our historian pal Nathan Marsak taking tickets as the newest operator. (He loves exact change.)

It’s an honor to act as a public information kiosk, helping Angelenos who care to understand their options when something they love is suddenly threatened. And by doing much of this work in public, we get to see how contagious and congenial historic preservation advocacy can be. One of the sweetest phrases in the English language, and we hear it often, must be some variation on “I didn’t think there was anything I could do, but then I heard about how ________ was saved. So my friends and I would like to try!”

And tomorrow 10/6 at 10am, you can tune in to the Cultural Heritage Commission to witness some lively community preservation activism in action, as the Jay Risk Standard Oil Co. Service Station, one of the oldest such structures in the nation, gets its first hearing as a potential city landmark—just weeks after the new property owners began illegally demolishing it, and were stopped by a hard working consortium of furious Eagle Rock locals (with a little help from us).

Also on the agenda is an informational report about planned restoration of the Art Deco Eastern Columbia building’s blue terracotta facade, and landmarking of Whitsett Garden Apartments (Valley Village, 1949) and Kun House II (Richard Neutra, Hollywood Hills, 1950). Here’s all the call in info from Eagle Rock Valley Historical Society, sponsors of the service station nomination. This is the last item on the agenda, and will likely be heard after lunch.

Public touring is off for a spell, but we’ll be back exploring on October 22 with the debut of a walking tour of Alvarado Terrace & the South Bonnie Brae Tract, a couple of lesser known National Register districts that were home to a colorful cast of self-dealing politicians, crooked cops, gay physique photographers, cult leaders, civil rights activists, wild teens, do-gooders and lost souls whose stories will stick with you.

Then on October 29, we’ll celebrate Halloween in Evergreen Cemetery for a spooky stroll through the city’s biggest, oldest and most eclectic burial ground, a graveyard that represents in its 300,000+ monuments the mix of cultures and pioneering spirit that is uniquely Los Angeles.

And on November 12, we’ll trek through the early streetcar suburb Angelino Heights to discover stunning architecture, curious characters, relics of horse-and-buggy era infrastructure and some of the prettiest crime scenes in town.

Until then, you’ll find us nurturing some of the precious places (and trees) that define us as Angelenos, and doing all we can to support our preservation pals who work so hard to keep cool things around for future generations to love. Join us, do!

yours for Los Angeles,

Kim & Richard

Esotouric

Psst… 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 on demand, in-person walking tours, gift certificates and a souvenir shop you can browse in. Or just share this link with other people who care.

---

CLOSELY WATCHED TRAINS

We're rendered speechless by these new CLUI scans of the Coast Realty marketing archive they salvaged. The weird old West LA of roadside diners, funky signage, giant dogs and tacky dingbats with that new dingbat smell calls you!

This week, a limited edition Blu-ray of the only film made from an original Charles Bukowski screenplay, Barfly, was released with our bonus audio track that celebrates the writer and the lowlife landmarks he loved. If you watch it, let us know what you think.

San Marino Grill, est. 1966, was one of the oldest businesses in town, family operated with love by Walter Celic and Gina-Marie Stea. New owners turned it into a ghost delivery kitchen where anyone foolish enough to stop in for a meal had cause to regret. Gutted, sans awning. Save me!

For the small cult of E.G. Lewis faithful—a cult we’re in after seeing his magical University City, Saint Louis work—there is sweet symmetry to UCLA buying Marymount California University in Palos Verdes for a satellite campus, 100 years after his dream went poof. Now build the man’s monorail!

Landmark nomination submitted for the tiki time capsule Verbin Residence at 1335 Shadybrook. While it has a Beverly Hills address, it's actually in LA, so there's hope this treasure can be protected and not lost to land value speculation.

cartoons by Billy Cam

The ghost of Sid Grauman is grumbling, because Netflix hasn't finished work on his Egyptian Theatre in time for the only centennial Hollywood’s first motion picture palace will ever have. Hollywood Heritage has a members only event planned at the barn.

A wonderful video from The Huntington features curator Erin Chase showing off one of her favorite sets of plans from the newly acquired John Parkinson Archives, a deep dive into the Art Deco glories of Santa Monica City Hall.

Preservation alert! A little birdie tells us the new owners of Diner on Main in Alhambra (built as a Prebles franchise by Googie masters Armet & Davis) is closed not for remodeling, but while redevelopment is explored. C'mon, the parcel is 75% surface parking. Save the Diner!

Shout out to Friends of Covina Bowl, who lobbied for preservation of the magnificent Tiki-Egyptian entryway, coffee shop and sign. The bowling alley and banquet rooms are gone, replaced by a new townhomes. Swing by on 10/8 and see if it's cool or just odd.

Civic neglect is killing the Echo Park lotus beds, again. The park desperately needs a friends group to manage and advocate for the landscape and landmarks within.

Move over, C.C. Julian! Broadway's biggest scammer is Joel Schreiber, who somehow held onto the Broadway Trade Center despite not paying loan interest, property taxes or insurance premiums. (But on the bright side, five months after it was reported to the city, the dangerous scaffolding surrounding the derelict property was finally being removed today.)

The Clifton's building has sold to Robhana, who also own the Oviatt Building. Andrew Meieran has a lease to keep operating the nightclub. Could another operator revive the late, lamented cafeteria? Please yes—do it for Brother Pancake!

Update on Thomas James Homes' mega mansion project on top of the Alexandria Avenue artesian spring in Los Feliz: L.A. city geologists were seen inspecting the street seepage and walking the construction site—and neighbors gave them this link.

At the core of this amateur hour affordable housing fiasco that's heading to court and foreclosure: the building in question is a 50-unit rent controlled apartment house. How is it "helping" to displace 50 households?!

The ghouls at ESI Ventures have a new dirty trick to displace the longtime 410 N. Rossmore tenants so their home can become a co-living crash pad: stealing parking spaces.

Kim wrote a blurb for Vicious, Jeff Gomez’ charming alternative history mystery about Lou Reed in his post-Velvet Underground era, out now in paperback and Kindle.

Did you tune in to City Council’s PLUM Committee yesterday hoping to make public comment about landmarking Pacific Dining Car? That item, and the Victorian mansion called the Queen of Elysian Heights, were both pulled because the city cannot send timely notices to property owners. (PDF link #1, #2.)

Corruption Corner: Save LACMA reminds us that everything about LACMA is troubling. Where is the staff now, what's the plan for $1 Billion in debt, and why isn't local and national media covering the gutting of this public institution?… We're very interested in this letter from Project Roomkey tenants, demanding the right to remain in the L.A. Grand Hotel (though we worry the property is unsafe, in light of allegations that city inspectors looked the other way). It boggles the mind that a foreign hotel owner charged alongside Councilman Jose Huizar in a massive public corruption scandal, a fugitive from justice, is benefiting from taxpayer funds that have kept his hotel full through the pandemic. Every time his attorney files something in the case, we're paying for it… After we raised the alarm about LADBS scrubbing evidence of open investigations into unpermitted demolition work at historic Downtown L.A. hotels, including the Cecil, Proper and the Morrison, the MIA code violations reappeared… Things are weird in City Hall, as lame duck councilmen Mike Bonin and Joe Buscaino call out the West LA Area Planning Commission for rubber stamping LADBS approval of a clearly dangerous Brentwood spec mansion that sends mud into the neighbor’s pool… We’ve shared links before about the North Hollywood bungalow court tenants abused by slumlord Arthur Aslanian. You think maybe if the housing department and many other civic agencies had done their jobs, he wouldn't be rich enough to engage in murder for hire schemes?