A vanished city lives again...

Thursday, August 30, 2012

Spring and First Streets, c.1903

One of my favorite places in vanished Los Angeles was the bustling intersection of Spring and First Streets. Here are three contemporaneous views from just after the turn of the last century.

Looking north on Spring Street from First.


Courtesy U.S.C. Digital Library.


Now, in the photo above, see the man at upper left leaning on the flagpole? He's standing on the roof of the Larronde Block, which is the likely vantage point of this shot dated 1903.


Courtesy U.S.C. Digital Library.


And the view south, probably taken from an upper storey window in the Phillips Block.


Courtesy U.S.C. Digital Library.


South on Spring from First today. Click on the Google Street View image below to have a look around the intersection now. (Peek over your left shoulder to really get your bearings.) ;-)


Google Maps Street View.

 

Thursday, August 23, 2012

Hill Street at First, Then & Now

1908:


Courtesy U.S.C. Digital Library.


2011:


Google Maps Street View.


Today, clearly, it's "Hill Street" in name only.

 

Friday, August 3, 2012

More old Temple Square views

I appear to have found the original version of a previously-posted photo of Temple Square c.1879, looking south from the NW corner of Temple and Main Streets. In this stereoscope view, you can see the top of the United States Hotel's four-storey-tall flag pole, which, for many years after the Civil War, was the tallest man-made object in Los Angeles.


Wikimedia Commons. (A high-res 2737x1446 version can be viewed here.)


Now, if you were to go up to the top of the Temple Block (at right in the above images) and look northward, this is what you would have seen. The building with the three cupolas was the Baker Block. The tall mast at right was not a flag pole, but an arc-lamp street light. (An excellent illustrated history of street lighting in Los Angeles can be found here.)


Wikimedia Commons. (A high-res 2737x1613 version can be viewed here.)