#51: Plaza Substation (Downtown)
December 20, 2021
This electrical power station, right on Olvera Street, powered 40% of LA's streetcars from 1905-1963
#50: Los Angeles Plaza Historic District (Downtown)
December 14, 2021
The birthplace of Los Angeles and its one-time commercial/social hub, housing dozens of historic buildings and monuments to the founders of LA
#49: San Gabriel Mission Playhouse (San Gabriel)
December 9, 2021
A 1927 theater built to house John McGroarty's epic play about the CA missions. Now it's haunted by his ghost!
#48: James Allen Freeman House (Heineman Brothers – Pasadena) + World’s First Motel
December 5, 2021
A historic home in the posh Oak Knoll neighborhood, designed by the untrained Heineman brothers. PLUS: a visit to Arthur Heineman's Milestone Mo-Tel in San Luis Obispo, the world's first motel!
#47: The Old Mill/El Molino Viejo (San Marino)
November 30, 2021
The Old Mill is Southern California's oldest surviving commercial building. Its millstones once ground grain for the San Gabriel mission, and were later rediscovered by a famous WWII hero.[…]
#46: Culbertson House (Greene & Greene – Pasadena)
November 27, 2021
Across the street from the Blacker House is another stunning home by architect bros Charles and Henry Greene. Completed in 1913, it was the last major home they designed as a duo.
#45: Union Station (Downtown)
November 24, 2021
A beloved landmark for travelers, architecture aficionados and culture vultures since it opened in 1939 Added to the National Register of Historic Places on November 13, 1980 I took these[…]
#44: Blacker House (Greene & Greene – Pasadena)
November 22, 2021
Henry and Charles Greene's Blacker House is a residential work of art wrought with wood, brick and iron – and their prelude to the Gamble House. https://youtu.be/LjPKVCCM5K4 Added to[…]
#43: Mission San Gabriel Arcángel (San Gabriel)
November 20, 2021
Mission San Gabriel Arcángel is the grandaddy of LA historic sites. Legend has it that the 44 “pobladores” set out from here the day they founded Los Angeles in 1781. For three years, it was closed to visitors due to the pandemic and a devastating arson. On July 1, 2023, the Mission finally reopened, with a reimagined museum that tells the Mission's complex story of deracination and development.
#42: Burbank City Hall
November 19, 2021
One of the few reasons to go to downtown Burbank: a streamline moderne masterwork of civic architecture Me @ Burbank CIty HallNRHP plaqueFountain detailBas relief sculpture @ Burbank City[…]
#41: Downtown Burbank Post Office
November 16, 2021
A WPA-era post office building that turns dropping off a package into a trip into California's mission past That's a genuine grin. I love this post office.NRHP plaque @[…]
#40: Little Tokyo Historic District (Downtown)
November 15, 2021
Once the center of social and commercial life for LA’s huge Japanese community before the internment camps of WWII, Little Tokyo is now a business hub and tourist destination grappling with its difficult history.
#39: Million Dollar Theater (Downtown)
November 14, 2021
Sid Grauman's original movie palace, opened downtown in 1918 – years before Grauman's Chinese, El Capitan and the Egyptian moved the movie industry's commercial epicenter to Hollywood Million Dollar Theater,[…]
#38: Angels Flight Railway (Downtown)
November 13, 2021
The shortest railway in the world, carrying folks 298 feet up and down a downtown LA hill in the same cars since 1901 Added to the National Register of[…]
#37: Frank Lloyd Wright’s Storer House (Hollywood Hills)
November 12, 2021
One of the master architect's four textile-block homes in LA, restored (re-Storered?) to its original glory.