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Motion Pictures Los Angeles in the 1950's

Discussion in 'The Hokey Ass Message Board' started by Ryan, Sep 7, 2012.

  1. Ryan
    Joined: Jan 2, 1995
    Posts: 21,632

    Ryan
    ADMINISTRATOR
    Staff Member

  2. James Curl
    Joined: Mar 28, 2006
    Posts: 370

    James Curl
    Member

    Ah, all of those old cars that we lust for were just old cars in 54 like 80s to 90s cars are now, its a wonder that many have survived with the war scrap drives in the early 40s. I remember as a child on the farm when they brought flat bed trucks and a bunch of men out to the farms and hauled all of the old scrap metal they could find off. That included any old car or truck that was not being used.
     
  3. you would be different! I was there in the 40's thru 70's and loved my youth and miss the simplicity. but times change and so do people.
     
  4. A perfect blend of deco and mid-century design. Its damn near like a Cuban cigar. :D I love that Thrifty store sign with the three legs. I'm a sucker for atomic.
     

  5. That cash register looks old even for back then!
     
  6. 3rd Gen Hot Rodder
    Joined: Jan 8, 2009
    Posts: 405

    3rd Gen Hot Rodder
    Member
    from Indiana

    As I was watching, I could not help but think how much different that clip would have been if it was shot just one or two years later, specifically related to body syles. I am thinking of 1955 Chevys, but many of the other models were about to go under drastic changes as well. Thanks for posting!
     
  7. 49ratfink
    Joined: Feb 8, 2004
    Posts: 18,828

    49ratfink
    Member
    from California

    man...look at all those white people.:eek:
     
  8. Mazooma1
    Joined: Jun 5, 2007
    Posts: 13,598

    Mazooma1
    Member

    Yes, pretty much my childhood right there.
    Born in 1950 in Pasadena and grew up about 14 miles east of Los Angeles and 61 years later, I'm still just three miles from the house I grew up in.
    I rode my bike to San Gabriel Drag Strip and was within 45 minutes of Lions, Fontana, San Fernando and Pomona drag strips. When Irwindale opened in 1965 I was one of the first into the gates....just six miles east of home.
    Downtown Los Angeles was THE place to window shop in the 1950's at Christmastime. All the windows had terrific displays, electric trains and animated figures. Really spectacular.
    The sidewalks had that glittery flecks in the concrete that sparkled under the neon signs.
    Pure magic for a kid.
    Los Angeles started to get pretty run down in the late 1960's when suburbs started to expand and they got their own shopping centers called "malls".
    That was a new term for us in high school.
    The malls pretty well killed off downtown L.A. Smog was horrible and the wonderful old movie theaters and posh department stores started to close down.
    All the suburbs now had their own theaters, etc. and none of us had any reason to go "downtown".
    When I was a senior in high school in 1968, a bunch of us drank a rather large amount of beer in the Santa Anita Race Track parking lot on night and drove into Los Angeles. But...the only reason was to see "Sesame" at the burlesque house. THAT was a BIG deal to us 17 year old...beer and boobs. Ol' "Sesame" could make her tassels go in opposite directions while on stage. That was something that we needed to verify for ourselves.
    Well....that's a story for another day, kids.
    Yup, "downtown" was really run down as the suburbs stole the show.
    It wasn't until the mid-1990's that El Lay started to make a comeback.
    With the Music Center, the Disney Concert Hall, lots of restoration work and jobs returning to "downtown", it's actually getting pretty nice again.
    Old building are being converted to condos, apartments and "lofts".
    There's a busy, fun "arts district" along the Los Angeles River. I go down there every few months to take photos and there are hundreds of artists, film makers, photographers, pottery artists, etc. working in the rehabilitated old factories and warehouses.
    The large grocery chains are starting to come back to downtown along with many other specialty shops.
    Downtown is getting pretty cool again.
    Kind of like New York's "Time Square"....it has to hit bottom before it gets turned around.
    The smog alerts are gone, the traffic hasn't changed, the light rail trolleys are back and Los Angeles is getting cleaned up again and looking like it should.
    There was no better place to grow up for a kid born in 1950.
    If you weren't into cars, you would be soon enough. There was no escaping the car culture of the Los Angeles area in the 1950's and 60's....
     
  9. squirrel
    Joined: Sep 23, 2004
    Posts: 55,931

    squirrel
    Member

    neat stuff

    <iframe width="560" height="315" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/7LpPKAhW9-s" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>
     
  10. ardyboy
    Joined: Mar 5, 2008
    Posts: 664

    ardyboy

    very neat stuff. Thanks for sharing your trip down memory lane Doug. I grew up in a small Canadian town but just one year behind you.
     

  11. I've never scene the City of Angels look so angelic. This is some pretty cool shit man.
     
  12. waldo53
    Joined: Jan 26, 2010
    Posts: 863

    waldo53
    Member
    from ID

    That is neat. Check out that HAMB friendly suede Ford ragtop in the opening page. Did you notice that baby-blue Buick conv. that we're behind in the beginning of the video and then later on it pulls in front of us again? I know, I know, it's how the video was edited but pretty cool. I noticed in one shot there was a Pontiac dealer on one side of the street and a Studebaker dealer on the other - sad to see those names no longer with us today. And then that guy in the '55 'Bird that tries to jump the light (there were no left turn arrows back then, you were supposed to observe right-of-way rules and wait your turn) the camera truck almost creams him! Funny. Oh, and did you notice that AD Chev telephone truck? Very neat.

    I didn't see Grauman's Chinese Theatre in this video. I spent about 2 weeks of my part-time job pumping gas money and took my girl to see the Windjammer there in '57, or maybe '58. Pretty impressive for high school kids. Thanks for posting, this brings back a lot of good memories.
     
    Last edited: Sep 7, 2012
  13. MATACONCEPTS
    Joined: Aug 7, 2009
    Posts: 2,069

    MATACONCEPTS
    BANNED

    Yes, pretty much my childhood right there.
    Born in 1973 in Monterey Park and grew up about 8 miles east of Los Angeles and 39* years later, I'm still just 13 miles from the house I grew up in.
    I rode my bike all over San Gabriel Valley and was within 45 minutes of Lions, Fontana, San Fernando and Pomona drag strips. When Irwindale re-opened in 1999 I was one of the first of 20,000 into the gates....just six miles north of home.
    East Los Angeles was THE place to eat in the 1950's at Christmastime. All the windows had security bars, piniatas and animated figures. Really spectacular.
    The sidewalks had that glittery flecks in the concrete that sparkled under the neon signs.
    Pure magic for a kid.
    Los Angeles pretty run down in the late 1970's when suburbs started to expand and they got their own shopping centers called "malls".
    That was a new term for us in high school.
    The malls pretty well killed off downtown L.A. Smog was horrible and the wonderful old movie theaters and posh department stores started to close down.
    All the suburbs now had their own theaters, etc. and none of us had any reason to go "downtown".
    When I was a senior in high school in 1991, a bunch of us drank a rather large amount of beer in the Santa Anita Race Track parking lot on night and drove into Los Angeles. But...the only reason was to see some hookers. THAT was a BIG deal to us 17 year old...beer and boobs. On Sunset could make her make her boobs go in opposite directions while on the street. That was something that we needed to get off.
    Well....that's a story for another day, kids.
    Yup, "downtown" was really run down as the suburbs stole the show.
    It wasn't until the mid-1990's that El Lay started to make a comeback.
    With the Music Center, the Disney Concert Hall, lots of restoration work and jobs returning to "downtown", it's actually getting pretty nice again.
    Old building are being converted to condos, apartments and "lofts".
    There's a busy, fun "arts district" along the Los Angeles River. I go down there every few months to party and there are hundreds of artists, film makers, photographers, pottery artists, etc. working in the rehabilitated old factories and warehouses.
    The large grocery chains are starting to come back to downtown along with many other specialty shops.
    Downtown is getting pretty cool again.
    Kind of like New York's "Time Square"....it has to hit bottom before it gets turned around.
    The smog alerts are gone, the traffic hasn't changed, the light rail trolleys are back and Los Angeles is getting cleaned up again and looking like it should.
    There was no better place to grow up for a kid born in 1973.
    If you weren't into cars, you would be soon enough. There was no escaping the car culture of the Los Angeles area EVEN in the 1970's and 80's....
    <!-- / message --><!-- sig -->
     
  14. Mazooma1
    Joined: Jun 5, 2007
    Posts: 13,598

    Mazooma1
    Member

    uh....wow, that's very similar to what I posted earlier...:rolleyes:
    If you were born in 1973, you wouldn't have a clue what I was talking about.
    Lions was shut down in 1972 one year before you were born.
    Irwindale closed in 1977 and never re-opened.
    I really question why you would mock my original post.
    Really....pretty disrespectful.
    In fact, really disrespectful. :mad:



     
  15. MATACONCEPTS
    Joined: Aug 7, 2009
    Posts: 2,069

    MATACONCEPTS
    BANNED

    No mock, no disrepect what so ever, just trip'n on the paralle worlds with different time frames & a couple of offsets.
     
  16. 1964countrysedan
    Joined: Apr 14, 2011
    Posts: 1,131

    1964countrysedan
    Member
    from Texas

    WOW!

    So drum brakes do work in traffic...
     
  17. MATACONCEPTS
    Joined: Aug 7, 2009
    Posts: 2,069

    MATACONCEPTS
    BANNED


    Yeah, I heard of those track but had no idea where or when except for Pomona, matter-a-fact, I learned here on the HAMB & it was your bitchen pictures on "Histiry of Los Angeles" thread, Fucker!:)

    Peace. Be Cool. :cool:
     
  18. Made me laugh. Kinda crazy how times changed. I was born and raised in Orange county 1984 so I didnt see the Golden days. I am from Garden Grove and still live in same neighborhood. Here is our town in the 50's.
     

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    Last edited: Sep 7, 2012
  19. 39cent
    Joined: Apr 4, 2006
    Posts: 1,569

    39cent
    Member
    from socal

    Yea Mazooma, that' about the same story for me, altho I recall some of the 40's. LA was pretty good bak then, I wen east to Riverside in the 50,s, lotta rodders there and lotta good deals on dueces then. I had a roadster, pheaton, 2dr, and 2 model A pheatons.


     
  20. 62RagtopNova
    Joined: Feb 5, 2012
    Posts: 115

    62RagtopNova
    Member

    Yeah born in Whittier in '53 so I remember little flashes of growing up in the '50s with no skyline except for the city hall and the gas works. Our family drove Studies as my grandfather worked there.

    We used to drive into LA to see my 102 y.o. great grandmother who would tell me stories about the civil war. Pretty cool to think about a direct link to someone who as a little girl saw Lincoln's funeral train.
     
  21. 19Fordy
    Joined: May 17, 2003
    Posts: 8,025

    19Fordy
    Member

    Gee, NO foreign made cars. The economy was booming. Times were good.
     
  22. liljonny
    Joined: Aug 31, 2011
    Posts: 203

    liljonny
    Member
    from menifee,ca

    My dad and uncles were same boat as mazooma1. Dads 5 of 10, grew up in l.a., grad high school in 67. Its cool to hear similar stories from other people besides my uncles.
     
  23. MATACONCEPTS
    Joined: Aug 7, 2009
    Posts: 2,069

    MATACONCEPTS
    BANNED

    Being an Angeleno is like winning the "Places to be From" Lottery
     
  24. That video takes me back to my youth. I was born in Monterey Park in 1948 and my folks moved east to Azusa/Baldwin Park/Covina area shortly there after. As I have said before, it was a great time and place to be a teen and like others here, I could be found at Pomona and Fontana drag strips, at Newport and Huntington Beaches and of course In N Out.
    One of my uncles worked at that Ford plant, in the video, during the 50's and 60's. I left Southern California in the mid to late 60's and never looked back. Too much hassle for a guy that owned lowriders and rode a Harley but that's another story...
     
    Last edited: Sep 8, 2012
  25. jcmarz
    Joined: Jan 10, 2010
    Posts: 4,631

    jcmarz
    Member
    from Chino, Ca

    I was born in Downey in 1963. Lived in La Mirada until I was 5 and then we moved to Whittier in 68 and lived there until 1992. I remember being able to see the city hall from our house. We lived on Armley off Lambert. My parents were born and raised in E.L.A. so almost every weekend we would take a drive down there to visit one of my grandmothers or maybe my uncle who lived a block away from Dodgers stadium. Sometimes we would go to Cliftons or Yee Mee Loos for dinner before heading home.
    My parents used to tell me how Downtown L.A. was back in the 40s. They would take the street car from E.L.A to Dowtown and hang out on Broadway. They said there used to be a lot of movie theaters on Broadway and how the Big Bands like Glenn Miller or the Dorsey Brothers would play in those theaters (live concert) They said it was a wonderful place to be back then but it started to change in the 50s. By the 70s, Downtown was a shell of it's former self. The place stunk like a toilet. I am glad to see all the improvements going on today and I am looking forward to taking my mom back to Cliftons as soon they are done with renovations and it reopens. I wish Yee Mee Loos was still there. Anyone remember that shrimp shack on Main Street? Can't remember the name of it.
     
  26. ...so no one noticed the new '53 Fords on the car hauler? Lot's of mix and match footage there.
     
  27. 34toddster
    Joined: Mar 28, 2006
    Posts: 1,482

    34toddster
    Member
    from Missouri

    Everytime I see one of the old Ford car haulers I wonder how that old Flathead pulled all that weight, gearing?
     

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  28. jcmarz
    Joined: Jan 10, 2010
    Posts: 4,631

    jcmarz
    Member
    from Chino, Ca

    Fords?? What Fords?? Saw the all the Chevys, just like today.
     
  29. 62RagtopNova
    Joined: Feb 5, 2012
    Posts: 115

    62RagtopNova
    Member


    My mother is 92 and she remembers the great LA air raid in 1942 when the only damage done was from falling anti aircraft shells.

    We used to go into Chinatown for dinner every once in a while maybe at the same place. I miss Little Joe's. My dad was a GI bill student at USC and we hit the USC and Dodger games in the Coliseum when he had a saturday off.

    I still go to the USC games and I'm glad to see the LA downtown area cleaning up.
     
  30. junkyardjeff
    Joined: Jul 23, 2005
    Posts: 8,588

    junkyardjeff
    Member

    I agree since we here in the Dayton Ohio area did not get multi lane highways until the mid to late 60s and they were not finished until the early 70s,the malls arrived about the same time so yes that was the future.
     

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