History Inglewood in the 1940's and 1950's - Photos and stories

I started this thread, because I want to know more about Inglewood and cars that hailed from there. After what I understand, it was a lot of hot rods and custom cars there back in the days.


While searching around here on the Hamb, I haven't found much about districts and their stories. I hope people will add more photos and stories on this thread about Inglewood as time goes by. I'll begin with this 39 Mercury, owned by a relative of mine Jim Kierstead.


He and Sam Barris began to restyle it in 1945. A time witness, Harold Johnson told me they borrowed shop and space from Balch's Garage on Vermont street.


Now, Jim crashed and died in his Mercury on December 7th, 1947 in a head on collision on Sepulveda and El Segundo. It was just painted black a week before the crash. His son remembered seeing one photo of it finished, but he has still not found it.


This 1937 Ford was Jim's first custom, restyled in 1942.


And here's a shot of his Roadster in 1945.


Jim worked with his dad doing carpentry building houses during the great building boom of Los Angeles. Here's their work truck, that was hopped up of course.


Jim's younger brother Robert had Barris to restyle this 1941 Mercury in 1948.


This was Jim's brother in law, Harold Johnson's car.


Balch's garage on Vermont street is where a lot of people used to hang out.


He did a lot of racing with midget racers.


Here's a photo of George Barris' newly acquired 1941 Buick next to Jim's Mercury at Balch's Garage.


I took a little drive up to where Balch's garage one night with my woodie. Quite different now, but it's still there.


The Pierson Brothers were also from Inglewood!


And here's a photo of another 36 from Inglewood, Owned by George Patris. Maybe he was inspired by the Pierson 36?


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The Wich Stand was a popular hang-out place, located on Slauson Avenue at Overhill. The Beach boys lived in the area and wrote an unreleased song called "Wich Stand".The coffee shop also inspired another Beach Boys' song, "Root Beer (Chug-a-lug)", about "Cruisin' the A," which was driving the five miles between the A & W on Hawthorne Boulevard and the Wich Stand on Slauson. I drove up there once, but the building was now used as an animal hospital or something..


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Incredible pics and I can suddenly see where you get your good looks and your passion for all things hotrod and custom.

 

Kool Man, yup that's the real deal...

 

I went to Westchester High School, about 5-6 miles west of Inglewood. We did cruise from the A&W in Hawthorne to the Wich Stand in those days; 1965-1969. A little later than your relatives. The Inglewood Kart Shop was on the route as well as Century Chevrolet where a great guy named "Brownie" used to give us young hot rodders the long deal on Chevy parts. J&J Muffler ran several race cars out of the Inglewood shop and Inglewood Tire was nearby where we got those "hard as concrete" slicks. We often hung out at Foster's Freeze, on the route, just down Hawthorne from Inglewood Tire.
Just off Hawthorne Blvd, in neighboring Lawndale, on Larch St lived a guy (Carl?) who cruised Hawthorne in a black, flamed, '32 Ford Vickie with a blown small block Chevy in it.
I missed the earliest years with the customs, but I caught the tail-end of the hot rods as the muscle cars eventually took over. My car at the time; a black '47 Ford business coupe with a 1/2" stroked '58 Olds, Lockerman ported heads, Engle cam, dual AFBs, W-H DuCoil distributor, home-made fenderwell headers and a C&O Hydro. Mufflers and pipes from J&J, Inglewood slicks on the back, of course. I put every penny I made into that car. Good times.

 

very Cool - Thanks

 

Tom L 24 has a lot of photos of race cars parked on the street and in front yards in Inglewood. Names like Hila Sweet/ Rufus Jones/ and a host of others. I saw these in his book about calif jalopy racing. He has one great photo of a custom merc towing a race car.. May be he will share, Thanks for posting your photos they are great..

 

Subscribed.

 

Thanks for all the cool info. I was born in Inglewood in 61'. Both of my parents were raised there. I really enjoy all the info youve gathered.

 

Cool photos so far. I hope a lot more show up. Thanks for sharing those.

 

Always cool to travel back in time...get a kick out of seeing what used to be...I don't think you would be cruising into Compton or Inglewood too much these days. So Cal in the 30's through early 60's must have been awesome.

 

Great stuff, very interesting. Sorry to have lost Jim, he seemed to be ahead of the times.

 

Born there in '57 and lived under the approach path for planes landing at LAX. This is dad with his daily driver back then. He and mom refinished the wood by scraping the old finish off with broken bottles. A later pic shows no sign of interesting cars parked out front.

 

I was in a car club in Inglewood called the Chancellors about '58 or '59. Yeah, there were a lot of cool cars around the area then. Not that far from Compton. Might be scared to go back and visit nowdays.

 

Hung out in Inglewood in the '50s, had a good friend who lived near Century Blvd...remember in particular a '40 Ford pickup with a Cad engine...painted sort of a persimmon color...owned by a guy who owned a gas station near Century...lots of cool cars there back then.

 

I remember the airport bought out my grandparents to enlarge, I heard that its now a parking lot where their house used to be. I think crusing Inglewood or Compton in a nice custom these days would be just asking for trouble.

 

Is Englewood a no-go zone these days? What a shame.

 

"Englewood" is in New Jersey. Inglewood is in Southern California. It's plenty safe around there, but it seems like some folks these days are even afraid of their own shadows ...

 

Hey Ed you ever been Shot at

 

Inglewood is fine during the day, probably still wouldn't take my sled or rod there though. Night time, fogetabout it...

 

Randys makes a Good Donut there. Love the early pics keep em coming

 

Olav...
Many thanks for this Thread ! When I was living out there in the early-60's, I first lived in Pasadena (when I was studying at the Pasadena Playhouse) on El Molino. Then when I moved into Hollywood, I was in the Highland Towers Apts., at the corner of Highland & Franklin.

Tiny Naylor's was still there, as well as many other places, BUT, I didn't have a good camera to photograph any of the cars I saw in that whole SoCal area. However, this Thread, and others like it...sure help bring back the memories of that time & place.

What was cool about living in that area, was that Bohman & Schwartz, Don Lee Coach & Body Works, as well as, Earl Automobile Works (think: Harley Earl's family), had ALL been in that vicinity at one time...and I think ever-so-often I picked-up the scent of their paint fumes from out out of the past, mixed into the smog.

Thanks again, Olav ! Great meeting you when you were here, and, tell your big brother I said "hi" !

Below is a pic of the Pasadena Playhouse, and, the Highland Towers Apts. where I lived in Hollywood. They're BOTH still there !

Jonnie www.legends.thewwbc.net

 

I was born there in '67, but we moved to Arizona about 6 months after I was born. I missed out on growing up in the So-Cal car culture, but I'm still afflicted with the disease! I have great fun telling my kids that I am an OG, straight outta Inglewood. Never fails to get an eye roll!

 

I used to have a car club plaque just like this one (except it was painted green). It is now hanging in Kiwijeff's garage in New Zealand.

 

There were a few car clubs in Inglewood .....

INGLEWOOD​

 

I love your website. That's where I shamelessly stole that picture from, since I apparently didn't take a picture of mine before I sent it on. Maybe @kiwijeff will post a picture of it.

 

I'll go snap a pic later today and get it up.
I never realised this area had such a big car scene.

Here's a bad phone pic.

 

Here's a question for you Inglewood guys .....

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After I received the photo of this Inglewood plaque in 2004, someone wrote me and said the name of the club was "Vatos and Camel Herders". Can anyone confirm that, or know what VC or CV stood for?

 

Born in Inglewood in 1932, & all my family too,
Here's my first car 1941 Chev. club coupe.

The "Coupes" car club was a select group--All white 3 windows,spots,skirts, lowered, twin pipes,Desoto bumpers.
Members---Pierson,Torvick,McKinney & above mentioned Patris.