In November — alas, not the weekend as the last SCTA event of the season — I’d like to retrace the route driven by the original dry lake racers in the mid/late 1940s, coming from Los Angeles. I’ve been doing research on that generation of WWII-era lake racers and it’d be my first time making a pilgrimage of sorts to one of the dry lakes and El Mirage makes the most sense. Based on my basic research, to get to El Mirage, it sounds like I’d want to start with the Sierra Hwy, just north of Sylmar, then switch onto Mint Canyon Rd. for a mile or so, then hop back onto the Sierra Hwy until it turns into Pearblossom Hwy in Palmdale which then turns into E Ave T. However, this is where I don't know what the "historically accurate" route would be for the rest of the way to get to the dry lake. I could just follow Google instructions and I don't need for this to be as accurate as possible but I still figured it was worth asking the folks here since I assume I'd be far from the first to make this kind of trip.
I use https://www.historicaerials.com/viewer to look up old aerial photos for whatever research I am doing. Usually for old buildings.
If you REALLY want to be accurate with your route, I'd spend some time at a local LA library and find a couple maps of that era. That will tell you definitively the route that you should be taking as many of the local roads through the canyons and hills in the area between San Fernando and Palmdale probably didn't exist back then. You might be surprised how much time you'll actually be spending on the 14. After all, most of our Interstate routes followed old wagon trails that followed old migration paths, etc.
Thanks for the suggestion. I'm literally writing this from inside the Huntington Library and just requested a 1949 Los Angeles road atlas to look at.
Cool! Let us know what you find. Off the top of my head, I can only think of three routes to El Mirage from the LA area. The 14, the 2, or the 15 to the 395. Not sure what those routes may have been called in the '40s however, but I would imagine they were in use to some degree.
Update: Ok, I was able to look through a combination of old maps from the 1940s and '50s and the best I can currently come up with is this route: https://maps.app.goo.gl/vja13B7BvC1PgdHr6 I'm most confident about the starting point: the old Hwy 6 aka the Sierra Hwy aka Mint Canyon Hwy. Getting out of L.A. towards the desert is straightforward (though I added a slight detour onto Mint Canyon Rd. because I wanted to drive the "seven sisters" curves). It's the route from Palmdale to El Mirage that I'm doing guess-work on. The route I have here is based on what would have been the major roads that existed in late 1940s but whether or not hot rodders would have followed that exact route, I can't verify yet. All I know is that this route should have existed back then but there could have been alternate routes. For example, a more direct route would be to go north towards to present-day Palmdale Blvd. but the route I have here stays on the southern Pearblossom Hwy until right before Llano which is where you'd swing northeast towards El Mirage.
Thanks for the input! CA-14 is the one I'm tracing as it used to be Hwy 6 and multiple sources from the time mention that this was the primary route out of Los Angeles. Folks likely wouldn't have used the 2 — it's too out of the way — and they may have used the 15 had they been coming from the Inland Empire.
Nothing to add besides keeping an eye on this thread for updates. Self admittedly kind of goofy but definitely the kind of things I'm intrigued by and would spend the time researching as you are. Good luck on your endeavors, keep us in mind with pictures and follow ups
. . . it would seem to me that Hwy. 138 east on 18 to Sheep Creek Rd. would have been an alternative.
I agree and you couldn't get there from here on the 2 these days anyways! From South LA/OC, we've always taken the 15 route to avoid traversing the LA area in general. Whatever that route was called back then, I would think that theory would have applied. Once you figure this out, I have three more assignments for you...routes to Harper, Cuddeback, and Rosamond dry lakes.
Ha! I would have done Muroc if I could have made it there. But El Mirage has special resonance for me because of the exhibition work I've been doing which includes a focus on the Nisei racers both before and after WWII. In particular, I know a decent amount about the Turtles, an RTA club formed by Japanese Americans from the Hollywood area who went to a string of RTA events at El Mirage between the spring of 1949 through 1950. A young Larry Shinoda — who I assume most people here already know — was a Turtle for example. If I really want to do this "authentically", I know where one of the members lived, in East Hollywood, back in 1950 and could start driving from that address but to be honest, it would add an extra 45 minutes just to get from there to the beginning of Hwy 6 and it's not like it'd be particularly scenic since I'd mostly just be driving up San Fernando Blvd. So I'm going to drive to Weldon Canyon (where Hwy 6 begins) via freeway but the rest of the way to El Mirage will all be pre-freeway roads. I'm mixing eras too but I opted to rent a Miata for the trip as the car was designed by Tom Matano, who came to L.A. from Japan in the early 1970s, went to ArtCenter for transpo design, and was mentored by Larry Shinoda at GM in the '70s before he bounced around and eventually landed at Mazda in the '80s and would go onto create the most iconic roadster of the last 40 years. Should be fun on the 2-lane canyon roads at the very least.
The SCTA, established in 1937, was the result of several clubs cooperating in the interest of organization and safety. Hello, Well, if you want to trace the original highways, your route is a lot better these days, from a two lane road heading out of Los Angeles in those early days. A lot of those steep sloping portions of the highway were pretty rough going, if one towed a car behind for that distance. But, once out in the desert behind the mountain bordering Los Angeles metropolitan area, it is almost eerie as the desert is still about the same. Yes, there are more developments, but it is dry, hot, and open spaces abound. Your route is almost 2 hours, by current standards, which means fast modern v8 powered vehicles. So, add on at least another 45 minutes to an hour, back then. We drove those roads during the early 60s and even then, a v8 El Camino loaded with two desert motorcycles and gear took a long time chugging through the canyons to get to the flat desert areas. For us, the freeways were 70-80 mph even loaded down. But the original race coursed marked in the Western portion of the desert area became fewer and the open spaces moved East toward the El Mirage Dry Lake locations. Jnaki There were two specific races I remember that part of the course actually was a flat out full throttle acceleration on the dry lakes and then back into the hilly areas to finish the races and get to the pits. Most bikes were geared for short power bursts going up slopes, through dry sandy riverbeds and dirt roads. So, the hum of the motorcycle motors was very high pitched. If one had the power and the right gearing, they could fly by others on the flat dry lake surfaces. Usually, the 500-650 Triumphs were the fastest. As the desert motorcycle races moved East, then it was closer to go the other route through Cajon Pass via San Bernardino area. But the climb over the peak is horrendous, with the vehicles being towed or loaded down. So, add, at least, another 45 minutes to an hour that way. Why does the map start in South Los Angeles? Well, at the time, all research points to the center of local noted hot rodding and racing cars was almost centered in South Central Los Angeles. Even if a lot of racers came from San Diego, they definitely went through San Bernardino. The route heading East was a lot nicer as far as scenery was concerned. Coming home, one just wants to get back to a nice cool shower and a change of clothes… YRMV Those were definitely, fun times blasting around the dry desert areas with motorcycles set up for the different racing. But, on Sunday afternoons, it was a long drive home, tired, sleepy and thirsty. 1940 map of Los Angeles Metropolitan area, including the dry lake area, centered.
Chiraco Pass (sp) is on I-10 between Indio and Blyth. Kinda a last stop for fuel until you hit Blyth. I use to stop there to and from Phoenix hoping to talk with someone there. The windows on the old station are blacked out but you can see a row of old flatheads sitting on engine stands. There’s a shop up there behind the old gas station now which houses Reds Headers. The ole boy that ran the station back in the day ran the dry lakes in modified model As etc. I think his son runs Reds Headers. Years ago I made a stop there and he was working on an old VW. Told me they use to drive down the mountain and crossing over into the desert driving those old cars to the dry lake beds. Had to be in the 30s through the 50s. You might give them a call and see if they have information on the routes that were used traveling from the east.
Not yet but I've met with filmmaker Ming Lai a few times and we interviewed Chico Kodama as part of our project
Hi, thanks for replying! I actually wrote SCTA's HQ with the same question about the routing but never heard back from that address so I appreciate you chiming in. The thing I can't figure out is for people coming from L.A. via the Sierra Hwy (see red star, bottom left), what route did they take to get from there to El Mirage (hot rod icon, upper right)? The map below is a 1950 Thomas Guide map so it should be "era accurate" to what roads existed then. My starting point is the red star in the bottom left. Destination is roughly where EL Mirage lake should be, hot rod icon on the top right. This is the route Google Maps recommends: https://maps.app.goo.gl/wJes3GkLLxmjdYhFA Basically, they suggest taking Pearblossom Hwy/E Ave T for a while before heading north to Palmdale Blvd. and taking that east until 240th St. From there, the 1950 map has roads that seem to lead to El Mirage but those same roads do not exist on modern maps so I assume the County re-did the roads. What roads did you all take back then?
I was going to mention getting a vintage map. There is a guy on YouTube called "sidetrack adventures" and he does a lot of historical roads in Southern California along with their history and some vintage photos of then and now. He is a must watch if you are a Southern California history lover.
Thank you for the info! Will definitely want to check it out! If you do anything with customs you need to include Bob Hirohata if you haven't already.
We 100% cover the kustom era. We actually licensed one of his Bob Hirohata's Xmas cards — featuring the Merc — from Brett Barris. Hot Wheels also put out the Merc this year in fact so I bought one for the exhibition. We'll likely have Tats Gotanda's Buddha Buggy for the actual exhibition and I'd like to plan an event during the exhibition run next fall focusing on people involved in the kustom/street rod scene (Tats, Richard Mikami, Leslie Koyama, Ed Fujita, etc.)
Cool! Glad to hear that! Thanks for what your doing. It's really cool to learn about another aspect of the hot rod and custom culture.
What roads did you all take back then? Hello, As we got started in desert motorcycle racing, the courses were to the far western end of the Mojave desert area near Palmdale. But, the courses were used up and the near-ness to the general public homes, businesses and other places seemed, too close. So, the later courses got moved out to the eastern end of the Mojave Desert area. (for a couple of years toward the early 70s, some of the courses got moved out into the Red Rock Canyon and the army fort area) Now, for us, the drive was definitely through the Cajon Pass area instead of going through Los Angeles to the Palmdale area. The courses were randomly selected and one of the farthest races location started in Barstow and went to Las Vegas. The famous “Barstow to Vegas desert motorcycle race.” Drew the big names and publicity. But, it was too far out there for us. Pretty soon, the courses took too much time on the weekends and the attraction of the local European Scrambles events and then new Motocross events were staging in the nearby local dirt tracks. Those started to appeal more for both of us. Jnaki The blue line is/was the best condition road and route for us. We stopped for gas, extra food and water for the extended stay from Friday night to Saturday after the races. But, the highway was the best in the area and went through those classic towns or establishments, with oddball names: Littlerock, Pearblossom, and Llano. As we drove east, those were stops for supplies, mostly. But, eventually, the random laid out courses were scattered all over the open ranges and into the hills. Each course laid out was at least 40 miles and some were 50 miles in a marked course in the desert. If one did not know the white line markings, then getting lost is simple and happened to a lot of newcomers. YRMV
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