"The cousin" Dave MacDonald (thanks @noboD ) http://www.davemacdonald.net/gallery/racing/racinggallery.htm
Hello, Please check your resources. This is Huntington Beach at the current Bolsa Chica State Beach area. Back then, it was county property and not Huntington Beach city property. It may have been taken in 1948, but look in the far left of the photo. The old cliff top rod and gun club area is shown. Plus, the telephone poles on the right side are along the railroad tracks that used to run from Long Beach to Newport Beach along the coastal beach enclaves. It is an early photo of the famous "Tin Can Beach." Jnaki https://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum...no-explanation.1143737/page-818#post-14901616
From this angle it looks like it's just not latched. In the shot before it looked like the back of the lid closest to the rear glass was to high to just be an unlatched lid.
Looks like my guess of vertical bar removal was right… I thought the trunk was just not latched in the rear photo