Dateline>City of Angels

An old gnarled trunk forms an eerie arch in the so-called “Badlands” of Elysian Park.

Originally part of El Pueblo de Los Angeles’ common lands, the 600-acre tract was officially established as the city’s first public park in April 1886. Today the green space offers stunning city views and is home to the Police Academy, Dodger Stadium, Grace Simons Lodge, and a former Navy / Marine Armory now used as an LAFD training center. Yet long before their appearance, the locale had already witnessed plenty of history and lore.

You might even say that Los Angeles owes its very existence to this place.

The historic Portola Expedition encamped near the park’s present-day Broadway entrance in 1769. Greatly impressed by the area’s natural beauty, they recommended it as the ideal site for the future City of Angels.

The town’s first Zanja Madre was also fed by a massive wooden water wheel situated along the L.A. riverbank nearby, and eventually by a small reservoir constructed in the park’s canyons.

Moreover, for decades treasure-seekers have believed that early pobladores like the Avilas and Picos buried their valuables in the park to safeguard them from raiding privateers and advancing American troops. No one has yet been able to prove the legend, which may also be connected to the story of a shrieking White Lady said to haunt the trails and hillsides. Some assert she keeps a lonely vigil over the lost belongings, while others claim she was the victim of a brutal post-World War II murder.

Then again, perhaps she’s an errant spirit from L.A.’s first Jewish cemetery, which once stood somewhere near Chavez Ravine.

Unfortunately, there were no signs of treasure, ghosts or gravestones when I snapped this photo with my trusty Nikon D70s just around sunset the other evening [1/50 sec. @ f10, 18-70mm lens]. With darkness — and the park’s curfew — closing in, I reluctantly hopped back in my Jeep and put it in gear, leaving exploration of these unsolved Elysian Mysteries for another day.

Caution: The object depicted here may appear smaller in real life.

Seriously, this has got to be the world’s littlest red school house. Hardly bigger than a garden shed from Home Depot, it has room for a teacher and lectern, chalkboard, and two students. (Maybe four with classroom overcrowding.)

But don’t be fooled. This little school house didn’t actually sit on the prairie — at least not originally.

In 1927, when promoter Robert E. Callahan built the 3.5-acre Mission Village auto court in Culver City, he included the school house as one of his many tiny-town tourist attractions. When the Santa Monica Freeway plowed through the area in 1963, Callahan relocated the structure to Mint Canyon, where it did finally serve as a classroom.

The school house is now part of the Santa Clarita Valley Historical Society’s “Heritage Junction” collection at the William S. Hart Regional Park. The society makes no pretenses about the structure, noting that while not “architecturally significant, it does however represent small schools used in mining camps and frontier settlements during the late 19th Century in the American West.”

Since 1975, SCVHS has managed to also save a number of full-sized, historically significant buildings by moving them to its leased section of Hart’s former ranch. These include the old Saugus Train Depot (pictured left, now serving as the society’s headquarters), a company bungalow built by Edison in 1919 to house workers, and the Henry M. Newhall ranch house, which dates to the mid-1800s.

Heritage Junction is open Saturday and Sunday from 1 to 4 p.m., with additional tours by appointment. For more info, visit the SCVHS website.

Looking for a peaceful little Saturday getaway from the workweek’s cares and hassles? I know it sounds macabre, but tranquility awaits you within the walls of Mission San Gabriel’s Campo Santo.

Like many history buffs, I find old cemeteries both oddly soothing and profoundly educational. Walking among the plots, statuary and epitaphs, you never know what names you’ll stumble upon. Nor can you help but muse over our common mortality and the many life stories lost forever to time. It’s as much a philosophical as a historical pursuit.

For this little tour of the Great Beyond, postpone any excursions through the original cemetery within the mission’s courtyard walls. Although that smaller, first cemetery dates to 1778 – making it Los Angeles County’s oldest Christian bone yard – few of its approximately 6,000 neophyte graves are marked. (One notable exception is a Native American named Antonio, the burial ground’s first occupant.)

Instead, make a beeline across the parking lot toward the parish’s larger, second church and pass through the skull-adorned gates to the “newer” cemetery. This is the far more visually rewarding resting place for scores of pioneering families, including names like Lugo, Felix, Verdugo and Ortega, whose simple, unassuming monuments belie their importance to early Los Angeles history. (Up until about 1822, deceased Angelenos were usually transported here for burial.)

Once you’ve read enough tombstones, by all means go back, pay the fee, and wander the gardens and museum of L.A.’s “Mother Church” for the usual tourist fare. Dedicated to the Archangel Gabriel on Sept. 8, 1781 near what is now Montebello, the settlement was moved here five years later. It was fourth in California’s chain of 21 missions, and among the most prosperous.

Unfortunately, there’s little left of the once-sprawling complex, so your sightseeing will likely be brief. Afterwards, you’ll find eats, refreshment and maybe even a little curio shopping in the City of San Gabriel’s modest Mission District, a brief stroll west of the mission’s famous campanile and rectory.

Quick glimpses of the last surviving trunks of the padres’ former vineyard (at one time the most renowned in all California) and the nearby Mission Playhouse complete your adventure. Enjoy!

Web Resources:
MapQuest Directions
Mission San Gabriel Museum
City of San Gabriel

Now here’s something you don’t see everyday — at least not in Southern California. But signs warning pedestrians about alligators and other reptiles were a common sight in Sugar Land, Texas, just outside Houston, where I was traveling for the past week.

This particular caution appeared in the city’s Oyster Creek Park, a large green space popular with local joggers, cyclists and strollers. I soon learned that gators and snakes weren’t the area’s only dangerous inhabitants. Fire ants and leeches also call the place home.

We Left Coast types like to make fun of the South and other “fly-over” regions of the country, often assuming they’re nothing more than a haven for bubbas and bumpkins… Read more

Yep, folks, I’m bilingual too. And while the paucity of postings since August 2 might indicate I’ve been vacationing along the Mexican Riviera, unfortunately that isn’t the case. (How I wish it were…)

The days surrounding the 15th of each month are always what I affectionately refer to as Hell Week. That’s when the trade publication I oversee as editor (aka, my Day Job) ships to press. Putting the magazine to bed pretty much sucks up all my attention, leaving me little time for getting out and about, let alone blogging. However, this last week I did manage to carve out enough time for two extracurricular pursuits.
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