History
Hawthorne’s deceptively sunny history
Home of The Beach Boys, the South Bay city was billed as "the most beautiful suburban town." But it wasn’t so idyllic.
The glory days of MacArthur Park
It reigned for a half-century as a grand setting for outdoor concerts and boat rides.
Former ‘feminist mecca’ in Chinatown could become Los Angeles landmark
The Woman’s Building was a hub for women artists from 1975 to 1991.
See LA all dressed up for the holidays in these vintage photos
From Christmas parades to home light displays, Los Angeles could get pretty festive back in the day.
Remembering the rare, magical times it snowed in LA
For Angelenos, the once-in-a-blue-moon snowstorms were a "beautiful sight."
‘Variety’ owner wants to turn a black church in Venice into a residential compound
Some members of the century-old church are trying to stop him.
How Skid Row formed in Downtown LA
At the turn of the century, Los Angeles was the end of the line for Civil War vets and stowaways.
In 1961, the Bel Air-Brentwood Fire burned more than 500 structures
Richard Nixon, then renting a house on North Bundy Drive, took to the roof with a garden hose, saving the home.
How one man pioneered a homeless shelter on Skid Row
"Free soap, free soup and free salvation."
The ‘bargain’ brothels of Victorian era Los Angeles
Near Union Station, in a part of town once known as Hell’s Half Acre, women worked in squalor while pimps and landlords grew rich.
Haunted Los Feliz
One of LA’s most idyllic neighborhoods is also its most haunted.
Soak up the splendor of Jayne Mansfield’s ‘Pink Palace’
In honor of a new Jayne Mansfield documentary, soak up the splendor of the ‘Hollywood Babylon’ covergirl’s over-the-top mansion.
Rare vintage photos show Sunset Boulevard’s 1930s Hollywood Reporter building in its prime
Now up for landmark status, the property could be demolished to make way for a huge new Hollywood development.
Los Feliz’s romantic Van Griffith estate on the market for $8.9M
Built for the son of the Griffith Park namesake, the six-bedroom, five-bathroom Mediterranean has gorgeous views and lush grounds.
The deadly history of Hotel Barclay
There were gruesome slayings and bloody accidents. But the Downtown hotel prospered.
Katy Perry’s plan to buy an Eagle Rock mansion for Catholic priests falls through
Built in the 1920s by moving magnate Martin Bekins, the estate is now up for grabs, asking $5.6 million.
The weird occult origins of Downtown’s famous Bradbury Building
Legend has it a ghost told the building’s architect to take the job.
Hollywood’s first tourist attraction was a sprawling rose garden
Long before the Walk of Fame and Grauman's Chinese Theater, tourists flocked to Hollywood to tour a garden filled with roses and fields of orange poppies. It was the work of the famous French painter, Paul De Longpre.
Original Blue Line train car will be preserved in Downtown Long Beach
Mayor Robert Garcia says the 27-year-old car could be reused as a restaurant or a museum.
National Park Service will host a haunted attraction at Paramount Ranch
Dubbed "Scare-amount Ranch," it will be the first Halloween event hosted at the ranch, which has been a popular filming location for nearly 100 years.
Digging under the future Purple Line: ‘We’re anticipating a wealth of fossils’
LA was once teeming with wildlife. We chat with a paleontologist who’s helping unearth the fossils.
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Angels Flight, LA’s tiny railway, is a trip back in time
In a city best-known for its midcentury architecture, for experimentation and innovation, it’s a treat to still be able to use a 116-year-old time capsule.
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The bike path through Santa Monica is intoxicatingly beautiful
For the prettiest commute in Los Angeles, rent a bike-share in Santa Monica and roll down the coast, soaking in ocean views.
New documentary explores gentrification in LA
Boyle Heights, Long Beach, and South Central LA are three of the communities highlighted in the KCET doc.
The story of Scotty's, the infamous gas station brothel of 1940s Hollywood
A new documentary shines a light on the notorious brothel that once stood on Hollywood Boulevard and Van Ness and the man who ran it.
A look at the atomic blasts that lit up the early morning sky in 1950s Los Angeles
Eerie photos from the era show the flashes produced by nuclear testing performed 300 miles away in the Nevada Desert.
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Southern California’s experimental communes, mapped
From Silver Lake to Santa Barbara, zealots and hippies high on religion, LSD, and idealism withdrew from mainstream society to build their own utopias.
Why does LA have a mall based on the Babylon set from a 1916 epic?
Science fiction author Ray Bradbury says it was his idea.
How LA got in the habit of putting ‘the’ in front of every freeway name
Southern California was an early adopter of freeways, but keeping the names and numbers of all those freeways straight wasn’t always easy.
The La Tuna Fire is the biggest—but not the most destructive—in LA history
The La Tuna Fire has now surpassed the scope of the Bel Air Fire of 1961, but that blaze destroyed close to 500 homes, including those belonging to Burt Lancaster and Zsa Zsa Gabor.
Hollywood’s transformation from rural paradise to tourist hell
It’s hard to believe, but Hollywood was once a charming, tight-knit village. We submit these 15 photos as proof.
The real story behind the LA street named for a Confederate general’s son
California was a Union state not typically associated with Confederate efforts, but one of its streets is named after the son of Robert E. Lee’s predecessor.
Memorial honoring Confederate soldiers is removed from Hollywood Forever
The marker, which stood where some 30 Confederate veterans are buried, was taken down this morning after public outcry.
The Valley motel that always steals the show
Thrust back into the spotlight in the Netflix hit "GLOW," the motel is a must-see for midcentury architecture fans.
Lucille Bryant Raport: The midcentury architect you haven’t heard about
In the 1950s, the Valley Times dubbed her "one of the most respected and sought after architects in the Valley."
Studio City was LA's original master planned megadevelopment
Mack Sennett—a Hollywood giant with the nickname the "King of Comedy"—used a giant pie and swimsuit models to to draw attention to the neighborhood when it opened in 1928.
This vintage map of the Valley romanticizes its early mission days
A local bank made the map, showcasing, among other events, the discovery of gold in nearby Placerita Canyon—before Sutter’s Mill.
What’s happening with Studio City’s iconic Sportsmen’s Lodge?
A developer has the green light to transform the site with the addition of new restaurants and shops, but construction has yet to start.
Take a look at the Valley when it was still ranches and farmland
Before it was home to swimming pools and shopping centers, the Valley was largely an agricultural region—with horses, jackrabbits, and giant pumpkins.