History

In this 1988 file photo, the deserted housing development west of LAX can be seen to the right of the shoreline, between Vista del Mar and Pershing Drive. Imperial Highway runs across the bottom of the photo.

 

It was originally a picturesque housing development, this plot of land west of Los Angeles International Airport between Imperial Highway and Playa del Rey and just across Vista del Mar from the beach.

The development firm of Dickinson & Gillespie began offering lots on the property, which it called "Palisades Del Rey," in the early 1920s. Frank Lloyd Wright is said to have designed some of the houses, and film director Cecil B. DeMille was an early resident.

Residents of the Surfridge housing development remember their seaside life fondly. The area's occupants described a rather idyllic existence at the seaside enclave, especially in the early years before the airport began to encroach upon the area.

As former resident Gerry Cully told Daily Breeze reporter Ian Gregor in August 2000, "It was a delightful place to live, kind of like the French Riviera, because you had all these old homes and it was pretty isolated, you see. It was like being on vacation every day living around here."

Concerned about safety and noise issues, LAX began buying up the Surfridge homes in 1965. For the next 13 years, the airport bought 924 properties covering 248 acres for a total of $56 million. Then they began the process of either moving the houses or razing them.

The winding, empty streets with occasional foundations, crumbling walls and lampposts - Sandpiper, Jacqueline, Kilgore and the rest - were all that remained once all the houses had been removed by 1978. A modern-day ghost town had sprung up.

Plans were made. The Airport Commission and the city of Los Angeles both signed off on the Airport Dunes plan in 1983. It provided for a 27-hole championship golf course, with some 80 acres set aside as a nature preserve for the endangered El Segundo Blue Butterfly and other threatened local animals, insects and plants.

But environmental concerns led to the Airport Dunes plan being nixed by the California Coastal Commission.

Similar plans resurfaced in 1990. This time, the wildlife area would be doubled in size and the golf course portion scaled back to two 9-hole courses on 120 acres in the northwest corner of the property, with profits from the golf used to fund the wildlife preserve. Critics still balked at the proposal and it ended up in limbo for several years.

During this time in the early 1990s, a dedicated group of environmentalists obtained a $430,000 state grant and began the painstaking job of revitalizing the preserve, removing non-native plants and carefully tending to the remaining indigenous wildlife. Emphasis was given to restoring the coastal buckwheat plant favored by the El Segundo Blue. By 1993, the 200-acre site was completed.

 

An El Segundo Blue Butterfly lands on a coastal buckwheat flower in this file photo. The once-endangered insect species has thrived in recent years.

 

Another version of the plan resurfaced in 1996, but nothing ultimately came of it. The streets were blocked off after the area began to attract sightseers and Sandpiper Street began to be used as a lover's lane. After 9/11, access to the area was restricted further for security reasons.

The El Segundo Blue Butterfly has thrived at the wildlife preserve over the years. In July 2009, the butterfly population that once had dropped to an estimated 500 in 1976 had reached an estimated 70,000.

Other than the butterflies, the area remains desolate. A small two-acre park was built across from the beach, but the rest of the land remains undeveloped -- for humans, anyway.

 

 

 

One of several deserted, fenced-off streets that intersects with Vista del Mar.

 

 

Sources:

 

Daily Breeze files.

"Once Vibrant Beach Colony a Ghost Town," by David Ferrell, Los Angeles Times, Aug. 30, 2001, Page B2.

 

On September 2, 1957, the city of Torrance opened Sea-Aire Golf Course, above, a small, lushly beautiful pitch-and-putt course at 22730 Lupine Avenue in the Seaside Ranchos area in the southern section of the city. It would turn out to be the only public golf course in the city to date, though not for a lack of trying. (A private nine-hole course that operates at the New Horizons senior housing development opened in 1965.)

Ever since the 1950s, efforts have been made to develop a new public golf course in the city, but none have come to fruition.

In 1958, a serious push was launched to build a golf course at the Entradero Sump site in west Torrance. The city's parks and recreation commissioners at the time envisioned either an 18-hole par-three course, or a 9-hole course with a driving range.

Dr. Cecil Hollingsworth of the National Golf Foundation, which at that time was operating Alondra Golf Course on county land just north of Torrance, said his group would consider developing the site. Occasional flooding of the sump was not seen as a detriment: "It might even work to an advantage, because flood water could be used as a course hazard," he was quoted as saying at a parks commission meeting in Sep. 1958.

Unfortunately, the Torrance City Council did not agree. After listening to protests from area residents, it voted down the proposal on July 14, 1959 (see clip, left, click to enlarge).

The next groundswell to build a municipal golf course came in July 1964, when Torrance City Manager Edward Ferraro began studying the possibility of building a course on the 185-acre site owned by Chanslor-Western Oil Co. This land had been designated as the future site of South Bay State College.

The parcel was located north of Sepulveda Avenue between Crenshaw Boulevard and Madrona Avenue. We now know the site as the location of Madrona Marsh and several condominium developments.

South Bay State College would evolve into California State University, Dominguez Hills in Carson.

As for Ferraro's golf course proposal, it whipped up some enthusiasm, including an endorsement from Mayor Albert Isen. The South Bay Golf Association was formed to support the idea, and the city appointed George Post to head the 15-member Torrance Golf Course Advisory Committe on the topic.

Once again, though, the course never was built. A more detailed study by Ferraro's office indicated that costs to purchase the land and build the course would be far higher than first anticipated. It would have involved using money from the city's general fund, something to which the city council was opposed. In addition, Chanslor gave no indication that it was interested in selling the land. By January 1965, enthusiasm for the proposal had faded.

Within months, though, the backup site near the Torrance Municipal Airport that also had selected as a possibility began to come under serious consideration. Developer Dan Butcher owned the 246 acres between 235th Street and the airport. He first proposed building a cemetery there, a facility that Torrance does not have to this day.

The debate over the Butcher site would continue for four years. The cemetery proposal was rejected in November 1966. The council voted to let Butcher's golf course land offer expire in June 1967, but discussions, feasibility studies, offers and counter-offers continued until mid-1968. Butcher was never able to assure the city that the golf course venture would be able to pay for itself, so ultimately no action was taken on it.

Since then, no serious efforts to build a public course have been made in Torrance, probably due to the lack of available land as the city's development increased, and the high cost of the land that did remain.

Two efforts on the city's border have been made in recent years. One proposal for the county to build a public course on the site of the Palos Verdes Landfill in Rolling Hills Estates near Torrance's southern border did not come to pass. The plan was abandoned in April 2006, after years of debate.

A second proposal that would replace the current Rolling Hills Country Club course with a new course at the site of the Chandler quarry and landfill in Rolling Hills Estates is still in the development stage. The Chandler Ranch project would involve a 28-acre piece of land in Torrance that would be swapped with Rolling Hills Estates if the golf course/housing project wins approval.

 

A golfer prepares to tee off on the first hole at Sea-Aire Golf Course in Torrance. It remains the only public golf course in the city.

 

Sources:

Daily Breeze files.

"New Horizons Golf Course," http://www.golflink.com/golf-courses/course.aspx?course=88334.

"Sea-Aire Golf Course," http://www.ci.torrance.ca.us/Parks/10153.htm.

 

 

 

It's a 3-square-mile city with no public streets, only private roads. None of its lots are zoned for business, commercial or industrial use, only residential. All of its houses are single-story, and must be painted only one color: white.
It has no public infrastructure: no storm drains, sidewalks, curbs or sewers. Its police and fire services are provided by Los Angeles County.
Sound primitive? Welcome to Rolling Hills.
Its 1,908 residents (as of July 2008) are among the wealthiest in the U.S. According to 2008 figures, the city's median household income is $263,908, and the estimated median house value is $2,607,252.
Entrance to the city is controlled by means of gates manned with security guards, and outsiders are not allowed to enter without permission from the city resident they plan to visit.

It all began when Beverly Hills landscape archtiect A.E. Hanson was tapped by landowner Frank A. Vanderlip Sr. to develop a community on part of the 16,000 acres of Palos Verdes Peninsula land that Vanderlip had acquired in 1913.

This early brochure promoted the dude-ranch concept in Rolling Hills. (Photo from Rolling Hills: The Early Years by A.E. Hanson.)

 

Hanson began his task in March 1932. He attempted to sell the idea of developing the city's large lots into single-family vacation dude ranches. That idea evolved into a development with one-story luxury homes with room enough to keep and ride horses. The minimum lot size was one acre of land.

 

Hanson sent out 10,000 postcards in 1940 advertising Rolling Hills land (see above, click to enlarge), but claimed to have not gotten any responses.

In 1935, the city's first gatehouse was built at the intersection of Palos Verdes Drive North and Portuguese Bend Road. To this day, it is the main entry gate to the city.

 

The main gatehouse to the city of Rolling Hills in a July 2010 file photo.

 

For awhile, it also served as the city hall and community center for Rolling Hills. A new city hall built just across the street was dedicated in April 1967.

Rolling Hills officially became an incorporated city on Jan. 24, 1957. The incorporation election was held on Jan. 8, 1957. The vote was 408 for incorporation, and 126 against, a 75.3 percent turnout of the city's 712 elegible voters.

 

Rolling Hills City Hall is situated just outside the city's main gate. (July 2010 file photo.)

 

At the time, the city claimed to be the only fully gated city to be incorporated in the U.S.

Organizers of the incorporation claimed it was necessary to retain the city's unique identity and to preserve it from annexation attempts by surrounding cities.

Two governing bodies regulate Rolling Hills: The City of Rolling Hills is governed by 5 council members with a rotating mayor, and a city manager, while the Rolling Hills Community Association supports and maintains the guard houses, community areas such as tennis courts and horse trails. The RHCA also has architectural authority over home construction in order to maintain the one-story ranch house flavor of the community.

As for Hanson, he also developed a similarly themed city in the San Fernando Valley, Hidden Hills, beginning in 1950. It also featured bridal trials, white three-rail fences and no sidewalks or street lights. Hidden Hills became an incorporated city in 1961. Hanson died in 1987 at 92.

 

 

 

Sources:

Daily Breeze news stories.

"Facts About Rolling Hills," The City of Rolling Hills, California (official website), http://www.rolling-hills.org.

"Rolling Hills, California," City-Data.com website, http://www.city-data.com/city/Rolling-Hills-California.html#ixzz0tbZJ8kKT

Rolling Hills: The Early Years, By A.E. Hanson, City of Rolling Hills, 1978.

 

 

Daily Breeze, March 28, 1969, Page 1.

When Steve Yancy, 51, of Torrance, died six weeks after an explosion and fire at the Fletcher Oil and Refining Co. plant in Carson in 1969, the last hope of finding the cause of the $1 million disaster died with him.

He was the second person to die in the blast and ensuing fire on Thursday, March 27, 1969 at the refinery at 24721 S. Main Street, just north of Lomita Boulevard. Truck driver Myron Chase of Petrolane Transport Co. died at the scene.

An additional 154 people, including both refinery workers and spectators at the scene were injured. All but about nine of them were treated at area hospitals and released.

Officials first thought that a spark during the unloading of Chase's tanker truck into a giant tank at the refinery had caused the blaze, which began with an explosion at 5:27 p.m.

After an intensive investigation, officials ruled that a nearby 30,000-gallon tank in the same area burst for an unknown reason. The rupture caused the lid of the tank to blow off and fly about 700 feet in the air, landing in the middle of Main Street.

This photo diagram from the May 12, 1969 Daily Breeze shows the sequence of events in the Fletcher Oil refinery explosion and fire. Click to enlarge.

 

Two backup systems that would have stemmed the disaster failed to work, and the conflagration was on. In total, four tanks went up in flames following the blast.

By 9:30 p.m., firefighters had brought the intense flames under control. Another flareup at about 10:00 p.m. was knocked down, and the blaze was controlled completely just after midnight.

One of the men injured in the refinery blaze, Charles H. Sallee of Torrance, received credit for greatly minimizing the scale of the disaster. Following the initial explosion, he picked himself up and struggled into the control center building, where he was able to shut down operations at the plant. This prevented the fire from destroying the entire plant and its storage facilities.

 

Daily Breeze, March 28, 1969, Page 3.

 

Investigators had hoped that the seriously burned Yancy would be able to provide answers that would help determine the cause of the blaze and the reasons that the backup controls failed, but he never became well enough to answer questions. He was transferred to the burn unit at Little Company of Mary Hospital in Torrance where he appeared to be recovering, but he died there on May 12, 1969.

The Fletcher Oil plant continued to operate after the 1969 disaster, but a growing chorus of environmental complaints that included noise, air pollution and noxious odors led to an organized campaign by nearby homeowners to shut down the plant.

The plant did close briefly from Nov. 1991 to April 1992. It then reopened for several years until it finally closed for good in the late 1990s.

The 36-acre site was purchased by the Sanitation Districts of Los Angeles County in 2000 for $14 million. The site is being cleaned up to remove soil and groundwater contamination left by the Fletcher Oil operation and the Sanitation District plans to build new regional wastewater treatment facilities there in the future.

This Daily Breeze file photo from March 1980 shows the Madrona Marsh area looking northwest, with Madrona Avenue at left center.

 

The battle for Madrona Marsh began in the early 1970s. Some three decades later, the concept for the 43-acre preserve finally came to fruition with the opening of the Madrona Marsh Nature Center in 2001.

The area, located just east of Del Amo Fashion Center and bounded on the north and south by Plaza del Amo and Sepulveda Boulevard, and on the east and west by Maple and Madrona avenues, is considered to be the last remaining vernal marsh in Los Angeles County.

Vernal marshes are found in low-lying areas where rainfall runoff accumulates. They may run dry in late summer, depending on the accumulation from the previous rainy season.

The fresh-water marshes are home to a wide variety of both local and non-local plants and animals.

 

A snowy egret searches for food in  the waters of Madrona Marsh in this 2003 Daily Breeze photo. (Scott Varley/Staff Photographer)

 

Some non-native birds use the marsh as a stopping-off point during annual migrations, while others make it a permanent home. The varieties of wildlife that can be found in the marsh vary with the amount of water and the time of year.

When developers began eyeing the prime real estate on which Madrona Marsh sits, they met resistance from environmenatalists and open-space advocates who wanted to preserve the wildlife area.

The group Friends of the Madrona Marsh was formed in 1972, and together with another group, STOP, Stop Torrance Overdevelopment Plans, offered resistance to the development proposals of the Torrance Investment Co., a firm consisting of developers Ray Watt, Guilford Glazer and Shurl Curci.

The developers wanted the whole parcel for homes, condominiums and office space, while the environmentalists wanted to save as much of the marsh as possible. In August 1974, the Torrance City Council announced a plan to acquire part of the 160-acre marsh and convert it to open space.

Arguments often grew heated. At one point in late September 1981, a representative of the Torrance Investment Co. made the argument that the wildlife found at the marsh consisted mostly of animals released there by the Southern California Humane Society, not animals living in a natural habitat. According to an Oct. 1, 1981 Daily Breeze story, the assertion "brought gasps and laughter from the audience."

Negotiations, debates and environmental impact reports continued throughout the 1970s. In 1980, the developers offered 15 acres for preservation. By 1983, they came up with an offer which eventually would be accepted: 34.4 acres would be deeded to the city, with another 8.5 acres made available for sale.

In 1984, Torrance Mayor James Armstrong was given a deed to the marsh, but it would be two more years until the arrangement would become formalized.

 

Construction crews work on townhomes near Monterey Street and Maple Avenue just northeast of the Madrona Marsh in this July 1985 Daily Breeze photo.

 

The city finally won clear title to the land on September 16, 1986, and environmentalists credited developer Ray Watt for helping to make the Madrona Marsh plan a reality.

Controversy flared again during a drought year in 1990. The city, concerned about dried-out conditions at the marsh, approved a plan to pay to import 230,000 gallons of water into it. Councilman Dan Walker objected, saying that it ran counter to the water conservation message being sent to residents during the drought.

A plan was adopted to pump rainwater runoff from the city's sumps and drainage systems into the marsh to minimize the effect of droughts on the area.

Over the years, the marsh began to take shape as a nature preserve. At least 43 5-ton truckloads of trash and other dumped debris were hauled away in 1989, and in 1994, 200 tons of inactive oil drilling pipes on the property were dug up and removed.

 

The 8,000-square-foot Madrona Marsh Nature Center, above, located across from the marsh at 3201 Plaza del Amo, opened on Saturday, April 28, 2001. The $1.8 million project was a joint venture of the Friends of the Madrona Marsh and the City of Torrance, using funds from Proposition A, which passed in 1996.

Just recently, Madrona Marsh has been closed for several days over concerns about mosquito larvae found there. West Nile virus warning signs were posted, though so far the virus has not been detected. As a precaution, the marsh remained closed until Friday, July 9, 2010.

The marshland has been closed once before in 2003, when a mysterious pink substance, later determined not to be dangerous, entered the wetland's water supply through a storm drain.

 

 

SOURCES:

Daily Breeze news stories.

Friends of the Madrona Marsh website, http://www.friendsofmadronamarsh.com/j/.

"This Unknown Peninsula," by Jess Morton,

http://www.lmconsult.com/audubonyes/madronamarsharticle.html.

For a map of the Madrona Marsh:

http://www.torrance.ca.gov/Parks/6642.htm

 

 

The land that ultimately would become the Palos Verdes landfill had been used as an open-pit mine for diatomaceous earth since the early 1900s.

This undated aerial photo shows the diatomaceous earth mining operation being conducted by the Great Lakes Carbon Corp. on the future landfill site.

 

The county purchased the 150-acre site on Crenshaw Boulevard just north of Palos Verdes Drive North from mine operator Great Lakes Carbon Corp. in 1956 for $1.1 million. Six county sanitation districts were involved in the plans to create a waste disposal facility on the site.

Despite the objections of residents led by James Cobham of Rolling Hills, head of the Committee Against the Palos Verdes Dump, plans moved ahead.

On May 15, 1957, the dump opened for business at 26300 Crenshaw Blvd, charging a 50-cent minimum fee and $1 per ton for non-garbage waste material.

The county's long-range plan was to convert the landfill into a regional park once it had been filled to capacity with waste.

This plan was realized partially with the opening of South Coast Botanic Garden on the eastern end of the site in April 1961, and the construction of Ernie Howlett Park on the site's western side, a project fully completed in 1982.

But more ambitious plans for the site that would have included multiple baseball diamonds, a community amphitheater, picnic areas and a nine-hole golf course and clubhouse did not come to fruition.

 

A bulldozer moves trash amid scavenging sea gulls at the Palos Verdes Landfill in this Daily Breeze file photo from Jan. 1979.

 

As operations at the landfill began to wind down in 1980, concerns about toxic and liquid waste being dumped there began to rise. After a County Grand Jury report detailed the problem in Aug. 1980, officials curtailed the amounts of waste being dumped there.

In Oct. 1980, the Guion family filed a lawsuit over methane gas that had been seeping into their Carolwood Avenue home near the northern border of the landfill. Several other Torrance homeowners in the area reported similar problems.

On Dec. 31, 1980, the Palos Verdes landfill officially closed after having accepted a total of 24 million tons of trash since its 1957 opening. At that time, plans to transform the site into a recreation area still were on the table.

In 1987, though, the site was placed on the state's toxic cleanup list over concerns about hazardous waste.

In Sept. 1999, a power failure at the nearby Ralphs grocery store revealed that its power lines had been eaten away by sulfuric acid, which, it was suspected, might have leaked from the landfill. But a 2003 EPA report concluded that the shuttered landfill posed no risk to nearby residents, schools and groundwater.

In 2009, a massive report by the state Department of Toxic Substances Control looked at groundwater, gas emissions, soil covering the landfill, storm water, wastewater and risks to human health, and found the site safe for workers, nearby residents and users of South Coast Botanic Garden and Ernie Howlett Park.

Almost since the time the landfill opened, plans to build a golf course on the site had been made by the county. The proposal gained momentum in the early 2000s, but difficulties with the site led to the county abandoning its golf course plans in April 2006.

In May 2010, county sanitation officials created a 9-member Citizens' Advisory Committee to promote continued public dialogue about the closed dump.

The latest proposal for the site: a plan for a two-to-three acre dog park that gained approval from the Rolling Hills Estates City Council on June 8, 2010. That plan now moves to Los Angeles County, which has the final say-so on use of the parcel, for final approval.

This 2001 aerial photo shows the closed Palos Verdes Landfill site.

 

 

Sources:

Daily Breeze files.

"Garden History: A successful venture in land reclamation," South Coast Botanic Garden website, http://www.southcoastbotanicgarden.org/history.

 

The Graf Zeppelin on the ground, left, at Mines Field in Los Angeles, Aug. 26, 1929. Hundreds of cars can be seen lining the road at bottom, and the original airport buildings are visible at center right. (Click to enlarge photo.)

 

Thousands of local residents jammed Mines Field on Monday, Aug. 26, 1929, 20 years before the airfield officially became known as Los Angeles International Airport.

The occasion: the arrival of the German dirigible the Graf Zeppelin, which was then on a worldwide tour.

Named after the inventor of the rigid airship, German engineer Count Ferdinand Graf von Zeppelin, the  airship is considered to be the finest vessel of its type ever built.

During its 10 years of operation, it flew 590 flights for more than one million miles, and had a perfect safety record.

At 776 feet long, the Graf Zeppelin was four times the size of the Goodyear blimps (192 feet).

In 1929, American publishing czar William Randolph Hearst decided to sponsor a round-the-world flight for the dirigible, starting in Lakehurst, New Jersey. He placed female reporter Lady Grace Marguerite Hay Drummond-Hay on the ship to file exclusive stories on the trip for his newspaper chain, and, as a result, she became the first woman to circumnavigate the globe by air.

It was during this ballyhooed flight that the Graf Zeppelin came to visit Mines Field, landing at sunrise on Aug. 26.

 

Spectators on the ground look over the massive Graf Zeppelin at Mines Field, Aug. 26, 1929.

 

Airport employee Henry Bates recalled that day for a Daily Breeze news story in 1979, calling it a "great deal ... a very exciting thing."

The Navy had closed the airport and had dozens of men ready to grab the ship's anchor lines when it approached the field.

After it landed, "I got on it," said Bates. "It was just like a big hotel." Others who went on board to tour the ship included Hearst himself, and movie stars Douglas Fairbanks and Mary Pickford.

The two-story passenger gondola had 20 bedrooms, a dining room, a ballroom area and many other amenities.

 

This view from the front of the airship offers a better view of its two-story gondola.

 

The Graf Zeppelin stayed at Mines Field until shortly after midnight on Tuesday, Aug. 27. Thousands of people remained into the wee hours to catch a final glimpse of the airship when it took off at 12:14 a.m.

On May 6, 1937, the heyday of dirigible flight essentially ended with the ill-fated attempted landing of the Hindenburg at the same Lakehurst, New Jersey field where the Graf Zeppelin had taken off from in 1929.

The famous accident and explosion killed 35 of the 97 people on board and one man on the ground. Thousands witnessed the crash, and millions more heard WLS radio announcer Herbert Morrison's unforgettable  "Oh, the humanity" description. After the Hindenburg disaster, airship travel no longer was a viable commercial enterprise.

 

The U.S. post office issued a set of three Graf Zeppelin stamps in 1930, and it remains one of its most popular and valuable issues, with a catalog value of more than $2,000 for a mint set of three.

 

 

Sources:

"Dirigible era: When fliers slowed to a crawl," by Richard Dore, Daily Breeze, Oct. 27, 1979.

Images of Aviation: Los Angeles International Airport, by William A. Schoenberger,  Ethel Pattison, Lee Nichols and Flight Path Learning Center of Southern California,
Arcadia Publishing, 2009.

"The Zeppelin," U.S. Centennial of Flight Commission website, http://www.centennialofflight.gov/essay/Lighter_than_air/zeppelin/LTA8.htm 

It's the first thing you see on your left from the water as you enter the main channel of the Port of Los Angeles, right after passing the Angles Gate Lighthouse.

That massive building with the water tower on top is Warehouse No. 1, and it was crucial to the establishment of the Port as an international facility.

Construction began in 1915, and the half-million square-foot building was completed in 1917.

 

Warehouse No. 1 under construction in 1916. Port of Los Angeles photo.

 

Its location was ideal, with wharfs on its west side where ships could dock, and railroad tracks just on the other side of Signal Street running down its left side.

 

Railroad tracks can be seen on the west side of Warehouse No. 1 in this 1917 photo taken shortly after the facility opened. Port of Los Angeles photo.

 

The six-story structure cost $476,000 to build. It was constructed out of reinforced concrete, and equipped with elevators and roof-mounted hoists for handling all types of cargo.

The distinctive water tank on its roof was part of the original building, and was built for fire prevention.

In the 1920s, the roof of Warehouse No. 1 also became the home of the Marine Exchange, the agency that monitors ships leaving and entering the port. In 1928, the Marine Exchange completed a new building offering panoramic views of the port, with a distinctive red beacon on top. The Exchange operated there until the 1980s. The warehouse roof also was the site of a weather station for many years.

The building was a key player in port activities from the moment it opened in 1917 up through the 1970s, when the arrival of containerized cargo lessened the need for warehousing. For years, it was the Port's only bonded warehouse.

It is still a working warehouse more than 90 years after it was built. On April 21, 2000, Warehouse No. 1 was listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

 

Warehouse No. 1 dominates the landscape as you enter the main channel of the Port of Los Angeles.

 

Sources:

Port of Los Angeles: An Illustrated History From 1850 To 1945, by Ernest Marquez and Veronique De Turenne, Angel City Press, 2008.

"Port of Los Angeles Virtual History Tour: Warehouse No. 1," Port of Los Angeles website,
http://www.laporthistory.org/level3/warehouse_2.html.

 

 

Aerial view of the White Point Hot Spring Hotel and resort from August 1922 shows the hotel, saltwater swimming pool and outdoor dance floor. Photo courtesy Palos Verdes Library District. 

Only a few remnants remain today of the White Point Hot Spring Hotel resort and spa located at what is now Royal Palms County Beach in San Pedro.

During its heyday in the 1920s, it was one of the most popular beach resorts in Southern California, especially among Japanese-Americans.

Before Tojuro Tagami and his brother Tamiji built the resort in 1917, the area had been part of the Rancho de los Palos Verdes, which owner Jose Sepulveda had used as a cattle ranch.

In 1898, then-owner Ramon Sepulveda built housing and leased land to 12 Japanese-American fishermen from Los Angeles who had discovered an abundance of abalone and other readily harvestable sea life in the area. The fishing village thrived until 1906, when the abalone supply diminished and the operation closed.

The discovery of a sulfur hot spring in the area led to the Tagami brothers developing the bathhouse, together with Ramon Sepulveda. They built roads and dug out the hot spring, and by 1925 the resort included a hotel, restaurant, salt water swimming pools and an enclosed boating area.

 

This July 1925 aerial view shows the outdoor concrete swimming area and an enclosed saltwater pool just north of it at the resort. Photo courtesy LACFD Station 48.

 

Sepulveda also had built a terrazo dance floor surrounded by stone fireplaces and carved stone benches, some of which still survive today.

 

View looking north show the White's Point Hot Spring Hotel, with land owner Rámon Sepúlveda (b. 1854), son of José Diego Sepúlveda, on horseback next to fountain in foreground. Photo courtesy Palos Verdes Library District. 

 

Enterprising fisherman Mitsuo Endo placed a fishing barge about a mile offshore among the kelp beds, then built a pier at the resort from which fishermen were transported to the barge by small powerboats.

The resort thrived during the 1920s. Physicians would send patients to the resort for the curative powers of the hot springs, and newlyweds would stay there for the beauty of the weather and location.

A variety of factors led to the resort's demise. A huge storm battered the coast in 1928, damaging the concrete pool. A bigger blow came when the Long Beach earthquake of 1933 cut off the flow of the natural sulfur hot springs, and the Depression also hurt the resort economically.

The Tagamis continued to run the resort, but they never were granted ownership of the land. Ramon Sepulveda legally could not sell to them under a California law which prohibited ownership of land by those not eligible to become citizens, a category that at that time included Asian immigrants.

The resort finally closed in the late 1930s. In February 1942, federal agents raided the surrounding community for security reasons and by April 1942, its residents had been moved to internment camps.

The federal government took over the area, incorporating it into the nearby Fort MacArthur military defense complex. The resort's buildings were demolished, and fortifications were added to the shoreline and nearby hillside.

The state of California bought the beach area in 1960, and it became Royal Palms State Beach. In 1995, the land was deeded to the county and became Royal Palms County Beach.

The site underwent a $2 million renovation in 1997. Additions included a children's play area, picnic tables and new restrooms. Descendants of the original Tagami family that built the resort were in attendance at the dedication.

 

Remains of concrete walls from the resort can be seen in this July 2006 Daily Breeze file photo.

 

Photos:

"Local History Collection," Palos Verdes Library District website,

http://localhistory.pvld.org/.

Sources:

"Los Angeles County Beach History," http://beaches.co.la.ca.us/bandh/Beaches/BeachHistory100708.pdf

"A Historic Cove Comes Back to Life," California Coast & Ocean, Summer 1997, http://www.ceres.ca.gov/htdocs/coast&ocean/suchive/COVE.HTM

"Reminders from a Royal past," by Josh Grossberg, Daily Breeze, Feb. 10, 2002, Page A4.

San Pedro: A Pictorial History, by Henry P. Silka, San Pedro Bay Historical Society, 1993.

 

 

 

pvlib photos:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/pvlocalhistory/sets/72157622140682988/

 

Pierre Lamure was born in Nice, France, on June 15, 1909. He gained fame during the 1930s as a correspondent for a French newspaper, a position which brought him to the United States in 1937.

In addition to his newspaper writing, he also wrote books, receiving the Strassburger Prize in 1939 for his biographies of Thomas Edison and John D. Rockefeller, both of which were written in French.

After coming to the U.S., Lamure, his wife Dorothy, and their daughter, Lynn, settled in Palos Verdes. Once there, the civic-minded naturalized citizen worked for the founding of the city of Palos Verdes Estates, which incorporated in December 1939.

The Lamures lived at 1501 Chelsea Road in a house that became known by the name "Lost Horizon." Dorothy Lamure had a knack for decorating and furnishing houses, and the Lamures owned and re-sold several PVE properties. After they sold the "Lost Horizon" house and moved to a home on Via Elevada, the new owners later leased it to Ethel Barrymore.

 

Pierre Lamure works at his desk in his Palos Verdes Estates home in this undated photo.

 

On January 31, 1941, Lamure and his wife revived the Palos Verdes Bulletin, a twice-monthly publication that had been founded originally in 1924, died out during the Depression and then was revived for a year in 1932 before failing again.

Its 15-month third incarnation from 1941 to 1942 reflected the Lamures' boundless energy and gave Pierre an outlet for his sometimes volatile views. He was often critical of local governing authorities such as the PVE City Council, the Homes Association and the Art Jury in its pages, frequently using his "Among Ourselves" column to tweak them.

Near the end of the Bulletin's third run in 1942, Lamure also used his platform to call for the relocation of Japanese-Americans on the Peninsula: "On the other hand, a removal which will receive universal approval is that of the Japanese now living on the Pacific coastline."

While the Lamures were living at the Via Elevada house in the 1940s, Pierre began working on his most famous work, a biographical novel about French artist Henri de Toulouse-Latrec titled Moulin Rouge. Mildred Beckstrand, a friend of the Lamures at the time, recalled in a 1964 interview that she spent many evenings at the Lamure house listening to Pierre read chapters of his work-in-progress aloud to groups of friends.

 

 

By the time Random House published Moulin Rouge in 1950, the Lamures had left Palos Verdes, and Pierre Lamure's name had become Pierre la Mure on the book jacket. The book was a huge success, and was translated into at least 18 languages.

In 1952, the first film version, left, starring Jose Ferrer and Zsa Zsa Gabor and directed by John Huston was released. It was nominated for seven Oscars and won two, for best art direction and best costume design, the same two awards that Baz Luhrmann's 2001 remake "Moulin Rouge!" won, coincidentally. That version starred Nicole Kidman, John Leguizamo and Ewan McGregor.

 

Lamure went on to write other successful biographical novels, including Beyond Desire (about composer Felix Mendelssohn) and Claire De Lune (about composer Claude Debussy.

His final book, The Private Life of Mona Lisa, was published in 1976. On December 15, 1976, Pierre Lamure died in Los Angeles at the age of 67.

 

Sources:

"Pierre La Mure, American Writer (1909-1976)," Contemporary Authors Online, Detroit: Gale Publishing, 1998.

The Palos Verdes Story, by Delane Morgan, The Palos Verdes Review, 1982.

 

Photos of Pierre Lamure from The Palos Verdes Story.