Recently, Boyle Heights Historical Society stalwart Rudy Martinez came across a pamphlet on an Internet search called Beautiful Highlands of Los Angeles, Comprising Boyle Heights, Brooklyn Heights, Euclid Heights. Apparently published in 1899 by the Ninth Ward Improvement Association (the city was then divided into “wards,” a common designation in American cities then), this remarkable document was…
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Lorraine Schneider: Artist from Boyle Heights
With the Memorial Day holiday upon us and it being a holiday of remembrance for the soldiers who have died in wars fought by the United States, it seems timely and appropriate for this post about Lorraine Schneider, an artist raised in Boyle Heights whose 1966 print, “Primer,” decrying war has been an iconic image…
Autry National Center Jewish LA Exhibit and Boyle Heights
The Autry National Center’s newest exhibit, Jews in the Los Angeles Mosaic, which just opened and runs through early January 2014, provides a broad overview of the multidimensional history of Jews in Los Angeles from the 1850s to the modern day. Elements relating to families, religion, business and economics, Hollywood and the entertainment industry, sports,…
The Bernstein Film Studio of Boyle Heights
From the time that motion pictures were first filmed in the Los Angeles area around the turn of the 20th century, the industry has, obviously, been identified with Hollywood. The first studios, however, were in Edendale (the Silver lake/Echo Park/Los Feliz area) and others eventually were established in Culver City, Universal City, Burbank, Lincoln Heights…
John Edward Hollenbeck and Boyle Heights
His tenure in the emerging neighborhood of Boyle Heights was short, just under a decade, but the mark John E. Hollenbeck made in the community and in the Los Angeles area generally was notable and is still maintained in some key ways. Hollenbeck was born in Summit County, Ohio, south of Cleveland and near Akron,…
An Interesting Boyle Heights Letter from 1891
One of the other early notable players in the early development of Boyle Heights was John Edward Hollenbeck, of whom and his wife Elizabeth, there will be a separate post here soon. The Hollenbecks were successful business people in Nicaragua for some twenty years before moving to Los Angeles in 1876, just as Boyle Heights…
Early Spanish-Language Theater Programs from Boyle Heights, 1929
Though there is a great deal of printed and digital information about downtown Los Angeles theaters, the vast majority cover those centered in the theater district on Broadway and nearby streets and concern those that featured English-language films and live entertainment. Material on theaters that catered to Spanish-speaking audiences is much harder to come by.…
Boyle Heights and Its “Pioneer Aristocrats”
As noted in the last post, there was a brief time in the 1920s, when, at least to some people, Boyle Heights was actually known as “Hollenbeck Heights.” In September 1926, a lengthy article appeared in the Los Angeles Times called “Hollenbeck Heights Once Was Home of Pioneer Aristocrats.” Though romantic essays like this were…
The Boyle Heights and Hollenbeck Heights Controversy!
A recent question about when the name “Hollenbeck” was applied to the Los Angeles Police Department station in Boyle Heights led to an interesting aspect of the history of the neighborhood. First, a police station was contemplated for the community as far back as the mid-1890s, though it was a few years before one was…
Boosting Boyle Heights During the Boom of the 1880s
After a decade of economic stagnation, Los Angeles entered into a major growth boom in 1886 shortly after a direct transcontinental railroad link was made to the city from the east by the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railway. Over a few year period, tens of thousands of new arrivals poured into the region and…