Out With the New, In With the Old

I’ve decided I like old news better than new news. Let me explain.

A few years ago, I needed some background information on a vintage story and stumbled across a website containing historic California newspapers. This quickly became one of my favorite sites. It wasn’t only historical information, it was the day-to-day commonplace details that I found useful. There’s nothing like a page of advertising to convey the flavor of a time gone by.

I’ve gotten hooked on perusing a historic newspaper much the way I would a current newspaper or news website. I page through and when I hit on a title that seems interesting, I read.

My current era of inquiry is March of 1913. Much of the information I obtain is never going in a book but it is certainly entertaining. For instance, I never knew Universal Studios was originally in Hollywood on the corner of Sunset and Gower. The entire thing burnt up. It was hardly the tragedy it would be today even though the studio was so huge and well-equipped it could shoot a whopping four pictures simultaneously. A hundred and fifty people were out of work. It wasn’t until 1915 that Carl Laemmle rebuilt his studio at its current location. Can you even find this information on Wikipedia? No way.

Poppy Days was once celebrated much closer to Los Angeles than I ever thought possible. Guess what city hosted this event. None other than Van Nuys. Can you imagine the San Fernando Valley covered in golden poppies? Angelenos were urged to hop on the trolley and come out for a day of picking flowers, touring and barbecue. Although Mr. Whitsett—where have I heard that name before?—was in the business of real estate promotion, no land was offered for sale during Poppy Days. This is probably going in a book.

The Los Angeles chamber of commerce completed a tour of the progress on the Panama Canal. They believed the canal would not open until 1914 due to the abundance of landslides they witnessed. Turns out, they were wrong. The canal opened in October of 1913.

No surprise here. Los Angeles faced a $750,000 shortfall for the aqueduct. Almost $2 million were being expended for Powerhouses No. 1 and 2 in San Francisquito Canyon, the same powerhouses that would be swept away by the Saint Francis Dam disaster a decade-and-a-half later. The reconstructed Powerhouse No. 2 is in use today. One of the original turbines survived the flood and is still in operation. The aqueduct was also completed in October of 1913.

A hundred thousand citizens were spellbound one March evening at seven o’clock as they watched the Mount Wilson Hotel burn to the ground. Mount Wilson was once a world-renowned tourist attraction. The landmark hotel was rebuilt and housed countless visitors until it was torn down in 1966.

Naturally, there are incredibly mundane articles. Most modern readers would find the focus on morals and religion quite foreign. Can you imagine opening a newspaper today and finding a review of a sermon? And all of this came from a single issue of the Los Angeles Herald.

I do not get the comedy of the day. Not only do I find it less than funny, it usually doesn’t even make sense. Some news items are better now—but not many!