For an example of what makes Los Angeles such a gruesome and greedy place, one needs to look no further than the plans to raze and destroy the 9-acre Oakie Estate in Northridge.
Jack Oakie was a comedian and actor from the 1930s and 40s who lived here in the NW Valley when the surroundings were filled with horse farms and orange groves. Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz were his neighbors.
Oakie, who died in 1978, watched as Northridge descended into the grotesque, un-walkable and blindingly crude big-box sprawl that it is today. The farms were asphalted over, and the mammoth shopping centers, with their baking black asphalt in the 110 degree heat, this is what we have today.
So USC owns the house, which is also a historical monument, yet the University wants to sell it to a developer, who will pave over the green land and Paul Williams designed home. Proceeds from the sale will allegedly be used to finance the film school so its students can learn those skills needed to make the future “Transformers” or “I Now Pronounce You Chuck and Larry”. A piece of the Valley history, one that goes back to our agricultural and film industry roots, will be no more.
Is there not one government official with guts who can persuade the city of Los Angeles to buy this and turn it into a recreational and historic green space? This would be a most beautiful park, a respite from the commercial and material assault on the senses that Northridge normally is.
I can already see the vinyl windows, the Hummers pulling into the gates, the fat kids sitting in air-conditioning in front of their plasma screens, the absolute artificiality of what will be coming here…..
Here in Van Nuys 