It is always fun to come across yet another old photograph of Van Nuys. (Courtesy of USC Digital Archives)
This time it’s the Fox Market, a chain, which once had an outpost at 7425 Van Nuys Bl. at the corner of Van Nuys and Valerio, north of Sherman Way .
Legendary photographer Julius Schulman shot the Carl Maston designed structure sometime in the early 1960s. Maston was a noted Mid- 20th Century architect whose work is described as “stark and no frills” in his USC research repository.
A flat roof, floor to ceiling glass, and acres of asphalt mixed convenience and modernism.
The neat, spare, boxy building is gone, and in its place is a riot of ugliness typical of that stretch of Van Nuys where architecture has gone to die. And all who pass through here glimpse a hot Hell built by indifference, corruption and “The Free Market”.
The May 5, 1960 Los Angeles Times carried a display ad from the Fox Market, which also had many other locations throughout the Southland.
There was a pound of peanut butter for 39 cents, lamb roast for 39 cents a pound, cans of Libby Peaches for 29 cents, along with a 59 cent cream pie and 4 buttered steaks for 69 cents.
Nobody seems to drink grapefruit juice these days, but in 1960 you could have had a 46 ounce can for 29 cents to wash down your 4 pounds of red potatoes for 25 cents.
Here in Van Nuys 
Andy, this is an exact copy of the Fox Market on the corner of Magnolia and Kester in what was then designated as Van Nuys (now Sherman Oaks). When they shut down, said market became Food Fair. Food Fair was anti-union and ended up dumping their employees. This particular store was bought out by Barney Dale and his brothers and remained a Dales Market from about 1964/’65 until the Spring of 1987. The Feds. took this property as well and turned it into a Post Office with not enough parking to go ’round. Thus they ended up adding to congestion and the further decay of our neighborhood…so what else is new. But what a pretty store this once was. Before that-c. 1952, it was a horse ranch owned by Jackie Coogan’s brother-the brunt of which spread west along Magnolia Blvd.
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