Tag: 1940

Van Nuys City Directory, 1940

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The Los Angeles Public Library has a collection of city directories dating back to the late 19th Century and these are now mostly available online.

Of course, I turned to browse at the 1939/40 San Fernando Valley City Directory, all 674 pages of it, with its detailed listings of every single person, property and business in the entire valley at that moment in time.

SFV 1940 Wray Bros 1940 Van Nuys

Van Nuys is described as a “model suburban homes community of Los Angeles City; strategic and important business center. Municipal administration headquarters for Los Angeles in the annexex area of San Fernando Valley.” Population 35,000. (Population in 2015 is estimated at 140,000)

The Valley, on the eve of WWII, was about to undergo changes unforseen and unprecedented. It was a unique conglomeration of modern convenience and the dusty rustic.

It was a time when men and women wore hats and dressed up to go out. And people spoke in hushed terms about health concerns and family secrets. Nobody said fuck in public, and the fat tattooed lady was only found in the circus.

While people were private about private matters, they were at ease having their names, addresses and professions printed on a publically distributed platform.

It was a folksy time when business owners adopted nicknames for themselves. “Bran” and “Dee” Funkhouser, for example, owned the Bran-Dee Brass Rail and Cafe at 6308 Van Nuys Boulevard. Their menu emphasized alcohol: beer,  cocktails, wine, lunches and sandwiches.

California was at its most golden moment, still basking in its abilities to welcome [white] newcomers, while radiating an image of wholesome enterprise, carefree recreation, opportunity for all. It stood confident and inspired envy for its education, innovation and technology. It was the home of the movie stars, cattlemen, aviators, oil men and just plain happy folks who swam in pools and ate oranges off the tree.

From the ocean to the mountains, tired people came here to strike fortune, escape gloom, pursue health and happiness, and emerge energized and reborn.

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Postcard From Van Nuys: 1940

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Van Nuys HS Van Nuys HS1

 

Postcard courtesy of Valley Relics/ Tommy Gelinas.

Van Nuys Boulevard, Circa 1940

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From the Department of Water and Power photo archives, comes this photograph of the Norvord Building at  6420 Van Nuys Boulevard, just north of Victory, circa 1940.

Van Nuys Boulevard, before it was widened in 1954, had diagonal parking, as Brand Boulevard in Glendale does today.

In looking at the above photograph, one can see that the 1920s building, had, by 1940, undergone some modernist facade renovations with curved glass at Mode O’Day and streamline signage at Arnold W. Leveen Hardware.  The simple and lovely “Van Nuys Stationary Store” had a discreet sign and an awning to shade the interior from the sun.

Van Nuys Boulevard was a walkable, civilized, clean and prosperous street in the heart of the San Fernando Valley.  Locals shopped here and patronized small businesses who in turn watched over the community.  That was Van Nuys 74 years ago.

And what is it today?

Van Nuys Bl. Circa 1940

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Van Nuys Blvd. Circa 1940 (courtesy Valley Relics)

Valley Relics posted this circa 1940 color photograph of Van Nuys Blvd. facing south (towards Sherman Oaks) near Victory Blvd.

Two things in the photo stand out that are different from today: the streetcar running up the center of the street and the diagonally parked cars.

For many years, people have spoken about the loss of the streetcar as a viable way of transportation around the Southland.  Many think that the sprawl of this city makes streetcars irrelevant and automobiles the only solution.

But streetcars traversed the sprawl of Los Angeles from the beginning, going across hundreds of miles, even when much of the land was undeveloped. They brought the Pasadenan to Venice and transported the Hollywoodian to Chatsworth.  They were above ground and had open windows.   No city of millions of people can be without a viable public transport. And cars–polluting, crowding, noisy, inefficient, expensive, deathly–are the most self-centered and self-destructive machines ever put inside a city. Los Angeles has been demonstrably more dysfunctional since the Red Car tracks were torn up.

Diagonal parking is a way of making shopping more convenient and serves to slow down traffic and discourage speeding. While current day Councilman Cardenas proposes raising metered parking rates in the midst of the Great Recession, the old photo above shows a thriving and much more appealing Van Nuys, with free diagonal parking,  than exists today.