LA as Subject Blog
KCET
Who Eucalyptized Southern California?
Although the orange and the palm loom large in Southern California's iconography, another imported tree -- the eucalyptus -- has been almost as prominent a feature of the region's landscape. Eucalypti grace parks and gardens and shade sidewalks and roadways. In many suburbs, long rows of the… Read more »
Topics: KCET
From Plaza Abaja to Pershing Square: L.A.‘s Oldest Park Through the Decades
Downtown L.A.'s emergence as a residential neighborhood has focused attention on the area's dearth of green park space and, with it, the perceived shortcomings of the city's oldest park: Pershing Square. In its 163-year journey from open pasture to urban park, Pershing Square has weathered… Read more »
Topics: KCET
From Roosevelt Highway to the 1: A Brief History of Pacific Coast Highway
Admired for its scenery and dreaded for its traffic -- as well as the landslides that occasionally render it impassable -- Pacific Coast Highway is perhaps Southern California's most iconic ribbon of asphalt. Even if Beach Boys-era woodies are now a rare sight, the scenes of crashing waves,… Read more »
Topics: KCET
SoCal and Astronomical History: The Big Bang Theory, the Demise of Pluto & More
With L.A.'s night sky shrouded in a veil of smog and light pollution, Southern California might seem an unlikely place for star-gazing scientists to congregate. But before population growth and industrialization transformed the night sky into a dull glow, Southern California's generally… Read more »
Topics: KCET
L.A.‘s Secret Gardens: The California Botanic Garden of Mandeville Canyon
Now that warm weather has returned to the region, many Southern Californians are rediscovering the botanical joys of spring, from hillsides blooming with wildflowers to strolls through the Huntington's historic and recently re-opened Japanese Gardens, which initially opened to the public in 1928.… Read more »
Topics: KCET
How the Miracle Mile Got Its Name: A Brief History of L.A.‘s Unlikely Retail District
In 1921, the stretch of Wilshire Boulevard now known as the Miracle Mile was a 20-foot-wide dirt road, flanked by oil wells and barley fields. Today, the strip is a busy thoroughfare, home tomuseums, the La Brea Tar Pits, and a collection of historic Art Deco structures. The story of the… Read more »
Topics: KCET
Canoga Park at 100: A Brief History of the Birth of Owensmouth
One hundred years ago last Friday, a town named Owensmouth was born on the barley fields of the San Fernando Valley. "Like an eaglet bursting asunder the egg which nourished its embryonic life," the Los Angeles Times gushed in its coverage the following day, "Owensmouth yesterday pipped the shell… Read more »
Topics: KCET
Rail Returns to the Westside: The Expo Line’s Historical Precursors
When the long-awaited Expo Line opens on April 28, riders will be retracing a historic route through the city. Although its tracks, signals, and power lines are all new, much of the light rail line's right-of-way dates to 1875, when the first rail link between downtown L.A. and the Westside… Read more »
Topics: KCET
Earth, Water, Air, Fire: A Historical Look at SoCal’s Troubled Relationship with Nature
Is Southern California a paradise? According to classical thought, what distinguishes a paradise from a wild wasteland is a proper balancing of the four elements: earth, water, air, and fire. A desert suffers from a plethora of fire and earth, for example, and a jungle from too much earth and… Read more »
Topics: KCET
Photos: L.A.‘s First Railroads Connected the Region to the Global Economy
In December, the city's Bureau of Street Services announced that it would remove the railroad tracks running down Alameda Street's center lane between First and Seventh streets. Lying dormant for years, the rails--tormentors of automobile suspensions--represent one of the last remnants of… Read more »
Topics: KCET
