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A Genealogy of the Naud Junction Neighborhood (Now Under the Terminal Annex and CA Endowment Buildings) INSIDE: LA's Early Immigrant Entrepreneurs ...and Their Erased Enclaves by Damian Gatto Introduction A year and a half ago, I released my genealogy of the La Loma neighborhood of Chavez Ravine. My sample size was the neighborhood’s five remaining streets: Bouett, Brooks, Spruce, Aqua Pura, and Phoenix. My data sources were the United States Censuses from 1900 to 1940, historic building permits, land surveys, home titles, and grant deeds. I went lot-by-lot along the remaining La Loma streets documenting the builders and subsequent occupants of the homes until they were demolished. Media portrayals of Chavez Ravine during the era of its slow demise depicted the community as a ramshackle bunch of shanties and corrugated steel shacks. However, I knew based on my lifelong relationships with some of the uprooted (known as Los Desterados) that this was a vast misrepresentation. Indeed, I found that nearly every building in this five-street remnant of La Loma had a new construction permit attached to it. Another thing that fascinated me about communities like Chavez Ravine, Dogtown, Diamond Street (amongst many others) is how they were all selected to be razed and replaced with public (and sometimes private) improvements. In light of new documentation and testimonials, it is now no secret that these communities were perfectly healthy communities, but they simply had the misfortune of being built upon land that was too valuable for public and private use to be in the hands of working-class folk. The Naud Junction and Macy Street neighborhoods, which now lie, respectively, under the Terminal Annex and Union Station, were two of these such neighborhoods. This article focuses upon the Naud Junction Neighborhood, the Northern 8th Ward. The vast majority of homes were built before 1924 (when dozens were immolated, ostensibly to fend off the plague) or the mid-1930s (when they were eminent domained to build the the USPS Terminal Annex Building. When it comes to development and government improvement projects, it is easy to look to "blighted" areas (i.e. working class neighborhoods) and figure that they have to be improved upon.
Above: The American Foundry. (Source: USC Digital Libraries)
The Naud Junction Neighborhood
From 1889 to 1909, prior to the establishment of the modern City Council representational system consisting of council districts, Los Angeles was divided into nine wards. The northern part of the Eighth Ward, which we will be strolling through today, was also called “Naud Junction” after Frenchman Edouard Naud, who built a warehouse near the modern-day William Mead Homes in 1878.
Naud Junction was marked by a signal tower built at Alameda and Ord streets in 1898. Naud Junction was also the location of the city of Los Angeles' primary boxing pavilion. USC students exchanged jabs there, and it also hosted the likes of Tommy Burns, Marvin Hart, and Abe Attel. The 8th Ward was also the site of the city's first orphanage, Institucion Caratitiva, as well as one of its most prominent infirmaries, the Los Angeles Infirmary. My motivation to do a genealogy of the Eighth Ward neighborhood was similar to Chavez Ravine. For one, I was interested in how the community was constituted demographically. I knew that the community was one of Los Angeles’ earliest melting pots. Persons of Mexican, Indigenous, Chinese, and Italian descent resided here, unable to find housing in other areas of the city due to “deed restrictions” (i.e. racial covenants) and other forms of discrimination. I was also aware of the neighborhoods role as a launching pad for numerous immigrant entrepreneurs, such as Gladding McBean & Co., the Italian-immigrant founded American Foundry, and the German immigrant-founded Kerckhoff Lumber Co. I had also heard of community institutions like the Macy Street School, designed by the famed architect A.C. Martin (of Los Angeles City Hall fame), which lasted all of 15 years before being demolished. A further motivation for performing this and other genealogies was that I wanted to further substantiate how, historically, working class communities in Los Angeles were the go-to communities that were razed in order to construct government buildings and other forms of urban redevelopment. Finally, following the illuminating results of my Chavez Ravine genealogy, I was inspired to document the daily life in the northern Eighth Ward--the community's geography, its goings-on, and its economic activity. I wanted the displaced villagers of Naud Junction to be known to future historians and Angelenos.
CLICK "READ MORE" BELOW for A Genealogy of the Eighth Ward
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The Lasso of La Loma: A Genealogy of the Few Remaining Chavez Ravine Streets by Damian Gatto Chavez Ravine is the historic name for the hillside immediately northeast of Los Angeles’ Chinatown, and for the communities that once existed in these hills. For many, this land still is--and always will be--Chavez Ravine, the Lil' Town. I. The Lil’ Town City Councilman and namesake Julian Chavez acquired the land that would become Chavez Ravine, along with much of the land that would become Elysian Park, in the 1840s. The Stone Quarry Hills, as they were known then, was already populated with several ravine enclaves. By the late-19th/early-20th Century, “Chavez Ravine” was defined by four neighborhoods: Palo Verde, Bishop, La Loma, and Solano Canyon. Disdained as worthless land, and seen as too remote to make residential development pragmatic, it was initially the site of, among other things, a blasting mine. In 1926, LA City Council voted to zone Chavez Ravine for exclusively residential use.
Sadly, most people know about Chavez Ravine because of the way in which it met its demise, rather than its fascinating, unique, and diverse history. Originally, the communities of Chavez Ravine were razed through the power of eminent domain (the interpreted constitutional power of the government to seize land with "just" compensation) to make way for public housing designed by Richard Neutra. As the story goes, because of the anti-Communist political atmosphere of the time, this proposed “socialist” form of land use fell from favor. Following the infamous "helicopter ride," the land was purchased by the Dodgers, the final families were violently evicted, and Dodger Stadium was constructed in the early 1960s. Fewer than a dozen families remained by that time, most notably the Arechiga and Perich families, who were infamously documented being physically dragged from their home by LA County Sheriffs as news cameras rolled. Once a contiguous range of ridges, the construction of the Stadium and its giant parking lot were made possible by leveling the ridge lining the Bishop and Palo Verde neighborhoods and infilling the remaining gap with silt. Angelenos formed communities in Chavez Ravine for a century before Dodger Stadium came around. A truly sui generis community, its humble, owner-built bungalows and country markets contrasted with the bustle of Downtown, less than one linear mile away. A mostly Latino community by the early 20th century, it also had a considerable number of Slavic, Italian, Jewish, German, and Anglo residents. A remarkable mixture of people, mostly working class, flocked there not only to live the simpler life, but also to avoid housing discrimination in other sections of the City. Residents built their own homes and raised livestock. Children frolicked in its dirt roads. People looked out for each other. This idyllic, agrarian setting was almost too good to last forever in the rapidly modernizing City of Angels. II. The Physical Remains of Chavez Ravine When Dodger Stadium was built, only the Solano Canyon community was spared in its entirety. However, terraced above the 110 Freeway, south of the Stadium, are also the few remaining traces of the La Loma neighborhood: six streets from the neighborhood, lined with foundations of houses and-- if you look hard enough-- scattered belongings. Take the Academy Road exit off of the southbound 110 Freeway. Traveling northbound, Solano Avenue terminates at Bouett Street. Bouett, in turn, dead ends at a City-padlocked gate. Beyond this gate is Brooks Avenue, which travels southward up into the hills and merges with Spruce Street, coming to an end at the ovular Aqua Pura Drive. The arrangement forms a neat little lasso shape on a map. Below is a detail of Baist's survey (1910 and 1921), depicting the respective lot cuts and all. Above: Enlarged detail of the 1921 Baist survey depicting the lot cuts on our five sample streets: Bouetts, Brooks, Spruce, Aqua Pura, and Pheonix. Yolo Drive is also pictured. (Source: USC Digital Libraries) Immediately west of this lasso-shaped island, leading to the Chavez Ravine Reservoir, is a tiny stub of what used to be Yolo Drive. Parallel to Spruce Street (and right behind the San Conrado Church) was the serpentine Phoenix Street. Although Phoenix Street was formally designated, it was never paved, and as such has receded from view. At present, it is slowly being reclaimed by nature. You can hike up into the hills behind the church, along Phoenix Street, up until where it intersects with an old, unpaved portion of Jarvis Street. Here is where you will find poignant signs of former habitation, such as foundations of houses. You can see items that had just been in the kitchen…or in the family room…or on the porch… one day, 60-odd years ago. It is truly profound. It feels wrong to remove or even touch these things. III. A Genealogy of The Neighborhood Bouett Street, Brooks Avenue, Spruce Street, Aqua Pura Drive, and Pheonix Street. With this sample size--five streets, sans the stub of Yolo Drive, for now-- I decided to conduct a street genealogy in order to deduce the demography as well as some of the building habits of La Loma folks, to see if I could paint a picture of the geography of a Chavez Ravine neighborhood. Though it would be quite an undertaking to perform such a task for the entirety of Chavez Ravine, someday I may do just this. The following is a list of all the recorded house numbers on these streets, containing the names and families appearing on the original titles of the properties, their mailing addresses (if applicable), and whether they built the structure(s) themselves or hired a contractor-builder. If an original title was not available to deduce the name of the owner-builders, the names of the earliest known owners are listed instead. + Phoenix Street’s address system ran from 600 to 800. + Aqua Pura Drive’s address system ran from 600 to 700. + Spruce Drive’s address system ran from 500 to 800. + Brooks Avenue's address system ran from 1700 to 1900, and from 700 to 900. Much of the 1800 to 1900 block of Brooks (save for 1860) is still standing today, and as such is omitted below…for now. + Bouett Street's built environment still largely stands, and so a street genealogy is omitted...for now. CLICK "READ MORE" BELOW
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