Found on EBay -- Polytechnic High School

A lot of 12 postcards, including Polytechnic High School, top left, and the library, bottom left, has been listed on EBay. Other postcards include Angels Flight, Bullock's downtown, the fountain at what is now Pershing Square, the alligator farm and the Plaza Church.  Bidding starts at $9.99.

Bullets Fly When Men Try to Kill Mule

July 10, 1889: Two men trying to shoot a sick mule nearly kill a neighbor. The mule had glanders, an incurable disease passed in public watering troughs, so they shot it five times. One of the bullets almost hit Mrs. Maria Ybarra.

Streetcar Runs Over Horse

July 7, 1889: One of the horses pulling a streetcar is put to death after the animal falls and is run over by the car, breaking a leg.

Downtown L.A. Is Red, White and Blue

July 4, 1889: The cable cars and the engine house are decorated for the Fourth of July ... and two neighboring ranchers settle their differences at the blacksmith shop.

Mayor Orders Crackdown on Animal Cruelty

July 3, 1899: Dog races continue at Agricultural Park despite the mayor's order of a police crackdown. According to testimony in an 1899 animal cruelty case brought by the ASCPA, these races consisted of two greyhounds chasing a California jackrabbit that was given a 60- to 80-yard head start. There were about 28 places along the race course where the rabbit could escape. If it didn't, it was usually caught and torn apart as the dogs fought over it. A man was employed to kill the rabbit, usually by crushing its skull, if the dogs didn't finish the job. If the rabbit escaped, it was kept for about a week and used as bait in another dog race. In October 1899, a judge ruled that such races inflicted "unnecessary cruelty" on the jackrabbits. Coursing continued elsewhere in Los Angeles without interference from the police. In 1904, it was again ruled to be illegal. Still, coursing continued in other jurisdictions. Here's a description of a race in Arcadia. Warning: This is gruesome.   April 4, 1905: The Times noted that female spectators were frequently the most bloodthirsty when it came to dogs mauling the rabbits.

Found on EBay -- Shriners Convention

I'm always interested in items from the 1907 Shriners convention (right) in Los Angeles. Here's an interesting companion: A commemorative license plate from the 1959 convention. Bidding starts at $5

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Ailing Lou Gehrig Retires From Baseball

"Quiet, Stupid! ... Yeow!"

The state Senate approves a bill that would license bookies and take 5% of their gross. I wonder what the lobbying was like on this bill. A Ford executive says industry voluntarily reduced the workweek to 40 hours. "The charges that these improvements were made at the insistence of a morally outraged society is not tenable."   Talk about fuel economy: 23 mpg. Maybe I'm an overprotective parent, but I really wouldn't want my kid doing this.

Maybe more than any other era, I find the artwork -- and lettering -- in the 1930s ads just remarkable. I recently listened to a program on Winston Churchill. He certainly had a knack with words that put everybody in their place. Especially "Corporal Hitler." The Times begins a contest on movie titles. I'll try to run some of the entries.

Above, a stylish ad for "The Old Dark House" and "My Man Godfrey." At left, a feature on the arrival of Michael Farrow, born to John Farrow and Maureen O'Sullivan.

Another elegant, stylish ad, this one for Harris & Frank. Re-creating the early days of California. Moral Rearmament! The cat ate a watch?

Lou Gehrig's career was over. The Yankees slugger, whose skills had seemed mysteriously in decline, was diagnosed with what was then called infantile paralysis. Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, also known as Lou Gehrig's disease, is an incurable ailment that attacks nerve cells in the brain and spinal cord. Gehrig, who had played in 2,130 consecutive games with the Yankees and took himself out of the lineup in May, died in 1941. The Times ran an Associated Press story with a horrible lead: "The 'Iron Horse' was consigned to the baseball roundhouse today -- to stay." The Yankees tried to be optimistic about Gehrig's recovery, discussing a post-baseball job with the Yankees "in some executive capacity." The next day, The Times ran a short story on plans for a day in Gehrig's honor. Here's footage from the event. -- Keith Thursby Update: Keith is on vacation so I'll pinch hit for him. The Times' original story indeed says Lou Gehrig had "infantile paralysis." Later stories also say he had "infantile paralysis" or "a form of infantile paralysis." His June 3, 1941,  obituary says he died of "a rare disease" called "amyotrophic lateral sclerosis." --lrh

A Kinder, Simpler Time Dept.

May 9, 1930

Paul V. Coates -- Confidential File, May 6, 1959

Confidential File Prince Otto I Isn't Even Housebroken There is a base canard, perpetrated by the hopelessly sentimental, that a dog is man's best friend. A dog, I say to you, is a false friend. He'll make a slobbering, emotional display of licking your hands. But on a whim, he'll leave you without so much as a backward glance. I had a dog once. As a matter of fact, I had him until just a couple weeks ago. He's a dachshund puppy, and believe me, I gave him the best years of my life. He dined only on the most exotic creations dreamed up in the fertile, culinary mind of kindly old Doctor Ross. He slept on a pillow that had but recently been confiscated from beneath my head. When, in a fit of childish pique, he chewed up my bedroom slippers, I didn't whack him on his baby teeth, the way I should have. I just passed it off with a philosophical shrug. That dog had it made. But a few weeks ago he hopped out of our parked car in the vicinity of Sunset and Laurel, and disappeared in search of some imagined green pastures. His name, which I gave him in a weak moment of sheer snobbery, is Crown Prince Otto I. But, if you call him by it, he won't answer. It embarrasses him. Anyway, since this four-month-old delinquent ran away from home, the family plantation hasn't seemed the same. There's a cloud of gloom hanging over us all. My kids, who usually can't be made to shut up, have hardly spoken. And my wife, in whose care Crown Prince Otto I was at the time he lammed, has deftly managed to transfer the blame for the whole thing over to me. "If you had the window of the station wagon fixed like I told you to, he never would have been able to get out," she said. "If you knew the window of the station wagon wouldn't close you never should have left him in the car, I replied. Overwhelmed by the utter logic of my remark, I glanced at the kids for their approval. But they just stared at me with grim accusation in their eyes. "There's one thing you could do," my wife said after a moment. "You could mention it on your TV program." "That's impossible," I snapped "Impossible, impossible," she said, "everything with you is impossible." She glanced at the kids for their approval. And got it. "If I do a missing person's program about my own dog, everybody in town will want me to do one about their missing dogs," I explained. She sniffed disparagingly. "Well," she murmured, "if it's too much trouble." The kids turned their backs on me. "It's not too much trouble," I shouted. "It's just..." I stalled desperately for a moment. Then, a thoroughly outrageous inspiration hit me. "It's just that I couldn't do it. It's against the FCC regulations." "The WHAT?" she said suspiciously. "The Federal Communications Commission. They have a ruling that says no TV commentator can make a plea in his own behalf on his own program. They could cut me off the air, and even fine me if I asked people to bring back my own dog." It was a low ruse, but it worked. She fell silent, and thoughtful for a while. Finally she looked up brightly. "Ask George Putnam to mention it on his program," she said. "I can't do a thing like that," I replied in a shocked voice. Kith and Kin Gang Up on Me "Can't, can't," she mimicked. "Everything with you is can't." My children nodded in agreement. Rather than lose this happy home I've just described to you, I called Putnam and told him the problem. "Gee, kid, I'm sorry to hear that," he said. (He always calls me kid. It has something to do with the difference in our ages.) "I wish I could help you by putting it on my program. "But," he added, "it's against FCC regulations." So, if someone out there has found my dog, please bring him back. I'm telling you for you own good. I happen to know he isn't even housebroken.

Paul Coates -- Confidential File, March 27, 1959

Confidential File A Depressing Story Brightens Up a Bit Yesterday I told you a rather depressing story. One of its central characters had coldly refused to display any concern for the lives of two young children. I surveyed the facts with a cynical eye of a newspaperman and concluded that there could be no happy ending. The two kids had been bitten by a dog. They faced the extremely painful and dangerous Pasteur treatment as a precaution against rabies because, as their father told me, the woman who owned the dog had spirited it away. No dog, no quarantine. And without adequate examination over a period of days, the Animal Regulation Department obviously had no way of knowing if the dog were infected. To be on the safe side, the kids were scheduled for Pasteur shots. As I said, I could see no happy ending. But plagued as I am by cynicism, I had overlooked one very important fact. There are still some pretty decent people in this city. Two of them stepped in to rewrite the story's conclusion. I don't know one of them. She remains an anonymous voice on a telephone. But it was she who pinpointed the dog's whereabouts. I do know the identity of the other. He is deputy City Atty. Sam Palmer. And he's a guy who can get fighting mad. That's what he did yesterday when he heard the father's story. "It was a case of the general welfare being threatened by the malicious act of one person," he told me. Palmer picked up his phone. He called the people who had the dog and got them to agree to cooperate with the Animal Regulation Department. The animal was quarantined. Then the young city prosecutor dispatched a letter to the woman who disposed of the dog, asking her to be in his office next Thursday for a hearing. At that time, Palmer promised, he will consider filing a misdemeanor complaint against her charging six separate violations of the law. "The trouble is," Palmer explained, "the laws involved in a case of this kind don't contain the kind of teeth they might. But I think this woman, if guilty, should answer to society in some way. "I," he added, "have a kid, too. "It's inconceivable to me that anyone would refuse to help when a youngster is threatened with anything as painful as the Pasteur treatment." Dog Bite Law Is Specific Palmer called to my attention an obscure city ordinance which requires a pet owner to take positive action in protecting the victim of a bite. The law says: "Should a dog or any other animal bite a person ... it shall be the duty of the owner ... immediately to notify this department (health) and surrender said animal to said department." Palmer conceded that the ordinance doesn't allow law enforcement officers much latitude in investigating animal bite cases when the person who owns the offending pet refuses to cooperate. "You can't," he pointed out, "go around busting down people's doors." And, of course, you can't. But, if you're a public official, you don't have to throw up your hands in frustration in a case like this. Sam Palmer didn't. And I hope he set a precedent.