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e have a bounty of news today. Above, Mexican troops put down an insurrection in the state of Coahuila. And turmoil in the Mideast.
At left, Mayor Harper urges Democratic presidential candidate William Jennings Bryan to accept Capt. Eugene Merrick of Los Angeles as his running mate. Merrick says he is a war veteran, having fought with the Union Army at the age of 12. He is also a temperance supporter.
An inquest is scheduled in the crash of a wagon and a streetcar that killed six people ... C.M. Pierre hopes to extend his Balloon Route trips ...
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Mrs. Marie Heider returns to her home at 1623 Court St. and bumps into the body of her husband, Herman, who had driven a spike into the casing above a door and hanged himself. His box factory had been failing and he had been drinking heavily, The Times says. His suicide note is in German.
And perhaps the most interesting little item: a one-inch ad for the newly published book "The Bridal Night of Ronald and Thusnelda" by Hulda von Liebetraut. I might need a copy of that.
Above left, safety tips on the streetcar system's electric cables, which carry 500 or 1,000 volts.
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n this Sunday, June 28, 1908, The Times is full of politics, past and present.
At left, the editorial page praises Frances Folsom Cleveland, the widow of President Grover Cleveland, as the ideal of the American woman. Even making allowances for Victorian hyperbole, this piece is rather remarkable:
"In the shadow of her great grief she stands out even more luminously than she did in her lovely youth when, bright-eyed and light-stepping as the fawn, she entered the doors of the White House to become the first lady of the land.
"Now that the passing years have made the college girl a wife, mother and widow, her life may be said to be fairly rounded out, and she may be regarded as a character formed and builded to completion...."
Mind you, we are talking about a woman in her mid-40s who was far younger than her husband; they married when she was 21 and he was 49. In fact, she remarried in 1913 and lived until 1947.
Meanwhile, the paper hasn't wasted any effort trying to hide its support for
Republican presidential nominee William Taft, above, and has done nothing to
conceal its disdain for Democratic candidate William Jennings Bryan in its editorial
cartoons (at top) or in its coverage by Harry Carr, at left.
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 ong ago, I lost track of how many highway maps The Times has run over the years. Here is yet another one, giving us a trifecta with the map from Ed Ainsworth's traffic series of 1938 and the one that appeared with Ray Hebert's 1958 update.
Even a casual glance shows the beginnings of what we know a century later as the freeway system: It's easy to pick out what will become the Santa Monica and Foothill Freeways, the Golden State and the Pasadena.
At left, The Times' Harry Carr files a story on Democratic presidential candidate William Jennings Bryan.
This will give you an idea of the style of political coverage 100 years ago--and these are just samples of Carr's critical, dismissive piece:
"There is something peculiarly shifty and, to me, untrustworthy, in his face. His personality is agreeable but I don't feel that compelling quality of charm manifested by so many big men....
"As you interview him, you can't screw your imagination up to seeing the man as president of the United States. You can't see him negotiating treaties with great nations, compelling peace conferences and naming Cabinet officers."
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Above, Normandie and Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard, "Home of the Garbage Burrito."
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 he Times' Harry Carr, fresh from the Republican National Convention in Chicago, heads to Lincoln, Neb., to interview William Jennings Bryan, the Democratic presidential candidate.
"When he is on the stump, Bryan is the simple child of the people who helps baggage smashers handle his trunks. Today, in fact, he brought out a humble request that plain alpaca coats be worn at a banquet to be given him here in place of dress suits.
"Bryan, you good, old faker, if you can get away with that and also pose as the influential, rich country squire, you are a wonder, and I guess you can."
Glen Curtiss flies his Curtiss No. 2 airplane 41 seconds at an altitude of 40 feet for a distance of 2,175 feet. A record ... President Grover Cleveland is laid to rest ... And turmoil in Tehran ...
On the jump, an armed mob hunts a man who robbed and beat a woman at Normandie and Santa Barbara (now Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard) and attacked another woman during his escape.
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 e have more fallout from Earle Kynette's conviction in the Harry Raymond bombing. On the jump, The Times reports that seven officers will face a police board of rights on charges of obstructing the Raymond investigation.
Mayor Frank Shaw sends a letter to members of the county grand jury noting the achievements of the Police Department ... but more important, he also tries to remove Police Commission Vice President Charles W. Ostrom. An attorney, Ostrom has clients who include Milton "Farmer" Page, a leading underworld figure. Shaw says Ostrom should either quit the commission or stop representing Page. Ostrom, however, says he will "go out fighting."
Shaw was unable to remove Ostrom, who remained in office. But the victory was temporary... (Bonus fact: Ostrom died in 1959 at the age of 77).
Milton "Farmer" Page, above, was a major underworld figure in early Los Angeles and was among the defendants in the case against Tony Cornero's gambling ship, the Rex. I'm going to have to dig up more about him; he sounds like quite a character.
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rue confession: I mixed up June 26, 1908 and June 25, 1908. I suppose that happens more often that one might suspect--or not. Readers either politely didn't bring it to my attention or didn't notice. Thank you for your diplomacy.
To get to the point: The Times notes that the death of Grover Cleveland leaves the United States without a living ex-president. That will change when Theodore Roosevelt is succeeded by William Taft, but I'm trying to think of the next time the U.S. was in a similar situation. Certainly not in my lifetime.
In the second section, eight people are injured in the head-on crash of two streetcars at the Arroyo Seco bridge. Passengers on the outbound streetcar blame the crash on inattention by the motorman, who was "working with his motor" before the streetcar collided with the inbound car from Pasadena. Note that one of the injured was taken home instead of going to a hospital.
Also notice a meeting of Zionists for a fundraiser at the synagogue at Olive and Temple. Those who contribute to the cause can have their names inscribed in an elaborate "book of gold," The Times says.
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 ermany begins the systematic roundup of Jews on the pretext of putting them in "protective custody" or claiming that they are foreigners "without proper papers."
"At Buchenwald Concentration Camp, near Weimar, it was reported that 65 army buses were arriving nightly from Berlin, filled with Jews," The Times says. "Other centers sent smaller contingents."
... In the case of two youngsters who are Jehovah's Witnesses, a federal judge rules that it is unconstitutional to force students to salute the American flag if that violates their religious beliefs.
On the jump, a brief follow on the conviction of Earle Kynette in the Harry Raymond bombing ... The American Medical Assn. is divided over a campaign to treat the needy. Dr. Hugh Cabot is calling for the government to pay for preventive medicine, healthcare for the poor and scientific research for the good of the people as a whole, The Times says. The AMA concedes the need to treat the poor, but balks at anything that resembles socialized medicine, The Times says ... A woman says she left her 10-week-old baby in a cafe because she wanted to go to a dance. She says she has three other children, two of whom have been adopted while the other is being cared for by a friend.
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wenty years after Ed Ainsworth's series
on Los Angeles' congested streets, The Times takes another look at
traffic. I (almost) never grow tired of saying that the incredible
number of transportation studies performed in Los Angeles would fill a
library.
Above, Ozzie Virgil makes his debut with the Tigers.
He was traded to the Kansas City Athletics in 1961, and after coaching
under Clyde King in Phoenix, joined manager King at the San Francisco
Giants in 1968.
Below, Superior Court Judge Stanley Mosk calls
for the creation of a crime commission ... Times Education Editor Dick
Turpin joins a contingent of Stanford students to establish a campus in
Germany. The Stanford in Germany program will continue until 1976
... Actor Eddie Albert and his wife, Margo, greet 4-year-old Maria,
whom they have adopted from Spain ... Rhonda Fleming and Dr. Lewis
Morrill are splitsville ...
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irst, we have tragic news from Berlin: Panicked Jews wander the streets in hopes of avoiding mass arrests in which entire families are hauled away in the middle of the night.
"...officials explained that the anti-Jewish activities were necessary because 'the Jews' behavior lately has become provocative, resulting in growing indignation among the population,' " The Times says.
The Times leads with a story about repercussions of Earle Kynette's conviction in the Harry Raymond bombing. The most significant story is on the jump: Councilman Hyde introduces a resolution calling for the resignations of Mayor Frank Shaw, Police Chief James Davis and the entire Police Commission. The resolution was sent to a committee, where it was expected to lie dormant. But by the end of the year, a recall election will have changed the landscape.
Also note Betty Rowland, the "Ball of Fire," at the Follies.
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he Times concludes its series on traffic in Los Angeles with a call to action: "Are the beaches and the sea to be separated by impenetrable masses of congested cars? Is mankind to stagnate in Southern California, fettered by its own lethargy when a means of release is offered? Those are the questions that must be answered either willingly or unwillingly. They cannot be escaped."
"...The monster of Frankenstein--the motorcar which has wrestled free from its master--must be made a willing and useful slave again!"
To emphasize his point, Ainsworth cites some figures from the Auto Club: Going from 1st to 10th on Broadway took 14 minutes, 12 seconds by auto and 12 minutes, 2 seconds by streetcar. The Auto Club re-created a horse and buggy trip that took 10 minutes, 21 seconds.
Ainsworth also talks about funding the freeways, a subject that I will leave to interested readers.
And yes, the contrast between the Holocaust in Germany and Southern Californians worrying about traffic is pretty stark, isn't it?
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Photograph by the Los Angeles Times
Police Capt. Earle Kynette, after initially refusing to be interviewed after his conviction in
the Harry Raymond bombing, meets with the press. (Howard Decker writes of the flashbulbs the photographers are using: "Methinks them suckers put out a whole lot of light. Stop down
your apertures, guys!")
Photograph by the Los Angeles Times
Bombing victim Harry Raymond in a photo published June 17, 1938
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Above left, Auto Club Chief Engineer Ernest East, sometimes called the father of the freeway, and Assistant Engineer Harold Holley.
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os Angeles Police Capt. Earle Kynette is convicted in the Harry Raymond bombing. No surprise, except perhaps to Kynette, who spent the next 10 years in custody.
Officer Fred A. Browne, who was cleared in the case, died of a heart attack the next year in a Vermont Avenue bowling alley. Former Officer Roy J. Allen died of heart problems in San Quentin in 1942.
Kynette was paroled in 1948 despite Raymond's protests. His wife had divorced him while he was in prison. He was sent back to San Quentin in 1951 for violating his parole after he was convicted of being drunk. He was freed again in 1952. His pharmacist's license was restored and he was working in a drugstore in Twain Harte, Calif., when he was charged with drunk driving in a car accident that killed two people. He was later cleared.
In 1963, Kynette was stabbed in the abdomen and left arm during a drunken fight in a skid row hotel in Oakland. The Times failed to note his death in June 1970 in West Hollywood.
Raymond died in 1957.
For me, the most surprising discovery in the Raymond case is The Times editorial, below. As far as the unsigned editorial is concerned, Kynette was a rogue officer in charge of a rogue department. The rest of the Police Department--and City Hall, presumably--was free of corruption.
Below left, the next installment of Ed Ainsworth's series on traffic in Los Angeles.
Listen to some of the predictions if the "motorway" system is built:
Los Angeles to Santa Monica in 15 minutes. Pasadena to Inglewood in 19 1/2 minutes. Los Angeles to Long Beach in 21 minutes.
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 ou might well wonder whether the designers actually expected to run "motorways" right through buildings in downtown Los Angeles -- the answer is yes, they did.
There's quite a bit of data in this installment of Ed Ainsworth's series on traffic in Los Angeles. If I had the time, I would track down population growth figures to see how successfully the Southern California Auto Club predicted the future. Alas, there are so many stories, and only one Larry Harnisch. I'll leave it to my interested readers to see how the Auto Club did.
But here's the interesting material that should resonate 70 years later:
"... Los Angeles, above all other cities, depends upon the automobile for its actual everyday traffic needs.
"This is what Automobile Club engineers say: That if the streetcars were to stop, life would go on about as usual. San Antonio --a city of a quarter of a million -- has led the way by being the first major American city to abolish the streetcar in favor of buses.
"If the buses were to stop, there would be hardly a flurry.
"But if automobiles were to suddenly to cease to function, the whole economic and social structure would be disrupted."
And the jury is out in the trial of Police Capt. Earle Kynette in the Harry Raymond bombing ... Stay tuned.
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A detail of the arch, as shown on San Pedro High School's website. For the full image, go here. |
A cloverleaf interchange, as envisioned in 1938. Note the extensive landscaping on both sides of the freeway.
A map of proposed "elevated motorway" routes. One of many that have been prepared over the years. |
 his victory arch at San Pedro High School was salvaged from the Federal Building (1910-1937), which was at Main and Temple. I'm always thrilled to discover that any piece of old Los Angeles has survived, no matter how small. If you click on the photo below, it will appear full size and you can see similar entryways all along the right side of the building.
At left, the prosecution's closing arguments in the trial of Police Capt. Earle Kynette follows the trail of civic corruption to Joe Shaw, the mayor's brother. With Kynette convicted, attention will turn to the Shaws and the recall movement will gain momentum.
Part 4 of Ed Ainsworth's series on Los Angeles traffic lays out an elaborate proposal for 420 miles of "elevated motorways." As superficial as this story is, it contains key elements of what transformed Los Angeles transportation into what we contend with today:
"Street railways would gradually be eliminated and bus service substituted, both on surface streets and the elevated motorways."
"The elevated motorways would not run along above present streets. They would be cut through the middle of blocks. Preliminary surveys disclose that is is possible to run practically all of these through so-called blighted areas."
Would the motorways be an architectural eyesore?
"Definitely not. It is almost an axiom of modern civilization that man's highest achievements in industrial design are in themselves objects of symmetry and beauty."
Recall that there are some essential differences between what was proposed and what we have today: One of the original plans called for parking structures to be placed at intervals along the motorways. Also take a good look at the map of the network: It's massive.
So here we have a blueprint from 1938: Get rid of the streetcars, switch to buses that can use surface streets as well as elevated lanes and build a massive freeway system.
Most important, note the source of the proposal: The Auto Club of Southern California. Not a name one usually hears in discussions of what happened to the streetcars. But the Auto Club was a major player in the demise of the streetcar system.
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