Cruising with MONA, Pt. 3

On our last MONA (Museum of Neon Art) Neon Cruise post, I left you at the Chapman Market near Koreatown. Disneyland fans might find this building a bit familiar, especially if they compare it to Off the Page in Disney California Adventure:



The drive-in Chapman Park Market opened in 1929 and was one of the first markets in the western U.S. designed for the automobile. Today it thrives with chic Korean shops, restaurants, coffeehouses, and clubs.







OK readers...let's bring it on home! A few more shots as the double decker bus made its way through Saturday night traffic to show us what's left of the glorious vintage neon that once burned brightly throughout Los Angeles. The Gaylord Building (I'm not touching that one).





The Bryson, made famous by author Raymond Chandler:



Park Wilshire:



What's left of the Westlake Theatre sign. Please fix!!



Those beautiful light standards of Wilshire Boulevard:



And what better place to stop after your Neon Cruise than Clifton's Cafeteria, which looks even more splendid at night!



I HIGHLY recommend you check out the MONA (Museum of Neon Art) Neon Cruise for yourself!

See more MONA Neon Cruise photos at my main website.

Hollywoodland: What Happened?

Back in 1990, The Walt Disney Company released this image titled "Hooray for…Disneyland." The accompanying publicity blurb heralded:

The most ambitious Disneyland project in the upcoming "Disney Decade" will be the addition of "Hollywoodland" to the Anaheim theme Park. The new land, inspired by the success of the Disney-MGM Studios in Florida, will include a fantasy version of Hollywood Boulevard, Disneyland's own version of Florida's "Great Movie Ride," Roger Rabbit's Toontown, and "The Adventures of Baby Herman."

Zooming into the art you can see Stan Laurel, Oliver Hardy, and Edgar Kennedy:



a direct copy of this vintage publicity still:



So what happened to Hollywoodland? Looks like it bit the dust when the idea for Westcot came to be. What's Westcot? It was to be the west coast version of EPCOT. It also bit the dust. Instead, in 1993 Disneyland got Toon Town (without a Baby Herman attraction) and in 2001, Disney California Adventure debuted giving us...Hollywood Pictures Backlot. Just like a backlot, there was absolutely nothing behind the facades.

More DCA photos at my main website.

Hooray for Hollywood-land

This vintage image was taken in the 1940s and shows the iconic "HOLLYWOODLAND" sign. That's right, readers. The original 1923 sign was intended to be a short-term advertisement for a local real estate development but as we all know, it ended up staying. The reason it was allowed to stay was that in 1949 the City of Los Angeles Parks Department demanded that "LAND" be removed so that the sign would be representative of the district, not the housing development.



While driving through the residential area of the Hollywood Hills in August 2001, I captured a shot of the Hollywood sign that is somewhat close to the vintage shot.



This photo from March 2002 is even closer; I was hiking in Runyon Canyon when I snapped this.



More vintage Hollywood at my main website.