Family matters...

This was Mother's first car – a 1936 Pontiac Master Six Coupe.



Click image to enlarge

In July, 1938, Mom was working for the Los Angeles Civic Light Opera Association. Evidently the job paid well enough for her to afford her own automobile. I'm pretty sure she didn't live at Silverlake Court, though. If I had to guess, I'd say it was her sister, Lorraine, who lived there, and took this picture, too...

 

In 1934, at the age of 17, Mother graduated high school and moved to Los Angeles to attend Woodbury College, where she would study to become an executive secretary. While attending school, she lived with her mother and sister at 1434 Bond Street near downtown. After Mother got her B.S.S. in 1936, she and sister Lorraine got an apartment of their own. The Barker Hotel, at 2000 Miramar Street in Los Angeles, was the first place Mom lived after leaving the parental nest.



click image to enlarge


Here's Mother in the parlor of her rooms at the Barker. Interestingly, I still have both of those art deco reverse-painted picture frames (one can be seen here), and the little cedar chest at left is the twin of the one that belonged to my mom, which was featured in this post (both sisters were given identical chests as a high school graduation present).



click image to enlarge


Apparently, back in the day, it was expected that the residents of "SRO" hotels like the Barker would openly socialize with each other. Nothing like today where people keep to themselves in their own little cubicles and don't even know most others in the building. Anyway, the two sisters can be seen sitting next to each other in the left row: Mother is ninth from the front, and Lorraine is eighth. (I've made these enlargements higher-res than usual so you can better see the faces.)



click image for SUPER-enlarged version


Mother is the young lady with the pearl necklace (Lorraine is not in this photo). I have to chuckle at that stereotyped view of Mission San Juan Capistrano on the wall. How many thousand times have we all seen this painting?



click image for SUPER-enlarged version


Lory and Mom both got married in 1938, so that was it for the Barker Hotel. Probably fair to assume they looked back fondly on their time there. Most of us remember our first apartment with some measure of nostalgia, I think.



A big thank you to Nathan Marsak for locating the Barker Hotel for me! As long as I've known about it, I've wondered where it was. Mother never said boo about it, just like almost everything else in her past...

 

It may be worth noting that family history definitely played a part in my decision to adopt Shadow. Mother herself grew up with a jet-black German Shepherd Dog named "Pepi."

Bingham Canyon, Utah, sometime after 1924:






( That's Mom with the shotgun! )

Mother and Pepi, Los Angeles, August 26, 1935:




Safe to say, I'm confident my mom would approve of my current choice in canine companions. ^_^

 

I got a new dog today! He's a 3-year-old all-black German Shepherd Dog named "Shadow." Ain't he a looker?



click image to enlarge

I'm so happy to have a dog again!

 

I finally got rid of Bucky's car today...



I know I shouldn't get sentimental about a mass of machinery that's been nothing but trouble for me for the past year, but that car was so associated in my mind with my dear-departed dog that I can't help but feel sad that it's gone out of my life now, too.

My "new" car is so nice, though, I'm unsure whether or not I'd allow a future dog to ride in it. If I could have afforded to maintain and insure two vehicles, I definitely would have kept the old Volvo as a "doggy" car, but that's completely out of the question given the precarious state of my finances...

 

Wally Moon's Summer Baseball Camp (or was it Wally Moon's Baseball Summer Camp?), in the hills east of Covina, California, 1962. Look at the size of that mitt! It's bigger than my whole chest!




Little League, 1966. Our team was "Badillo S&M Pharmacy." I wore the number 8. What a joke! The only reason I was in the Little League "majors" that year was because my dad was the team's coach. I struck out looking about 100 times that season. And I almost hit a home run once! Other than that, it was a season to forget. I never played organized ball again after this.




I was pretty darned good with a bat when I wasn't afraid the pitcher would hit me, though. If someone would pitch underhand to me, I could hit a ball anywhere on the field I wanted to. I never imagined that when I put down my bat after my last time up in PE in my senior year in high school that I'd never hit a baseball again. I'm too old to even think about doing that now...

 

Orioles 3, Angels 2, July 6, 1982. It was the last time I went to see a professional ballgame. It was also the last time I went to a game with my mom and dad...

For like 10 years, Dad had season tickets to the Angels games. We had amazing seats for only $6! First row box, right next to the visiting team's on-deck circle. It was really something to sit just feet away from superstar players like Reggie Jackson and Carl Yastrzemski; close enough to hear the swish of their bats as they took warm-up swings.

I hope I can see another professional baseball game in person someday. I miss going to games. The sport was a HUGE part of my life when I was growing up...

BTW,  GO YANKS!!! :D

 

When I was a kid, I was a terrible snoop and thief. One day, in search of plunder, I found this little wooden box deep in Mom's closet that looked like a treasure chest. (Many years later, I was to learn that the cedar box was Mother's high school graduation present.) Imagining I'd find the chest full of old coins, I broke into it. I was disappointed to discover it contained nothing but junk like old letters and typing speed awards, etc. Phooey. It wasn't until now, about 45 years later, that I discovered it was a little treasure chest, after all.




The other day, while looking for clues about Mother's professional career, I went through the contents of the cedar box again for the umpteenth time. I thought I'd seen it all before, but this time, hidden away inside the holder of a railway station pass, I found this amazing revelation:



Mom knew how to fly a plane? WHAT?!? I had absolutely no idea. Wouldn't you think at some point during the whole time I knew her that she'd've told me about this accomplishment? That was no small feat for a girl of 21 back in those days. Why the big secret? To use Mom's own word, I'm flabbergasted.

Then, just yesterday, I was going through the letters in the little chest that opera singer John Charles Thomas had sent to Mother over the years. Inside an envelope postmarked March 11, 1942, I found the letter written then, plus a second one I hadn't noticed previously. Note the date on it:



I can only surmise that it had been written early on that Sunday morning in NYC, when it was still the wee hours in Hawaii. I very much doubt that if it had been written later in the day that the tone would have been so casual...

Another mystery recently solved by the "junk" in the box was the location in this photo. For years, I've wondered where this house was with the street number "1434". Was it in L.A., Bingham, Salt Lake? I could only guess, but there were several pictures taken in front of this house from 1934-1937, so it was clearly of some significance.



Well, it just so happened that Mom kept her old 1937 Los Angeles Public Library card in this cedar box, and finally – FINALLY – I noticed the address on it: 1434 Bond Street, Los Angeles. So, this must have been the first house that Mom lived in in L.A., with her mom and sister, Lorraine (the tall girl at right) after they all left Bingham. Unfortunately, I can't show you a picture of the house today, as the site is now the intersection of Interstates 10 and 110.

So far I'm really pleased with the amount of information I've been able to glean from the cedar box's relatively few contents. I just wish Mom were still here to answer all of my questions about her past. There are so many things in my life that I regret not doing when I had the chance...

 

In 1938, Mother gave up her professional career as General Secretary of the Los Angeles Civic Light Opera to marry Mr. Frank E. Naso of Marion, Iowa. The couple were wed on August 20, 1938 at Holy Rosary Church in Mother's home town of Bingham, Utah. She had just turned 21 years old...




Mother had studio portraits taken of her several times during the WWII years. Here are the best of those images.

( She was quite a lovely young lady... )

It's a shame people today don't go in for portrait photography. Other than baby, graduation and wedding pictures, we almost never get our portraits taken for posterity anymore. I'm sure glad my mother (and father) did. If not for these images, I'd've never known what they really looked like when they were young...

 

Since December 24th of last year, my old Volvo wagon has been the blight of my existence. It used to be the most dependable passenger vehicle I ever owned, but beginning last Christmas Eve, it developed some kind of problem with the fuel/air mixture that no repair shop in the last 9 months has been able to fix.

This lack of dependable transportation has completely stunted my life. Still out of work and with limited options, I've tried to hold on to this car if possible, but I finally decided that I really had no choice but to replace it. I couldn't let this paralyzing situation go on any longer.

This past Thursday, a Volvo 240 wagon showed up on our local Craigslist which appeared to be my salvation. Long story short – it was! It's a 1992 model with 190,000 miles on it (that's low mileage for an 18-year-old California Volvo), and I got it for a mercifully affordable price, too.



The car has some superficial cosmetic issues (the finish on the roof is peeling), but overall it's in a lot better shape than my old wagon. And – talk about a small world – it turns out my next-door-neighbor has been this Volvo's auto mechanic for the last few years! My neighbor was totally surprised when he saw the new wagon in my driveway. He told me it's a great car – and he should know. So hurray! I've got reliable transportation again!



Apologies for the lack of updates recently. My Los Angeles history blog has attracted quite a respectable following since I moved it to Blogger some months ago, so lately I've been doing most of my writing there.

 

First edition, 1956. Found in a Pasadena, California, antique store, circa 1979. Price: $5.

Even the Wikipedia entry on the Guiness Book of Records fails to mention the book's original title.




The Guiness Book of World Records was one of my favorite books when I was a kid. Back then, I never would have imagined that I would end up living out my days in the town with what was then the world's "Tallest Totem Pole." :-)

 

Local artist Allison Reed recently painted this wonderful portrait of Bucky for me.



click image to enlarge

Isn't it amazing? I just burst into happy sobbing when I first saw it. I found the halo effect to be especially poignant. Bucky truly was my angel, both in life, and now beyond. This painting means so much to me! Until now, I had not one single physical image of Bucky that I could look at – only digital ones – so being able to see this portrait on my living room wall is tremendously comforting. Once again, I feel Bucky's presence here in a really tangible way, and for that, I am genuinely grateful. Thank you, Allison!