Looking at Pershing Square's History

It's good to see that Cara Mia DiMassa is back at writing great articles. Missed her stuff for a while.

it was a beautiful park and it always reminded me of washington square in nyc!

this is a fine if not perfect example you should never let an architect build park or public spaces! i am sure the drawings looked seductive at the time and now we have this concrete reality sitting in the middle of downtown!

weeeping once again!

Eric, you ought to charge the Times a finder's fee.

er... on second thought, an originator's fee would be more like it!

That 1925 picture is how the park should have always looked for the last 80 years.

Great story & photos. Nice picture of the old California Club building (5th & Hill)where the Title Guarantee Building is now.

I had noticed one error in the story - the one stating that trees were removed for Disneyland AFTER the building of the garage in 1955 - since there were no trees big enough to be moved after the garage was built (and no reason to move any tress after that) and the tropical trees for the Jungle Ride were installed about the same time the garage was built. But I have just been informed - by another LA Times writer - that the whole Pershing Square/Disneyland trees story was a hoax - and that NO trees were moved to Disneyland from Pershing Square - ever.

So now I am curious if anyone has any news reports from the time to verify which story is true.

Yes, there are news stories describing what happened to the trees. Through the library website - www.lapl.org - you can gain access to the historical Los Angeles Times.

According to one article, from February 1951, most of the trees were bulldozed; and the ones saved were to be replanted around the edge of the park.

Once again, concerning the fate of those trees in Pershing Square here some links to a couple of articles:

Bulldozers Raze Trees to Clear Pershing Square; Displaced Persons Just Watch, but Pigeons Protest as Workers Start Park Destruction - Feb 3, 1951

http://proquest.umi.com.ezproxy.lapl.org/pqdweb?did=447431972&sid=7&Fmt=2&clientId=13322&RQT=309&VName=HNP

Pershing Square Trees Coming Home Tomorrow; 400 Rare Growths, Put Out to Pasture Last Year, Will Be Augmented by Many New Plants - Feb 18, 1952

http://proquest.umi.com.ezproxy.lapl.org/pqdweb?did=449920152&sid=6&Fmt=2&clientId=13322&RQT=309&VName=HNP

"It's that limbo-time in Los Angeles arbitrarily called "spring," merely because, technically, summer hasn't come. The weather inches toward summer, boundaryless, and the only difference you notice, in the park, is that the crowds become even thicker as the days become slowly warmer. Now in the park - and it is mid-afternoon - there are the familiar sights of mangled American outcasts of every breed. Under the drooping palmtrees, old men and women sit on benches; and outside the enclosed lawn, along the outer ledges, the vagrants of all ages - the younger ones out to score and the older ones out merely to fill the necessary space of time required of that day to qualify them as being "alive" - sit singly or in groups, always waiting: the masklike faces of people expecting anything or nothing.." [pg. 126]

("CITY OF NIGHT is one of the most remarkable novels to appear in years...it illuminates, it stirs the heart, it is unforgettable." Herbert Gold

The problem is that we keep projecting onto Pershing Square a boatload of quaint ideas retained from the home towns where all of us came from. Lots of lawn. Trees. Back to Mayberry.

The social and economic context of Pershing Square is irretrievably changed, changed particularly from that one diagonal view through the park featured in the Times - showing the walkway crowded like the Hollywood Freeway at rush hour. I remember the north hall of Union Station being like that, in the early '50s. But it is all so different now.

A wide swath of lawn will only bring back, generate the problem of vagrancy which emerged in the Great Depression and has re-emerged with each renovation of the square.

The only way to prevent the vagrancy is to instill an over-riding sense of magic and transcendance. An atmosphere such that a cross section of the population will return to visit again and again and again. An atmosphere such that visitors and conventioneers from around the world would have an express desire to make a visit. A must-see place.

To hell with the environmental designers. Hire artist Robert Irwin. There is only one architect that I feel would begin to understand what is needed. And he is more than an architect. So hire Frank Gehry as well. A collaboration between Irwin and Gehry could very well give us an astounding result.

having been born & raised in culver city in the 40's & 50's - and having spent lots of time in downtown l.a. during that period - i have really enjoyed your pieces (and the bloggers comments) about: angels flight and pershing square - which were 2 of my fav places to visit/hang-out ! i also remember going to clifton's restaurant - the orpheum theatre - olvera street - and when we were in high school = the new follies burlesque theatre on main street !!

and... how did we get to l.a. - from - culver city ?? = by riding the ol' "red cars" = the pacific electric railways - of course !! = thoz were the dayz !!!