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This Date in Downtown

A look back at some of the events that have taken place Downtown over the years.

Fifty-Eight Years Ago Today: Hollywood Freeway Opens Through Downtown

By Eric Richardson — December 27, 2008 — 6 Comments

USC Digital Archives / Los Angeles Examiner

On December 27, 1950, civic leaders made their speeches and welcomed the first vehicles onto the Hollywood Freeway through Downtown. The first link of the highway, now known as the 101, stretched from Grand Avenue to Silver Lake Boulevard and cost $13,000,000. — Continued Inside...

Fifty-Five Years Ago Today: Plans for 4th Street 'Cut' Unveiled

By Eric Richardson — November 25, 2008 — 8 Comments

Eric Richardson

On November 25, 1953, city officials presented detailed plans for the viaduct-cut that would take 4th street over Figueroa and Flower and under Hope and Grand. The plan, which the Times called a "sort of roller-coaster loop over Bunker Hill," replaced a previous agreement to build a tunnel under Bunker Hill. — Continued Inside...

Thirty Years Ago Today: Jewelry Exchange Opened Amid Local Industry Boom

By Eric Richardson — November 14, 2008 — 3 Comments

Eric Richardson

Hailed as the "largest retail jewelry exchange in the world," the New York Jewelers Exchange opened on November 14, 1978. For thirty years the Exchange has occupied the ground floor and mezzanine of the Los Angeles Jewelry Center at 629 S. Hill, offering ninety booths where jewelers can cut costs by sharing rent and utilities.

The opening came at a boom time for Downtown's jewelry trade. Between 1974 and 1979, jewelry sales Downtown ballooned from $150 million to $500 million. — Continued Inside...

Thirty-Eight Years Ago Today: Hall of Justice "Rocked By Blast"

By Eric Richardson — September 05, 2008

Early in the morning hours of September 5th, 1970, an explosion on the sixth floor of the Hall of Justice demolished a concrete wall near the office of District Attorney Evelle J. Younger. Investigators found the remnants of a homemade bomb on an adjoining stairwell. Being held upstairs in one of the Hall's cells at the time: Charles Manson.

Today in Downtown History: Library Declared Work of Art

By Eric Richardson — August 20, 2008

Thirty-nine years ago today, on August 20, 1969, the city's Municipal Arts Commission declared the Central Library building and grounds a work of art. The building was forty-seven years old, and the designation was part of an ultimately unsuccessful fight to keep the library from building an employee parking lot on the site now occupied by Maguire Gardens.

Downtown 1990

By Eric Richardson — June 04, 2007
4 Comments

Thirty-five years ago today the Times ran an interesting piece talking about the $250,000 Downtown plan put together by planning firm Wallace, McHarg, Roberts & Todd. The plan laid out a vision of Downtown in 1990 (pictured at right), and it's a bit different than the Downtown of 2007. Most interesting: the park that was supposed to give some sense to...