Sycamore
trees and the primitive villages along the valley, and the main passage
through the hills to the valley beyond was located immediately east of
the Gabrielinos' village. It was known as the Cahuenga Pass.
Cahuenga Pass 1897
During the early years, Cahuenga Pass was covered with a species of
cactus known as nopal, and grown as food for chineak, and insect used in
the manufacture of dyes. This area of the nopal was known by the
Spaniards as Nopalera. After Los Angles was established as pueblo in
1781, the pass became a branch of El Camino Real del Rey, the principal
passageway up the coast. The route through Cahuenga Pass was at first
just a crude winding trail over which cattle and sheep were driven to
and from San Fernando.
Eventually it became a wagon road, and then a paved highway. Finally in 1954 the Hollywood freeway was completed.
Cahuenga Pass 1920
Cahuenga Bl
Cahuenga Pass Late 40s
Hollywood Freeway Construction at Cahuenga Pass
Canvas
covered freight wagons from Los Angeles used the pass on the way to
Owens Lake and Panamint Mines in Inyo County. They left the pueblo in
the morning and crossed the hills behind Hollywood during the first
day's travel, then spent the night by a river near what is now Universal
City.
The following morning the mules were doubled up to cross the river.
The next night was spent at the San Fernando Mission, which was a hard
day's travel in the deep sand of the San Fernando Valley. It wasn't
until the 1870s that the first oasis wayside inn was built on the long
road north, a two-story wooden toll station known at the Pass Hotel or
Eight Mile House.
Kit Carson was among the carriers who used the Cahuenga Pass to
deliver the overland mail from the United States to Monterey. The first
mail arrived in Los Angeles in May 1848. Ten years later John
Butterfield had the mail carrying contract. His famous sages took 23
days from St. Louis to San Francisco through the Cahuenga Pass.
The pass was the site of a number of minor skirmishes that
nonetheless were significant in California history. War was declared in
1846 between the United States and Mexico, whose weak government
controlled California. General Andres Pico surrendered t the United
States within one year, signing the treaty of Cahuengo in 1847 at the
Casa Adobe de Cahuenga, Senora Maria Jesus de Feliz's small, tile roofed
adobe house at the north end of Cahuenga Pass on the present site of
Universal City. The treaty of Peace was signed between the two countries
the following year, and California became a U.S. Territory.
La Brea Tar Pits 1910
Rancho La Brea
The
Spanish and Mexican governments offered settlers large tracts of
unoccupied land at no charge in an effort to encourage colonization of
the land acquired throughout the 1870s. A successful petitioner could
obtain as many as 44,000 acres. Exact boundaries were considered
unimportant and few owners knew where their land began or where it
ended. Maps accompanying the petitions were simple sketches showing any
important natural landmark that might serve to identify the land.
The westerly half of what is now Hollywood was part of Rancho La
Brea, Spanish for the Tar Ranch. The rancho was named for the swamps of
tar first noted by portola's 1769 Spanish expedition. The Gabriello
Indians probably burned the tar for fuel. Later, settlers hauled it in
oxcarts from the swamps and used it for waterproofing of the roofs of
adobe houses. Rancho La Brea was granted to Antonio Jose Rocha and
Nemisio Dominguez, but neither resident of the Los Angeles pueblo ever
lived on the rancho was James Thompson, later a Los Angeles County
Sheriff.
After numerous title transfers, the rancho eventually ended up in the
hands of John and Henry Hancock, and John's portion became a large part
of West Hollywood. A refinery, which Henry built to prepare the tar for
local marketing and for shipment to San Francisco, operated until 1887,
producing five tons of asphalt daily for nearly 17 years. Workers at the
beds commonly came across bones teeth of saber-toothed cats, wolves and
sloths. It wasn't until the early 1890's that the tar pit beds became
archeologically important. Henry's son, G. Allan Hancock, gave Los
Angeles County the exclusive right to excavate and, in 1915, he donated
to the county the 23 acres upon which the fossil beds lay. Thousands of
specimens-many dating back thousands of years to the late Pleistocene
period-have been retrieved from the paleological gold mine known today
as the La Brea Tar Pits.
In 1895 Hill street was located in a sleepy residential neighborhood.
Just beyond the intersection of 3rd and Hill Street was an un
-landscaped hill. Perched on top of that hill resided very wealthy Los
Angeles dignitaries who lived in newly constructed opulent Victorian
mansions. The neighborhood was affectionately called "Bunker Hill."
1903
The whole scene changed dramatically when a small funicular railway was constructed to connect Hill Street with Olive Street.
The over all result was a more built up little neighborhood just outside the big city.
Built in 1901 with financing from Colonel J.W Eddy as the Los Angeles Incline Railway,
Angels Flight began at the west corner of Hill Street at Third and ran
for two blocks uphill to Olive Street. Angels Flight was built to
transport residents of Bunker Hill to the down town shopping area, with
the foresight of installing benches to take advantage of te beautiful
view of downtown, the Pacific Ocean, and the lovely green parks that
were new to the city of Los Anglels. As one car ascended, the other
descended, carried down by gravity. An archway at the Hill Street
entrance was labeled "Angeles Flight" in 1912 and this became its
official name when the Funding Company of California purchased the
railway from its founders.
Bunker Hill was still a suburb in this photo and retained its exclusive
characteristics through the end of World War I, but during the 1920s the
increased urban growth fed by an extensive streetcar system, resulted
in its wealthy residents leaving for more privacy in Pasadena
neighborhoods. Bunker Hill's houses were increasingly sub-divided to
accommodate renters and the once glorious mansions were rapidly being
run down. Bunker Hill would eventually become urban and over crowded.
1910
Almost ten years after it was constructed, the large Victorian home
at the upper left is already gone and replaced by a large building, and
the rail tracks were raised and added to make the overall incline
steeper.
The appearance has gone from residential railway to a city transport system.
By World War II the Pasadena Freeway was built to bring shoppers to
downtown Los Angeles, and was simultaneously driving more residents out.
Additional post-war freeway construction left downtown comparatively
empty of both people and services. The once-grand Victorian mansions of
Bunker Hill were being rented out to numerous families at the same time
and crumbling from decades of neglect.
In 1955, Los Angeles city planners decided that Bunker Hill required a
massive slum-clearance project. Angeles Flight and Bunker Hill had been
seriously run down since the 1940s, and the plan was to demolish the
outdated funicular and remove every structure that was connected to the
old Angeles Flight and Bunker Hill.
The railway was closed in 1969
when the Bunker Hill area underwent a redevelopment which destroyed and
displaced a community of almost 25,000 working-class families renting
rooms in architecturally beautiful but run-down buildings, to a modern
district of high-rise commercial buildings and modern apartment
complexes. After much bickering and protesting, the city agreed to
restore Angels Flight after a significant portion of the new buildings
were completed. The archway and the cable cars were placed in storage in
anticipation of the railway's restoration and reopening.
The top of Bunker Hill was cleared of its houses and then flattened
as the first stage of the Bunker Hill Redevelopment Project to populate
Bunker Hill with modern plazas and buildings. Developers built some of
the tallest skyscrapers in Los Angeles to take advantage of the area's
existing dense zoning. In approving such projects, the city sought to
project a modern, sophisticated image.
The project is the longest
redevelopment project in Los Angeles history, and is scheduled to end
some time after 2015. The majority of the skyscrapers on the old Bunker
Hill were built in the 1980s, with a new skyscraper or two being
finished nearly every year. However, the momentum died down in the 1990s
during a dip in the economy.
After almost 30 years in storage, the funicular was rebuilt and
reopened in 1996 one half block south of the original site. Although the
original cars, Sinai and Olivet, were used, a new
track and haulage system was designed and built, a redesign which
resulted in sad consequences five years later.
In 2001 a passenger was killed and several others were injured when Sinai was approaching the upper station and reversed direction suddenly and accelerated downhill out of contol to hit Olivet
near the lower terminus. An investigation was condicted and it was
determined that the cause was improper design and construction of the
railway system. Unlike the original, the new system used two separate
systems for each car with the two systems connected to each other, it
was the failure of this gear train which was the immediate cause of the
accident as it disconnected Sinai from Olivet's balancing load and from the service brake.
