| Toluca Lake | |
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| — District of Los Angeles — | |
| Toluca Lake sign | |
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Toluca Lake
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Toluca Lake
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| Coordinates: | |
| Country | United States |
| State | California |
| County | Los Angeles |
| City | Los Angeles |
| Established | 1923 |
| Population (2009)[1] | |
| • Total | 7,782 |
| Time zone | Pacific (PST) (UTC-8) |
| • Summer (DST) | PDT (UTC-7) |
| ZIP codes | 91602 |
| Area code(s) | 818 |
| FIPS code | |
| GNIS feature ID | |
Toluca Lake is a district, 12 miles (19 km) north of downtown Los Angeles, in the San Fernando Valley region of the city of Los Angeles, California, and a "community within two communities, North Hollywood and Burbank".[2]
Toluca Lake started out as Forman Toluca Ranch, a ranch known for its crops of peaches, apples and walnuts,[2] but after development is currently home to affluent residents, many of whom work as part of nearby Hollywood's film industry.
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Toluca Lake is situated in the southeastern San Fernando Valley straddling the city of Burbank, the Los Angeles district of North Hollywood, and near the unincorporated county area of Universal City, at the northern base of the Hollywood Hills section of the Santa Monica Mountains.
The area’s historic boundaries were Cahuenga Boulevard, Camarillo Street, Clybourn Avenue, and the Los Angeles River,[2][3] but have been widened to Vineland between the 170 freeway and the Los Angeles River [4] and it is located between two major film and television production studios, Universal Studios to the south and Warner Bros. to the east. The Santa Monica Mountains surround the area.
The geologic Toluca Lake is a 6-acre (2.4 ha) body of water located near the district’s southeastern boundaries. The historic natural lake was fed by springs of upwelling groundwater from the substantial Los Angeles River and San Fernando Valley subterranean aquifers. Late 19th and 20th century L. A. DWP well extraction and 1930s concrete river channelization lowered the water table, and currently community wells at the lake’s edges maintain the water level.[2][5] The bottom of the lake is surfaced with four inches (102 mm) of asphalt concrete to prevent seepage.[2] Owned by the surrounding homeowners, the lake has been maintained by the Toluca Lake Property Owners Association, a non-profit corporation established in 1934.[2] The lake, surrounded by private residences and the Lakeside Golf Club, is inaccessible to the public.
In 2009, the Los Angeles Times’s “Mapping L.A.” project supplied these Toluca Lake neighborhood statistics: population: 7,782; median household income: $73,111.[1]
The Tongva people lived in the locale, and the San Fernando Valley and Los Angeles basin, for 8,000 years.[6] The Tongvan settlement Cahuenga used the springs and marsh for water, fishing, hunting, harvesting, and building supplies (tule plants).[7]
After the Spanish conquest in the 1790s of Las Californias the San Fernando Valley, including the "Toluca Lake locale" became the extended property of the Mission San Fernando Rey de España. After the 1823 Independence of Mexico, the secularization of missions in Alta California included the issuing of a Mexican land grant for Rancho Ex-Mission San Fernando.[8] The extreme eastern end of the lake was within the 1843 Rancho Providencia grant to Vincente de la Osa.[9] In 1862, Pío Pico sold his share of the Ex-San Fernando Mission land, the entire southern half of the Valley below Roscoe Boulevard, to Isaac Lankershim (operating as the "San Fernando Farm Homestead Association") in 1869. In 1873, Isaac Lankershim's son James Boon (J. B.) Lankershim, and future son-in-law, Isaac Newton Van Nuys, took over management of the property, including the lake at Toluca. During the 1880s, the San Fernando Farm Homestead Association was succeeded by the "Los Angeles Farm & Milling Company".
In 1893, a petition was filed with the U.S. Postal Service for the area's first post office, to be named "Toluca Post Office". General Charles Forman, a wealthy local landowner and one of the proponents of the petition, later stated that he had chosen the name "Toluca" from a Paiute Indian word meaning "fertile" or "beautiful" valley. Though part of a larger area traditionally called "Lankershim" after a Colonel of the same name — and with a Southern Pacific Railroad train station named "Lankershim" also opened in 1893 across from the post office — Forman called his own ranch and the surrounding land "Toluca".[10]
One of the wealthiest men in Nevada, Forman had made his fortune from nothing, starting in mining, then cattle ranching, and then lumber. Falling in love with and marrying Los Angeles native Mary Agnes Gray, he soon moved to the area in the late 1880s and started the Kern River Company, a power company which delivered electricity from generators at the Kern River to Los Angeles. He also bought a large parcel of rich farm land, which included much of modern day Toluca Lake and at least the western portion of the "ancient and historical" marshy pond now called Toluca Lake.[10] By 1923, the Forman Toluca Lake Ranch was a flourishing producer of peaches, apples and walnuts.[2][11] That year, investors bought and developed the land as "Toluca Lake Park". This initial venture failed, but a new group soon took over, renaming the development company "The Toluca Lake Company". With a "vision of creating a first 'bedroom community' for Los Angeles in the San Fernando Valley", the company formally changed the name of the community to simply Toluca Lake, and adopted as their logo the "swan on rippled water" image still associated with the community today.[10]
The name Lankershim also was considered for the town. Colonel J. B. Lankershim established the town site of Toluca at the eastern edge of the family's vast holdings in 1888. During the late 1890s, the town name Lankershim had replaced Toluca.[12] By 1927, the lure of Hollywood inspired local merchants to launch a campaign to change the community's name to North Hollywood.[13] The original town site of Toluca is now part of Toluca Lake.
Aviator Amelia Earhart lived in Toluca Lake on Valley Spring Lane after marrying flamboyant publishing magnate George P. Putnam in 1931. The Spanish colonial-style home, which still exists today, features a front-yard tree under which she signed her round-the-world flight plan. She made her home in Toluca Lake because the best aircraft in the world were being designed and built nearby at the Lockheed plant in Burbank. Entertainer Bob Hope moved to Toluca Lake in the late 1930s and lived there until his death in 2003 at the age of 100.[14] In the 1938 Little Rascals film Three Men in a Tub, the kids hold a regatta on the lake, which is shown to be still largely surrounded by open country at that time.[15] In 1945, Frank Sinatra and his family moved into a house in Toluca Lake and spent weekends at their Lone Palm Hotel in Palm Springs. The house was located down the street from where Earhart had lived.[13] Former actor and future 40th President of the United States Ronald Reagan had his wedding reception with second wife Nancy Reagan at the Toluca Lake home of actor (and best man) William Holden on March 4, 1952.[16]
Toluca Lake is represented by City Councilman Tom LaBonge in the Los Angeles City Council and Mike Gatto in the California State Assembly. NBC-4 weatherman Fritz Coleman is the honorary mayor of Toluca Lake.
Toluca Lake homeowner groups have recently begun mobilizing against a proposed development in North Hollywood by NBC-Universal and Thomas Properties Group. The Metro Studio Project involves upwards of 1,000,000 square feet (93,000 m2) of space and would house employees leaving NBC's Burbank facility. The project also proposes a Times Square-style supergraphics and digital illuminated billboards. It would be built partly on land for which NBC Universal has a lease agreement from the Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority. Given the current recession, there have been signs the project may be delayed indefinitely. The Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors has yet to act on the proposal, and Environmental Impact Reports are not finalized.
Toluca Lake is a part of the Los Angeles Unified School District, and Toluca Lake Elementary School[17] is within its borders.
Toluca Lake is known for a point of interest located in Burbank: a Bob's Big Boy. The Burbank restaurant, a California Point of Historical Interest, is the oldest in America;[18] it is just beyond the boundary of Toluca Lake and is often misidentified as being located there.[19][20][21]
St. Charles Borromeo Church of North Hollywood, is attended by various well-known Toluca Lake residents and has played host to several celebrity weddings and funerals, including the funerals of Bob Hope and Dorothy Lamour.[22] Choir director Paul Salamunovich was the former director of the Los Angeles Master Chorale.[22]
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