Laurel Canyon, Los Angeles

This article is about the canyon neighborhood in Los Angeles, California. For Laurel Canyon Boulevard, see Laurel Canyon Boulevard. For other uses, see Laurel Canyon (disambiguation).
Laurel Canyon, Los Angeles
Neighborhood of Los Angeles
Laurel Canyon, Los Angeles

Location within Los Angeles and San Fernando Valley

Coordinates: 34°07′02″N 118°22′31″W / 34.117275°N 118.375281°W / 34.117275; -118.375281
Country  United States of America
State  California
County Los Angeles
City Los Angeles
Time zone PST (UTC-8)
 • Summer (DST) PDT (UTC-7)

Laurel Canyon is a neighborhood and canyon located in the Hollywood Hills region of the Santa Monica Mountains, in the Hollywood Hills West district of Los Angeles, California.

Location

Laurel Canyon is focused on its central thoroughfare, Laurel Canyon Boulevard. However, unlike other nearby canyon neighborhoods, Laurel Canyon has houses lining one side of the main street most of the way up to Mulholland Drive. There are many side roads that branch off the main canyon, but most are not through streets, reinforcing the self-contained nature of the neighborhood. Some of the main side streets are Mount Olympus, Kirkwood, Wonderland Avenue, Willow Glen, and Lookout Mountain Avenue. The zip code for a portion of the neighborhood is 90046. [1]

Laurel Canyon Boulevard is an important North-South route between: West Hollywood, Hollywood, and Central Los Angeles; and Studio City and the eastern San Fernando Valley. The canyon's division between the two regions is defined by Mulholland Drive.

In early 2005, the first section of the road on the Hollywood side was partially washed away in a heavy rainstorm, and traffic was redirected to a normally quiet residential side street.

History

The Laurel Canyon area was inhabited by the Tongva people, a regional tribe of the indigenous peoples of California, for thousands of years. A spring-fed stream flowed year-round providing water.

The reliable water attracted colonial Spanish ranchers who started sheep grazing on the hillsides in the late 18th and early 19th centuries. After the Mexican-American War and U.S. statehood, the area was settled by Americans interested in water rights. Around the turn of the 20th century, the area was subdivided and marketed as mountain vacation properties.

Trolleybuses passing each other in Laurel Canyon Drive. The bus on the right is coasting with trolleys down

Between 1912 and 1918, a trackless electric trolley bus from the Laurel Canyon Pacific Electric stop ran up the canyon from Sunset Boulevard to the base of Lookout Mountain Road, where a road house served visitors. Travel to the newly subdivided lots and cabins further up the canyon was at first made on foot or by mule. As the roads were improved access was possible by automobile.

Around 1920, a local developer built the Lookout Mountain Inn at the summit of Lookout Mountain and Sunset Plaza roads, which burned just a few years after opening.

Among the famous places in Laurel Canyon are the log cabin house once owned by silent film star Tom Mix, that later became home to the Zappa clan,[2] and another (directly across the street) that magician Harry Houdini may have lived in.

Laurel Canyon found itself a nexus of counterculture activity and attitudes in the 1960s, becoming famous as home to many of L.A.'s rock musicians, such as Frank Zappa; Jim Morrison of The Doors; The Byrds; Buffalo Springfield; and Love.

John Phillips of the Mamas & the Papas took inspiration from their home in Laurel Canyon in the song "Twelve Thirty" a.k.a. "Twelve Thirty (Young Girls Are Coming to the Canyon)", released in 1967.

In 1968, John Mayall recorded and released Blues from Laurel Canyon based on his experiences on a vacation earlier that year.

Joni Mitchell, living in the home in the Canyon that was immortalized in the song, "Our House" (1970), written by her then-lover Graham Nash, would use the area and its denizens as inspiration for her third album, Ladies of the Canyon (1970). Crosby, Stills, and Nash first met each other in her living room.[3]

On July 1, 1981, three members and one associate of the Wonderland Gang, so-called because they were based at 8763 Wonderland Avenue, died in the Wonderland murders (also known as the "Four on the Floor murders" or the "Laurel Canyon murders"). Salon reports: "The massacre took place just down the street from what was then the home of Jerry Brown, who was California’s governor at the time. And 8763 Wonderland Ave. itself is said to have been inhabited at one time by Paul Revere and the Raiders."[4]

See also

References

  1. ↑ Verified Aug 16, 2015 at US Postal Service look-up site. See https://tools.usps.com/go/ZipLookupResultsAction!input.action?resultMode=1&companyName=&address1=laurel+canyon&address2=&city=los+angeles&state=CA&urbanCode=&postalCode=&zip=
  2. ↑ Dowd, Vincent (28 September 2011). "Frank Zappa: the clean-living hellraiser". BBC News. Retrieved 6 September 2014. Interview with Pauline Butcher, Zappa's live-in secretary.
  3. ↑ Sheila Weller, Girls Like Us: Carole King, Joni Mitchell, Carly Simon--And the Journey of a Generation, Atria Books, 2008, ISBN 0743491475.
  4. ↑ Lemons, Stephen (June 9, 2000). "Return to Wonderland". Salon.

Further reading

External links

Studio City Studio City Studio City
 
 
Coldwater Canyon in Hollywood Hills    Laurel Canyon     Runyon Canyon Park & Cahuenga Pass in Hollywood Hills
West Hollywood West Hollywood Hollywood

Coordinates: 34°7′2.19″N 118°22′31.01″W / 34.1172750°N 118.3752806°W / 34.1172750; -118.3752806

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