Mt. Washington I

There are several hill-top neighborhoods that stretch northward from downtown Los Angeles.  The first of which was called Chavez Ravine before the neighborhood was replaced by Dodger stadium.  North of the stadium is an area called Elysian Park consisting of a neighborhood and a sprawling public park that covers 575 acres.  The park was founded in 1886 and was the site for the pentathlon shooting competition during the 1932 Olympics.

Located in the park is an historic marker indicating a 1769 campsite used by the first recorded European exploration of California.  Gaspar de Portola led a Spanish exploration of what was then referred to as Baja and Alta California.  He was accompanied by Junipero Serra, the head of Franciscan Missionaries who helped establish the 21 missions that survive to this day.  The northern rim of the park looks 600 feet down to the Los Angeles River which was so named by the Portola Expedition.

The Los Angeles River lies in what was once called the Elysian Valley.  On the north bank of the river, a gradual incline becomes the base of the San Rafael Hills.  Atop the beginning of these hills sits a neighborhood known as Mount Washington named after a Colonel Harry Washington who surveyed the area in 1855.  The steep terrain surrounding the area on 3 sides discouraged any development including access roads and was devoted to sheep ranching until 1910.  As testimony to the radical inclines, the south end of Eldred Street ranks as one of the steepest streets in the world with a 33% grade.  I wouldn't recommend driving up it unless you like being scared shitless.  The very top of the street comes to a dead end with no space in which to turn around.  

Soon after 1900, a real estate developer took notice of Angel's Flight, a funicular railway operating in downtown Los Angeles.  He figured a similar railway could be built to carry residents up to homes he would build on Mt. Washington.  After all, a street car line already ran from downtown past the base of these hills.  In addition to the railway, he planned a hotel at the 940 foot summit.  Once the railway began service the developer's lots started to sell. 

On weekends as many as 3,500 visitors would ride to the top to check out the hotel and the view that stretched all the way to the Pacific.  The railway was on the east side of Mt. Washington and its route up the hill is taken up today by Avenue 43.  A 2-story ticket station at the bottom of the line on the corner at Marmion Way is still there but has since been converted to a residence.  The railway was 3,000 feet long with the power supplied by a building at the top.  The railway grew in popularity and ran from 7 a.m. to 6 p.m. on week days and 6 a.m. to midnight on weekends.  The price of a round trip ticket was 5 cents. There were two railway cars in operation each with 24 seats that were scheduled to depart every 10 minutes.  The railway cars were able to get by each other by means of a passing oval at the halfway point.

Getting to the Mt. Washington railway from downtown Los Angeles took less than 20 minutes by street car.  Ticket books for riding the street cars were good for 500 miles and sold for $6.25 (or an eighth of a cent per mile). 

Water for the growing hill-top community came from a natural spring where Avenue 41 meets San Fernando Road.  The pumping facility that carried the water to a reservoir atop the north end of Mt. Washington is still in operation today.  The 350,000 gallon reservoir was given a wooden cover after neighborhood kids began swimming in it. 

Public safety and accessibility concerns resulted in the building of San Rafael Avenue that runs a mile in length along the top of Mt. Washington, reaching El Paso Drive at the north end, the only side of the hills with a gradual decline.

The Mt. Washington Hotel opened in January of 1910 and soon became popular with well-healed patrons.  The hotel was 3 stories high and built in a somewhat flamboyant version of the mission style by the same firm that put up Grauman's Chinese Theater.  The property covered 7 acres with luxurious gardens, tennis courts and winding walkways.  The Hotel had 18 rooms, each with its own bath which was unusual for the time.  Production companies often filmed in nearby Sycamore Park and were frequent guests including the likes of Charley Chaplain.

Residential development on Mt. Washington continued to progress but the railway and hotel's days were numbered.  In 1919, the Board of Public Utilities ordered the railway shut down until improvements to equipment were completed.  The cost of the required changes was impractical and the work was never even started.  The railway sat idle until the cars were removed in 1922 and the tracks were taken out in 1930.

With only 18 rooms the hotel could never hope to be a money maker.  When the production companies found other locations and the railway was shut down, the hotel limped along and finally closed for good in 1921.

The hotel and grounds served briefly as a military school for boys and later a hospital for emphysema victims.  The property sat empty until it was purchased by Parmahansa Yoganada in 1925.  He was a monk of the ancient Swami Order of India and founder of the Self-Realization Foundation.  The site today serves as the organization's world headquarters and has changed little except that it is now enclosed by walls.

Here's something for our city fathers to think about.  100 years ago, at the peak of rush hour you could get on a street car at 7^th and Broadway, ride north to Avenue 43, take the railway to the top of Mt. Washington and arrive in less than 30 minutes for under 10 cents.  Emission free to boot.