More Olympic rowing in Long Beach, 1932. The oil derricks don’t quite outnumber the well-dressed spectators. From the Los Angeles Area Chamber of Commerce Collection in the USC Digital Library.

Olympic rowers during the 1932 games in Los Angeles, with Long Beach oil derricks in the background. Part of the Los Angeles Area Chamber of Commerce Collection in the USC Digital Library.

Record crowds escape the heat in Long Beach in 1957

Opening of the Long Beach (I-710) Freeway in 1959

1929 map of the coast highway route between Long Beach and Newport Beach. From the USC Digital Library’s Automobile Club of Southern California Strip Maps Collection.

1929 view of the Pike in Long Beach

On this day in 1951: workers strike at the Douglas Aircraft plant in Long Beach.

A pipe smoking contest at the International Pipe Smokers Convention in Long Beach, held on this day in 1952. According to the metadata for this image, Paul Spaniola, who is lighting an opponent’s pipe in this photo, once kept nine-tenths of an ounce of tobacco lit for 88 minutes.