Circa 1890 view of the Santa Monica shoreline, looking northwest from the Arcadia Hotel.
Circa 1895 view of Santa Monica’s seaside bluffs. The Arcadia Hotel and a wharf - forerunner to today’s Santa Monica Pier - are both visible in the distance.
Between 1893 and 1920, a 4,600-foot long wharf extended into Santa Monica Bay at Port Los Angeles. Read L.A. as Subject’s latest KCET contribution, “How Santa Monica Almost Became a Commercial Harbor,” to learn more.
Circa 1905 view of the Santa Monica shoreline from Palisades Park. The tracks of the Los Angeles & Independence R.R. run where Pacific Coast Highway is today. To the right, a motorcar ascends an early version of the California Incline.
Santa Monica’s Third Street circa 1891. The view of the street, now a shopping- and dining-oriented pedestrian promenade, looks northwest from Broadway toward Wilshire Boulevard (then named Nevada Avenue).
U.S. Highway 66, which stretched from Santa Monica to Chicago, was decommissioned 26 years ago today. This 1931 map from the USC Digital Library’s Automobile Club of Southern California Strip Maps Collection shows the segment of the route between Los Angeles and Claremont.
