Los Angeles Before Hollywood: Journalism And American Film Culture, 1905 To 1915, Jan Olsson

c. 2008

This is a wonderful book I stumbled across while shopping in a Japanese bookstore in Los Angeles a few weeks ago. As mentioned in an earlier post at another blog, 90% of the offerings at this bookstore were in Japanese, but the English-book section was outstanding. I picked up a "Manga" book on electricity, and a graphic novel on Steve Jobs. But the best buy was the 2008 Los Angeles Before Hollywood by Jan Olsson. I enjoy it mostly because it is a most challenging book to read; very, very dense; somewhat obtuse writing, I guess, one would say. I have started the book several times, and have had to read the first two or three pages three or four times to figure out what the author's intent for the book was. I have now gotten through the introduction after the fourth or fifth try, and for the first time, finally looked at the author's bio on wikipedia. It looks like it's a much better book than I had even imagined.

I don't recommend the book for anyone but the most diehard movie historians. It has real heft, again literally and figuratively. It looks compact but it is "heavy." It has ten chapters (plus an introduction), 394 pages; notes, 50 pages; a 14-page bibliography; and a 19-page index.

The book covers the history of film in Los Angeles and the West Coast from 1905 to 1915, a period the author considers a transitional period for film. Two films serve as symbolic bookends for this decade: Escape From Sing Sing (1905) and The Clansman, later The Birth of a Nation (1915). I recall seeing the latter many years ago, but I forget where and exactly when -- but it must have been back in high school, if you can imagine that. It left a huge impression on me. 

I doubt I will finish the book any time soon. I may not finish it at. Certainly, I will skim some portions of is. It is interesting, rewarding, and fulfilling to see my alma mater, University of Southern California mentioned often.

The early 1910s was a period when social scientists and progressive reformers began mapping the amusement and recreational geographies in America. In the spring of 1911 renowned social scientist Dr Emory S Bogardus was summoned to Los Angeles at the behest of the University of Southern California's president.

The mission: establishing a department of sociology at USC. The result: a highly regarded and in several respects groundbreaking academic institution crafted during Bogardus' long tenure at the helm.

According to a small news item from December, 1911, Dr Bogardus, during his first year as a professor at USC, had thirty-five students in a civic-education course prepare to maps of downtown Los Angels marking all its places of amusement and recreations based on a systematic inventory of 3,600 blocks.

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Themes

1905 - 1915: a transitory period for film

Paging through the newspapers during this time period may be one of the best ways to learn about the evolution of film during this transitory period.

Bookend movies: Escape From Sing Sing (1905; the reel has been lost); and The Clansman (re-titled, Birth of a Nation, D. W. Griffith, 1915).

1905: the nickelodian craze.

The Saunterer. From the net:

One hundred and thirty years ago today, the new owner of the Los Angeles Daily Times, Colonel Harrison Gray Otis, reported to work in this modest building at Temple and New High. According to the 1882 newspaper announcement, Otis would have editorial oversight of the Daily Times and Weekly Mirror (now the Los Angeles Times). Otis and his wife Eliza had purchased 15% of the newspaper. While Harrison published bombastic editorials, Eliza wrote articles for the women’s section and columns called “The Saunterer” and “Susan Sunshine.” By 1886, the couple bought out their partners and owned 100 percent of the newspaper. -- the blog posting was undated

"Otis saw a glorious future for Los Angeles whose population totaled about 12,000 when he joined the Times. ‘Los Angeles is in a transition state,’ he wrote in an early editorial. ‘She has finally waked up from the dull lethargy of those old days when she was one great sheep-walk and cattle range. All she needs now is men of brawn and brains to grow up with her.’" [Harrison Gray Otis became the newspaper's editor in July, 1882.]

 The Times.

The flaneur.