He lives in Los Angeles because he loves it -- not because he was born there. He doesn't really care about street art, sleb culture, sunshine, and prefers mass and active transit to cars.
View all posts by Eric Brightwell. The heart of Frogtown was cut out by the completion of the Golden State Freeway in She soon remarried and moved to Inglewood with her husband and our family of 5 Mom, Dad, younger brother, youngest sister squeezed into the 2 bedroom, 1 bath cottage.
Bunk beds and a sofa bed made it work. I knew the house and street well, having spent many happy hours visiting Grandma when younger. Her neighbor, a retired Hollywood dancer named June Lee, had a TV and let me watch the cowboy shows on Saturday mornings.
June Lee was the one who introduced Grandma to her 3rd husband, a widower of Ms. For us kids he went from Mr. We were married in at St. Like Like. Like Liked by 1 person. OMG yes!
These things grow from the fertilized egg to a small toad in 6 to 8 weeks, and it seems we had an invasion about every quarter…first we kids would play with the tadpoles down in the river, then not long after the tadpoles would slowly lose their tails and look like miniature toadlets. These things would climb up the concrete riverbank and go into the neighborhood by the thousands.
They were all over the streets, walks, yards, everywhere. It was horrible for the girls and we guys loved it. We did not see them very often after that… I thought toad invasions were a normal part of life for years…Some would climb down into our heater basement, or under the house in the dry sand and get mummified. These were great to take to school and throw at girls you had a crush on. Fortunately I outgrew that by the time I met my future bride in The connection of the explosives to the toads is better left to the imagination.
You are commenting using your WordPress. You are commenting using your Google account. You are commenting using your Twitter account. You are commenting using your Facebook account. Notify me of new comments via email. Notify me of new posts via email. Skip to content. City of Los Angeles neighborhood sign for Elysian Valley. The Los Angeles River. Lovely Service Market.
Dorris Place Elementary. Elysian Valley seen from Elysian Park. Nice Frogtown mural with an FTR placa. A mural in Elysian Valley. Backs of warehouses along the Los Angeles River. Dutch rowhouse murals on Clearwater Street. Rattlesnake Park. Share this: Tweet. Email Print. Like this: Like Loading The name comes from the frogs that used to emerge from the grassy banks, and it was later adopted by local gangs that gave the area a dangerous edge and kept most except locals and intrepid artists away.
But things have changed over the past few years—dramatically in the last year alone—and a genuinely thriving creative community has blossomed. Today the Twinkies have been replaced by Eames-style chairs the furniture manufacturer Modernica bought the Hostess Brands bakery in , and Doi Todd is a part owner of Zebulon, a bar and music venue that relocated from Brooklyn and opened in another former bakery on Fletcher Drive last May.
The location—beside the freeway with no residential neighbors, just around the corner from the popular taco spot Salazar—was ideal, and the involvement of Doi Todd and her musician husband Jesse Peterson eased the neighborhood-council approval process. A smaller front space made a cozy cafe setting, and Joce Soubiran brought the original s wooden bar out of storage in Brooklyn and shipped it across the country.
With its eclectic international crowd, Zebulon serves as both a physical and cultural anchor for the quickly evolving community. Of course, artists and cultural happenings have been part of the fabric of Frogtown for decades. The author and activist Lewis MacAdams founded Friends of the Los Angeles River FoLAR in with the intention of making it an ecologically sound recreational space—something that is now closer than ever, with kayaks rentals and the Los Angeles River Greenway Trail bike path, which will extend to San Pedro by Word on the street says that Pitt has been looking to buy in the neighborhood.
For Houseago, a multimedia practitioner who bought the first of his four buildings in , it was when collectors could suddenly find his studio that he realized his secluded haven had become a destination.
A walled outdoor lot holds the monolithic white plaster sculpture that will eventually be cast in ash stone and donated to LACMA as an interactive artwork. Along with the creative possibilities that this space affords him, Houseago has also begun to realize his own role in the changing DNA and rents of the neighborhood. He has taken it upon himself to help younger artists—offering them work space or simply inviting them to lunch and making introductions to other artists.
He also has an ongoing partnership with the Underground Museum and regularly hosts school groups. Houseago dismisses suggestions from developers that he would be wise to sell. My work is here—this is how I survive, this is how I live. For Karl Kruegermann, president of Kruegermann Pickles and Sauerkraut, the changing neighborhood and skyrocketing value of real estate is an even more mixed bag.
The Kruegermann family has been manufacturing traditional pickles and sauerkraut on Gilroy Street in Frogtown since they emigrated from Germany in Over time, his family bought seven buildings on the block, because they were told it was a smart investment. Now he finds himself running a family business that might be worth more money as a rental property.
Still, he is excited by the new energy brought by his tenants—who include the French artist Claire Tabouret and the design and branding company Oh Joy! When she fabricates off-site, she tries to keep it local.
Since opening in a former auto-repair shop in with a simple tacos-and-tequila menu and a clashing, dated HTML website that is such an eyesore it could only be tongue-in-cheek it is , the family-friendly outdoor spot routinely has hour-long waits. Alternatively, Spoke Bicycle Cafe, which opened in as a coffee stand and tune-up pop-up right off the bike path, began serving a full menu by chef Laura Parsley-Gonzales, from the Highland Park vegetarian hub Kitchen Mouse, last spring.
Some of their custom wooden tables have built-in slots for easy bike parking. It was in fact the bike path that led the chic local handbag, apparel and accessories brand Clare V.
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