Okay, so on to point 2 on the above map, the Church with the white steeple…
I located this church at the Vermont exit of the 10 West. It was south of the highway, at approximately 25th St. I took the following image of the
church itself…
Church with the white steeple up close:
I then went inside. I met a very nice lady who didn’t speak any English, and I don’t really speak great Spanish either, but I know a lot of
keywords. We had a ‘sort of’ conversation, and I gathered that I wasn’t supposed to be in the building unless it was Sunday. So I thanked her
and left. I walked south to the end of the block, and then crossed the street. There I saw a residential building, and what looked to be the
building manager coming out the front door. I gained access to the roof through this gentleman, and took the following image of the White Church from
the roof of this building, to illustrate that the view from the church and the view from this building would be approximately the same…
Steeple from roof of building down the block:
I also took two good images of the hills. I’ve combined them below into a composite image. The image on the left shows the new mountain range,
determined to be the Kenneth Hahn Recreation Area, from a distance. As anyone can see from the picture, I was still too far away to be where the LA
Times Photographer must have been standing...
Composite Image of the new mountain range and the Hollywood hills for comparison:
So I continued on to point 3 on the map, quite on accident. I did not mean to pass the majority of the mountain range, I just sort of drove right
past it while looking for a good place to take images from. I eventually came to La Brea, and defining La Brea as the Western edge of the Kenneth
Hahn Recreation Area, I turned left (South) to seek entrance from this side of the park. Upon heading south for just maybe 20 seconds, I looked to my
right, and saw the mountain range that has me so excited today.
I quickly turned right at the first chance I got, and as I was turning I saw this sign:
Yep, that’s right, Culver City. It’s certainly not the Culver City I’m familiar with, but it’s within the city limits. For those who are not
familiar with Los Angeles, LA is comprised of MANY smaller cities like Culver City, Santa Monica, Van Nuys, West Hollywood, etc.
At any rate, here are the images of that mountain range, taken from a small street within this subdivision neighborhood:
img406.imageshack.us...
img404.imageshack.us...
img72.imageshack.us...
img72.imageshack.us...
img258.imageshack.us...
img249.imageshack.us...
img72.imageshack.us...
And if you turn around and look behind you from that vantage point, you see (across La Brea) the Western edge of the Kenneth Hahn Recreation Area.
This ridgeline within the park would have been easily accessible from a resident of this housing subdivision in 1942. One could have climbed straight
up that hillside with your camera and tripod, and snapped the picture in the LA Times.
This leads me to Theory 1 about where the photographer might have been standing. I’ll be returning to the Kenneth Hahn Recreation Area when I have
more time. I’ll hike in the long way to the ridgeline, and see what this new mountain range looks like from that vantage point.
I did manage to image the mountain range from the entrance to the park, but did not have time on Saturday to hike all the way to where I needed to be
from the parking area of the park. Like I said, I’ll go back and get this done as soon as time allows. For now here are the images from the park
entrance, assembled into 1 composite image, that clearly shows the mountain range I think we’re looking at in the original LA Times Photo (albeit
from a slightly different angle):
EDIT: Please click on this image to see it in it's entirety, in a new window. That way you can also zoom in slightly...-END EDIT
The proper angle should be from higher up, and to the right of where the above composite image was taken. That’s on the ridgeline directly behind
where the other picture set above was taken. I’ll return there shortly, and take a picture from the proper location.
Theory 2 is that the photographer could have been standing on the Eastern edge of the park, facing west. I’ll also image from that angle when I
can, and will post comparison photos from each location here in this thread.
I believe we’re getting close, and if these hunches pan out, it’s only a small matter now of narrowing down which particular ridgeline we’re
looking at in the original image.
Comments and thoughts would be much appreciated.
-WFA
[edit on 25-3-2008 by WitnessFromAfar]