Sunday, March 31, 2013

US Wrestlers Prepare For Last Olympics To Have Wrestling. But Cheer Up! The Olympics Will Still Have Table Tennis, Badminton and the Modern (100% Wrestling-Free) Pentathlon!

Every time I am reminded the Olympics dropped the oldest known sport (a natural human activity engage in even before they walk) - wrestling - just so the French could save a French invented 'sport' - the modern pentathlon - and keep all other true Olympic sports such as badminton and table tennis as opposed to that 'upstart' - wrestling, I am reminded how unimaginably corrupt the modern Olympic movement has long been.

Now there are supposedly guidelines on how a sport is dropped but those guidelines were twisted and warped beyond recognition in order to 'prove' that modern pentathlon is more deserving of being in the Olympics (as well as table tennis and badminton - even though wresting had contestants from 71 countries in 2012 while the pentathlon only had 72 people even competing.  One of the real ironies is that the person who invented the modern version of the original Greek pentathlon (and who is given credit for starting the modern Olympics), removed the sport of wrestling from that event - presumably for being too uncouth for gentlemen - as befits a man who received an Olympic medal for a poem he wrote.

Here is the AP wire story at the New York Times website on how American wrestlers are reacting to the possibility there will be no Olympic wrestling starting with the 2020 Olympics.

With Sport’s Future Shaky, Wrestlers Are in HurryBy THE ASSOCIATED PRESS DES MOINES (AP) — Last summer, the college wrestling stars Kyle Dake and Jordan Oliver were so excited at the London Olympics that they toyed with the idea of opposing each other at a different weight class.
The 165-pound Dake and Oliver, who competes at 149 pounds, kicked around the idea of wrestling at 157 pounds. After watching Jordan Burroughs win a gold medal, Dake and Oliver became so fired up that they nearly skipped the celebration for a late-night training session.
“We were so amped up to be back on the mat,” Oliver said.
The enthusiasm of the United States wrestlers is now accompanied by a sense of urgency. With the International Olympic Committee’s recent recommendation to drop the sport from the 2020 Games, America’s collegiate wrestlers are on notice. The Rio de Janeiro Games in 2016 could be their only chance for Olympic gold.
That means wrestlers who might have aimed for 2020 as their most realistic shot to make the Olympic team have to start training immediately in hopes of being ready.
“We’ve got great people working on it, and they’re going to take care of it,” said Dake, who attends Cornell. “I’m confident we’ll get it back. But in the meantime, we’ve got to propel our goals sooner. We’ve got to think 2016, and think that’s it’s our last shot. So after this season, I’m going to be going at it full time.”
Such urgency is, in a way, a positive for a United States freestyle team that is on an upswing. The squad could soon absorb more young talent concerned it might have only one Olympic cycle left.
This month, Dake became the first wrestler in N.C.A.A. history to win four national titles in four weight classes when he beat Penn State’s David Taylor at 165 pounds. Taylor is a legitimate Olympic contender, having won the Hodge Trophy as the nation’s best wrestler in 2012.
Oliver is a two-time N.C.A.A. champion at Oklahoma State with strong freestyle skills. Penn State’s Ed Ruth will head into his senior season at 184 pounds with a 68-match winning streak and 2 straight N.C.A.A. titles.
Ohio State’s Logan Stieber has won the national title in each of his first two seasons and nearly beat Coleman Scott in the Olympic trials in Iowa City last spring.
The difference between domestic and international titles is clear, but Burroughs showed it can be done by winning a gold medal 18 months after winning an N.C.A.A. championship.
Cael Sanderson, the Penn State coach and a past Olympic champion, said the ancient sport had adapted and thrived.        


And you can find the rest of this story at the NYT website.




Saturday, March 30, 2013

Further Proof Why California & Los Angeles Are Now Losing both Hollywood and Technology Jobs to Other States and Other Countries.

If there is any field that Los Angeles and California has been - and should have been able to remain - an easy number one in  - it's the visual affects industry.  It is the combination of entertainment and state-of-the-art technology - the state's two traditional strengths.

And yet that industry is not just leaving Los Angeles and the state - but it is rapidly approaching near total collapse due to Sacramento's refusal to support it by creating a level playing ground.  

First, one of the largest companies, Digital Domain, had to file for bankruptcy and is now largely owned by a Galloping Horse, based in Beijing, and other locally based companies, including such majors as Illusion Affects, CafeFX and Asylum Visual Affects completely collapsed and were forced to close their doors.  Then one of the best in the field - Rhythm & Hues - was forced into bankruptcy and was sold to locally based Prana Studios on Friday, with Prana just barely beating out bidders from China and India.

And, increasingly, even the last remaining locally headquartered companies, are being forced to slash their staffs to stay afloat as the industry flees California for the increasing numbers of states and countries that provide the tax incentives that Sacramento politicians refuse to even consider, and the industry's latest victim is Tippett Studio which is now being forced to lay off 50 employees - almost 40% of their work force as reported in THE WRAP, just to stay alive until they can get their next major job

Tippett Studio Chief on Layoffs: 'Why the Hell Doesn’t California Do Something?'

By Lucas Shaw & Brent Lang
Award-winning visual effects company Tippett Studio has laid off 50 employees in the latest blow to the embattled industry, and its chief Jules Roman wants California to step in and stop the bleeding.
Layoffs are not new at the company, which has been around for 30 years and contributed to blockbuster films like “RoboCop,” “Jurassic Park” and “Ted.” Many visual effects houses cut staff between big jobs.
Yet Roman says the financial problems afflicting her industry are “particularly bad now,” and argued it’s time for some outside assistance to keep jobs in the state.
“The bigger question is why the hell doesn’t California do something instead of letting it all go away?," Roman told TheWrap. “There so many territories with interventionist economic policies that it makes us feel we are really being preyed upon."
Roman said that the average person's kneejerk reaction would be to oppose helping Hollywood financially given that executives, agents and actors are earnings millions. However, those people are "above the line" and visual effects workers “are people way way below the line."
"We haven’t made that point very well," she acknowledged.
She dubbed the latest cuts, which reduce her staff of around 140 by almost 40 percent, a “hibernation” until another big job comes along. The company is just concluding work on “After Earth,” the futuristic M. Night Shamylan movie starring Will Smith and his son Jaden. They only have small jobs on the books for now“T
And...
Tippett is the latest in a string of California-based visual-effects companies to experience financial difficulties. As it was confirming its own layoffs, Oscar-winning effects company Rhythm & Hues was in bankruptcy asking a judge to approve a sale to Prana Studios. Rhythm & Hues is one of roughly a half-dozen visual effects companies to file for Chapter 11 protection in recent years. 
Asylum Visual Effects, CafeFX and Illusion Effects were forced to shut their doors while Digital Domain filed for bankruptcy and was acquired by Galloping Horse America and Reliance Mediaworks for $30.2 million last September.
In February, the Visual Effects Society, an honorary society with some 3,000 members, called on state leaders to pass new tax incentives designed to keep more effects work in Hollywood. The group argues that California film subsidies, which began in 2009, are insufficient, and that until they are more generous, effects work will continue to migrate to places like Canada and the United Kingdom that offer more comprehensive packages for studios.
 The rest of this story by Lucas Shaw & Brent Lang can be found here at THE WRAP. And yet - when you read the business writers at the non-trade publications based in Los Angeles - they almost all are still saying that there is no problem and that Hollywood will never leave Hollywood.

Friday, March 29, 2013

My Historic Downtown Los Angeles Tour Will Start at 11 AM This Saturday March 30th and next Saturday April 6th. And - My "How Los Angeles Invented the Wild West - and Why No One Knows About It" Resumes NEXT Sunday April 7th at 11 AM.


The Last Bookstore (and it's  2nd floor with 100,000 books at only ONE DOLLAR each!)  Presents


... The Secret Lives of Historic Downtown Los Angeles!

 I am continuing the  HISTORIC DOWNTOWN LOS ANGELES 101  2 hour walking tours this Saturday and next Saturday March 30th and April 6th and then NEXT Sunday - April 7th,  I will resume the "How Downtown Los Angeles Invented the Wild West - And Why No One Knows About It"  tour again, on Sunday April 7th. at 11 AM.  Plus there will also be tours on other upcoming weekends.  And all tours start at THE LAST BOOKSTORE in the Spring Arts Tower at 5th and Spring and they are still only $15 per person.

And  besides our regular scheduled tours, we will be offering customized tours on different days and different times and from one to three hours including weekdays - depending on your schedule.  With a minimum of four reservations, we will design a tour of any part of Downtown focusing on any subject matter you choose.  These tours can be after work, during lunch breaks - or??

FOR MORE INFORMATION  - contact Brady Westwater at 213-804-8396 - or bradywestwater@gmail.com
BRADBURY BUILDING
All tours begin at THE LAST BOOKSTORE at 453 S. Spring Street in the Spring Arts Tower and will be led by long time Downtown resident Brady Westwater who, besides being involved with the Downtown LA Neighborhood Council, the Historic Downtown BID, Gallery Row, Art Walk, and the BOXeight and the CONCEPT Fashion Weeks, has brought over 150 businesses, artists and non-profit institutions to Downtown.  All tours are only $15 per person.  
Wyatt Earp

If you are a participant in 'Historic Downtown Los Angeles 101' Tour, you will see the first motion picture theater built,  the place where Babe Ruth signed his contract with the Yankees, the hotel where Charlie Chaplin lived when he made his early films (and the place where he made his Los Angeles vaudeville debut in 1910) - plus the homes and haunts of everyone from actor Nicholas Cage, the Black Dahlia, Rudolph Valentino, LA’s version of Jack the Ripper, President Teddy Roosevelt, the Night Stalker, western outlaw Emmet Dalton,  actor Ryan Gosling and more.  And you will also visit where O. J. Simpson bought his knife.

You’ll explore an intersection where all four buildings were often visited by gunfighter/sheriff Wyatt Earp since they were all built or occupied by friends of his from Tombstone during the shoot-out at the OK Corral.  At this intersection you will also discover what John Wayne, a prime minister of Italy, Houdini, Winston Churchill, boxer Jack Dempsey, Greta Garbo, President Woodrow Wilson and multiple Mexican boxing champions all had in common here.

You will also see where the first new lofts were opened, the places where Gallery Row and the Art Walk began and where Fashion Week returned to Downtown.  You will see many of the new boutiques, designer showrooms and stores that have recently opened in the area along with getting a sneak preview of what will soon be happening in the area.

Tickets for either tour are only $15 per person - free for children under 8 - and reservations can be made by calling Brady Westwater at 213-804-8396 or emailing bradywestwater@gmail.com.  All credit card orders will be processed  at Last Bookstore and cash payments may be made at the start of the tour.   All proceeds will go towards the revitalization and the study of the history of the neighborhood.  
Lastly, future tours will feature specialized areas of interest such as architecture, art of all kinds, shopping and food, single streets, sports (from steer wrestling to luchador wrestlers to a Sumo wrestler), transportation, specific periods of history, the hidden Wild West history of Los Angeles, movie locations, Downtown after hours and many other aspects of the neighborhood. And custom designed can be developed by request  for groups of four or more.
We will also be soon starting weekday and evening tours on what it's like to live in Downtown Los Angeles. You will be introduced to the many of stores, restaurants, bars, and entertainment venues (and often their owners, too) - along with being given previews of one of a kind special events - so you can get a feel for what it is like to live in Downtown Los Angeles.

We expect this tour to be popular with not only people considering moving to Downtown and people who work in Downtown and who would like to know what to do after hours in Downtown - but also to recent and even long established Downtown residents who want to know more about their neighborhood.

Tuesday, March 26, 2013

Happy B-Day To My Father on his 90th Birthday!

After a few medical scares and his very first operations, my father's health has not only improved, but he has gotten all his strength and energy back and is once again  mowing the lawn, working in the garden and again living a fully active life.


Happy 90th Birthday, LA Cowboy, Senior!!



       













Myself, my grand-nephew who is my father's great-grandson, my sister and my now still active and vigorous 90 year old father.

As I entered adolescence in the 1960's, a common criticism of 1950's sit-coms such as 'Leave It To Beaver', 'Ozzie and Harriet' and 'Father Knows Best' was that the they screwed up the kids of my era by presenting an unrealistic view of family life. I really didn't understand this, however, as the families in those shows did not seem all that different from my own family. It was only much later when I realized how exceptionally unexceptional my own upbringing, and my own parents, had been.

From the earliest I can remember, we were always treated more as young adults than as kids. Our parents talked to us about everything (and never talked down to us) and, even more importantly, they always listened to us.

I remember when I once complained to my father as he was dropping me off at Miss Francis' Nursery School on Occidental Boulevard (just north of Third as I recall, near the Precious Blood School) that I didn't want to go there; they simply didn't have any good books to read (as few of the other kids could yet read) and we spent way too much time napping and that it was just generally... boring. So after a short discussion, he took me home and I no longer had to go there and other arrangements were made until I could start kindergarten early.

Conversely, however, when my teachers wanted me to skip grades, my parents always consulted with me, and we agreed that it was better for me to remain with my own friends and my own age group. They also agreed with me that I should stay in a public school as opposed to going to a private school. Even then it was clear that I was going to self-educate myself and so they - and I - preferred that I experience the social interaction of public rather than private school.

Then, a bit later, when I was recruited by a East Coast prep school, while I knew my parents would never want me to leave home, they also made it clear that the decision was totally mine. So even though the catalogue of classes and the immense range of activities at Phillips-Exter was quite tempting, I knew even then that I would never want to grow up without my family, nor that I would ever want to leave the City of LA, even for my schooling. Still later, when all my friends were going Ivy - or to Cal Berkeley or even just around the corner to Claremont, I only applied to UCLA.

Now to get back to the sit-com analogy - once I and my siblings were born, my parents no longer had (or wanted) any independent life other than as... parents. When they went out, we all went out. When they went on a trip or to a movie or to a store - or anywhere - we all went out. Now while there must have been many other occasions, I can only recall both my parents going out once and leaving us with baby sitters - my grandparents - when they went to see the Music Man at the now demolished Biltmore Theater.

My mother worked at E. F. Hutton on Spring Street before I was born (when she quit her job) and my father worked at a law office in the Doulgas Building at 3rd and Spring while he got his degree from Southwestern Law School. This was after the War had interrupted his education from 1941 - 1945 as Pearl Harbor happened while he was enrolled at UCLA. He later set up his own office there and stayed there until the upper floors were vacated for seismic concerns.

My father never smoke or drank and I do not recalling him ever even once using a four letter word in my presence during the entire time I was growing up. I also never heard any kind of racial joke or insult at the expense of anyone's race, religion or background in our home, which was a literal United Nations of kids coming and going while I was growing up. I might add that my parents were Goldwater/Reagan Republicans.

My father also coached the Hollywood YMCA's basketball team and was the sponsor of the Y Groups I was apart of such as the Indian Guides. He also became the surrogate father for the many kids I knew who no longer had their own fathers in their lives, taking us on trips, to Dodger's games and to our cabin in the mountains.

His own father, correspondingly, also had a long history of public service between working with Gifford Pinchot (founder of the National Forest system) on conservation matters and helping run war relief in the Balkans after WW I, before his early death when my father was but one year old during a 1920's flu epidemic.

My father also quietly participated in many other community projects including serving as the honorary Mayor of Westlake Park, which was, ironically, kind of the neighborhood council of its day. But what made even more of an impact on me was how he treated people in every day life. When Christmas and Thanksgiving came, he did not just write a check to a charity, but we - as a family - took food and gifts to families ourselves and we then shared their food with them and accepted gifts from them so it became an exchange of gifts from one family to another and not charity. And as a lawyer, whenever potential clients did not have enough money to hire him, he was always willing to accept barter in food, a painting, used cars (we never once had a new car) - or any other medium of exchange.

I also remember when we went to McLaren Hall (where kids whose parents were unable to take care of them were often housed temporarily) to visit the son of a single parent client who was in jail and he discovered that the kids who wanted to play baseball did not have enough balls and bats. So my father not only went out and bought them balls and bats but he also went back on weekends and hit balls with them to show them that someone cared about them.

It is all those the simple, day to day acts that I most remember and cherish about my father. And it is only now that I have slowly realized that all of what I do now in my life is only my following behind him in his footsteps and my trying to apply all the lessons I learned from him as a boy so many years ago.

So even though the trail this poor cowboy has ridden - due to life's all too common tragedies - has not always been an easy one, or a typical one due to things often beyond my control, my deceased mother and my still alive father still never gave me anything less than their full love, their constant support and their ceaseless understanding, no matter how off-trail my life at many times seemed.

So Happy 90th Birthday from all three generations of Shockley's! 

PS -- As you the more discerning reader may notice, my father and I do not share the same surname. These is because in my 17th summer when I discovered that I was born to ride the cowboy trail (however brief that period of my life was allowed to be) and that I was also to become a writer, I then took Brady Westwater as my pen name.

However, as those aspects of my life soon became my primary lives, by the time I was 18, it was the only name I was publicly using to the point that by the time I had left UCLA, even my family had changed over to it. So this is just another of the many examples in their never ending patience with the life I have chosen for myself.

MOCA Critics Dining on Crow This Morning After MOCA Announces Agreement to Raise Endowment to 60 Million Dollars

If you are wondering why there are no crows in the sky over Los Angeles this morning - it's because they are being served up for breakfast for all the MOCA critics now dining on crow after MOCA announced its new $60 Million Dollar Endowment.

As reported in the New York Times....
The Museum of Contemporary Art in Los Angeles... announced Tuesday that it had been promised donations that would boost its endowment to more than $60 million, the highest in the museum’s 34-year history.
The museum said that the money was “a reflection of the board’s commitment to keep MOCA as a museum dedicated solely to contemporary art,” an apparent reference to a recent proposal under which the National Gallery of Art in Washington would collaborate with the museum on programming and exhibitions but would not provide any financial assistance.
“The financial support we have already raised demonstrates the commitment of the board to ensuring that MOCA remains a world-class independent contemporary art museum, and we call on others to join in this campaign,” Jeffrey Soros, the board’s president, said in a statement. Mr. Soros and another trustee, the prominent collector Eugenio Lopez, are the leaders of a new fundraising campaign for the museum, MOCA Independence, which seeks to increase the museum’s endowment to $100 million.
So - are there any other questions about the decision not to auction off MOCA to LACMA?

Monday, March 25, 2013

MTV Awards Show Heads To Brooklyn Week After Sources Say Tonight Show is Also Heading to New York

First the hour TV dramas started heading back to New York, then the sit-coms, then feature film production, then post- production work - and now talk shows and awards shows and yet  - still - several major local business writers continue to state Hollywood has nothing to worry about!  They still are saying the incentives New York and other states are offering will have no long affect on local employment and that we have absolutely nothing to worry about.

Saturday, March 23, 2013

When the 1912 Clark Hotel Re-Opens, It May be The Oldest Conventional Hotel Built as a Hotel Operating in Downtown LA - if Not All of Los Angeles

With all the smaller older hotels in LA, it's hard to be certain, but when the Clark Hotel reopens - see Bringham Yen's post here, it might be the oldest building  built as a hotel and still operating as a conventional hotel in Downtown Los Angeles. Or maybe even anywhere in Los Angeles.


The Pico House was built in 1869/1870, Plaza House in 1883, the Van Nuys/Barclay in 1896, the Hayward in 1905, the King Edward, the Alexandria & the Bristol  in 1906, the Baltimore in 1910 and the Rosslyn in 1913  but it's been a long time since they've been  hotels.  The only other possible contender would be the hotel that is within the LA Athletic Club - assuming it opened concurrently with the rest of the building in 1912.  And counting them all up - that means LA Downtown LA has at least eleven old hotel buildings that are at least a hundred years old - and likely a lot more

Friday, March 22, 2013

Los Angeles County Loses over 80,000 Jobs in Just One Month!

According to the Los Angeles Business Journal, not only does California have the highest unemployment rate in the country at 9.8% (compared to the national average of 7.9%) , but LA County even exceeds that with its unemployment rate increasing to 10.4% - which is more then one out of ten of the people in the work force unable to find a job, not counting those who have given up even looking..

Even worse, the City of Los Angeles tops the rest of the county with its unemployment rate jumping from 11.6% to 12.1% compared to the 7.9%  national rate.  That's almost one out of eight people in the City of LA - not counting those have have given up even looking for work.

So even though a couple local pundits still try to claim Los Angeles has nothing to worry about from New York and other states using subsidies to take the film and TV industry from LA and California - more jobs were lost in the entertainment industry than in any other job category (other then the post-Christmas drop in temporary retail) during the month of January. Yes, fourteen thousand entertainment industry jobs vanished in just one month.

And now, film and TV are the fastest declining businesses in all of LA Country. And that's not - of course - counting the TONIGHT SHOW which is now about to move back to New York - and join much of the TV industry that has already relocated there.

Here is the opening of the Los Angeles Business Journal article, and the link to read the rest of  it:

Job Losses Hit L.A.

By HOWARD FINEOriginally published March 22, 2013 at 1:27 p.m., updated March 22, 2013 at 9:59 a.m.
L.A. County’s economy took a big hit in January as more than 81,000 payroll jobs were lost and the unemployment rate edged up to 10.4 percent, according to revised state figures released Friday.
Virtually every sector got hit with job losses after the federal government finished its annual revision of employer payroll data. The biggest drop was in retail trade, which saw nearly 20,000 jobs disappear from December to January, in part because of layoffs after the holiday shopping season.
Other sectors taking big hits were motion picture and sound recording (down 14,000 jobs), professional and business services (down 12,500 jobs) and leisure and hospitality (10,000 jobs). All of these sectors consistently posted gains during the past year; with this data revision, some of those gains were likely illusory.
The only sector to post a significant gain was construction, as 800 more people filled payrolls in January.
L.A. County suffered disproportionately in January; statewide, 1,700 jobs were added to payrolls, meaning other parts of the state saw significant job growth.
The rest of the story and the unemployment rate of the City of Los Angeles is right here.

Thursday, March 21, 2013

New York Times Covers Los Angeles's Role in the CIvil War - and Our Civil War Museum You Probably Never Knew Existed

On of the best ways to learn about our city is to read about it in... the New York Times.    Now even though at times that distant vision can get a little ... skewed.... but - more often - the NYT's can see with a fresh eye what local papers sometimes miss - or haven't covered in many years.  One such subject is Los Angeles' role in the Civil War and LA's own Civil War Museum located in our last remaining military institution built during the Civil War - the Drum Barracks in Wilmington.

What Did You Do in the Civil War, California?



LOS ANGELES
ABOUT 15 years ago, Ron Hyde was thumbing through a Civil War magazine when he came across an advertisement for a museum called Drum Barracks.
“The ad said it was located in Wilmington, Calif.,” said Mr. Hyde, who lives in Norco, about 50 miles southeast of Los Angeles. “I thought, ‘That’s got to be a typo. It must be in Delaware or North Carolina.’ ”
Intrigued, he called the number and found the state was no mistake. A Civil War museum was in Wilmington, a part of Los Angeles about 20 miles from downtown.
What is more, the museum was housed in the last surviving structure of a 22-building Union Army base.

The article - located in a special museum section that just went on-line at the New York Times goes into both the history of the building, but also the entire history of the Civil War in California.
 The outpost owes its existence to a chain of events in the Far West, an often overlooked theater of the Civil War. In summer 1861, a few months into the war, Confederate forces struck out into the Arizona territory from Texas. Their long-range goal was the ports, mineral resources and open lands of the lightly defended California, which was admitted into the Union in 1850. In her 2012 book “The Golden State in the Civil War” (Cambridge University Press), the historian Glenna Matthews writes that Confederate leaders viewed California, particularly the pro-secessionist southern section, as “a land of opportunity for them.”

In Southern California then was Capt. Winfield Scott Hancock, who would become a hero of the Battle of Gettysburg. He and Maj. James Henry Carleton, a cavalry officer dispatched from San Francisco to help him, chose a site a half-mile from the harbor to build a base, which was named Camp Drum. That was in late 1861. From there, in April 1862, Major Carleton’s force, the California Column, rode east to meet the Confederates. By the time the force reached the Rio Grande, the main Southern army had turned around. But the Union troops battled the rebels at Picacho Pass, about 50 miles northwest of what is now Tucson.

Back in Wilmington, an expanded base was built with the help of Phineas Banning, a local businessman who named the community he had developed after his hometown in Delaware. He donated 60 acres for what would become known as Drum Barracks.

The new base became a depot, training base and staging point for operations of the Union Army in the West. Almost 8,000 men passed through Drum Barracks during the war. In her book, Ms. Matthews cites a letter from an Army officer who called the large, well-built base “astonishing,” adding that “some of the men in our company who had seen service in the East said that they had never seen anything like it.”

No doubt one of the most astonishing sights was the 36 Levantine camels quartered there. The Army brought them from the Middle East in the 1850s for use in the desert. For the most part, they spent the war munching the grass around Drum Barracks.
It also discusses some of the many relics and exhibits the museum contains,
Visitors find a wealth of artifacts in the 14 rooms of the U-shaped building, which was originally the junior officers’ quarters. One of the most impressive is an 1875 Gatling gun, part of an extensive display of Civil War-era weapons, including a collection of 291 bullets. A battle flag was donated by the family of a veteran of the Battle of Vicksburg who received the Medal of Honor. Rooms are decorated to show the living conditions of soldiers and officers, featuring period pieces, like a rare 1869 Steinway piano. Drums Barracks also has a genuine drum from the 8th New York Volunteers, a library of 3,000 volumes and the artificial leg of a soldier, which was donated by his descendants.  
And how to get more information about it.
Drum Barracks Civil War Museum, at 1052 Banning Boulevard, Wilmington, Calif., is open for tours Sunday, Tuesday through Thursday and Saturday. It is closed Monday and Friday. Donation: $5. For more information: www.drumbarracks.org.
About the only thing this article does not cover is that an even large museum - the Banning Museum -  is located not far away. It was the home of the man who not only founded Wilmington, but who also donated the then 60 acre site to the Union Army,  Phineas Banning.

And I'll bet that almost no one reading this post has even visited one of these landmarks - much less both of them

       

Wednesday, March 20, 2013

William Poundstone Seems to be One of the Few Who Actually Read the MOCA Press Release

While some art world commentators claim yesterday's MOCA press release didn't say anything new - the fact it was only three short sentences  impressed some of us -  including eternal skeptic William Poundstone over at ... Los Angeles County Museum on Fire.... that every word in it was carefully chosen.

“The Board is in agreement that the best future for MOCA would be as an independent institution. The Board understands that this will require a significant increase in MOCA’s endowment to ensure its strong financial standing. We are working quickly toward that goal, while at the same time exploring all strategic options, to honor the best interest of the institution and the artistic community we serve.”

And I agree.

For the MOCA’s trustees to meet last Friday - after a week of being attacked by the press for not doing anything - and then - four days latter -  release a statement saying they would ‘quickly’ and ’substantially’ raise the amount of money in the endowment demonstrates, to me at least,  they put a lot of thought into those words for one simple reason.

There is absolutley... zero.... wiggle room in those words.

So even though they said they would also consider other strategic options - it was clear that was only in addition to what they had just pledged.  And even then they said those options would have to:  " honor the best interest of the institution and the artistic community we serve.”

Tuesday, March 19, 2013

MOCA's Trustees Cowboy Up and Tell LACMA to Stuff It!! But in the Nicest - and Best - Possible Way

In a single paragraph statement MOCA's Board of Trustees says MOCA will remain an independent organization and the Board is taking necessary steps to significantly raise the needed endowment to make that happen. In addition, the Board will also consider any strategies that will honor both the museum and the artistic community it serves.
“The Board is in agreement that the best future for MOCA would be as an independent institution. The Board understands that this will require a significant increase in MOCA’s endowment to ensure its strong financial standing. We are working quickly toward that goal, while at the same time exploring all strategic options, to honor the best interest of the institution and the artistic community we serve.”
 Equally importantly, it did not mention either LACMA or any offers that had been made to acquire the museum.  Nor did it mention USC or the National Gallery.

Instead it front and center acknowledges three things.

MOCA needs to stay MOCA.  The Board has the personal responsibility to raise the money to do that.  And that any actions MOCA makes must take into account the needs of the institution - and - the artistic community it serves.

And the world I come from, that's how you Cowboy Up!

Monday, March 18, 2013

What ONE SANTA FE Project (And Disney Hall) Can Tell Us About MOCA

Brigham Yen has an update on the construction of the largest  projects in Downtown Los Angeles - ONE SANTA FE; a project whose history can tell us a lot about MOCA

The photo shows you the massive scale of the project and the link above it brings you up to date.  Not mentioned in the post, however, is the long road this - like other major projects in Los Angeles - had to take before it could be successfully launched - or be successfully relaunched.

I heard about the project in 2003 and by the summer of 2004, a development team  had submitted a bid to the property's owner, the MTA.  But for the usual variety of reasons - construction did not start until last year  - 2012 - and it will not finish until late this year, 2013.  Ten years later.  And there were, as always, many who said the project was too ambitious and that it would have be abandoned or  scaled down.  But now its being built and its original vision is being maintained.

Ironically - 2003 is when Disney Hall finally opened a mere... sixteen years... after Lillian Disney made the first donation for the building.  And, again, during the years it just sat there - there were constant calls for the project to be dropped - or scaled back to something far less than its original vision.

But this time the original vision was not just maintained,  it ended up far exceeding what anyone had thought possible.  And that was only because a certain local patron of the arts - had stepped up and shamed the rest of the city's wealthy into joining him in funding what is now arguably the world's finest large concert venue with one of the world's great orchestras and one of the world's great conductors.

So - to all those who are asking us to forget the original vision of MOCA - after some bumpy years  - and are calling for it to be sold on the auction block to the highest bidder;  just remember Disney Hall.   And remember how many decades it took LACMA to escape the Natural History Museum and develop its own vision.  And remember how many decades it took that little ranch house that was once the entire Getty Museum to become what it has become today.

And then ask yourself - was the original vision for MOCA really so... meaningless.... that after just a  handful of  years of turmoil - it should all forgotten  - and abandoned - forever?

I don't believe that.  And if you don't think so either  - like I said earlier - just remember Disney Hall. And remember how its original vision was able to be saved.

Sunday, March 17, 2013

Tim Rutten Scoops Everyone With News of LACMA's Rapidly Declining Balance Sheet

Tim Rutten, formerly with the Los Angeles Times and now at the Daily News turns the tables on LACMA and presents a case that  LACMA and not MOCA  has more serious long term financial problems and those problems started to get out of control in 2008 - which was just two years after Michael Govan was hired  And the date of the decline seems to start just two years after Govan took the reins.

Rutten opens  with a detailed and  look at both MOCA and LACMA and where they stand in the world. MOCA  has a collection of post 1945 work that only the Modern cam compare with while LACMA has multiple collections - none of which are are in the best in their class - which suggestsa why LACMA needs MOCA so much more than MOCA needs LACMA.  And then get he gets to the real meat of his argument:




....more to the point, the attractiveness of this takeover - and that's essentially what's on the table -- turns on the perception that LACMA's own finances are robust and MOCA's remain unstable. Before anyone rushes into anything, it's worth asking whether both those things are true.
A careful analysis of LACMA's publicly available audited financial statements paints a picture of an institution whose own foundation is not quite as steady as the chutzpah inherent in this merger proposal would suggest. The museum currently has an endowment of $110 million, but only $52 million is available as unrestricted funds. Between 2008 and 2012, its total assets declined from $797.5 million to $660.5 million. When you figure in bonded indebtedness and other liabilities, LACMA's net assets declined over the period from $387.4 million to $213.7 million or a total of $173.7 million. At the same time, its net revenues declined by $111.6 million.
When it comes to bonded indebtedness, LACMA's liabilities far outstrip any other leading American art museum; it is currently carrying on its balance sheet roughly twice as much as New York's Metropolitan Museum of Art and almost $100 million more than the Museum of Modern Art. Moody's has downgraded its outlook on LACMA's bonds to negative, and the museum's ratio between adjusted net assets and indebtedness is within one-hundredth of a point of triggering a technical default.
MOCA, by contrast, currently has no debt, $8 million in the bank, $23 million in its endowment with more to come shortly in donations, sources tell the Los Angeles News Group. It also is restoring the vigor of its board with the addition of activists like super agent Ari Emmanuel. Moreover, it's currently in talks with the National Gallery, which would like to provide curatorial assistance and loans of art without in any way infringing MOCA's independence.
Obviously, more needs to be done, but that's not quite the "troubled" MOCA nor the "dynamic" LACMA that many uncritical reports recently have suggested. There's no reason to rush into a merger that would irrevocably sacrifice MOCA's unique contribution to this region's aesthetic spirit.
What's interesting here is that I don't think any of these facts are unknown by anyone who closely watches the museums.  But as far as I know, the only person who has actually sat  down and done the math - has been... Tim Rutten.

Saturday, March 16, 2013

Why Los Angeles Doesn't Have An Eli Broad Problem: It's Eli Broad Who Has a Los Angeles Problem

My title is the only comment I have to make beyond what Harold Myerson has to say about the lack of civic engagement in Los Angeles in a Los Angeles Times Op-Ed piece,


L.A.'s civic disengagement

In Los Angeles, the haves and the have-nots have something in common: apathy.

Eli Broad
Philanthropist Eli Broad is seen at the topping-out ceremony commemorating the placement of the steel beams in the framing of The Broad Museum located at the corner of Grand Avenue and Second Street.(Los Angeles Times / January 8, 2013)

March 15, 2013

At first glance, two stories much in the news in Los Angeles of late would seem to have nothing to do with each other. The first concerns the fate of the Museum of Contemporary Art — whether it will affiliate with the Los Angeles County Museum of Art or USC or the National Gallery in Washington — and the outsized role its primary benefactor, Eli Broad, is likely to play in the choice. The second concerns the low voter turnout in the first round of the city's mayoral election this month.
In fact, a through-line connects the two stories: the generally low level of civic engagement and consciousness in Los Angeles, within both the city's elites and its overall population.
Los Angeles, I hasten to explain, does not have an Eli Broad problem. The Brentwood billionaire, who amassed his fortune through home building, insurance and other ventures, has been the foremost donor to numerous local institutions, from museums and concert halls to universities and medical schools. There isn't a signature local cause in which Broad hasn't played a central role, both as a donor and in bringing in other donors. Without him, for example, the Walt Disney Concert Hall might still be just an idea. And there are some other local causes, such as keeping MOCA afloat, in which Broad seems at times one of the only major players to involve himself.
There's the rub. While America's second-largest city is chock-a-block with millionaires and billionaires, why is Broad's often the only hand raised when help is solicited from the city's wealthiest citizens for various civic institutions? Where is the rest of the city's elite? There is no analogous figure to Broad in New York or Chicago, because both of those cities are home to so many more high-dollar civic donors than you find in L.A. that no one donor predominates.
Why this Angeleno disconnect? Partly, it stems from the fact that Los Angeles has always been the most de-centered of cities, and not just physically. Sixty years ago, its WASP elite ran the local banks, oil companies and newspapers; Jews, whom the WASP elites shunned, ran the studios; and beyond the city limits, aviation moguls ran the region's biggest factories.
Through the first half of the 20th century, the city's wealthiest (WASP) businessmen informally — and later more formally through the Committee of 25 — joined forces to influence the city's politics. But not until the 1950s, when Dorothy Chandler began strong-arming the city's wealthiest residents (both WASPs and Jews) to fund construction of the Music Center, did the city's elite focus on cultural concerns.
For a time, then, the city had a genuine cultural elite, and it was responsible for creating and endowing many of the arts institutions that survive today. But it began to crumble as the business concerns its members controlled left the city and the region.
Today, virtually all the local banks, oil companies, studios and aerospace companies have been taken over by conglomerates headquartered in distant states or nations that don't see Los Angeles as their town. Nor are the many wealthy investors or Hollywood millionaires who live in L.A. necessarily invested in L.A. — or, by extension, in its civic betterment. They are as connected to the city as they want to be, and in far-flung, polycentric, polyethnic Los Angeles, that often means not very much.
A similar dearth of civic sensibility is at the root of L.A.'s historically low rate of participation in city elections (which, to be sure, are strangely scheduled to come just as voters are catching their breath after presidential elections).
There are many reasons for the underdevelopment of L.A.'s political culture: to name just two, the fragmentation of local governance among the county, the city, the other 86 cities within the county, and who-knows-how-many school and special districts; and the focus of local television news on anything but public affairs.
Another factor is the absence of citywide political institutions. Municipal government has been nonpartisan in California since 1911, which means there are no citywide party organizations as there are in most big cities. In the last 15 years, organized labor has effectively stepped into that void for a segment of the population, turning out its members, and working-class Latinos more generally, in certain elections. Its impact on L.A. mayoral contests, though, has been at best a sometime thing.
Disconnection defines Los Angeles. Eli Broad and voters in city elections have this much in common: They're entitled to feel lonely.
Harold Meyerson is editor at large of the American Prospect and an op-ed columnist for theWashington Post.


Friday, March 15, 2013

Saturday's March 16th Walking Tour of Historic Downtown Los Angeles Will Leave THE LAST BOOKSTORE at 11 AM!

The Last Bookstore (and it's just opened 2nd floor with 100,000 books at only ONE DOLLAR each!)  Presents


... The Secret Lives of Historic Downtown Los Angeles!

 I am continuing the  HISTORIC DOWNTOWN LOS ANGELES 101  2 hour walking tours this Saturday and Sunday March 16th and 17th at 11 AM -  plus there will also be tours on other upcoming weekends.  And all tours start at THE LAST BOOKSTORE in the Spring Arts Tower at 5th and Spring and they are still only $15 per person.

And  besides our regular scheduled tours, we will be offering customized tours on different days and different times and from one to three hours including weekdays - depending on your schedule.  With a minimum of four reservations, we will design a tour of any part of Downtown focusing on any subject matter you choose.  These tours can be after work, during lunch breaks - or??

FOR MORE INFORMATION  - contact Brady Westwater at 213-804-8396 - or bradywestwater@gmail.com
BRADBURY BUILDING
All tours begin at THE LAST BOOKSTORE at 453 S. Spring Street in the Spring Arts Tower and will be led by long time Downtown resident Brady Westwater who, besides being involved with the Downtown LA Neighborhood Council, the Historic Downtown BID, Gallery Row, Art Walk, and the BOXeight and the CONCEPT Fashion Weeks, has brought over 150 businesses, artists and non-profit institutions to Downtown.  All tours are only $15 per person.  
Wyatt Earp

If you are a participant in 'Historic Downtown Los Angeles 101' Tour, you will see the first motion picture theater built,  the place where Babe Ruth signed his contract with the Yankees, the hotel where Charlie Chaplin lived when he made his early films (and the place where he made his Los Angeles vaudeville debut in 1910) - plus the homes and haunts of everyone from actor Nicholas Cage, the Black Dahlia, Rudolph Valentino, LA’s version of Jack the Ripper, President Teddy Roosevelt, the Night Stalker, western outlaw Emmet Dalton,  actor Ryan Gosling and more.  And you will also visit where O. J. Simpson bought his knife.

You’ll explore an intersection where all four buildings were often visited by gunfighter/sheriff Wyatt Earp since they were all built or occupied by friends of his from Tombstone during the shoot-out at the OK Corral.  At this intersection you will also discover what John Wayne, a prime minister of Italy, Houdini, Winston Churchill, boxer Jack Dempsey, Greta Garbo, President Woodrow Wilson and multiple Mexican boxing champions all had in common here.

You will also see where the first new lofts were opened, the places where Gallery Row and the Art Walk began and where Fashion Week returned to Downtown.  You will see many of the new boutiques, designer showrooms and stores that have recently opened in the area along with getting a sneak preview of what will soon be happening in the area.

Tickets for either tour are only $15 per person - free for children under 8 - and reservations can be made by calling Brady Westwater at 213-804-8396 or emailing bradywestwater@gmail.com.  All credit card orders will be processed  at Last Bookstore and cash payments may be made at the start of the tour.   All proceeds will go towards the revitalization and the study of the history of the neighborhood.  
Lastly, future tours will feature specialized areas of interest such as architecture, art of all kinds, shopping and food, single streets, sports (from steer wrestling to luchador wrestlers to a Sumo wrestler), transportation, specific periods of history, the hidden Wild West history of Los Angeles, movie locations, Downtown after hours and many other aspects of the neighborhood. And custom designed can be developed by request  for groups of four or more.
We will also be soon starting weekday and evening tours on what it's like to live in Downtown Los Angeles. You will be introduced to the many of stores, restaurants, bars, and entertainment venues (and often their owners, too) - along with being given previews of one of a kind special events - so you can get a feel for what it is like to live in Downtown Los Angeles.

We expect this tour to be popular with not only people considering moving to Downtown and people who work in Downtown and who would like to know what to do after hours in Downtown - but also to recent and even long established Downtown residents who want to know more about their neighborhood.

Thursday, March 14, 2013

AEG and LA Live Are No Longer For Sale - and Tim Leiweke No Longer Has a Job

While Philip Anschutz taking the entire AEG international empire off the market is not a huge shock - after all he said he would only sell it if he got his price - and it was becoming apparent that wasn't going to happen. But for AEG President and CEO - and public face for AEG - Tim Lieweke to concurrently leave the company he had built - now that's a shock.  Particularly everyone seemed to think that whoever bought the company would keep him on.

On the other hand - maybe that's why he left - if he was the one who made that decision (though the phrase 'jointly decided to leave' makes it sound otherwise.  But maybe he was doing to be able to become a partner with one or more of the new owners and - when he saw that wasn't going to happen - resigned to find another opportunity with an ownership option.  And maybe it was a joint decision if Anschutz knew that while also knowing that he was not never going to give up a chunk of a family owned business - so he and Leiweke each realized now was best for  to go on his own

My two other immediate thoughts are this might make the NFL more like to agree to move a football team to Downtown LA - which would mean a new stadium and a newly enlarged convention center.  Second, there is a lot of money that was in a holding patter to see if it would get AEG - and some of that money might now decided to go into one of the pools to buy the LA Times.

Here is the opening of the KPPC post:  

Anschutz: AEG no longer for sale; Leiweke out

L.A. Event Center and NFL Stadium Press Conference

Kevork Djansezian/Getty Images

Billionaire Philip Anschutz says he is pulling AEG off the market and the company that owns the Los Angeles Kings and the Staples Center is no longer for sale. Photo: Tim Leiweke, former president and CEO of AEG during an event announcing naming rights for the new football stadium Farmers Field at Los Angeles Convention Center on February 1, 2011.
Billionaire Philip Anschutz says he is pulling AEG off the market and the company that owns the Los Angeles Kings and the Staples Center is no longer for sale.
Anschutz said in a statement Thursday that he had made clear that he wouldn't sell the company unless the right buyer came forward. He says he will resume a more active role in the company and Tim Leiweke, who has served as president and CEO since 1996  is leaving AEG "by mutual agreement," according to the statement. 
“We appreciate the role Tim has played in the development of AEG, and thank him for the many contributions he has made to the company. We wish him well in his new endeavors," said Anschutz.
The statement said Anschutz, as Chairman of AEG, will resume a more active role in the Company, with a particular focus on the company’s world-wide strategy and operations.
Dan Beckerman will assume the position of President and Chief Executive Officer of the Company, according to the AEG statement. Mr. Beckerman joined AEG over 15 years ago and previously served as the Chief Financial Officer and Chief Operating Officer.

The sports and entertainment company was expected to fetch billions of dollars.
AEG's holdings also include the Los Angeles Galaxy, part-ownership of the NBA's Los Angeles Lakers, and major entertainment and real estate holdings in Los Angeles.
AEG also is spearheading a stadium proposal to bring back a professional football team to Los Angeles.
“From the very beginning of the sales process, we have made it clear to our employees and partners throughout the world that unless the right buyer came forward with a transaction on acceptable terms we would not sell the Company” said  Anschutz.

More and the press release from AEG here.