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Girl with a sailor friend
Photo Friends, October 06, 2021

Thirty years ago the Los Angeles Public Library embarked on a ground-breaking, collection-building project—reaching out to the diverse communities of the region for family photographs that would provide depth and nuance to an understanding of this region’s multi-cultural history.


Indians accept proclamation
Photo Friends, November 19, 2019

November is Native American Heritage Month. The land that now constitutes California once housed the most diverse population of indigenous people in the Western hemisphere, with 150 different Native American tribes inhabiting the area.


Baby splashing in a pool
Photo Friends, July 30, 2019

The Los Angeles basin cannot escape the fact that its climate tends to extremes, particularly of the hot variety. Global warming and galloping urbanization have exacerbated the situation Temperatures have increased over the past century, while heatwaves are becoming ever more common and last longer.


Ethel Schultheis looks into a large fountain
Photo Friends, June 19, 2019

We have written before about Herman Schultheis, the German-born photographer and jack of all film-related trades. With his wife, Ethel, Herman arrived in Los Angeles in 1937 with high hopes of a career in the film industry.


Nightclub at 42nd and Central Avenue, with Lucille and Edward on the right.
Photo Friends, May 15, 2019

Whether you want it hot or cool, swingin’ or slow, Dixieland or experimental, there’s jazz to fit your mood, mellow you out, pick you up. Jazz was born in New Orleans—the only place in the U.S. in the 1800s where slaves were allowed to own drums.


The Pike and warships
Photo Friends, April 10, 2019

William Willmore had a brilliant idea. He was going to create a farming community on the coast of Southern California. He bought 4,000 acres of Rancho Los Cerritos and subdivided the land into plots which comprised Willmore City.


Five women pose in front of the Los Angeles County Museum of Art in 1968
Photo Friends, February 20, 2019

Over 25 years ago, while organizing the photo collection of the Los Angeles Public Library, librarian Carolyn Kozo Cole found many photos that documented the city’s political and professional history—political rallies, building construction, front page stories—but few images showing the personal side of it


1934 colorized picture of people at the beach with typewriters
Tina Lernø, July 13, 2018

It's summertime in Los Angeles and the mercury is rising. Are you beach ready? Have you packed your sunscreen, hats, coolers, snacks, umbrellas, folding chairs, kites, frisbees, bikes, trikes, boogie boards and blankets? Do you know how you'll get there?


Brenda Allen waits for policewoman Audre Davis to appear at hearing arranged by Judge William McKay. Davis never showed up in court. Herald Examiner Collection, photo dated July 9, 1949
Photo Friends, June 14, 2018

After Ann Forst, the Black Widow, was sentenced to serve time for pandering, one of her protégés, Brenda Allen (born Marie Mitchell and going under a number of aliases including Brenda Allen Burns, Marie Brooks, Marie Cash, Brenda Burris, and Marie Balanque) wasted no time in setting up her own prostitutio


Photograph caption dated May 27, 1983 reads, "Some of the 5,000 people who rallied at Westwood Federal Building in support of more AIDS research funds."
Photo Friends, June 01, 2018

June is LGBTQIA Pride Month, a time to remember the challenges that the LGBTQIA (lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, intersex, asexual) community has faced and to commemorate the contributions they have made.


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