"Greetings from Los Angeles" by Peter Moruzzi

ABOUT THE PRESENTATION: Author Peter Moruzzi will present a rollicking slide talk on the history of Los Angeles as told through vintage postcards, photographs, and brochures. Featured are rare glimpses of the city’s early years as a dusty pueblo; Chinatown’s evolution; the miraculous orange empire; backyard oil wells; Venice of America; roaring 1920s and corrupt 1930s; colorful evangelists; glamorous Wilshire Boulevard; fabulous nightclubs; movie studios and lavish stars’ estates; and theme parks such as Disneyland, Knott’s Berry Farm, and Marineland of the Pacific. Witness the birth of midcentury modernism, futuristic Googie coffee shops, and space-age LAX.  Recall a postwar suburban paradise of drive-ins, bowling palaces, beach parties, Dodgers baseball, hotrod culture, and mushrooming tract developments.

ABOUT THE SPEAKER:  Historian Peter Moruzzi was born in Concord, Massachusetts, raised in Hawaii, and now resides in Palm Springs. He graduated from the University of California at Berkeley and later attended the American Film…