In Memory of JFK
Today's scans are not the usual fun or silly subjects I tend to share, so I hope that you find them interesting, at least. Years ago I found some slides mixed in with other random stuff; they were taken a day or so after President John F. Kennedy was assassinated (on Friday, November 22, 1963) while his motorcade traveled through Dallas. So these were taken almost exactly 61 years ago.
This first one shows the sign to the Whittier Quad (now called "The Quad at Whittier"), which is located at the corner of Whittier Boulevard and Painter Avenue. In Whittier, in case you hadn't guessed! It was built in 1953 and expanded in 1965 with the addition of a 3-story, 248,000-square-foot May Company California department store. Arcadia-based Hinshaw's and Pasadena-based Nash's were other major tenants.
Here's a photo (from Wikipedia) showing the current sign for The Quad at Whittier.
This next photo is also from the city of Whittier - Sackett-Peters was a hardware store, located at 15214 Whittier Boulevard. I like their sign! It appears that the location is now a Harbor Freight store.
3 comments:
Major-
I still have a jacket from Hinshaw's, that dates from the early to mid-1960's. (Clearly, the original signage from the Whittier Quad is the classier of the two). That Matador Red automobile is a 1953 Buick - with the 'tooth grille' removed - for some reason.
Thanks, Major.
Interesting, and kind of spooky, that you came across these slides taken so soon after the assassination.
I'm not a car guy, but isn't that red-orange car a 1950s model? It's got all those rounded edges like cars had in the '50s.
I agree with you about that Sackett-Peters sign. It's got style! They coulda just had the cylindrical pole supporting everything, but they added that yellow diamond-shaped element; and that made all the difference!
Ah, Nanook confirms my suspicions about that car being a '50s model. 1953; the year I was born!
We don't need to be silly and irreverent every day. The occasional serious mood once in a while cleanses the palate, so to speak. Thanks, Major.
Nanook, I still have two jackets and a couple pairs of dress shoes, which came from the Hinshaw's department store in Whittier. The Hinshaw family had a second store, in Arcadia, CA. My mom had worked in that store as a gift wrapper, while she was in college!
There were two of those original "Quad" signs. The one in the photo was along Whittier Blvd. The second one was on Painter Ave. They remained standing until the late eighties/early nineties. I spent a lot of time shopping at The Quad, during my childhood and teenage years. I even remember when the original outdoor shopping center had a roof put over it, during the big indoor shopping mall construction "boom" of the 1970s.
Throughout my childhood, I had hamsters, parakeets and hermit crabs, which all came from "Palmer's Pet Store," which was located in The Quad. I also remember going to some seasonal "haunted houses," which were set up in a vacated dime/drug store in The Quad. And speaking of "haunted" things, my Haunted Mansion Game, which I posted images of back in 2016, also came from a store in The Quad. Did I mention that I spent A LOT of time at The Quad???
And I actually have some stepping stones, which came from Sackett-Peters' nursery. They were in my mom's backyard for decades, but when she decided that she no longer wanted them, I took them!
If you look in the background of that Sackett-Peters image, you can see a Broadway department store. That was a part of Whittier's second outdoor shopping mall, also built in the 1950s, which was also covered over in the 1970s. That mall was torn down around 2004, but the Broadway building is still standing, and currently houses one of the last few operating Sears stores.
I should have mentioned that the original Quad shopping center was also torn down, and rebuilt as one of those sprawling outdoor shopping centers with a very poorly planned layout. The Hinshaw's building was the only thing that survived, but it is now divided, and contains a Staples, and a Burlington Coat Factory.
Thanks for these images, Major. They bring back many fond memories!
Oh, and R.I.P., J.F.K.!
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