|
A German Hollywood Tour 1/1
Tracing the German-Hollywood Connection
 F I R S T T O U R 1
The Film Studios and Hollywood Boulevard
| |
 |
Stars line the Vine Street section of Hollywood's
“Walk of Fame.”
Photo © H. Flippo |
|
|
|
|
Our virtual Hollywood tour begins with an abbreviated version of the First Tour in Cornelius Schnauber's book. This tour is first because it starts in that section of Los Angeles that used to be Hollywood's heart. However, visitors expecting some idealized version of “Hollywood” are in for a disappointment. Hollywood isn't what it used to be, but then it probably never was what most people think it was.
After it was absorbed by Los Angeles in 1910, Hollywood ceased to be a separate municipal entity. The name Hollywood was originally given to a ranch owned by Daeida Wilcox. Today the area that was once the Wilcox ranch is just another section of greater Los Angeles. While there is a neighboring community named West Hollywood, it has little to do with either Hollywood the place or Hollywood the legend.
Since it centers around Hollywood Boulevard and its side streets, much of Tour One can be done on foot, but the full tour, as described in the book is definitely a driving tour. This tour includes the following highlights: The sidewalk stars of “The Hollywood Walk of Fame” (see photo on right), the beautifully restored Roosevelt Hotel, Grauman's (Mann's) Chinese Theater, the Musso & Frank Grill, the intersection of Hollywood and Vine, the Hollywood Bowl, the Pantages Theater (where the Academy Awards were given out in the forties and fifties) and Universal Studios (founded by the German Carl Laemmle).
Below is a sample of the main attractions included in the book's First Tour. In our virtual tour, we cover only a few of the 29 points of interest from this particular tour.
From Hollywood Haven:
We begin our driving tour at the northwest corner of Sunset Boulevard and Gower Street.
1 LOCATION OF THE FIRST FILM STUDIOS, CORNER OF
SUNSET BOULEVARD AND GOWER STREET
Here, in 1911 on the former property of the widow Wilcox, in an old tavern, David Horsley situated his Nestor Company of Bayonne, formerly from New Jersey. The KCBS-TV studios are on this corner today...
Carl Laemmle (1867-1939), who was born in Swabian Laupheim and who purchased the Nestor Company in 1912, was a decisive influence in Hollywood's development. Laemmle then bought the property on Sunset Boulevard to the south, and founded the first large Hollywood studio, the Universal Film Manufacturing Company (later Universal Pictures).
...we drive west along Sunset Boulevard for about six blocks... At the sixth intersection we'll turn right onto Cahuenga Boulevard and follow it over the Hollywood Freeway.
2 JOHN ANSON FORD THEATER
3 UNIVERSAL STUDIOS
4 HOLLYWOOD BOWL MUSEUM
The tour continues to the Hollywood Bowl and back to Hollywood Boulevard and various attractions along that famous street. On the next page we'll pick up the tour at stop number 22, the intersection of Hollywood and Vine.
N E X T > First Tour 2
Hollywood Haven: Homes and Haunts of the European Émigrés and Exiles in Los Angeles
by Cornelius Schnauber, Copyright © 1997 Ariadne Press, Riverside, Calif. Excerpts used by permission.
Previous | Home| Film People | Film Studios | Next
Also visit our Video Shop
Copyright © 2002-2005 Hyde Flippo
|
