Tag: 1907

1907 Centennial Celebration Line Up

The proposals for the 1907 Centennial Celebration are in, and what wonderful performances they’ll be! We are so very pleased to host some of our favorite folks in a night dedicated to remembering the Los Angeles of one hundred years past.

When you join us at Bedlam on Thursday night, March 22, this is what you’ll being thrilling to, in order of appearance:

The invocation of Zuckerman the Potato King (Kim Cooper and Kelly Kuvo)
The strange tale of  A. Victor Segno, Mentalist with Beautiful Hair (Larry Harnisch)
A description of life in 1907 L.A. (George Garrigues)
The song stylings of Miss Figueroa Daguerre
Witty period readings from George Ade’s "Fables In Slang" (Brooke Alberts)
J. Stuart Blackton’s comic short film "The Starving Artist, or: Realism in Art" (American Vitagraph Company, 1907, live accompaniment by Laura Steenberge, presented by Ross Lipman)
Fortunes told in Madame Pamita‘s Parlor of Wonders
And the lovely Miss Janet Klein accompanied by Tom Marion revealing the next secret year to be blogged at 1947project, in song and patter.
 
The fun starts at 9pm sharp, and we anticipate about one hour for the show, with a potluck party to follow. Please bring an old fashioned recipe to share, dress in period duds if you’ve got ’em, and join us as we bid a centennial adieu to this great and endlessly surprising year of 1907 and welcome in the next year which we’re certain will prove every bit as worthy of obsession. Will it be 1967? 1887? Shhhh… you just have to come to Bedlam to find out!

Where: Bedlam Arts, 1275 E. Sixth Street, downtown L.A. 90021
When: Thursday, March 22, show starts at 9pm sharp
Cost: Free, but it would be neat if you brought an old timey potluck dish to share (recipe links are here)

See you then!
Kim & the 1947project gang 

Celebrate 1907’s Centennial in March

Reminder, you have until February 5 to submit your proposals for the 1907 Centennial celebration. We’ve already received some fascinating submissions–including one for the first public appearance in more than a decade of a legendary L.A. postpunk band, presenting a live score to a Melies Brothers short — and would love to have you be a part of it. So send over your ideas, half-baked or cooked straight through, and join us on March 22 at Bedlam.

1907 Centennial – open call for performers

For the past year, the bloggers at 1947project.com have been immersed in the weird old L.A. of 1907, a city of open sewers and Mexican revolutionaries, 15mph hot rodders and prankster firemen, holy rollers and hollow earthers. As the calendar strikes March and the conclusion of twelve months of 1907 research, we’re hosting a special centennial celebration, and we’d like YOU to be a part of it.

Writers, musicians, actors, artists, comics, storytellers, vaudevillians, curators, filmmakers, historians, poets and others are invited to propose a 3-10 minute presentation on a theme inspired by 1907-era Los Angeles (or the wider world). Your piece can be original or an adaptation of something you’ve read on 1947project.com or elsewhere. All media are welcome (we can provide amplification and video projection). The only requirements are that it be entertaining and respectful to any crime victims involved.

Prospective presenters should provide the following:
1) A one paragraph creative bio, 200 words or less, suitable for publication
2) A description of what you propose to do at the 1907 Centennial event, noting any source material that you have been inspired by
3) Length of proposed performance
4) Contact info
5) Your website or other helpful links

Event curators Kim Cooper, Larry Harnisch, Lucinda Michele Knapp and Nathan Marsak will be collecting proposals through February 5 and announcing the line up shortly afterwards. The ’07 celebration will be held on Thursday, March 22 at Bedlam Art downtown, and will culminate in the festive revelation by a very special musical guest of which historic year will next get the archival treatment from 1947project. The event will be free, with refreshments and libations on hand. Vintage recipes will be provided for those who enjoy cooking to contribute pot luck offerings to share.

Need more info to stoke the fires of your creativity? Visit www.1947project.com/1907 for some helpful historic resources.

Please submit your proposal for The 1907 Centennial by February 5 to Kim by email or mail to PO Box 31227, Los Angeles CA 90031.

Highwayman in Pasadena

April 15, 1907
Pasadena

As criminality reaches epidemic proportions in sleepy Pasadena, the citizenry grumbles about Chief Pinkham’s skills as police head, and makes noises about replacing him.

The latest outrage was visited upon George Syer, a public carriage driver who was called out to 876 Lincoln Avenue this evening, ostensibly to take some women to a train. The address should have been found north of Mountain, in an unlit area. He did not find the house, but while looking was acosted by a man with a thick Irish brogue who demanded his money. Syer parted with a dollar in change, but kept the contents of his other pocket. No mention was made of a weapon being brandished, but it is well known that one can’t be too careful with Irishmen!

Note From One-Time Suitor Spoils Honeymoon

March 30, 1907
Los Angeles 

Newlyweds Mr. and Mrs. Paul Solf, a couple from Denver who have been honeymooning at the Estelle at 312 1/2 West First Street, paid a visit to the police this evening at the insistence of the lady.

Paul Solf told the desk sergeant that he had returned to their room earlier, to find his wife reading a letter from a former admirer. As he snatched it away, a photograph fell out, and the pair commenced to arguing. After a time, Mrs. Solf said that if he did not accompany her to the police station, she would call for them herself. Thinking she was bluffing, he joined her in a perambulation towards Central Station.

Upon entering, Mrs. Solf declared that Paul Solf had threatened her with a revolver. He denied this, but a quick search revealed a heavy revolver on his person. Solf was locked up, while officers determined that he had a letter for $5000 credit from a Denver bank, and nearly as much in cash. On reflection, Mrs. Solf decided she didn’t wish to prosecute, but officers still plan to charge him for carrying a concealed weapon.

Solf is a race horse man, and his bride a bit of a gambler. 

White Wife of Celestial Deports Self

March 27, 1907
Los Angeles 

After visiting her Chinese husband in the County Jail, Mrs. Yee Lung (also called Mrs. Frank Chew) spoke of her intention to join her beloved as he was deported, and to travel with him in the train car packed with forty other Chinese deportees for the trip up to San Francisco.

Special permission has been granted by the U.S. Marshall for her to ride with her husband. They will immediately board a boat to Hong Kong, and the woman may never again see her white friends relatives in this country.

Mrs. Lung’s friends have pleaded with her to reconsider, but she insists "I trust my husband implicitly… he wouldn’t go without me, and I wouldn’t be so cruel as to ask him to."

Trolley vs Ruminant

March 22, 1907
Pasadena 

A special correspondent follows up on the distressing report of a cow gravely injured when struck by an electric car near Lamanda Park. Bossy was found happily chewing her cud with no sign of injury. As near as can be figured, the trolley ran over the cow’s tether, pulling it taut and forcing the reluctant acrobat to turn a dramatic aerial flip. She seems to have landed safely and forgotten all about her wild adventure, until the cries of do-gooders to the Humane Society roused an interest in her case.

Wounded Man Blows Up Like Balloon, Terrible Injury Causes Weird Effect

March 18, 1907
Los Angeles 

Carlos Perez, an unarmed man shot by an Olvera Street nightwatchman as he walked towards his home on Macy Street last evening, lies tonight in County Hospital, gravely wounded with a bullet puncuring his lung. A gruesome side effect of his injury is that air is seeping beneath his skin, inflating his body like a fleshy balloon. Doctors can press gently on the man’s hands, eyelids and ribcage, causing him to briefly deflate, though he quickly swells up again. 

Dr. Barber, the hospital superintendent, says that he has seen victims who suffer minor inflation around their injuries, but never someone whose entire body becomes so like a balloon. Doctors hesitate to puncture Perez’ skin for fear of introducing an infection, and so the poor man suffers the strange sensation of constant pressure from within. His outlook is uncertain.

Richard D. Birch, nightwatchman for the Merchant’s Fire Dispatch, has given conflicting statements regarding the shooting, and will surely face manslaughter charges should his victim perish.

Below, Olvera Street circa 1890