Los Angeles’s history is
mostly unwritten
The public archives hold only 3 old photos of Los Angeles. The rest are in attics, shoeboxes and the historical society. Help start the collection.
The story
from WikipediaRead it all ↗The settlement of Indigenous Californians in the modern Los Angeles Basin and the San Fernando Valley was dominated by the Tongva (now also known as the Gabrieleño since the era of Spanish colonization). The historic center of Tongva power in the region was the settlement of Yaanga (Tongva: Iyáangẚ), meaning "place of the poison oak", which would eventually become the site where the Spanish founded the Pueblo de Los Ángeles. Iyáangẚ has also been translated as "the valley of smoke".
Text from Wikipedia, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0.
Timeline
built from the dates on the items belowStart Los Angeles’s collection
The first neighbors to add old photos shape how Los Angeles’s history is told.
0 of 10 decades since 1900 have photos 🔁Retake an old viewBattle of, 1850: stand where they stood+15 📦Share a family photoSign in to add one+10Los Angeles, decade by decade
1990s
Then & now
No then-and-now pairs yet. Take a photo from the same spot as Battle of (1850) and it appears here side by side.
🔁 Retake this view · +15Historic places
National Register · via Wikidata
From Wikimedia Commons (1), the Library of Congress (2) and the National Register (3). Images are copied here with their credits and licenses, shown on each photo’s page. Refreshed monthly.