754 at Santa Anita Wash
Alan Weeks Photo, Alan Weeks Collection
Pacific Electric Hollywood car no. 754 rushes over the Santa Anita Wash viaduct at Duarte in this image dated September 10, 1951.
Alan Weeks Photo, Alan Weeks Collection
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This is a great photo. I plan to locate exactly where this was taken.
Note: this is not in Duarte, but is on the east side of Arcadia. Just barely visible is the 5th Ave. waiting house, which was on the other side of the fence from my boyhood home on 5th in Monrovia.
You’d have a bit of a problem, because where this was taken is now under the 210 Freeway. Rather like the historical marker for the Wilson family home in Hawthorne, which celebrates where the Beach Boys musical group started. Where the house was is now under the 105 Freeway. The nearest you can get to this Arcadia location is the intersection of 2nd and Saint Joseph, where the PE left street running when heading for Monrovia. If this photo were taken on a Saturday morning around 9:30, my brother and I might have been riding the car! But while you’re in Arcadia, you can watch the construction of the Gold Line Foothill Extension, which will bring electric railway service back to this area.
This photo appears to be located in Monrovia,
on the eastern boundary of Arcadia. This is not the city of Duarte, as the Santa Anita wash does not run through it. This is not Duarte Rd. either, as no PE line existed there to my knowledge.
The area in this photo is occupied by the 210 Freeway. Little evidence or clues of the PE existence there exist. This is near the back of the site of the Extended Stay America at 401 E.Santa Clara St. in Arcadia, California.
Thanks Bob. I posted before reading your reply. I am going to visit the site to look for a shred of evidence of the PE line there. The area around the water tank is where I plan to look.
Wow, Bob, the area certainly has changed. Good to know this history has not been forgotten.
Randy
Santa Clara Ave. follows the former SP Duarte Branch, which PE took over around 1941. The PE main line went northeasterly and went due east on St. Joseph Ave. The PE right of way has been completely covered by commercial development and the only clues are the odd angles of some property lines. The Duarte Branch (also known as the Day & Night Spur) outlived the main line in Arcadia and Monrovia by about ten years, but is now unrecognizable. The branch crossed the Santa Anita was on a wooden trestle, and was on private right of way east through Monrovia, although there may have been a bit of street-running. I have photos of SP diesel swichers at the Santa Anita Wash bridge taken in 1958 and 59, shortly before the lkne was abandoned. I even have a movie of PE 1299 being hauled by an SP diesel that my mother took around 1958.
I traced the Duarte Branch which headed east from Santa Clara Ave. all the way to the end in Duarte near Bradbury. That line was originally narrow gauge as part of the San Gabriel Valley Rapid Transit R.R., one of the first in L.A. You probably know all this. That movie your mom took must be special. My understanding is that the main P.E. right-of-way heading east from St. Joseph St. was located north of the Duarte Branch and was separate trackage altogether.
I do not have the firsthand memories and experience you do, but I have traced out that area extensively in the 90s. I found virgin sections of the P.E. path that were almost exactly as they were at abandonment. These 1/4 mile strips of P.E. history are developed now. I was astonished to find them in the mid-90s in perfect historic shape minus the tracks since the area was an island completely surrounded by development.