Customer Reviews

Los Angeles Then and Now (Then & Now)

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

Perfect as a gift for those whose coffee table is Hollywood challenged. Apparently, the author/editors believe Los Angeles is 9 parts Hollywood, 1 part unimportant. Also, this book is for the advanced Hollywood student who already knows where most of these vital cultural icons exists - addresses are infrequently provided - or doesn't really care. Original camera positions for the "then" pictures are not duplicated in the modern version, and worse, the year in which the historic photograph is taken is not uniformly provided. Film star names are essential to the sparse narrative, as opposed to information as to the significance or relevance to Los Angeles/rest of planet of the site/photo chosen.

I am a Los Angeles history buff (specialty, the early 1900s), so I bought this book for my library, but I was really disappointed in it.

For one thing, it is very badly edited; grammatical errors (mostly misplaced or dangling modifiers) abound. I mean, for such a handsome book, it really deserved a go-through by a professional editor.

Secondly, who really needs a photo of the present-day Roma restaurant at the corner of Hollywood and Wilcox (complete with a guy in a cowboy hat hurrying to beat a flashing "Don't Walk" light and a lineup of late-model cars waiting to cross)?

Or who needs a shot of the Virgin megastore where the historic Schwab's restaurant used to be? And on and on . . . Some of the "before" shots are worthwhile, but most of the "after" shots are really pedestrian -- including that hustling cowpoke.

The best pic is on the cover -- the opening of the movie "Hell's Angels" at Grauman's Chinese. There are some other good older pix inside, too.

As has been mentioned, this book is way too heavy on Hollywood, and the depth of the research by the author can be measured by the number of times she mentions the names of Hollywood movies. I am suspicious of some of the facts in the book, too, although I can't quite pin down the reason right now. Maybe it was all those grammatical errors.

Finally, this book was printed in China, and I have nothing against the Chinese or their desire to earn big bucks from the rest of the world, but couldn't the author have found a printer right here in the U.S. to do this book? "Produced by PRC Publishing Co." PRC, get it -- "People's Republic of China"?

So, don't make this your coffee table gift. If you want a so-so addition to your library of L.A. books, buy it second hand somewhere or pick it up off the remainder table. It has a very nice cover, but you know what they say about books and their covers . . .

We had this book at school. The teacher used it for our history class and it was really good. He said it was good history guide, but it also had interesting facts. I really loved the photographs. My Grandpa lived in Los Angeles then. My Dad bought him this book and he said it was the best book he'd seen on Los Angeles history.

I was given this book by a friend when we were in a Hollywood book store because he thought this was a book all about Hollywood. He then went back and bought me Rosemary Lords "Hollywood Then and Now". The error because the cover of the Los Angeles book has a photo of the Chinese theater in Hollywood on the cover. This book, side by side with the Hollywood book is not very different in content. In fact, it contains some of the same locations as the Hollywood book.

I was raised in Hollywood and Los Angeles and love the history of the area. The archival photographs are quite nicely reproduced, however, the current-day photographs are very poor. I enjoy digital photography and was in Hollywood a few weeks ago and visiteds some of the same historic scenes from this book. I quite easily found the angle of the original shots found in this book.. why this book showed those same shots but taken from different angles than the original photos is beyond me. The modern photos in this book are also very unflattering, out of focus and even amateur in appearance... not much more than snapshots.

The worst thing about this book are the many obvious mistakes in locations and historic details just as the Hollywood contains. Very disappointed!

This is a great book..I have lived in Los Angeles all my life, so
the book brouht back many great view of ou city. That is eighty
years of memory. Have shared the book with my childrens and all
was thrilled. Plan to purchase the other book...San Francisc..
Then and Now.

I really like this book and would buy more with this theme. For those of us fascinated with Vintage Hollywood it is a gem. I highly recommend!

If you won't be making a trip to Los Angeles soon, or you aren't going to be taking that limo ride around town on your next visit, try Rosemary Lord's marvelous book, Los Angeles Then and Now that will take you on a pictorial excursion through old and new L.A.

Ms. Lord gives you a snapshot history of what the city looked like way back in the first part of the Twentieth Century and then contrasts it with what the grand old city looks like now. Some places haven't changed much at all like the Vista Theater whereas the old Brown Derby is gone.

The nostalgia is remarkable, sweet and sour, but the book, chock full of great pictures, lets you see what you missed and what you will never see again. A great trip, not to be missed.

This would be a great gift for armchair travelers or history buffs.

This is a wonderful book. It's absolutely captivating. Once you start looking at the pictures, you can't put it down. I love the photographs as well as the historical narrative. I'd recommend this book to anyone. I only wish it were longer.

Of the 69 Then and Now photos, 30 were basically the same because
the view had not changed over the years. I lived in LA for over 30 years and there are so many areas that have changed completely it's a shame that they weren't used.

I'm not sure why Rosemary Lord's book LOS ANGELES THEN AND NOW received such a low rating? Perhaps it was because it didn't meet with reviewers' expectations, or some other reason, I'm not sure. I've been looking for a photo book that shows the city of downtown Los Angeles during the 50s-70s and so far this is the closest I've found.

Of course, the "then" and "now" photos are much older and newer than my chosen date range, some from the late 1800s where there was nothing but one building and a dirt field, but I still found the pictures fascinating.

Each photo shows an area of Los Angeles with a photo of it then, and how it looks in the present day (or at least early 2000-ish when the book was published), and provides a brief synopsis of the area's history and what changes, if any, are there now.

I deducted one-star because most of the photographs don't have dates, and there isn't address information listed in the captions. Also, there seemed to be a huge concentration of pictures of Hollywood and movie studios, which is fine but Lord also has Hollywood Then and Now (Then & Now), so it makes me wonder why use them in this book?

And some reviewers had a problem with the angles of the "now" shots not being the same, but I didn't have a issue with it. It does happen occasionally, but in some instances it would be impossible to shoot the same angle because what was once a vacant field, now has a building in it's place. So that wasn't a problem for me, plus there's enough landmark information contained in both photographs so that the viewer can recognize both as being from the same place.

Anyway, this isn't a book to use as a pre-tour book of Los Angeles or to plan an upcoming vacation here, and I'm still looking for a photography book on Los Angeles that really shows it's heyday (so if you know of one please post in the comments), but it's an interesting book nevertheless.