1960's anaheim/orange county (San Diego, Vista: to live in, mall, moving)

[donballard]

Originally Posted by DewDropInn

I had no idea they broke ground for the Disneyland Hotel that early. Very interesting. And that's a great souvenir.

The Disneyland Hotel was supposed to open at the same time as Disneyland but was delayed by almost 3 months. Labor strikes (the same that plagued Disneyland) and a shortage of workers as they were all working to finish Disneyland. The Hotel opened on October 5th and had only 7 rooms available opening night with an 8th being used as a lobby/office/registration room. It's official Grand opening was not until August of 1956 when they had a little over 200 rooms, shops, administration building, pool, restaurants and a bar.

Disneyland® Hotel: The Early Years 1954-1988

[owlman]

Anyone you know where this intersection (photo) is today?

It's from a neat 1958 driver education film showing nice footage around the area (

Driving Tips for Beginners - Part 1 (1958) - YouTube )

I guess Lincoln Ave / Center St was CA-18 at the time, so this may be at Lincoln @ Euclid? or Lincoln & Manchester?

The sign confuses me, saying US-101 straight ahead, but Santa Ana Fwy right. When did US-101 switch to the Santa Ana Fwy alignment? Just ahead is a road closed sign, so I'm curious if the switch was happening then or some freeway expansion was going on.

no particular reason, just some useless historical pondering...

[donballard]

Has to be somewhere in that area with all those parameters. My guess is heading south on Euclid north of Orangethorpe.

[fladnag]

The Red Vest was a Bar/Lounge attatched to Danny's Coffee Shop, later changed to Denny's. It finally became the dining room of Chris and Pitts restaurant ot Euclid and Crescent (not LaPalma) It all went away circa 2009

[fladnag]

Santa Ana FWY was 101 at the time. SR 18 was an extention of US 91 into Long Beach. The picture is an intesection near Buena Park where US 91 crossed Santa Ana FWY. Probably near Lincoln or Manchester.

[C2ShiningC]

Dew, I got a notification that you wanted a still shot of the intersection, but now your post is gone.

Anyway, here are two stills I took, the second provided so you can see the buildings and signs in the background, perhaps they will help. I sharpened the focus a little bit too.

Originally Posted by fladnag

The Red Vest was a Bar/Lounge attatched to Danny's Coffee Shop, later changed to Denny's. It finally became the dining room of Chris and Pitts restaurant ot Euclid and Crescent (not LaPalma) It all went away circa 2009

Thanks for this info, fladnag.

[DewDropInn]

Sorry, C2 I hadn't seen your first link with the still. Then, waking up, saw it so I deleted the post. Thanks for enlarging the photos.

I don't recognize any of the buildings. I'm going to think about it and look at a map. The Santa Ana and the 91 converge at Magnolia between LaPalma (south) and Orangethorpe (north). There was a tricky way to get on the on-ramps for both in that spot. It could also be Beach Blvd. I'm just not sure.

BTW: I DID recognize the voice on the film. We used to watch all kinds of films on littering and safety and driving in school. Same guy. That made me laugh. And feel older than dirt.

[C2ShiningC]

Originally Posted by owlman

I guess Lincoln Ave / Center St was CA-18 at the time, so this may be at Lincoln @ Euclid? or Lincoln & Manchester?

The sign confuses me, saying US-101 straight ahead, but Santa Ana Fwy right. When did US-101 switch to the Santa Ana Fwy alignment? Just ahead is a road closed sign, so I'm curious if the switch was happening then or some freeway expansion was going on.

I believe that Lincoln and Manchester is correct.

Those street signs are really confusing, thanks to those who pointed out the highway history. I too was totally confused about the 101 sign straight ahead and also it saying Los Angeles was straight ahead - but since the road curves to the left, it made a bit more sense. It's hard to see in the still, but the sign says Anaheim is one mile to the right, as well as the Santa Ana Freeway, so I figure that Anaheim meant downtown Anaheim,which is a mile from the Lincoln/Manchester intersection, rather than the city limits. I think that the reason it says both the Santa Ana Freeway is to the right and the 101 is straight ahead is possibly that, as there usually are, there were on and off ramps for north and south, so that if you turned right, you would have the ramp for one direction, and if you went straight, you would have the ramp for the other direction. It seems a bit silly to call them by different names, but it may also be that the name "Santa Ana Freeway" was so new that they referred to it also as the 101 so people would see both names and find the freeway using whichever name they were familiar with. I don't know, just a theory.

Anyway, I found this 1959 street map that shows Lincoln Avenue as both Highways 91 and 18, so the street with the traffic crossing in front of the camera is Lincoln: http://www.cahighways.org/maps/1959rmn.jpg

I then found this earlier photo of the intersection of Lincoln and Manchester. This is looking south where Lincoln intersects Manchester, Manchester curving to the right at the bottom of the photo. I believe that the building in the bottom right of the intersection is the building (gas station?) in the video to the left of the intersection.:



With the widening of the freeway and changes to the on-ramps/off-ramps and such, Manchester north of Lincoln really doesn't exist any longer - it was essentially absorbed into the on-ramp from Lincoln onto the southbound freeway. There is a fragment of it left, paralleling the off-ramp to Lincoln. All the buildings in the video are gone now.

[Fontucky]

That almost makes me weep.

[DewDropInn]

C2: Have you got a date on that photo?

And any chance of enlarging the bottom right so we can read the sign on the storefront of that building?

Great find, BTW.

(Just so I have this straight, downtown Anaheim would be to the right?)