There are widespread urban legends that the Disney Studios built and/or owned the so-called “Snow White” cottages on the 2900 block of Griffith Park Avenue in L.A. These charming–but tiny–1931 dwellings were built by architect Ben Sherwood in the storybook style that was popular in Southern California during the early decades of the 1900’s–especially in Hollywood. AlthoughDisney’s Hyperion studio was located nearby (from 1926 – 1940), Disney neither built nor owned the Griffith Park Boulevard cottages. It is true (as confirmed by Dave Smith, Disney’s  Chief Archivist Emeritus, in a January 2013 D23 Fanfare column) that some Disneyanimators rented the cottages as living spaces; their proximity to the Hyperion studio was too good to pass up. Ham Luske, supervising animator of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, was an occupant of one cottage.

It is possible that the whimsical storybook flavor of the Griffith Park Avenue cottages inspired some of the animators’ Snow White production designs.  It would seem impossible to live in a fairy tale cottage, among other fairy tale cottages, while working on Snow White, without the real architecture influencing the animation.  A January 2014 visit to the cottage complex by the author and her research associate revealed that the courtyard, which in recent years had fallen on hard times, seems to have been painstakingly renovated, its original charm restored. It is a gem, definitely worth a look if you’re a Disney fan and you’re in the neighborhood.  (Just remember that there are tenants in residence; quiet, please.)  The Gelson’s supermarket located nearby stands on the site of Walt’s Hyperion studio.  A plaque memorializes the significance of the site. And Walt once lived at another nearby (and privately owned) landmark, the house at Lyric and St. George. 

It always confounds me when pundits worry about the younger generations, about the Millennials (b. circa 1980 – 1999) and the Digitals (b. 2000 – present).  All I can picture when those pundits wax gloomy is Mr. Wilson shaking his fist at “Dennis the Menace”.  Whenever this happened, Mr. Wilson’s wife, Martha, promptly dosed her husband with a spoonful of his “nerve medicine” and told him to go lie down. Then Martha said something nice to Dennis, and gave him a plateful of cookies.  See, Martha got it.  Dennis, however irritating, was part of a dynamically disruptive new generation that was going to change the world.  He didn’t mean to turn everything upside down.  But it was his destiny, and his generation’s.


 So, the Millennials and Digitals are less … aggressive than the Boomers were.  They aren’t as strident or as chipper as they Boomers were—but they are more stylish.  The Millennials and Digitals are going to change the world—are already changing it—in a quietly disruptive way.  A politely disruptive way that will ultimately be constructive. Because one of the many things to admire about the younger generations is that they are creators, as well as consumers.  They create as well as consume culture, entertainment, design, goods, and technology.  And they not only create—they share what they create.  With everyone, and anyone.  Often for free.  They create for the sake of the act of creation, not to become billionaires (although that does, sometimes, happen along the way).

 
For this new youth, the act of creation is more important than the perfection of that which is created. The artifacts produced and widely shared by the Millennials and Digitals often have an appealingly hand-crafted, heartfelt, “let’s put on a show in the barn” quality.  Everything from music to art to video to gadgetry to throw pillows should have a texture—a smudge here, a stray thread showing there.  Artifacts that glow with shiny-bright perfection are either dismissed by the M’s and D’s as too finished, or consumed by the M’s and D’s as an act of conscious irony.

 
What I admire most about the M’s and D’s is their appreciation for the past.  Not merely the recent past, but distant (by the American reckoning of time, anyway) history.  Shawl collars are back—for men—as are pork pie hats and big dark-framed eyeglasses.  And while young men today appear to have stepped out of time machines installed in the 1920’s, 30’s, or 40’s, young women echo the sartorial time warp in their vintage Depression-era dresses and chunky shoes, or their seventies Boho silhouettes.  These retro-clad young hipsters are moving into affordably shabby gentrified lofts and houses, and downloading onto their“i”-everythings selections of digitized vinyl classics that could have been heard wafting from open windows on Tin Pan Alley or Don Draper’s apartment.

 
Which is not to say that today’s young people are not forward-looking.  While the M’s and D’s are visiting, even basking in, the past, they are creating the future, which promises to be an increasingly diverse, creative, and communal world, if its designers and future inhabitants are any indication. But our youth has no problem shifting amorphously from the present to the future to the past, and back again, endlessly, and effortlessly.

 
It’s no accident that many of the programs, films, and video games most popular with this demographic feature supernatural creatures—often stylish reboots of very old classics (see “Grimm” or “Dracula” or “I, Frankenstein” or the “Mass Effect” games). These supernatural beings are typically diverse (racially, ethnically, socioeconomically), but they are always beautiful, frequently ancient, sometimes immortal.

 
An important quality is their connectedness.  Whether they are trying to save the world, or trying to destroy it, they are all up in each other’s business.  Among these highly social, communal creatures, one person’s problem or secret or drama ends up impacting everyone else, usually in unexpected ways.  Therefore, one person’s problem or secret or drama belongs to everyone.

 
It is this connectedness that makes it clear that these supernatural beings are avatars for the M’s and D’s (the generations who are  linked to each other, almost every moment of every day, via text messages, social media sites, multiplayer online games, and share-sites YouTube and Instagram and Vine).  The fictional, supernatural heroes and villains portray how Millennials and Digitals see themselves, or want to see themselves.  The fictional worlds the M and D’s avatars inhabit are aspirational as much as they are reflective.  M’s and D’s have identified with supernatural characters, banded together in diverse, close-knit, purposeful tribes, since the first episode of “Buffy the Vampire Slayer” (arguably the prototype for this sort of ensemble) enthralled teen Millennials in the mid-1990’s.

 
View any 2014 episode of “Dracula” or “Sleepy Hollow” or“The Originals” or “Reign” (or “Buffy the Vampire Slayer” for that matter) and we see tightly linked groups of beautiful young people who are heroic and witty and talented and tolerant and flawed—yes, even “the bad guys”. Their lives are deeply entwined.  They all have purpose.  And they seem to slip effortlessly between different historical periods, through time and space, fantasy and reality, just as modern technology has allowed the M’s and D’s to shuttle along non-linear paths between the real and the virtual, to experience history, to listen to music and wear clothing from eras that seemed “old” even to their grandparents.



“Wired” (the February 2014 issue) and Chuck Klosterman (in“Eating the Dinosaur”) remark upon the way the past, present, and future are collapsing.  These kids today—they can (and do) listen to Frank Sinatra, watch painstakingly restored footage of early 20th-century battles and historical events on an electronic device that they can hold in their hands, wear the aforementioned shawl collars (un-ironically), and stream episodes of "Supernatural” or read a digitized copy of Bram Stoker’s original “Dracula” at the tap of an icon.

 
Because the past is deeply, instantly present for today’s young people, one thing you will find them doing in droves is revitalizing lovely old buildings—entire neighborhoods, even—that have fallen on hard times.  Today’s youth sign petitions to save these places, and rent or buy property at these locations, and attend meetings and rallies and fundraisers to resurrect the past in all its glory.

 
They apply their DIY creativity to open bars and cafés and restaurants and stores in these “undead” neighborhoods, in a conscious effort to revitalize them, to galvanize them back to life.  The M’s and D’s who cannot afford to open bars or restaurants or stores patronize them. The simple acts of drinking, eating, and shopping therefore become meaningful because those acts, in those locations, support a greater cause, fostering a building (or neighborhood, or city-wide) renaissance.

 
Wherever they live, drink, eat, or shop, the M’s and D’s are recording their experiences in words and images, and sharing the experiences via the worldwide electronic membrane, a medium that is increasingly become a quasi-real “place” populated by the people we wish we were (and kind of are) and the surgically extracted moments of our lives that we not only want to preserve but want to communicate to others. Nearly everything has become communal. Our image, and bits and pieces of our lives, once uploaded, become omnipresent and eternal and the de facto property of all.

 
The tendency of the M’s and D’s to commune and communicate is outstanding for historical preservationists, particularly in Downtown Los Angeles, where legions of hipster Millennials and Digitals have moved in and are reclaiming the once-blighted landscape. They are not tearing down old properties in a mad rush to build the new.  Rather, they are thoughtfully, appreciatively resurrecting the long-neglected beauty that was already there under layers of peeling paint, crumbling drywall, and icing-thick graffiti.

 
Our young citizens don fedoras, checked jackets, vintage dresses and boots, and attend preservation events.  Such gatherings are often held at “new” venues that conscientiously revive bygone worlds:  vinyl record shops, classic diners, gloriously restored golden-age movie palaces.  And, of course, the M’s and D’s record and then share their impressions of these events, the sounds and words and images, spreading the message, raising the profile of the cause, driving up interest.

 
When is the last time a vast population of young people was so entranced by what came before them?  One glaring example:  Millennials and Digitals wear three-piece suits and top hats and flapper gowns to Disneyland on“Dapper Days”.  If you have attended one of these stylish events, you know that almost without exception Dapper Day attendees, with their parasols and suspenders and pocket watches and canes, range in age from fifteen to thirty-five. These are the youths who watch the ubiquitously popular ghost-hunting programs more for the historical content than for the ghosts.  This genuine reverence for the past is a generational hallmark not seen, perhaps, among our youth, since before the Great War.

 
There are, of course, posers among the M’s and D’s, as there are in any group.  There are young men and young women who dress like hipsters and listen to Doris Day and Tweet about“Supernatural” merely to be part of their generation, merely to ensure that their selfies and their social media pages are in line with their peers’.  However, posers seem to be a small subculture.  And the M’s and D’s, being particularly earnest and self-policing generations, have a nose for sniffing out the most egregious and obnoxious poseurs in their midst and dealing with them in the global stocks of the worldwide web.

 
I admire the Millennials and Digitals immensely, nearly everything about them.  The Mr. Wilsons of the world need to take their nerve medicine and go lie down.  Let the M’s and D’s go about their creative, non-linear travel among time and space as they construct our brave new worlds.

 
Yet … I can’t suppress a slight feeling of unease whenever I see advertisements for uber-popular cable program “The Walking Dead”.  Because when I see the rotting zombies scurrying after the pretty young cast, I can’t quite shake the feeling that the fleet-footed zombie slayers reflect the M’s and D’s, whereas the zombies shambling after them in a disorganized, uncoordinated ballet … that’s my generation.



I don’t know—yet—exactly what that means, but the zombies are GenX, infected with … what?  With some defect that the M’s and D’s escaped, most likely—and quite paradoxically—because GenXers have been such excellent parents?  If so, it isn’t right … and it isn’t fair … but, somehow, the zombie is me.

Author Update:  "Downtown Los Angeles in Photographs 2014" will focus on Broadway, one of L.A.'s oldest and most important thoroughfares.


The street owes its existence to Lt. Edward Ord, who named it Fort Street.  From 1849 until 1890, Fort Street connected L.A.'s downtown with Fort Moore.  In 1890, the thoroughfare was re-christened "Broadway".  And, yes--the name was a nod to New York City's Broadway.


One of North Broadway's cross streets is "Ord"--named in honor of the famed surveyor.  Fort Moore is gone, but an impressive (if decaying) monument to the fort remains atop Hill Street.  Pedestrians on Broadway who wish to visit the monument can climb a narrow staircase connecting Broadway to Hill.


Today Broadway stretches from Lincoln Heights, a neighborhood north of Downtown Los Angeles, past the sprawling rail yards and newest downtown park, through the last vestiges of "Little Italy" and through still-vibrant Chinatown, through the Civic Center, and thence flowing through L.A.'s famed theatre, jewelry, and fashion districts, finally terminating well south of the downtown in Carson.


"Downtown Los Angeles in Photographs 2014" will be, like the original book, a
collection of black-and-white photos showcasing the city's "noir" beauty, featuring historical information as well as noting anticipated changes. For Broadway is under revitalization, particularly along its historic theatre corridor.


Broadway's Chinatown remains largely untouched, a bustling community that welcomes foreign and domestic tourists.  "Downtown Los Angeles in Photographs 2014" will focus heavily on this fascinating enclave, where the old and new, the traditional and modern, exist in sometimes dream-like congruence.


Chinatown is perfumed with the scent of freshly cut oranges, and incense burning in rooms off shop. There is very little you cannot find in Chinatown.  Tanks of live crabs.  Glass cases of roasted pig.  Bakeries--among the best in the city--and jewelers, and banks, dentists and optometrists, cultural centers and benevolent societies.


One hears the frantic clucking of chickens behind a fence on which a sign proclaims "Pollos Vivos" ("live chickens") and "No Entry".  No entry for the public; no exit for the fowl.
 
Everything seems to be for sale.  Cardboard boxes overlowing with colorful produce--fruits and vegetables and berries.  Herbs.  Vitamins.  Irish caps.  Heavy-metal T-shirts.  High-end sunglasses.  Lucky bamboo plants.  Fresh flowers. Birthday cakes.  Fortune cookies by the bag.  And everywhere, everywhere, merchandise stamped with the adorable visage of "Hello Kitty".


Bookended by the last remnants of "Little Italy" to the north, and the Great Dragon Gate to the south, the Chinatown section of Broadway welcomes drivers and pedestrians to Downtown Los Angeles.  Tourists snap photos and queue at the Chinese restaurants.  Elderly locals take morning constitutionals, or sit languidly on benches, smoking.


In the central plaza, a golden statue of Dr. Sun Yat-Sen welcomes visitors entering the plaza from the Broadway side.  Here is the district's heaviest concentration of traditional Chinese architecture and decor.  Red-pink paper-lanterns strung across the courtyards link restaurants, gift shops, and importers.


Esther, a shop owner, runs two stores in the plaza, one she describes as more American, the other more traditionally Chinese; the latter is presided over by a large, lucky Buddha statue.  "Sincere Imports" has been open since 1937, when Esther's father-in-law opened it.  Esther took over the store in 1980.


While instructing an employee on the benefits of using water-and-newspaper to remove grease from the shop windows, Esther holds forth about the upcoming Lunar New Year festivities.  "The Year of the Horse" is nigh.  She recommends that the author photograph Chinatown's neon and its glowing lanterns at night, particulary during the new year festivities.


In research there is no substitute for talking to primary sources.  Esther directs the author to a somewhat hidden gem:  The Chinese Historical Society, tucked away in a tiny purple house on Bernard, just west of an abandoned gas station.  Esther also holds forth on stories of treasure hidden by Chinese residents long in the past "in vases inside of vases" and then buried by construction when the nearby freeways were built ...


     [Look for "Downtown Los Angeles in Photographs 2014"
later this year at Amazon.com or through the author's website:  www.leslielemonauthor.com.]

"...Dreamers kept building their dreams in Southern California.  Over the years they have taken on many forms.  What seems to one person like a ludicrous obsession might seem to another to be peerless entertainment. You never knew what someone might build next door.  It might be a lion preserve, a whole safari land, or a reproduction of an old western town. It might be an alligator farm, or a seaside amusement park.


By the late 1940’s, as the California suburbs expanded, and more and more Californians were out and about in their cars, and more and more tourists were coming to the Golden state, Walt Disney began dreaming a very special, very complicated, and very expensive dream—a dream that combined many dreams, if you will.


And the genius folks at the Stanford Research Institute told Walt just where to build his dream:  Thirty miles south of Los Angeles, in Orange County, in a quilt of orange and walnut groves and strawberry fields.  Though Anaheim was still very small, and very sleepy, it was about to become the population center of California, smack-dab near a convergence of freeway interchanges that would make it exceptionally convenient for locals and tourists in those restlessly prowling cars.


Anaheim itself had been something of a dream, the utopian fantasy of Bavarian vintners and grape growers who settled Anaheim in the late 1850’s.  When the grapes were annihilated by insects thirty years later, the resilient residents regrouped and began growing citrus fruits and nuts.  Anaheim’s bucolic beauty attracted dreamers like the brilliant actress Helena Modjeska; in the late 1800’s she settled in Anaheim and built her own dream-like residential compound, Arden, in what is now Modjeska Canyon.


Orange County has been the site of vast cattle ranches, vast citrus groves, and vast oil fields, of Modjeska’s Arden, and Reverend Schuller’s Crystal Cathedral, of Friedrich Conrad’s interpretation of Copenhagen’s Tivoli Gardens, of seaside Fun and Joy Zones, of Knott’s Berry Farm among many, many, many other eclectic attractions large and small.


So when Walt Disney built his dream—some would say it’s still among the greatest dreams ever conceived and realized—he built it in a territory already well known for its utopias and fantasies ..."


     From "The Disneyland Book of Secrets 2014" available now at Amazon.com.

     *To read Leslie's complete blog, please visit her Goodreads site.

Riding the train between Los Angeles and  Anaheim on New Year's Day 2014, I  reflected (as I often do along that corridor) at the surreal landscape of "the between".

L.A. and Anaheim are both, in large measure, playgrounds as well as communities, known for dining and shopping and entertainment.  But where do their materials and products come from?  And where do they go when spent?

Much of what we consume or produce flows in--and then flows out--by rail.  Many of the city's raw or finished materials arrive by, depart by, or are manufactured along the rail lines.  And it is along these channels  that the city's refuse is banished, its scraps, its offal, its depleted, unwanted, and unused.

The rail lines betwween Los Angeles and Anaheim are weirdly beautiful.  They are lined with rail yards and factories and power plants.  Oil derricks nod in hypnotic rhythms as they pump the dark gold many Angelenos have long forgotten, though it continues to flow deep underground.

Glittering rubbish heaps tower stories high, gleaming like treasure hoards.

There are flat yards of *things*, of *stuff*, dozens, sometimes hundreds of them.  Armies of yellow school buses, herds of city trash trucks huddled like an armada of giant green armadillos, batallions of pallets, of flatbeds, of truck cabs, of oil drums, all aligned and stacked in fantastic arrangements like the blocks of a giant child.

There are lonely expanses under overpasses where L.A.'s mobsters might--might--quietly dump bodies which are then quietly recovered by the city's law enforcement ...

The  Surfliner South promises sea views, and along its southern leg delivers them.  But between L.A. and Anaheim the only view is of "the between," that inland industrial corridor where seemingly everything is made and mobilized and then
destroyed.

In this sleek and airbrushed digital age, we forget to some degree the gritty and sooty forums in which things are wrought with sweat, with tremendous exertion.  Traveling through "the between," a land ornamented with graffiti by the alienated, and the glimmer of broken glass, we are reminded with the force of a gut punch how things, even peoples, are made and mobilized and then cast aside ...

To read all of Leslie's blog posts, visit her Goodreads blog:

http://www.goodreads.com/author/show/7182708.Leslie_Le_Mon/blog