July 7th at 7:00pm. Ken Bernstein, the City Planner for the City of Los Angeles and a national advocate for historic preservation shares how Los Angeles has led the nation in historic preservation and shares how other cities can do the same.

Los Angeles has an image as the “City of the Future”―a city always at the cutting edge of change―but also as a “throwaway metropolis” that cares little about its history or architectural legacy. Yet the reality is quite different. Over the past decade, the City of Los Angeles has developed one of the most successful historic preservation programs in the nation, culminating with the completion of the nation’s most ambitious citywide survey of historic resources.

*$10 Presentation only  – Members (Pay Below with small Paypal fee)
*$15 Presentation only  – Non Members (Pay Below with small Paypal fee)
$66 Presentation and hardcover book including shipping, Member price (Pay Below with small Paypal fee)
$71 Presentation and hardcover book including shipping, Non-Member price (Pay Below with small Paypal fee)
*After your purchase you will be emailed the special presentation link by 6pm the day before the presentation and by 12pm on the day of the presentation.

Presents

Preserving Los Angeles: How Historic Places Can Transform America’s Cities

by Ken Bernstein

July 7th at 7:00pm

All across the city, historic preservation is now transforming Los Angeles, while also pointing the way to how other cities can use preservation to revitalize their neighborhoods and build community. Preserving Los Angeles: How Historic Places Can Transform America’s Cities, authored by Ken Bernstein, who oversees Los Angeles’ Office of Historic Resources, tells this under-appreciated L.A. story: how historic preservation has been transforming neighborhoods, creating a Downtown renaissance, and guiding the future of the city.

While it is younger than many East Coast cities, Los Angeles has a remarkable collection of architectural resources in all styles, reflecting the legacy of notable architects from the past 150 years. As one of the most diverse cities in the world, Los Angeles is also breaking new ground in its approach to historic preservation, extending beyond the preservation of significant architecture, to also identify and protect the places of social and cultural meaning to all of Los Angeles’s communities. Preserving Los Angelesilluminates a Los Angeles that will surprise even longtime Angelenos―highlighting dozens of lesser-known buildings, neighborhoods, and places in every corner of the city that have been “found” by SurveyLA, the first-ever city-wide survey of Los Angeles’ historic resources. The text is richly illustrated through images by a prominent architectural photographer, Stephen Schafer. Preserving Los Angeles is an authoritative chronicle of Los Angeles’ urban transformation― and a useful guide for citizens and urban practitioners nationally seeking to draw lessons for their own cities.

On Sunday, August 29th at 4:00 you are invited to A Garden Party at the home of June Bilgore, 355 S. Windsor Blvd, Windsor Square. It is our Annual Meeting which usually takes place in June of each year. We had to pass over 2020 because of Covid but we are now back in the swing of things. This will be our first live event since February of 2020. This year our garden party will honor Captain Shannon Paulson of the Wilshire Division Police who, after years of watching over the Hancock Park area will be moving to a higher position within the Los Angeles Police Department. Her successor will also be present to be introduced to the neighborhood.

SUNDAY AUGUST 29, 2021

355 S. WINDSOR BLVD, WINDSOR SQUARE

SOLD OUT

I am happy to announce our special guest speaker will be Alison Martino who created the online community Vintage Los Angeles. Alison has over two million followers daily being delighted by her trivia and nuances on growing up in Los Angeles. Daughter of the late popular singer and actor, Al Martino, Alison has been dubbed the “Godmother Of Los Angeles.” since her father played a prominent role in the movie, The Godfather as singer Johnny Fontane. Alison will be charming us with her colorful memories and interesting tidbits of growing up in the City Of The Angels.

For more information on Alison go to http://alisonmartino.com/

Price includes dinner and refreshments.

Tickets: Member Price $55.             Non-Member price $65.
SOLD OUT

November 10th at 7:00pm. In Saving Radio City Music Hall, published by TurningPointPress, Rosemary Novellino-Mearns reveals how Radio City Music Hall, Art Deco masterpiece and New York City’s premiere tourist attraction for generations, was saved from demolition. After years of struggling with intense, sometimes painful memories, “Rosie” tells the honest, fact-filled, emotionally charged, and often humorous story of how she organized the gargantuan effort to save Radio City Music Hall in the Spring of 1978. Against all odds, and in only four months, she succeeded. Readers will be shocked by the “no good deed goes unpunished” climax of the story in which Rosie reveals her reward for spearheading the movement to save “The Showplace of the Nation.”

*$10 Presentation only  – Members (Pay Below with small Paypal fee)
*$15 Presentation only  – Non Members (Pay Below with small Paypal fee)
Book available through Amazon
*After your purchase you will be emailed the special presentation link by 6pm the day before the presentation and by 12pm on the day of the presentation.

Windsor Square Hancock Park Historical Society

Presents

Saving Radio City Music Hall – A Dancer’s True Story

by Rosemary Novellino-Mearns

November 10th at 7:00pm

A modest but determined young dancer from Glen Rock, New Jersey, Rosemary Novellino joined the Radio City Music Hall Ballet Company, the classical dance counterpart to the world-famous Rockettes, in 1966. After a shaky beginning, she danced with the group for twelve years, eventually becoming its Dance Captain and Assistant to the legendary choreographer Peter Gennaro. In the mid-1970s, questionable behind-the-scenes changes in Music Hall management alarmed hundreds of employees, but no one was prepared for the official announcement in early 1978, that Radio City Music Hall was slated to close that April and be demolished.

Drawing upon formerly untapped inner strengths, Rosemary refused to let this happen. She became President of “The Showpeople’s Committee to Save Radio City Music Hall” and motivated fellow workers, friends, thousands of Radio City fans around the world, New York and national media, cultural leaders and politicians to support the cause. As a result of these efforts, the Art Deco palace was declared a National Historic Landmark. saving not only the building but the jobs and livelihoods of thousands of Music Hall employees on stage and behind the scenes who have entertained millions to this day. This “heartfelt and very personal account of that effort,” says Booklist, “provides a backstage glimpse of the drama that ensued and features a cast of characters that includes performers, politicians, the media, and some very heavy hitters in the world of New York real estate that will delight readers interested in the performing arts and their history in the U.S.”