Hadley Meares

Today there are approximately 38,000 McDonald’s, 8,500 Taco Bells, and 3,100 Carl’s Jrs. And they all started here in Greater L.A.

The L.A. Observer finally gets the Los Angeles retrospective he deserves.

As Los Angeles boomed in the 20th century, more and more workers needed places to stay. Residential hotels sprung up — often offering bare bone rooms which still exist today.

Sex and the studios were once a dangerous pair.

The eatery known for being one of the hottest spots in town shut down at the height of the pandemic, but made its return in 2023.

It was home to the first Academy banquet, the fourth awards ceremony — and, legend has it, where the Oscar statuette was first sketched on a napkin.

LAist's new podcast LA Made: Blood Sweat & Rockets explores the history of Pasadena's Jet Propulsion Lab, co-founder Jack Parsons' interest in the occult and the creepy local lore of Devil's Gate Dam.

Baldwin Hills communities began with an Olympic village in 1932 and later became home to affluent Black families in L.A. It is now facing changing demographics and gentrification.

Never before or since has the simmering resentment between workers and employers boiled over the way it did that day.

After her neighborhood was bisected by a railroad, she placed a railroad tie and a steel bar on a newly laid section of track, hoping to derail an express train. She tied a note to it demanding $10,000.

The former talent agent had a vision. "Everyone was stoned and had the munchies so he was always warmly greeted," his son says.

Here, in a paper-thin egg roll wrapper, is the tension at the heart of culture, cuisine and commerce in the U.S.