The Real "Los Angeles 2013"

Side-by-side comparison of Syd Mead's 1988 illustration of 2013 Downtown Los Angeles, and the real-life photo of March 2013 DTLA, looking west along 1st Street at San Pedro Street in Little Tokyo. No super-tall towers to dwarf the stately City Hall, nor split-level streets (Whatup with that?!), but we do have the "Death Star" Caltrans building and zebra crosswalks.

The whole local Intwerwebz lit up last week when the Los Angeles Times decided to open their published time capsule from April 3, 1988 of the Los Angeles Times Magazine article on what the city would be like in 25 years -- That is, 2013.

The Militant, still a teenager, actually remembers reading that article with eager curiosity, and marveled at the supertall towers and rail transit tubes that may or may not be common sights in Downtown Los Angeles. But all this talk about robots was pretty awesome stuff. Man, the future. That was pretty rad.

Because back in '88, The Militant was listening to music like this:


PURE ENERGY!

It was a bold new future, a brave new world.

But 25 years later, we read the article with much amusement. Predicting the future will always turn out both correct and incorrect. Take, for example, the city of Detroit, which has been victim of urban decay and corruption in local government, but still lacks a cybernetic officer in its police force.

There are lots of variables. For no one in '88 could predict, say, the Rodney King incident and the subsequent 1992 Riots. Or the 1994 Northridge Earthquake. Or the NFL moving out. Or the Lakers and Kings moving Downtown. Or 9/11. Or climate change. Or the demise of the Los Angeles Times Magazine. Or blogs. Or social media. Or CicLAvia. Or the fact that the Dodgers only garnered one World Series championship since then. Or...(Okay, the Militant will stop).

The Militant went through the article and noted down some of the innovations listed in writer Nicole Yorkin's fictional account of a day in the life of the Morrow family of Granada Hills.

The Militant has each of those "innovations" listed under three ratings: "Yes," "No" and "Sorta" when it comes to how prescient it was.

Mandatory staggered work plan (Sorta) - Back when Los Angeles was a more white collar town, working 9-to-5, so to speak, this was talked about back in the day as a way to mitigate traffic. But in a more service-based workforce, there are people working around the clock.

Computer printer printing out news (No)  - The Militant knew years ago news would be computerized, but more like the home-printed version in the article than the wireless, mobile digital form we enjoy today.And man, what a waste of paper!

Domestic Robots (No) - Cylindrical vacuum cleaners aside, no, there are no domestic robots in 2013. We're still a far way from the Jetsons Era, and such robots will remain to be limited in the science fiction film realm. Though if you could tell the people back in 1988 that there will be a Star Wars VII sequel coming out in two years, their minds would be blown.

Home Gym (Sorta) - Many people own their own workout equipment, especially computerized treadmills, that give you accurate counts of calories burned and whatnot. They don't (yet) function like personal trainers, and people in 2013 still go to the gym (The Militant doesn't, he has his bike...)

"Los Angeles-based multinational Corporation" (No) - The world in 1988 had a feeling that Japan owned everything and Los Angeles, across the pond from Japan, would be the financial center of this side of the Pacific Rim...since then, the big overseas capitalist power went to China (ironically, a communist country) and the Fortune 500 companies based in Los Angeles either merged with other companies based elsewhere or just moved out.

India cigarettes (No) - Though India is the 2nd-largest tobacco producing country in the world (595,000 tons annually as of 2000), it's far surpassed by China, which produces 2.3 million tons per year. Unlike coffee or tea, the origins of tobacco products is largely unknown to most consumers.

Denturinse (No) - With modern tootbrushes boasting advanced forms of bristle arrangements, and even some disposable models being battery-powered, ain't no way a rinse product is gonna clean yo teefs.

Video intercom (Yes) - Skype. FaceTime. Need we say more? Although we use these over long distances. Within the household, people just send texts...

Robo-pets (No) - Y'all blew your chances 15 years ago with the Tamagochi.

Nutrition plan (No) - Our kitchens still don't automatically provide these to us. Actually, with so much GMO food, would we really want that?

Plastic key-card (Sorta) - The protagonist in the 2013 story opens and runs his car with a plastic key-card. Though such things are mainstream in hotel rooms, they're not used in automobiles, especially since the whole wireless thing blew that usefulness out of the water.

Electronic map system (Yes) - Yes. Or more like GP-yes.

Commutes 3x long (No) - You complain about the traffic, yet don't even know it's not as bad as we all thought it would be. The average freeway trip forecasted for 2013 in the article was 47 minutes. In the real 2013 its around 29 minutes, only twice the 15 minute commute from the 1980s. Of course, though the article predicted Metro Rail (which was two years into construction at the time of writing), it didn't predict things like Metrolink, rapid buses, bicycle commutes or the recession, all of which reduced the number of automobiles on our freeways.

Automobile Trains with Inductive Couplers (No) - Oh no, that's kinda wacky. We're just getting used to those ExpressLanes with those fancy transponders.

Computer pen pals (Yes) - It's called Facebook, anyone?

Future Rock (No) - The big music wave in the 2013 Grammy Awards was folk music. Rock has gone retro for quite a while. And no, dubstep doesn't count.

Christa McAuliffe Elementary School (No) - With the space shuttle Challenger disaster still fresh in the minds back then, this was an inevitable assumption. But though the perished space-bound teacher was immortalized in other school districts, the LAUSD has yet to honor her (Not surprised...)/

Pilot program schools with scale down size, community-based operation (Yes) - They call them charter schools.

Smart Cards, Fiber optics and artificial intelligence in schools (No) - Are you kidding? the LAUSD is far too concerned with dumbing-down education via their obsession with standardized testing to invest in any of that.

Large Screen Displays (Yes) - Though not necessarily in LAUSD schools, colleges do have video projection and large LCD monitors at their disposal.

Toy Ultra-Laser (Yes) - One of the kids in the article has his laser confiscated from him. You can, too, if you aim yours at an airplane or a helicopter.

Telecommuting (Yes) - Though not nearly as widespread, telecommuting is commonplace enough in the industries that are compatible with it.

Electronic Mail (Yes) - E-mail was around in the 1980s, so it was a technological inevitability. The Militant was even using it, as a member of local bulletin-board systems (BBSes) which people called via their 1200-baud modems. Of course, the article probably didn't predict e-mail spam...

"Condensing and synthesizing information form all over the globe" (Sorta) - One of the characters does this for a living. In the real 2013, we have computers doing this for a living. It's called Google.

 "Flashing his monthly metro rail pass at a uniformed guard" (No) - Guess they couldn't predict TAP cards. Though you still have to show (tap)  yours to uniformed guards every once in a while on trains or stations.

Elevated Track (No) - While some of the Metro Rail lines run on elevated structures, it's not nearly as used as the article predicted, possibly assuming that subway tunnels "wouldn't work in earthquake country." The 1989 Bay Area earthquake and every earthquake in Japan proved that was wrong, and that tunneling was the way to go. Not sure how those Beverly Hills folks think about that, though, if we built an elevated Metro Rail line through their town, they'd scream bloody hell 10 times louder.

Computer Banking  (Yes) - Online banking is totally mainstream in today's world, but video-conferencing with tellers isn't even necessary.

Downtown population (Yes) - Perhaps an inevitability, but yes, tons more people live in DTLA than back in 1988.

Speaking of the Downtown population, it's interesting how this article focused on a family in suburban Granada Hills. Today, it would either be people living closer to the city, say, in Silver Lake or Palms, or farther away in now-suburban communities like Santa Clarita, Rancho Cucamonga (yay Tongva) or Aliso Viejo.

Another interesting thing was that lower-income communities were totally overlooked. Whether they would be eventually gentrified or ceased to exist was galaxies away from the tone and scope of the article. But history has a funny way of working; had it not been for the '92 Riots, and their lasting impact, both positively and negatively, we wouldn't be talking about lower-income communities today. And aside from the (assumed) mixed white-Latino marriage of the Morrow family, we saw little of how  Los Angeles, already a very diverse multicultural metropolis back in '88, would turn out in terms of culture.

So then, what would a day in the life of Los Angeles look like, 25 years from now, in 2038? Of course, knowing what we know now, it all depends where in Los Angeles and who we're focused on.

Red Line 20th Anniversary Contest Winner Announced!

Last week the Metro Red Line celebrated its 20th anniversary serving the subterranean commuters Los Angeles, and The Militant put on a little contest to commemorate it.

Entries were simple: Submit a one-paragraph anecdote on one of your experiences riding the subway.

And today, we have a winner, selected from an anonymous and unspecified panel of judges: Congratulations to Heather Johnson of Koreatown for winning the priceless package of Metro memorabilia!

Here's her entry:

A few years ago when I still worked in downtown LA I commuted via Red Line to the Civic Center station. I was dozing off in my seat when I had a weird feeling that I was being watched. Turns out, I was! A street artist was sketching me. When I got off at my stop, he gave me the sketch for free. It's actually quite a likeness. The sketch is currently on my wall and I keep getting told I should frame it.

Her account could be construed as either sweet or creepy, however you want to view the situation. But it nicely described the forms of human interaction that have only really occurred in the past two decades, something that rarely happens on the bus, and can never happen in a car.

We have some other great stories worth sharing, though!

Being a Clippers season ticket holder, I take the Red Line downtown to every game. Most days I take the Red Line the train is full with blank, tired faces, maybe a couple of conversations happening, nothing spectacular. One day, I invited my friend, who came from out of town, to the game. He had never been on the train before. We get in the train car and there are people getting down. Someone had a boom box blasting some funk and people were dancing. It was a party all the way town to 7th. We get of the train and my friend says "Man it must be fun to ride the train to every game.

-- Sean Baello, Los Feliz

Thanks, Sean. And if we do get to see a Clippers Parade this June, can you tell your fellow Clips Fans (diehard and bandwagon alike) to take the train for that one?

Every May Day protest, riding the red line with protest signs and wearing shirts with specific messaging, I end up having some genuine conversations with folks on the train. Folks ask what the sign are about, why am I protesting, what is May Day etc. and I answer their questions to the best of my capabilities.

More often than not, they'll see me wearing a shirt that reads, I am undocumented. That'll get the conversation started and it give me the opportunity to talk about not being a legal resident of the US, the work I do organizing with the immigrant community and putting a face to the issues folks have with immigration.

By the end of the conversation, folks leave with a little knowledge about what's going and they got to hear it from someone who is personally invested and affected by it.

-- Erick Huerta, Boyle Heights

Dude, Erick...that was more than a paragraph. But hey, a great example of how transit spurs human dialogue. Thanks!

One time, I was riding the Red Line towards Union Station, and a man with a very old and ragged-looking accordion came on. He gave a really good performance, and some people in the car, including myself, applauded him.

-- Joshua Insel, Studio City

Okay, that was shorter than a paragraph. But thanks for sharing, Joshua! BTW, was the accordion player accompanied by a woman carrying a baby and asking change from the rest of the passengers? Those are the first Metro Gypsies! How European...

There are many great experiences I've had riding the Red Line. I remember taking the Red Line with my grandmother for the first time in 2001 and there began my love for riding this train. I’d never been on a vehicle like this before. I had a great view while sitting in the front. I could see the beginning of each tunnel we passed through. I took in my surroundings and was aware of the speed of the train and in awe of the engineering it took to build this train. I saw that some seats were removed to accomodate bicycles. I saw that people from all walks of life came to ride. I met the train operator and ever since then, we would exchange greetings and small talk everytime I rode the train. I’m passionate about the Red Line, because it has impressed me from day one and has been part of my daily ritual. The Red Line has become such an important part of my life because it is the only way I get to explore our great city.

-- Marc Caraan, Burbank

Thanks, Marc! "I saw that some seats were removed to accomodate bicycles. I saw that people from all walks of life came to ride." Next time you see angry people wearing yellow shirts handing out fliers telling people how "racist" the subway is, remind them of what you just said.

And finally, this most honorable of honorable mentions:

Photo provided by Chase White

When waiting on the Red Line, I ran into this gentleman, who I actually had seen before on the bus. It wasn't Halloween. He happily let me take his picture. I asked if he was an emergency room nurse. He said "No, I'm a head nurse."

-- Chase White, Highland Park

Thanks for all your entries! Didn't win? No worries! The Militant will throw more cool contests like this, so stay tuned and STAY MILITANT!

The Last Super: Remembering Super Bowl XXVII

Twenty years ago, Los Angeles not only opened a subway (Don't forget to enter The Militant's Red Line 20th Anniversary Contest by 11:59 p.m. tonight!), but last hosted a Super Bowl.

The venue was Pasadena's Rose  Bowl, seasonal home of the UCLA Bruins football team and annual home of the, well, Rose Bowl game (duuh).

Not only did Super Bowl XXVII have the Dallas Cowboys rout the Buffalo Bills 52-17, but it was the first time The Big Game replaced its usual halftime entertainment of marching bands with the biggest pop/rock stars of the day (or even yesterday). Leave it to the Entertainment Capital of The World to inaugurate a tradition like that.

Gracing the field at halftime back in '93 was the late, great Michael Jackson, who arrived via an unforgettable intro in triplicate, and proceeded to do a lip-synched (Beyonce fans can relax, televised logistics and wayward stadium acoustics are the primary reason for this) medley of some of his biggest hits at the time:


Although Los Angeles has not hosted a Super Bowl since then (nor have we hosted an MLB All-Star Game since 1980 either, hmmph...), we are still the 2nd-most frequent Super Bowl host (Miami and current host New Orleans are tied for #1), having also staged the NFL's championship match in 1987, 1983, 1980, 1977, 1973 and most importantly, the inaugural Super Bowl in 1967.

Considering the big 50th iteration of the Super Bowl is coming up in the not-so-distant future, we may or may not get a chance to host it once again. Maybe by then we'll get an as-yet unspecified team...

As for Superb Owl XLVII, The Militant doesn't really give a crap about the NFL. He just wants to watch commercials, pig out on hot wings and nachos and watch Beyonce bounce around.

Honestly, under any other circumstances, he'd go with the 49ers...BUT, considering the fact that The City By The Frisco Bay won teh World Sereez (grumble grumble...) just four months ago, The Militant does not want to witness any more San Franciscan Gloating, so he's gonna root for the Ravens. Besides, The Militant being a writer, he's gotta give it up to the only NFL team named after literature.

Another SF championship parade? Nevermore!

Militant Contest: Win Some Historical Red Line Swag!

Twenty years ago yesterday, the Metro Red Line first opened. Twenty years ago today, people were still enjoying free rides during opening weekend. Today, The Militant is giving away a bunch of historical Metro Red Line mementos from The Militant Archives!

What You'll Win:

- Original, mint-condition 1993 vintage RTD first-ever Metro Red Line schedule from January 30, 1993

- Metro Red Line information brochure (Published 1989)

- Updated Metro Red Line information brochure (Published 1993)

- Old school 1993 RTD Metro Red Line ticket

- Red Line/MTA refrigerator magnet

- Old school Metro "M" logo stickers!

Cash value: PRICELESS! (You can't find these anywhere anymore!)

How To Enter:

1. You must have ridden the Metro Red Line at least once within the past 20 years (If you still haven't, there is no hope for you).

2. Send an email to militantangeleno@gmail.com with the following:
- Your Name
- City or Los Angeles neighborhood you live in
- A short, one-paragraph story, anecdote or interesting occurrence that happened to you while riding The Red Line.

3. One winner may or may not be chosen at random. Or maybe you have the most interesting story. The Militant hasn't quite decided yet.

4. Submission deadline: 11:59 p.m. PST,  Sunday, February 3, 2013.

The Militant will announce the winner on Monday, February 4 on the MA Blog. He may or may not also publish some of the more interesting stories!

Good luck and Stay Militant!

A Subway's Birthday: Happy 20th, Metro Red Line!

The Metro Red Line on Opening Day, January 30, 1993 (Note the "RTD" banner hanging on top and how shiny the trains were).

January 1993: Elvis appeared on a postage stamp, America inaugurated Bill Clinton as its 42nd president, teens and young adults used pagers to communicate, Michael Jackson performed at Super Bowl XXVII, held at The Rose Bowl. Speaking of the NFL, the Los Angeles Raiders and Rams didn't seem like they were going to go anywhere (both literally and figuratively), Whitney Houston's "I Will Always Love You" was the #1 song and a city long-chided for not having a subway system opened the first 4.4 miles of it to a curious, naive and skeptical public.

January 2013: Michael Jackson, Whitney Houston, pagers and Los Angeles' NFL teams are no longer with us. People can print their own postage stamps on their computers. We have an African American sitting in the Oval Office now, starting his second term (Bill Clinton refuses to be irrelevant, though). And the Little Subway That Could now stretches 17 miles to Koreatown, Hollywood and North Hollywood, connects with four other rapid transit lines, runs 24 hours on New Year's Eve, stays open to 2 a.m. on Fridays and Saturdays and last month logged in a record high 158,830 daily average ridership.

Yes, our Metro Red Line subway turns 20 years old today (Which means anyone who does the "L.A. has a subway?" thing now truly deserves an ass-kicking).

Unfortunately, unlike The Militant's 20-year-old vintage video of the Blue Line's opening he posted in 2010, the video he shot for the Red Line's Opening Day wasn't nearly as ceremonious. Just a bunch of people waiting in line and a few trains passing by. There was a VIP ribbon-cutting event the previous day, and a smaller ceremony that day, with free rides the rest of the weekend.

For those of you who were still in diapers back in '93 (or worse, still in the East Coast/Midwest, etc), The Militant will give you a glimpse of how things were back then. The Red Line only had five stations -- Union Station, Civic Center, Pershing Square, 7th Street/Metro Center and Westlake/Mac Arthur Park. That was it. 4.4 miles.  The ride lasted all but seven minutes. It was only used by the folks Downtown, and that really meant the people that worked Downtown. No one really lived there yet. There were no bars and restaurants and ArtWalks. Could you imagine that?

TAP what? This is an old-school Red Line ticket from '93!

To make up for the 7-minute subterranean adventure, the RTD (Southern California Rapid Transit District, to you youngins/newbies, as Metro was known at the time) set the fare to all but 25 cents. You can connect to the Metro Blue Line, which was just a couple years old, and Metrolink, which was just a couple months old, and had only three lines going to Moorpark, Santa Clarita and Pomona, respectively.

The trippiest thing about the Red Line back then was its schedule: 5 a.m. to 7 p.m.  Ya rly. 7 p.m. Like The Militant said, there wasn't really a DTLA back then. 

The first Metro Red Line schedule, January 1993.

Compared to today's timetable, it really wasn't much! Hopping on board a train (they were clean and shiny back then) at Union Station, you emerged at Mac Arthur Park 7 minutes later to a dredged-up lake across the street. Crews were busy at work building the second segment which would open up in 1996, adding the Wilshire/Vermont, Wilshire/Normandie and Wilshire/Western stations to the line (there was no Purple Line then, and incidentally the Wilshire corridor segment -- which was to be re-reouted along Olympic en route to the Westside thanks to certain politicians, was originally going to be named the "Metro Orange Line"). The 25-cent one-way fare remained in effect until the second segment opened.

How did people react? The Los Angeles Times  wrote articles about how riding in a subway was a strange new paradigm. Many people were leery of being in the tunnels during an earthquake (despite undamaged subways in other earthquake-prone cities like San Francisco, Mexico City and Tokyo) and others thought the whole thing was a $1.4 billion boondoggle and would never go anywhere.

But like the great El DeBarge once said, Time will reveal. A year later, the Northridge Earthquake caused only miniscule cosmetic damage and no structural harm. Within a few months, thousands of Downtown workers suddenly discovered that they were just 25 cents and a couple minutes away from the best pastrami in town, and injected new life into a once-floundering Westlake delicatessen, right across the street from the subway's western terminus. In 1994, The Red Line got its silver screen debut playing a supporting role to Keanu Reeves and Sandra Bullock in the transit porno flick Speed. After the Wilshire segment opened in '96, The Red Line got its real Hollywood premiere in the summer of 1999 with five new stations along Vermont Avenue and Hollywood Boulevard. And a year after that, the subway as designed was finally completed, speeding underneath the Santa Monica Mountains and reaching North Hollywood. People voted for more rail and more subways. Some politicians boasted having a Subway To The Sea as other electeds undid the Wilshire tunneling ban. Park N Ride lots in the Valley became full. The only haters were Libertarians and those yellow-shirted folks who blindly spout their "rail is racist" tirades. But subways are here to stay, yo.

Come 2023, our subway will be 30 years old - and will (hopefully) reach the Westside. Our first subway, the 1-mile trolley bypass tunnel built for the Pacific Electric, itself lasted 30 years. But this time it's for keeps.

If you can, wish our subway a "Happy Birtthday" by riding the Red Line today. It opened up people to new communities and new ways of travel. It even helped open up whole communities itself. It opened up even more possibilities in the city of many possibilities.

Go Metro, it's yo birthday...Happy 20th, Metro Red Line! 

Happy New Year...Where's The Party?

Uh, like, where IS everybody?

Where did you spend your last moments of 2012? At a house party? At a bar? Freezing your ass off on Colorado Boulevard?

The Militant was all set to have a festive New Year's Eve in Downtown Los Angeles last night. After all, there were a plethora of NYE activities in DTLA. He set out at 9 p.m. to take advantage of the free Metro fares until 2 a.m.. Then, he went out to Angels Flight for a couple of one-cent rides for its 111th Birthday, and ended up as the last rider of the year (for two out of the last three years!).

He then walked due north along Hill Street to Grand Park. As you may or may not know, it opened last Summer to much fanfare and soon became a popular gathering spot for CicLAvias, concerts and even election night observing.

So surely they'd have a big New Year's Eve celebration where Angelenos can finally count down the last seconds of the year. Right? RIGHT?

Welp, The Militant got there at about 10:30 p.m. and found the place...empty.

He first thought it was just a classic case of Angelenos showing up late. But as it turned into 11 p.m., he started to get worried. Shouldn't there be like a program or something? Maybe it was a poorly-publicized event. But even then there would be a few people hanging around....there was nada.

Maybe it was a smaller event at another part of the park! He walked due west and went to the court of flags plaza thingy. Maybe they were all there!

Is this some sort of bizarro 'Twilight Zone' episode or what?

Nope.

Okay, maybe it was by the Arthur J. Will Memorial Fountain. Like the fountain would turn all sorts of funky colors at the stroke of midnight and it would shoot out silly string or marshmallows or free tamales or something...

(Notice how the Comic Sans font actually looks good when used in the proper context)

Damn. Whatup with that?!

It was like 11:30 already and The Militant walked over to the bar by The Alexandria Hotel, where he got frisked and was treated to some really awful douchey rap songs from 2005-2008. At the stroke of midnight we were forced to watch a 3-hour old broadcast of an illuminated ball drop some 3,000 miles away. Whoop, whoop.

Okay, folks. Every New Year's Eve we get the same old thing. Time Square Tape Delay, or if we're online, we get shown a slideshow of various cities around the world ushering in the new year, which usually involves an assload of pyrotechnics shooting out from some of its most famous landmarks (Hmmm...imagine if the Hollywood Sign did that. Hey, why the big frown Mr. LAFD Fire Chief?).

So here's the deal. Grand Park Peoples, County Supes and Erryone In Between: In 364 days, please give us Angelenos a public New Year's Eve celebration we so long deserve. And make some fireworks shoot out of City Hall (That...would...be...Bad...Ass). Okay, okay, scratch the City Hall fireworks, we all know the City won't have the budget for that. But give us something on 12/31/13.

Pwetty Pweeze?

If not, The Militant will have his OWN New Year's Eve celebration at Grand Park, AND YOU'RE ALL INVITED!

Happy New Year, and Stay Militant in da Twenny-One-Tray!

Shuttling Down 2012: Event Of The Year

You voted, and The Militant agreed: THE event of 2012 was the return of the Space Shuttle Endeavour to its Southern California birthplace.

Out of 40 Militant Readers, nearly half chose the Endeavour's homecoming journey in September and October of this year. Coming up in second place was the looooong-awaited opening of the Metro Expo Line in April. A distant third was the opening of DTLA's Grand Park, and the sports-related events, namely the Dodgers' acquisition by Guggenheim Baseball Management, and the Kings' Stanley Cup championship, came up 4th and 5th, respectively. Gaining no votes was Dwight Howard's signing to The Lakers, which was sort of included as a joke anyway.

Los Angeles will always have transit line openings, new parks and sports victories, but what we'll never see again in our lifetimes is a big-ass spaceship being shown-off around town. And that's what made the Endeavour THE event of 2012 in Los Angeles. It was a moment that brought Angelenos together, for myriad reasons -- we were all curious, excited, thrilled and behaved. Our homeboy Endeavour brought out the best in us.

It was such a big deal, The Militant forgot about the heavy-ass LACMA Rock that was similarly paraded around in our streets in early 2012!

And the Endeavour's story ain't even done yet! Look forward to 2015 when it'll be reunited with its rocket friends and displayed a la launch style at a new permanent structure at the California ScienCenter.

What will hold for 2013? Only time will tell! Stay tuned for The Militant's projections and predictions for '13!

What Was THE Event of 2012? YOU DECIDE!

Yep, it's that time of the year when we wrap up those times of the year that made this year. Los Angeles had a pretty interesting year, to say the least. Here are some big stories that may or may not have made Twenty-Twelve the year that was:

Kings win the Stanley Cup
It took the Dodgers two years to win a title since arriving in Los Angeles. The Sparks, six. The Galaxy, seven. The Lakers, 12. But the Los Angeles Kings? 45 years of frustration, until this year, when they beat the New Jersey Devils in June to win their very first Stanley Cup. Kings fans, who are the most diehard in all of Los Angeles sportsdom, celebrated joyfully and responsibly. Look ma, no riot! From Disneyland to Dodger Stadium they proudly and rightfully showed off The Cup across the Southland. And with the 2012-2013 NHL season still being in limbo due to the lockout, it looks like we might get to hold on to the Stanley Cup a little bit longer...

Space Shuttle Endeavour returns
The most photographed subject in all of Los Angeles this year was not a celebrity nor a sunset, but the Space Shuttle Endeavour, decommissioned by NASA and making a triumphant return to its Southern California birthplace this past Fall. I wasn't just one event, but three: The playful flight of the shuttle atop a NASA 747 got nearly every one of us looking skyward on September 21; in mid-October, the impromptu parade through Westchester, Inglewood and South Los Angeles drew a million people in simultaneous displays of patriotism, scientific achievement and local pride. And in late October, the shuttle finally went on display at its new home at the California ScienCenter. In a year that saw the loss of the USC-educated Neil Armstrong and San Fernando Valley native Sally Ride,  the shuttle seemingly passed their pioneering astronaut spirit on to all Angelenos.

The opening of Grand Park
Los Angeles finally has its own town square in the opening of Grand Park, which stretches from Los Angeles City Hall to the Music Center in DTLA. Opened in two phases in July and October, the park has already been put to good use as a concert venue, a CicLAvia stopover and a place to watch the results of this year's presidential election. Gee, could we have like a New Year's Eve countdown celebration there sometime?

The Metro Expo Line opens
Rail transit finally reached the Westside for the first time in 60-something years as the newest branch of Metro's rail network had a new set of commuters "Going Metro" for the first time. Kings, Lakers, Clippers, Trojans and concert fans have already seen the wonders of Expo. And the story isn't over yet: By 2016, the Expo Line will become "The Trolley To The Sea" when it finally reaches Santa Monica.

Guggenheim buys the Dodgers
The long nightmare that was the Frank and Jamie McCourt era finally ended this year when Magic Johnson and some of his wealthy friends in the form of Guggenheim Baseball Management got together and made their 2-billion bid to purchase the Los Angeles Dodgers. The organization wasted no time in flexing its financial muscle, doing things like lowering the stadium parking fee to $10, resurrecting the Cool-A-Coo and making some high-profile mid-season acquisitions on the roster. If only the team's physical muscle were as strong...But hey, at least no more McCourt!

Dwight Howard joins the Lakers
Lakers diehards have talked about getting him for a while, and this year we finally landed Superman Iron Man. And okay, so he hasn't really done much this season aside from being a glorified (and expensive) cheerleader for the Purple & Gold, but he will be the face of the franchise following Kobe's inevitable retirement.

You as a reader of The Militant's blog has the opportunity to vote on which one of these was the Los Angeles event of 2012. Just select it on the upper right side of This Here Blog and vote! Polls are open from now until 11:59 p.m., Sunday, December 30, 2012 (That's New Year's Eve Eve!).

The Militant may or may not have missed some other important events this year...if you think there were some more he should have added to the list, feel free to list them in the comments!

Dia de los Muertos 2012: The Militant Visits the Dead at Hollywood Forever Cemetery

Everyone knows Los Angeles is home of some of the most famous people alive, but it's also home to the most famous people in the afterlife! For the past few years on this date, The Militant has made it a tradition to pay his respects to some famous (and infamous) Angelenos who make this City their eternal resting place.

Back in 2010, The Militant made a visit to Holy Cross Cemetery in Culver city. Last year, he visited Inglewood Park Cemetery, walking along through dimly-lit mausoleums just to bring you a blog post.

This year, he takes you to Hollywood.

Though it's popularly known as a hipster outdoor movie palace, or a place to see concerts, Hollywood Forever Cemetery, originally Hollywood Memorial Park, is one of Los Angeles' most historic and storied graveyards. It was founded in 1899 by early Angeleno developers Isaac Lankershim and Isaac N. Van Nuys (yes, those guys...Interestingly they were interred at the Eastside's Evergreen Cemetery).

It was then sold to Jules Roth, a known felon and racist, who forbade Gone With The Wind actress Hattie McDaniel from being buried there, as per her wishes. In the 1980s, Roth sold the front lawn properties of the cemetery fronting Santa Monica Blvd to a minimall developer to settle taxes. Local girl and Go-Gos singer Belinda Carlisle once called it "The worst thing to happen to Hollywood." The shady-ass old mofo finally croaked in 1998, prompting the sale of the cemetery to the Missouri-based Cassity Brothers for $375,000, and re-named and re-marketed the memorial park as "Hollywood Forever."

Its proximity not only to Hollywood, but to Paramount Studios helped make it a final production wrap for some of Hollywood's elite, such as filmmaker Cecil B. DeMille, but it's also the resting place of historical Angelenos, most notably Col. Griffith J. Griffith, who donated Griffith Park to the City in 1896. Early Hollywood pioneers Cornelius Cole, Hobart Whitley and Harvey Wilcox are also interred here, as well as Los Angeles Times founder Harrison Gray Otis (a.k.a. The Pointing Guy at MacArthur Park).

Griffith Griffith's grave.

Greatest. Epitaph. Evar.

Valentino.

Johnny Ramone rocks on for all eternity here.

There's also long-standing legends that the cemetery may or may not be haunted.  Guess you'll have to find out for yourself...Happy Dia de los Muertos from Hollywood!

Happy (West) Hollyween!

Last year, The Militant, dressed in full camo garb, went out in public for what may or may not be the first time during the Halloween festivities on Hollywood Blvd. But for several years, THE party has been a couple miles west, along Santa Monica Blvd for West Hollywood's annual Halloween Parade, where hundreds of thousands of folks turn the street from Doheny to La Cienega into a huge public space for the costumed.

This was the Militant's first time, mainly kept away by the traffic snarls. He was considering riding his bike there, but the cold weather was sort of a deterrent as well. But this time he rode an unspecified Metro Local bus west and walked a few blocks to the festivities. Easy as pie, and no need for parking hassles!

There were concerts on a few stages, oodles of food trucks, and restaurants and bars along the street that bled into the mayhem. This year there were suprisingly lots of Pokemon-related costumes, a good number of Dedmau5es (or is that Dedmic3?), astronauts (must be Endeavour-mania), the usual ghouls and superheroes, Star Wars, Gangnam Style and sexy maids (in both hot chick and drag varieties).

The Militant had a fun time, though someone asked him, "Are you the Taliban?" The Militant didn't know how to answer that question. Perhaps it was a golden opportunity to educate someone about his blog. The Militant just let is pass, though it kinda bothered him a bit.

Go Go Power Ranger!

What did the Tardis say to the Robot? Oh never mind.

Omit Romney, heh heh.

Wonder if Omit Romney tried to convince this guy.

This guy may or may not be dressed as a Metro bus driver.

Dedmic3!

Dunno what tis is supposed to be, but it's kinda cool.