The mailbox in front of 10612 Baird Avenue in Northridge is embedded in what looks to be authentic arm from a Bob's Big Boy statue, of which there used to be several around the Valley. Hat tip to the blog...

Secession only received 50% of the vote in the Valley, not the overwhleming support that a Republican candidate now claims.

The last used hardcover bookstore west of the 405 (say the owners) is closing soon. Jerry and Rose Blaz opened The BOOKie Joint in 1975 in the heart of Reseda at 7248 Reseda Boulevard. He talks about the store at...

The good news is an innovative program to catch stormwater near Sun Valley Park and store it in aquifers for later use. The bad news is a quote that confirms how late it all is.

Do you love the modern-era homes in the San Fernando Valley? Want to see inside some of the most notable examples of mid-century architecture? The Los Angeles Conservancy's modernism committee has arranged to have six homes open, with docents on...

There is a Museum of the San Fernando Valley, located on the Burbank Boulevard side of Valley College. It's small, but at least it's something. The museum is not usually open on weekends, but there is an open house this...

The former site of Valley Receiving Hospital will become a college and seminary.

The 6th annual Valley Film Festival runs starting tonight at the El Portal Theatre in North Hollywood.

Lakeside Country Club, the famed Toluca Lake hangout of Bob Hope and Bing Crosby in their day, only allows men to become members, according to a lawsuit filed by disgruntled member Reginald Lee and his wife, Jennifer Merkel. Lee has...

Saturday's New York Times covers the Valley restaurant robbery spree and adds some details I hadn't picked up on before. There's a rumor on the street that the "ski mask bandits" are ex-cops, says Valley Inn owner Sophia Brodetsky: “They...

The U.S. post office at 7320 Reseda Boulevard is being named the Coach John Wooden Post Office, under a bill sponsored by Rep. Brad Sherman and signed today by President Bush. Wooden, the former UCLA basketball coach, lives in Encino...

I enjoyed Saturday's cloudy skies and twenty-plus degree dip on the thermometer sitting in the backyard of the Northridge home where I grew up. Conversation was difficult, though, due to the continual roar of war planes overhead. These weren't the...

Red-light cameras will be installed at a dozen intersections along the Orange Line. Since the Valley Busway debuted last October, most of the sixteen crashes involving Orange Line buses have been due to inattentive drivers running red lights, the MTA...

Cupid's, the unofficial hot dog of The Valley Observed, is celebrating sixty years in the San Fernando Valley on Saturday, June 17. All hot dogs will cost sixty cents, instead of the still-reasonable two bucks, at the last remaining original...

The weekly Encino Sun debuts June 24. It's the latest from the publishers of the Studio City Sun (which began in 2002) and the Sherman Oaks Sun (2004). In Encino, says the press release, they plan to distribute 18,000 copies...

Today's Los Angeles Times notes the passing of Linda Menary, who ran the ramshackle barnyard petting zoo and pony ride called The Farm that has been at Tampa Avenue and Lanark Street in Reseda for about four decades. She died...

From the Sunday papers: ♦ In a Daily News feature piece on how being a lowrider saved Abel Perez's life, some memories of Cruise Night: On Wednesday nights, they'd cruise Van Nuys Boulevard, mingling with the hot-rod guys, the surfers...

When the porn company began to shoot on Hayvenhurst Avenue on Easter Sunday, there wasn't much the Encino neighbors could do but complain. The crew had the proper filming permits, and the city doesn't get any say on the content...

Half of the homes sold in the San Fernando Valley in March fetched more than the median, and half sold for less. It's the highest median for the Valley on record, a 17% increase over last March. Yet, as the...

Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa and developer J.H. Snyder won't discuss details yet, but they are talking up plans to reinvent and expand the Valley Plaza shooping center around Victory and Laurel Canyon in North Hollywood. A new Macy's department...

Can't believe I mentioned this at LA Observed a while back, but neglected to link it here. "The Colbert Report" on Comedy Central devoted a segment to informing viewers about the San Fernando Valley, and especially its 27th congressional district....

Los Angeles' redevelopment authority plans to reinvent the 1959 Canoga Park branch library at 7260 Owensmouth Avenue—a city historic-cultural landmark—as an upscale restaurant. The agency paid $1.1 million for the property last year, hoping that a restraurant near the restored...

Valley boosters are hoping to stage a half-marathon along the Orange Line route to mark the anniversary of the busway between North Hollywood and Woodland Hills. Today's Daily News says it would be held October 29, supported by Assemblyman Lloyd...

The MTA now says it will spend $3.6 million to renovate the old Lankershim train depot in North Hollywood, possibly as a customer service center. But the agency won't say where the depot at Chandler and Lankershim boulevards will end...

The blog Here in Van Nuys turns its gaze east to North Hollywood to point out the creeping destruction of a neighborhood of older, Spanish-style homes where actresses Carol Burnett and Agnes Moorhead once lived. The photo stream at Flickr...

The cover of the Studio City Sun features the impending closure of longtime bookstore Dutton's. Davis Dutton, whose parents opened on Laurel Canyon Boulevard in 1960, met his wife Judy in the library at North Hollywood High. Once the final...

Novelist and author Luis J. Rodriguez has a blog and posts this week about the fourth anniversary celebration at his Tia Chucha's Cafe Cultural in Sylmar. He started the cafe with his wife, Trini, and brother-in-law Enrique Sanchez. I want...

The Craigslist posting says that everything must go "including shelves, racks, display cases, counters. We're trying to make some money so please feel free to come in and make offers." The cover of the Studio City Sun says the store...

Mayor Villaraigosa, City Council member Wendy Greuel and a bevy of media traipsed out to Reseda and Rinaldi this afternoon for the unveiling of a high-tech traffic control system on major streets along the 118 or Ronald Reagan Freeway. Lights...

C. Frederick Wehba II, vice-chairman of the Bentley-Forbes real estate investment firm, blogs that the San Fernando Valley is nearing capacity. He basically agrees with a story in the Daily News (no longer online) that says the office and industrial...

Clocks at Olive View hospital in Sylmar stopped at 6:01 am on Feb. 9, 1971. That's when the Valley was shaken awake by a 6.6-magnitude earthquake that began under the mountains behind Sylmar. When the shaking stopped sixty seconds later,...

America's Suburb.com is now known as The Valley Observed. It's now a blog too, and that makes it a cousin of the other website about Los Angeles that I publish, LA Observed. The two blogs are similar and yet distinct,...

The friendly landmark on Laurel Canyon is shutting down. I posted this at LA Observed: The Dutton's in North Hollywood is in the midst of a clearance sale and will be gone by mid-March, Davis Dutton tells Daily News columnist...

In the 1980 film Foxes, Cherie Currie made her movie debut opposite Jodie Foster as a tough Valley teenager with a soft side who gets in trouble with drugs over the hill in the Hollywood club scene. In real life...

Efforts to preserve the old Lankershim rail depot (commented on a few entries below) were the subject of a story in the Feb. 17 L.A. Times. The station used by Southern Pacific trains and Pacific Electric "Red Cars" is called...

The Valley's last beloved Chris' & Pitt's barbecue closed in 2003. The old place at 13237 Victory Boulevard near Fulton in Van Nuys was torn down for a new Walgreens drug store. The demolition brought howls of protest from...

It was fitting when Boeing bought Rocketdyne in 1996. Both company names had been part of the Valley's history. A Boeing plant had been located at the original Burbank Airport, called United Airport in 1930. Rocketdyne has been in the...

It will cost $2 million to save and restore the old Lankershim train depot, the MTA in Los Angeles says. Built in 1895, the wooden structure at Chandler and Lankershim boulevards served the Southern Pacific railroad and the old Pacific...

I don't know how it happened, but we're all happy about it anyway: America's Suburb.com was selected as the Good Housekeeping site of the day for Aug. 22, 2005. The magazine's nod came with a nice little bump in visitor...

One Six Right, the documentary about Van Nuys Airport that was mentioned here before, is getting a week-long theatrical release in Los Angeles August 12-18, 2005. It will screen at 2 p.m. each day at the Laemmle Grande 4-Plex on...

Turns out that comedian Bob Hope was not buried in the main cemetery out back of Mission San Fernando Rey. Instead of sharing the same grounds as Ritchie Valens, William Frawley and Chuck Connors, the longtime Valley resident has been...

Early accounts of life in the Valley reported that both grizzlies and black bears were commonly spotted lurking in the grass on the plain. It's not surprising. Runs of steelhead swam up the Los Angeles River then, and wild berries...

The May 15, 2005 edition of the New York Times Magazine took a detailed look at the Granada Hills neighborhood developed by Joseph Eichler in the 1960s. The tract west of Balboa Boulevard is being considered for protection under the...

In 1964 the theater-in-the-round debuted on Ventura Voulevard with high hopes for elevating the culture of the Valley. A staging of The Sound of Music opened the doors, but before the decade was out, rock shows and boxing matches were...

Efforts to give official historic status to the original residential blocks of Van Nuys are the subject of a feature story by Dana Bartholomew in The Daily News. Some homeowners are asking City Hall to create the Valley's first Historic...

The circa-1932 miniature of the downtown Los Angeles City Hall is undergoing repairs and restoration. A Daily News feature on the project says the building should reopen in the spring of 2005. The photo ran with the story....

The former Southern Pacific Railroad station at Chandler and Lankershim boulevards is one of the last true relics of the 19th century San Fernando Valley. Built in 1895, it is reputed to be the oldest structure in North Hollywood....

Nice mention of America's Suburb.com and the ValleyBlog in the April 11-24 (2005) issue of the San Fernando Valley Business Journal. Reporter Jeff Weiss writes, "When it was reported that there were bloggers in Baghdad, you knew it was only...