Willie Nelson, beardless and braidless, at the Palomino in 1970. Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images at LA Magazine's website Before everyone forgets that LA's music lore includes North Hollywood, Los ...

Every so often somebody asks about the corroding civil defense sirens up on poles scattered all over Los Angeles. Well, Dennis Hanley knows all about them. They were air raid sirens first installed ...

With Ayn Rand in the media conversation around Paul Ryan and the Republican convention, here's a look at the home that Rand used to occupy in Northridge. And what a house it was — if it still existed, ...

Claud Beelman was one of those Los Angeles architects whose work spanned eras and dramatic changes in style. He encompassed noteworthy LA examples as different as the Eastern Columbia building ...

Helen Ly / viewfromaloft Downtown chronicler Ed Fuentes blogs at View from a Loft that the sign for Gorky's Russian cafe still hangs over the corner of 8th and San Julian streets. It's kind of like ...

KTLA was the first Los Angeles television station to deploy a news helicopter. It made Channel 5 the place for breaking news until the other stations wised up. This clip shows the news copter being ...

Sandstone Retreat was a clothing-optional refuge in Topanga Canyon that began in the late 1960s and survived efforts by the county to shut it down. John Williamson opened the retreat with his wife, ...

What is it about non-Angelenos becoming so obsessed with old filming locations that they spend years tracking down obscure shots and facts — then write books about their discoveries that become ...

Read the memo: LA Times hires again Read the memo: LA Times losing big on search traffic Gustavo Arellano, many others join LA Times staff Here's who the LA Times has newly hired* New seasons of SoCal ...

He says the paper's newsroom and offices will move to a new "campus" he is building out on property Soon-Shiong owns in El Segundo, the small South Bay city adjacent to LAX and LA's giant Hyperion ...

Walking through 4,000 photographs with Annie Leibovitz Read the memo: LA Times hires again Olde-time L.A. journalism Rorschach and Rashomon on the Washington Mall Read the memo: LA Times losing big on ...

Our occasional roundup of news, notes and chatter. Between posts you can keep up with LA Observed on Twitter — now with 24,858 followers. Top of the news The cleanup in Montecito from the deadly storm ...