Laurel Canyon is a canyon neighborhood of Los Angeles, California. It was first settled in the 1920s, and became a part of the city of Los Angeles in 1923 (prior to then, it was an unincorporated part of Los Angeles County).[1]
Much like Topanga Canyon, community life is focused on its central thoroughfare, Laurel Canyon Boulevard. Unlike other nearby canyon neighborhoods, Laurel Canyon has houses lining one side of the main street most of the way up to Mulholland Drive. There are many side roads that branch off the main canyon, but most of them are not through streets, reinforcing the self-contained nature of the neighborhood. Some of the main side streets are Mount Olympus, Kirkwood, Wonderland, Willow Glen, and Lookout Mountain Avenue. The zip code for at least part of the neighborhood is 90046.
Laurel Canyon is an important transit corridor between West Hollywood and the San Fernando Valley, specifically Studio City. The division between the two can roughly be defined by the intersection of Laurel Canyon and Mulholland Drive. In early 2005, the first section of the road on the Hollywood side was partially washed away in a heavy rainstorm, and traffic was redirected to a normally quiet residential side street.
Between 1912 and 1918, a trackless electric trolley ran up the canyon from Sunset Boulevard to the top of Lookout Mountain Road.
Among the famous places in Laurel Canyon are the log cabin house once-owned by silent film star Tom Mix that later became home to the Zappa clan, and another (directly across the street) that legendary magician Harry Houdini may or may not have lived in.
Laurel Canyon found itself a nexus of counterculture activity and attitudes in the 1960s, becoming famous as home to many of L.A.'s top rock musicians, such as Frank Zappa, The Byrds, Buffalo Springfield, and Love. Joni Mitchell, living in the home in the Canyon that was immortalized in the song, "Our House", written by her then-lover, Graham Nash, would use the area and its denizens as inspiration for her third album, Ladies of the Canyon. The bohemian spirit from that time period endures to this day, and every year residents gather for a group photograph at the country market.
Poster of the film Laurel Canyon (2002)
Laurel Canyon has been mentioned in many films and novels of Los Angeles, including Laurel Canyon written and directed by Lisa Cholodenko in 2002, and is the subject of a book by Michael Walker, Laurel Canyon: The Inside Story of Rock and Roll's Legendary Neighborhood, published by Faber and Faber in May 2006.
Laurel Canyon was also prominently featured in the 2003 film Wonderland, which chronicled the 1981 Wonderland Murders that occurred at 8763 Wonderland Avenue in the Canyon, and involved porn star John C. Holmes and reputed gangster Eddie Nash. The Wonderland Massacre has been described as one of the bloodiest mass murders in California history.
Literary references
The short story "—And He Built a Crooked House" by Robert Heinlein mentions an address on Lookout Mountain Ave. as the residence of the mad architect Quintus Teal. In real life, that address, #8775, was the residence of Mr. & Mrs. C. M. Kornbluth and later of Mr. & Mrs. Robert Heinlein. The story wasn't about Laurel Canyon or Lookout Mountain, but was a mathematical fantasy which was republished in 6xH (original title The Unpleasant Profession of Jonathan Hoag) and in the four volume collection Fantasia Mathematica, edited by Clifton Fadiman.
Marilyn Manson, 1997-2004 (residence is on Appian Way at the famed 'Mary Astor House', built in the 1920s as a 'Hills hideaway for actress Mary Astor, who used the home secretly for her romantic trysts with studio execs and other notables; Marilyn Manson wrote the entire Mechanical Animals album at this house, and much of it was recorded at 'The White Room'--Manson's home recording studio in his pool house)
The Rolling Stones, 1970s (interestingly, The Rolling Stones occupied the same house mentioned above, the 'Mary Astor House' in which Marilyn Manson lives today; their film, Cocksucker Blues was filmed here)
Denny Doherty, 1960s (also lived in the Mary Astor house on Appian Way)
Michael Walker, Laurel Canyon: The Inside Story of Rock ?n? Roll?s Legendary Neighborhood, Farrar Straus and Giroux (16 May, 2006), hardcover, 277 pages, ISBN 0571-21149-6 trade paperback (May 1, 2007) ISBN 0865479666
External links
www.laurelcanyonthebook.com website for Laurel Canyon: The Inside Story of Rock and Roll?s Legendary Neighborhood, by Michael Walker, published by Faber & Faber/Farrar Straus and Giroux, 2006
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