A Curious Case

I've been a Pasadena resident for almost three years. Before that I lived in Van Nuys for two years and before that I lived in Altadena for a couple of years. (Nothing personal, but my stint in Van Nuys made me eager to get back over to this part of the world ASAP.) I have a total of five years' experience living in the Pasadena/Altadena area. It isn't much, in the grand scheme.

So I love hearing from someone like Case, who recently added comments to my April 14th post about the faded Cinema 21 movie palace on Washington Blvd. :

"I lived in a House right behind this theater back in the 70's," says Case. "The back door exits were in a Deep stairwell that us kids used to drop water balloons into from our yard. Sometime a frisbee or ball would go into the dimly lit well, and we would have to be brave to retrieve it, as we were sure it was Haunted !"

Here's a shot of that stairwell for you, Case.

"The inside of the Theatre was Art Deco," Case continues, "with lots of Gold Gilting on Purple Velvet. Paisleys were everywhere ! I hear my 1920's Bungalo homestead was torn down about 10 years ago. Anything go up in it's place ? There used to be an old septic tank in the backyard that made a Beautiful Lemmon tree put out football sized fruit. Or at least it seemed that way to a 10 year old !"

As a little bonus today I have one shot of the lot behind the building. The stairwell pictured above is directly beneath the fire escapes seen in the photo below. If Case could drop water balloons into the stairwell from his back yard, it looks like nothing's gone up to replace that 1920's bungalow. Seems a shame. Why tear something down only to leave a vacant lot?

Now I wonder: what's all that lumber lying around by the stairwell?