Foster's Freeze In Hawthorne

[pixletwin]

So I am here in L.A. for the week and thought I'd visit Hawthorne to see the BB monuments. Can anyone recommend a good route to get from Disneyland to hawthorne, without having to go through Compton?

Muchas Gracias.

 

[Joshilyn Hoisington]

Compton is not a big deal if you go during the day.  I am a smallish white guy and I've driven through it many times without incident.

From Disneyland, I would imagine your best bet would be to get on the 5 going north and get on the 91 west (it comes up pretty quick once you get on the 5 by Disney) which will meet up with the 405 north (or they might call it west there) in approximately Torrance.  You can take that up to the Hawthorne Blvd exit.  No Compton.

I want to make it clear though, there's plenty of gang activity in Compton, but there's big gangs almost everywhere in the world.  Stay on the beaten track and don't make a fool of yourself and there's nothing to fear beyond what you'd fear anywhere.  I'm tired of these very interesting areas of LA getting a worse rep than they deserve.

I'm not trying to make this a personal thing, just a PSA or something.  Check out the neat "gumdrop" trees that line the median of La Brea through Inglewood, it's straight out of Mario Brothers or something.

[Aegir]

Doesn't Hawthorne have alot of gang problems, too? I remember hearing some gang graffitied the Beach Boys monument because it was on their "turf".

[cwalter]

What a coincidence---I'll be at Disneyland with the family from Saturday through Wednesday. On either Monday or Tuesday I'll be making my second trip out to the monument. The route I took last year worked quite well:

Hwy 5 North from Disneyland
605 South/West from the 5
605 to 105 West (Century Freeway)

The Century Freeway was the road that plowed right through the Wilson home so it gets you there directly. Just make sure to get off on Hawthorne Blvd, and cross the freeway going south. Parts of 119th are on both sides of the freeway and I made the mistake of searching out the parts on the other side last year before figuring it out.

This year, I'll also be visiting Hawthorne High, Pann's, The Wich Stand and Mike Love's old house at the intersection of Mt. Vernon and Fairway. If I have time I'll make a run out to the beach.

It's true that Hawthorne isn't a great area...so keep your eyes open and stay close to your car. You shouldn't have any trouble.

Have a great time!

[Joshilyn Hoisington]

How did this exploratory adventure go?

[pixletwin]

ha ha. Just got back today from Cali. It went well. I took the 405 N. It was really easy to find. I was at the intersection of Hawthorne and 120th st. when the car in front of me burst into flames and as soon as a police car came the fine fellow who was driving it ran away as fast as he could. there was an on-foot police chase and everything.  Quite weird when you have a mental picture of Hawthorne c. 1950's to see where its at today. It is definitely a rough area. But everyone I talked to was really nice and helpful.

I will post pics later for your perusal (yes, I got a picture of the burning car).

[Carrie Marks]

This post title caught my eye because we happened to be in Hawthorne about 3 or 4 weeks ago and David mentioned this when we drove by it....but the Foster Freeze in Hawthorne isn't THE Foster Freeze from back when the Beach Boys hung out there. The original is now a break shop.

[pixletwin]

Man, I feel so ripped off.

j/k 

[cwalter]

Had a great trip to Hawthorne and Ladera Heights (Mt. Vernon & Fairway) on 6/18.

Took pictures of the former Wich Stand, Mike's House, Chips and Pann's coffee shop (original condition Mid-Century Modern coffee shops) and of course the old BB neighborhood. Also went by the former Hawthorne Bowl, Hawthorne High and the Pizza Guys where Brian used to grab some Friday night takeout. Sorry to hear from Carrie that the Foster Freeze isn't in the ORIGINAL building...oh well, the soft serve was still great. Carrie do you know the street address of the original?

[Joshilyn Hoisington]

Feel free to post those pictures...   

[pixletwin]

Feel free to post those pictures...   

Sorry. I will get them up this weekend for sure. I solemnly swear. 

[pixletwin]

OK. So I solemnly swore too soon. I went to my parents to get the pics (on whose digi camera they were taken) and and she had unloaded them on to her computer and the power source died.

I will get the pics up. he he

Sorry. 

[mikee]

Interestingly (but in this case tragically), The Hawthorne Foster’s Freeze is a location of significance in another matter.

Patrick Chavis, a former physician whose medical career was cited by both supporters and opponents of affirmative action as evidence for their case, was killed there on July 23, 2002  at the age of 50.  Apparently he had stopped there to buy an ice cream cone.  As he was entering his car to leave, 3 men attempted to take his car and shot him fatally.  The following excerpted from a Washington Post article with the headline “Doctor at crux of affirmative action debate killed” details his significance:     

Chavis received a degree of fame through the quest of Allan Bakke to gain admission to the medical school at the University of California-Davis in the 1970s. The medical school rejected the application of Bakke, who was white, but accepted five black applicants, including Chavis, who had lower test scores and lower college grades than Bakke. The five won admission under a special racial-preference quota.
Bakke sued. What became a landmark case, Bakke vs. Regents of the Board of the University of California, reached the U.S. Supreme Court, where the school's affirmative action program was struck down in 1978. The court maintained that while an applicant's race could be used as an admissions factor, it could not be the only factor. Bakke was admitted to the school and later graduated, as did Chavis.
There it might all have ended but for the partisans on both sides of the affirmative action issue. By 1995, Bakke was an anesthesiologist in Rochester, Minn., and Chavis was an obstetrician-gynecologist in an inner-city section of Los Angeles where his patients were largely poor women of color.
Nicholas Lemann, in the New York Times Magazine, Tom Hayden, in the Nation magazine, and Sen. Edward Kennedy, a Massachusetts Democrat, speaking before a Senate committee, all called attention to the careers of the two medical school graduates. They pointed out that while Chavis was helping the poor of California, Bakke made his practice among much wealthier, largely white patients in the upper Midwest.
They suggested that the state of California was being repaid much higher dividends on the education it had given the poor California black student than by Bakke.

Then, it all started to go wrong for Chavis. As reported by conservative commentators as well as by such newspapers as The Washington Post and the Boston Globe, Chavis lost his medical license in 1997. He had switched his practice from obstetrics and gynecology to cosmetic surgery, including liposuction, areas in which he met with difficulties and was accused of malpractice.
An administrative law judge found Chavis guilty of gross negligence and incompetence in the treatment of three women, one of whom died, and the California medical board suspended his license, saying he had an "inability to perform some of the most basic duties required of a physician."

[pixletwin]

After driving around Hawthorne I believe it Mikee.

Here are the pics (no pregnant jokes OK? I am going through a Fat Elvis period ) :





There. It was a very interesting day. 

[mikee]

After driving around Hawthorne I believe it Mikee.

I don't want to unduly scare people off but that incident did occur.  I came upon it doing some other research and was struck by the irony.   The area is not really ALL that bad particularily in the daytime and the 119th Street & Kornblum neighborhood is a pretty safe one.  There is no reason not to go there in the daytime but I reccomend not getting lost and wandering around through the adjacent South Central district.  Hawthorne is on the southwest border  of South Central.  if you are lost - drive South or West.

 I live about 30 miles away in Huntington Beach and occasionally drive up there to play the Chester Washington Golf Course just a few blocks directly East of the Landmark.  Sometimes I think of it as the Wilson National C.C. due to my interest in the BB's.  Chester is a historically Black golf course where many famous Black golfers (such as Charlie Sifford, Ted Rhodes, Bill Spillner, & Lee Elder) played while the Wilsons were growing up nearby.  Until 1960 black pros had to play money games to make a living because they were barred from the PGA tour. Chester (known as the Western Ave. course back then) became a big gambling course.  A typical round out there might have $1000 to $10,000 at stake - and that was in 1950's and 1960's dollars!  Today there is still an appealing sense of community there.  It has a nice practice area where long time regulars congregate.  I most enjoy playing with some of the regular characters.  Last time there I went out with a  regular named Chico who with a purely unique homemade swing hits the ball a mile and usually straight.  Chico is both great company and a great competitor.  I always stop by the Landmark afterwords. 
Just south of the Foster's on Hawthorne Blvd. is the location where the Hawthorne Grill (used in the movie Pulp Fiction) sat.  I liked going there but it was closed and got torn down a few years ago.  Over North of the entrance to the Washington golf course, at Crenshaw and Imperial Highway, is a shopping center where Brian had a part-time job as a kid. 
             

[Joshilyn Hoisington]

I think that there could be some real change if there could be a change in the way people look at "bad areas", not just South Central LA, but anywhere.  I would always feel bad if I invited somebody to go the BBs monument with me, or even down for just a drive around, see the forum, the "gumdrop trees", or whatever, and a person wouldn't join me because of "the bad area".  It's that kind of thinking that insures it will remain the way it is.  First of all, it's too bad that the many, many ordinary people who happen to live in these areas have to be involved just because of gangs and violence.  But second, say you and I go grab a bite in a questionable part of Watts...that's two more people that aren't going to pop a cap in somebody than were there before.  If 50 peace loving people went to have lunch there, it would be 50 more than before, you know?

I think it will take somebody with a lot of vision in charge to spur change, but the way to turn torn neighborhoods around is not to avoid them, it's to go there and show people that there are other ways to live their lives than in violence.  By keeping our comfortable distance, I think we're doing society an injustice.

Just my 2c.

Keep it real in Surf City, USA, Mikee.

[pixletwin]

Totally agree. I figured, gang legends be damned and went ahead any had a real nice root beer float. Met a cool guy outside and saw a car explode.