This volume presents a pictorial history of Los Angeles hotels downtown, in Hollywood, and along the Wilshire Boulevard corridor from the late 19th through the mid-20th centuries. By the early 1900s, many hotels, including luxury ones, had been established in downtown Los Angeles to cater to business travelers and tourists. In the late 19th century, after the arrival of the Southern Pacific Railroad, hotels were built to encourage tourism and sell real estate in the agricultural Hollywood area. And with the growth of the motion picture studios in the early decades of the 20th century, grander hotels were erected to accommodate the new industry. As the city expanded westward, luxury and residential hotels were also placed in the Westlake District and along the fashionable Wilshire Boulevard corridor connecting to Beverly Hills.
Ruth Wallach, Linda McCann, Dace Taube, Claude Zachary, and Curtis C. Roseman are a team of authors affiliated with the University of Southern California and the Los Angeles Public Library. They have selected images from the extensive photographic archives at these institutions to illustrate the role of hotels in the growth and transformation of the urban fabric of the Los Angeles area.