Edendale LA's Lost Bohemian Enclave

 

Once upon a time before there was Hollywood there was a thriving idiosyncratic neighborhood in Los Angeles called Edendale. Edendale hugged the hills along Sunset Blvd. Narrow curved streets followed the contours of the hills abruptly ending and then starting up again when the hills became to steep. In the flatter areas small farms grew vegetables and citrus. Serviced by the Red Car streetcar system Edendale was a short commute to Downtown Los Angeles. It was an idyllic enclave populated by immigrants from the east coast and Europe looking to start a new life in California. Before World War II Edendale was a thriving artist colony and American communist stronghold. It was also because of this attitude and the climate the fledgling movie industry immigrated there at the turn of the century. The silent era was Edendale's film industry's heyday. In 1911 the early film trade magazine gushed over Edendale saying: "Edendale...is a very beautiful suburb of Los Angeles. It is the motion picture center of the Pacific Coast. With clear air and sunshine three hundred days out of the year, conditions are ideal for perfect picture making. The scenic advantages of the location, too, are unique. From [Edendale] can be seen the Pacific Ocean, twenty-two miles to the west, and the broad panorama of Southern California, with its fruit and stock ranches, its snow capped mountains and its tropical vegetation, to the east, north and south. Within a short distance of Edendale may be found every known variety of national scenery, seemingly arranged by a master producer expressly for the motion picture camera."

The quiet and busy streets, the hills and lakes, and the sunshine were custom made for the early film industry. In 1909 a film company from Chicago called Selig-Polyscope opened the first permanent studio in Edendale. Later that year New York Motion Picture company opened their studio in Edendale and started making westerns under the name Bison Pictures. Mack Sennett moved his studio to what was mainly a vacant lot and started making his Keystone Comedies. His Keystone Cops movies were shot on the streets on Edendale.It was in Edendale that the first filmed pie in the face scene was shot. The Sennett Bathing Beauties pranced around nearby lakes and included such future stars as Gloria Swanson and Carol Lombard. Both Fatty Arbuckle and Charlie Chaplin's careers started at Keystone. Sennett's biggest star in the silent era was Mabel Normand. She too built herself a studio right around the corner from Sennett's.

By the 1920's there were several studios pumping out movies in Edendale. William Fox started his Fox Studio's there. His early films included Cleopatra with Theda Bara. Tom Mix the colorful cowboy star built his Mixville Studio nearby. Norbig Studios opened as a rental space and directors like Hal Roach directed the early Harold Lloyd comedies on this lot.
Edendale was densely built and when the studios need more room to expand they weren't able to find the land they needed. They moved down Prospect Ave that had now been re-named Hollywood Blvd. and found the land they needed in the little village of Hollywood.

When the freeway system was built in Los Angles Edendale was dissected and eventually dissolved and became the neighborhoods of Los Feliz, Silverlake and Echo Park. There are still reminders of Edendale in tact, the post office and a library still have the name Edendale.