HISTORIC OLDE TOWNE
Commerce Avenue, Tujunga, California
photos courtesy Bolton Hall Museum

There was a time when Commerce Avenue in Tujunga was full of shoppers. 

At first the only store was the cooperative store for the Little Landers Colony, the Community Grocery. Soon other businesses opened. Dean’s Dry Goods was one of the first, where everything from mouse traps to calico was sold. If Charles didn’t have something, he’d go down to Los Angeles to get it. 

Later there were other businesses such as Wright’s Shoe Store, Herron’s Sweet Shop, G.B. Patterson’s meat market, Tujunga Drug with Arthur Stover pharmacist, McLean’s Drug Store, and Guiseppe Logreco’s bakery. 

The post office was at “Sunset” and “El Centro”. There was a library. The first bank, Farmer’s and Merchants, had opened. The theater had opened up.   

You could buy sodas and candy for the kids at the drug store and tobacco. Then you could go to the first honest-to-goodness barber shop in the valley in the back part of dean’s Store. The Chinese laundry was in there too. That was around 1914. There was plenty of chaparral on the street in the empty lots.

The Record Ledger newspaper started publishing in 1922. It can be seen by its advertising that the town had several doctors, dentists and sanitoriums. As the years went by from 1913 through probably the fifties, the town had every product and service anyone would need.

One can walk along Commerce Avenue and think about the men in the Millionaire’s Club sitting on the rocks outside the post office waiting for the mail to be delivered. We can think about the Verdugo Hills Realty selling roomy lots for $10 a month and of the grocery store selling cans of corn and peas for 15 cents a can, catsup by the pint at 17 cents. 

From the Chamber of Commerce Edition of the Sentinel Magazine dated May 25, 1922, we can see what Commerce was like. On a walk from “Highway” uphill we would go by The Californian Home Extension Real Estate office on the corner with the Verdugo Hills Transportation Company across the street. Walking uphill on “Sunset” we’d come to The Fair Dry Goods, Wright’s, Canaday’s Electrical Supplies, Tujunga Paint and Paper, Dean’s, Ashby’s Drug and Stationary (and Post Office), and Bolton Hall Community Center. 

Down the hill would be Garman and Sons grocery, G. Buck Real Estate, Insley’s Confection, Haines Canyon Water company, Greer’s Barber Shop, Tujunga Valley Bank, the Record Ledger Newspaper, Caldwell’s Feed and Fuel, The Blue Bird restaurant, The Sentinel Magazine, and the Sunshine Bake Shop. Close to Commerce on the side streets were the Lumber Company and Tujunga Drug and Jewelry.

In an issue of the Sentinel Magazine, 1922, a roster lists, on or near to “Sunset” and “El Centro” (Commerce and Valmont), 13 real estates, 4 meat markets, 8 places to buy building materials, two drug stores, a bank, a post office, a library, 3 garages, 2 gas stations, 13 grocery stores, 2 shoe and shoe repair shops, 2 barber shops, 2 newspapers, 4 eating places, 3 dry goods shops, a cleaners and dyers, 2 laundries, the Haines canyon Water Supply Company, and the transportation company.  

Many people remember other businesses and the people who worked in them. Throughout the years there have been so many changes. As you walk “Commerce Memory Lane”, remember 1922 and the busy street full of shoppers. Enjoy the stroll.          

(thank you to Lloyd and Marlene Hitt for this lovely memory)

Historic Postcard

TUJUNGA, California
Healthiest City in the U.S.A.
Foothill and Commerce Hub of this Foothill Community which lies nestled between the San Gabriel Mountains and the Verdugo Hills at an elevation from 1400-1800 ft. A haven for the asthmatic and an inspiration to the artist.
Published by Ansel Kickbush, Photographer, Tujunga, Calif.

photos courtesy Bolton Hall Museum