General Plan Update - City of Inglewood

Chapter 5 Environmental Resources
was replaced in the post-war period by Security First National Bank. As noted earlier,
Bank of America took over the Bank of Inglewood building in 1936.
Although the depression deeply affected Inglewood, as it did other communities
throughout the nation, the City benefited from the region’s relatively rapid economic
recovery. Construction continued throughout the early 1930s. A number of the buildings
constructed on both sides of the two hundred block of South Market Street date from the
1930s. Another stimulus for construction came from the Long Beach earthquake of 1933.
1930s commercial architecture in Inglewood, and throughout the Los Angeles region, was
greatly affected by the automobile. The automobile changed the perception of how
buildings are seen in the landscape. During the previous decade, access to commercial
centers had gradually shifted from a dependence on public transportation, to the privately
owned vehicle. By the 1930s, architects and designers had developed and architectural
vocabulary that could express the speed and sensation of the automobile. The ubiquitous
vernacular stucco box that housed commercial enterprises throughout Southern
California was altered by popular Modern architectural imagery which ranged from the
Art Deco of the 1920s to the Streamline Modern style. The Art Deco introduced a zigzag
pattern of ornamentation around the entrance and window openings and parapet. The
Sentinel Building (a 1921 building that had its two upper stories removed after the ’33
earthquake) at 335–357 East Queen Street (see Figure 5.5-1) is characterized by its hybrid
Deco-Egyptian that frames its upper floor. The Art-Deco style of architecture is also still
seen today in the City’s only officially designated Art-Deco District along Manchester
Boulevard in the Morningside Park’s commercial area. The Streamline Modern (popular
from the 30s to the post-war period) was
essentially an updated interpretation of a
classical building and it was frequently employed
in the design of public buildings and regional
institutions , such as the Bank of America on
330 West Manchester Boulevard (see
Figure 5.5-1).
The growth of the film industry during the
1930s presented an opportunity for the
application of new design to an emerging
Fox Theater on Market Street
development of the movie theater. The movie
palace at 136–144 North Market Street was built as a United Artists Theater (1931), while
the Fox Theater at 115 North Market Street was built for Fox West Coast Theaters
(1948/49).
Inglewood’s economic base began to expand outside the core downtown area toward the
end of the 1930s. In 1938, the ultra-modern Hollywood Park racing facility opened,
making Inglewood the home of Southern California’s summer racing season. This
addition also made Inglewood a tourist destination—a status it had not previously
enjoyed. Perhaps of greater significance to Inglewood’s future development was its
proximity to Mines Field, an airstrip located to the southwest of the city. In 1937, the City
5.5-8
City of Inglewood General Plan Update Technical Background Report