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Old Posted Feb 14, 2014, 10:47 PM
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Noircitydame Noircitydame is offline
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Join Date: Nov 2010
Location: Outskirts of Noir City, California
Posts: 226
Henry’s-Brass Rail and Sardi’s-Chi Chi's

By some personality defect/quirk, I apparently can’t spend 5 minutes to learn how to do screen grabs, or effectively search the online city directories, but I’ll happily spend hours researching a minor point about an LA or Hollywood building. For example, I had looked in to the Sardi’s and Henry’s thing not too long ago, having come across somewhere else online claiming Sardi’s was where Henry’s used to be; I knew that couldn’t be right. 6321 where Henry’s was, opened as the new location of Perry’s Brass Rail in March 1934. By Christmas eve 1936, it’s The Weiss Café.

Henry's
https://sites.google.com/site/hollywoodtheatres/vine

LAT 1-21-33

LAT 3-13-34

LAT 12-24-36


Then the former Henry's building seems to have been completely rebuilt (by S. Charles Lee) into a theater, and opened as The Admiral Theater (called the Vine in more recent days) in May 1940.
LAT 5-16-40

The Admiral Theater and Sardi's
https://sites.google.com/site/hollywoodtheatres/vine


Sardi’s, at 6313- Eddie was planning it as of July 1932. Opened as of Jan, 1933.
LAT 7-10-32

LAT 1-3-33

I’m not sure when he sold it, but he and David Covey were co-owners at the time of the 1936 fire. I’ve seen another site that mentions Sardi’s burning down, but doesn’t mention it was rebuilt right away and reopened.

LAT 10-2-36

LAT 11-3-36

The iron lung thing must be the “24 dish hors d’oeuvres wagon”

LAT 10-23-38

Tom Breneman broadcast his radio show from there, originally called “Breakfast at Sardi’s” until Mar 1945, when Tom got his own building around the corner in what had been the Tropics, and the new show was Breakfast in Hollywood. (that’s another story). Meanwhile back at 6313, there was a lawsuit about the name of the radio show, but Tom carried on with his thing and Sardi’s carried on without him for a little while.

LAT 6-21-44

LAT 3-14-45

Then August 1945 it reopened as Chi-Chi’s – part of a small chain, including the Palm Springs one. It was still Chi-Chi’s through 1946, then all of a sudden as of June 1947 it’s Sardi’s Chi-Chi’s, then in October, Sardi’s. Then they were denied a permit for some reason, and next thing you know, June 1948 "Sardi’s Chi Chi" fixtures are being auctioned off. In August 1948, a place called- fittingly enough- Eddie’s, is advertising at 6315. Probably no relation to the original Eddie, unless as a tribute, since he'd been gone for 8 years. I didn’t trace it any further than this.

LAT 8-12-45

LAT 12-28-46

LAT 6-28-47

LAT 10-25-47

LAT 6-20-48

LAT

For people who DO know how to do those Google-map screen grabs, it’s interesting: in Eddie’s obituary of January 19, 1940 it says he was found at home, 4709 Norwich Ave., Sherman Oaks. Then I came across a classified ad for a home at 6313 Ivarene Ave., Hollywood, that says it was Eddie’s too.


LAT 1-19-40

LAT 5-12-40
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