Incredible images of Los Angeles when it was covered in wetlands

Publish date: 2024-06-30
2018-03-02T14:01:00Z

Before Los Angeles became the center of the film industry, it was covered in wetlands and farmland.

The Southern California Coastal Water Research Project recently began mapping LA's lost Ballona Creek watershed, which once spanned thousands of acres and ranged from freshwater ponds to marshes to meadows for several centuries.

European colonists later came and formed the city's first street grid, destroying around a third of these wetlands.

Archival photos from the USC Libraries show what LA looked like before it became a modern municipality. Take a look at the city's transformation.

Spanish explorer Gaspar de Portola founded LA's first official settlement in 1769.

Ballona Lake, late 1800s. USC Libraries

That year, Franciscan missionary Juan Crespí wrote that the explorers "came across a grove of very large alders ... from which flows a stream of water ... The water flowed afterwards in a deep channel towards the southwest," referring to the headwaters of Ballona Creek.

The Southern California Coastal Water Research Project focuses on the years between 1850 and 1890, before European settlement completely transformed the land.

A boater on Ballona Lake, circa 1903. Title Insurance and Trust / C.C. Pierce Photography Collection, USC Libraries

Source: The Southern California Coastal Water Research Project

In the late 19th century, the Ballona Creek's wetlands stretched over 8,100 acres, according to the researchers.

Map from the Ballona Creek Watershed Historical Ecology Project's report showing the locations of historical wetlands in the Ballona Creek watershed. The Ballona Creek Watershed Historical Ecology Project

The area featured freshwater ponds, beaches, dunes, salt and tidal flats, marshes, meadows, and willow thickets (a type of plant that forms along sandbars). These served as habitats for a diverse set of flora and fauna, including migratory birds.

Playa del Rey lagoon, circa 1908. USC Libraries

Source: KCET

One of the largest wetland areas was La Cienega, a complex of ponds, meadows, pools, and marshes that stretched from Mid-City LA to South LA.

It connected to the region's other major wetland complex, Ballona Lagoon.

Undated photo of Ballona Creek, Los Angeles. Herald-Examiner Collection, Los Angeles Public Library

California became the 30th state in the Union in 1850. Los Angeles then began to grade its streets.

City of Los Angeles from Fort Hill, 1877. Library of Congress

Over time, many of these wetlands were destroyed by development or paved over to create a network of underground storm drains.

The laying out of Santa Monica Boulevard in the Westwood area in 1922. USC Libraries

At the turn of the 20th century, the Ballona Lagoon wetlands were converted into Marina Del Rey, an unincorporated seaside community in LA County. Here's a photo of what it looked like before.

Los Angeles Examiner Collection, USC Libraries

Today, just 1,228 acres of wetlands in the Ballona Creek watershed are left in LA.

Hollywood, viewed southwest from Laughlin Park, 1905 USC Libraries

The 130-square-mile swath of land is now home to more than 1.2 million people and includes much of western LA, Beverly Hills, Inglewood, South LA, and the Baldwin Hills.

A Ford Tri-Motor airplane flies over the newly-built Los Angeles City Hall, 1928. USC Libraries

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