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Planetarium, Griffith Park, Los Angeles, California

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Planetarium, Griffith Park, Los Angeles, California

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Identifier	clloy_106
Title	Planetarium, Griffith Park, Los Angeles, California
Creator	Unknown
Date Published	1938
Subject (Topic)	Planetariums--California--Los Angeles; Observatories--California--Los Angeles; Parks--California--Los Angeles;
Subject (Name)	Griffith Observatory;
Subject (Place)	Griffith Park (Los Angeles, Calif.);
Type	image
Form/Genre	Postcards
Physical Description	1 postcard : Color ; 9 x 14 cm.
Institution	Department of Archives and Special Collections, William H. Hannon Library, Loyola Marymount University
Country of Creation	US
Copyright Status	public domain
Copyright Statement	http://library.lmu.edu/generalinformation/departments/digitallibraryprogram/copyrightandreproductionpolicy/
Publisher	Western Publishing & Novelty Co.
Place of Publication	Los Angeles, Calif.
Language	eng
Description	Aerial view of the Planetarium at Griffith Park in Los Angeles from the southwest, including a monument in front of the building, landscaped grounds and surrounding Santa Monica Mountains.
Historical Background	In 1896 Colonel Griffith Jenkins Griffith (1850-1919) donated 3,015 acres of his land (formerly Rancho Los Felis) to the City of Los Angeles to be known as Griffith Park and used for public recreation for the "plain people." In 1912 Griffith gave $100,000 to the City of Los Angeles to build a planetarium on a parcel of his land atop Mt. Hollywood. Due to location difficulties and legal issues, it was twenty-one years before construction began on the Planetarium, known as Griffith Observatory. It opened on a south-facing slope of Mt. Hollywood in May, 1935, downhill from the originally proposed site. The federally-funded Astronomer's Monument was dedicated six months prior to the opening of the Observatory on November 25, 1934. At 40-feet tall, it was a "star-shaped poured concrete obelisk, capped by a brass-skinned armillary sphere (an ancient astronomical instrument)"(Ebert, M. Griffith Park: A Centennial History." Six astronomers were represented: Hipparchus, Nicholas Copernicus, Galileo Galilei, John Kepler, Isaac Newton, and William Herschel.
Publisher's Identifier	Publisher's serial number: 8A-H2996; Series number: 184;
Additional Notes	Date from Publisher Serial Number; Photo by Spence Air Photos; Printed using the C.T. Art-Colortone process; Printed on linen textured paper.
Contributors	Spence Air Photos
Source	Werner von Boltenstern Postcard Collection