Visit In SRO Land, a new site from the creators of 1947project

LA's Time Travel Blog 1947project Takes On Downtown's Historic Core

WHAT: The launch of In SRO Land ("lost lore of the historic core"), the newest 1947project time travel blog

WHERE: http://www.insroland.org

WHY: Blog creator Kim Cooper's husband Richard Schave is the new Director of the Downtown LA Art Walk; Kim's response is to explore the history of the Art Walk neighborhood

PREVIOUSLY: http://www.1947project.com and http://www.onbunkerhill.org

Each spring, L.A.'s popular time travel blog 1947project reinvents itself. For the first three years, that meant creator Kim Cooper announced which year's newspapers the bloggers will be scouring for incredible forgotten tales of crime and infamy (1947, 1927 and 1907 have all been featured). But last year's 1947project was different.

Gone was the chronological crime-a-day format--though there's always room for a great murder. The ON BUNKER HILL blog was a house-by-house survey of the great old downtown residential neighborhood that was demolished to create the high rise district that shares its name, but none of its charms.

The contributors, including authors, librarians, bloggers, psychologists, film scholars, art historians, artists and tour guides, dug deep into historic archives to uncover fascinating tales of more than a century of life on old Bunker Hill.Now, the 1947project bloggers turn their attention to the greater downtown LA area, with a new website called IN SRO LAND, subtitled "lost lore of the Historic Core." The site went quietly live last week, and is online at http://www.insroland.org with stories of burlesque rivalry, Skid Row murder sprees, obnoxious Edwardian rich kids and painfully tight underwear, with even wilder tales to come.

The blog's contributors are an eclectic mix of social historians and journalists, and include KIM COOPER (1947project creator, Esotouric bus adventures), BARBARA BOGAEV (public radio host "Weekend America" and "Fresh Air"), JOHN BUNTIN (author of the forthcoming book "L.A. Noir: The Struggle for the Soul of America's Most Seductive City"), ROB CLAMPETT (producer of "Beany and Cecil: The Special Edition" volumes 1 & 2, and manager of the Bob Clampett animation archives), ADRIENNE CREW (LAObserved, LABrainTerrain), DIANA GOODWIN (architectural historian), TONY MOSTROM (co-author of "Death in Paradise: A History of the L.A. Department of Coroner"), JOAN RENNER (tour guide for Esotouric bus adventures and the Los Angeles Conservancy, Vintage Powder Room blog) and RICHARD SCHAVE (Esotouric bus adventures, incoming director of the Downtown Los Angeles Art Walk).

Additional contributors will be joining the team as the project develops.

InSROLand.org explores the forgotten history of Downtown LA, up the grand entertainment boulevard of Broadway (where SRO means "Standing Room Only") and down the mean streets of Main (where SRO stands for "Single Room Occupancy," shorthand for a rented room with a sink in the corner, shared toilet down the hall). Between these two poles, straddling the financial center of Spring Street, modern Los Angeles was born.

IN SRO LAND, the blog, you'll find the real stories behind legendary theaters, hotels and shopping destinations, from the developers and visionaries who built them, to the celebrities and ordinary citizens who enjoyed them. You'll also meet the long-dead lowlife elements whose misuse of public space is as fascinating to contemporary readers as it was offensive in its time.

IN SRO LAND is home to cops and killers, stars and fans, architects and decorators, dancers nude and clothed, freak shows, classic Vaudeville ,street preachers and blues shouters, dreamers and schemers, shoplifters, slumming millionaires, pulp writers, bar keepers, finger men and B-girls, the innocent and the profane. Tune in often to discover the lost lore of the Historic Core, and the fascinating souls who made this town their own.

For more info on IN SRO LAND, or to explore the first posts, please visit
http://www.insroland.org