10,000 Steps a Day in L.A. #37, "From Statehood to Hollywood," 5 miles. 

Unsure if or when last night's rain would continue, Barbara and I decided to remain local and follow Paul Haddad's "historic" tour through a section of North Hollywood. His map was true to its word, blending interesting explanations of familiar sights with whimsical history with really, really important history. We set out from the corner of Weddington Street and Tujunga Avenue, strolling south on Tujunga past the Amelia Earhart Branch of the L.A. Public Library and her statue at the Magnolia St. corner of North Hollywood Park. Why honor groundbreaking aviator Amelia Earhart...there? She loved books (library) and in the 1930s she lived in nearby Toluca Lake (a qualified local.) The statue was erected in 1971; the post office renamed for her in 1981. Barbara and I continued south along North Hollywood Park, a setting in Pee Wee's Big Adventure, and the Boombox scene in Say Anything. Tujunga Avenue led us into charming Tujunga Village, in normal times bustling with diners and shoppers, today, empty but still window-shopping worthy. At Aqua Vista Street we headed west through the neighborhood, making a quick side trip down to Dilling Street's Brady Bunch House. Not an official landmark, but certainly memorable for its years as the exterior for the 1970s series, and the site of HGTV's 2019 renovation show that tore out the interior and recreated the TV series set. Following Haddad's route, we walked Vineland Ave. to Ventura Blvd. to Campo de Cahuenga, a street-bridge to Lankershim and the most important landmark on the walk. My favorite photo of the day was my shot (above) of the Minion on top of Universal Studios looking down on the little, clay-shingled adobe that, to quote Haddad, "is of such importance to California [that] none of this entertainment nonsense would even exist without it!" In 1847, US Army Lt. Colonel John Fremont and Mexican General Andrés Pico signed the Treaty of Cahuenga that ended the Mexican-American War and paved the way to California statehood. Campo de Cahuenga is a Los Angeles Cultural-Historic monument and California Historical landmark, of even more interest after the original foundation was unearthed in 1995 during construction of the NoHo end of the Metro Red Line. We walked up Lankershim for the last half of the hike, passing St. Charles Borromeo Catholic Church at Moorpark. To celebrate the Church's most famous parishioner, the city designated that corner "Bob and Dolores Hope Square" in 2003 on Hope's 100th birthday. We missed a tour through NoHo when our hike was interrupted at Riverside Drive—a homeless encampment blocked the sidewalk on both sides beneath the 101 freeway overpass—so we hooked a left and followed Riverside back to Tujunga Ave. Nonetheless, we completed our five miles (and more) then drove to the closest Starbucks for we-need-one-now mochas.