Notes for Book 2
Chapter 1. The Mouth — river was instrumental: Robinson, Los Angeles: A Profile 25 / all that happened: Bromide, Fieldnotes (unpag.)
1.1 — least navigable: Morrison, Río L.A. 73 / the magical and the real: Tobar, The Barbarian Nurseries 189 / mere trickle: Connelly, The Narrows 372
1.2 — Forsaken for so long: Gumprecht, The Los Angeles River 236 / Ghost river: Bromide, Fieldnotes (unpag.) / filming of The Poseidon Adventure: Pitt and Pitt, Los Angeles A to Z 411 / “aguas negras”: Linton, Down by the Los Angeles River 127
1.3 — efforts to revitalize: Gumprecht, The Los Angeles River 127 / melancholy land: Adams, To and fro in Southern California 71
1.4 — hunter-gatherers: Raab, “Political Ecology of Prehistoric Los Angeles” 23 / peculiar streams: Sanborn, A Truthful Woman in Southern California 58 / inside joke: Deverell, Whitewashed Adobe 94 / step and do not step: Heraclitus, Fragments 35 / The Tongva: McCawley, The First Angelinos 3 / small, gentle stream: Gumprecht, The Los Angeles River 12 / state of flux: Gumprecht, The Los Angeles River 19
1.5 — “stranger than fiction”: Luther (quoting a promoter of L.A.), The Boosters 9 / history, mystery and ecology: Benson et al., Lonely Planet Los Angeles, San Diego & Southern California 66 / local wisecracks: McWilliams, Southern California 299
1.6 — embryo city: Rand, Los Angeles: The Ultimate City 34 / Another great flood: Layne, Annals of Los Angeles 15 / control projects: Gumprecht, The Los Angeles River 129 / largely determined: Gumprecht, The Los Angeles River 2 / significance of the river: Gumprecht, The Los Angeles River 81
1.7 — remembered the boy: Connelly, The Narrows 387 / two seasons: McWilliams, Southern California 106 / same river snake: Bromide, Fieldnotes (unpag.) / mere trickle: Connelly, The Narrows 372
1.8 — earliest date: McWilliams, Southern California 186 / once arcadian: Davis, Ecology of Fear 63 / Titanic Project: cited in many sources, including “The Story of the Los Angeles Aqueduct” (Department of Water and Power) and Gumprecht, The Los Angeles River 105
1.9 — Author may not: Barthes, Image • Music • Text 161 / end of the river: Bromide, Fieldnotes (unpag.) / lifted his hands:Chandler, The High Window 492–93
1.10 — tons of cement: Morales, River of Angels 99 /drive out nature: Waits, “Misery Is the River of the World” / sentencing: Morrison, Río L.A. 62 / unstable hill-slope: United States Geological Service, “Geology of the San Gabriel Mountains, Transverse Ranges Province” (unpag.) / construction projects, amnesia: Gumprecht, The Los Angeles River 166 / treacherous stream: Gumprecht, The Los Angeles River 161 (quoting the Los Angeles Times of 20 January 1886)
1.11 — each spring: Los Angeles Times, June 7, 2019 / could hear the river: Connelly, The Narrows 372 / dragon: John Kinsey, Los Angeles Times July 21, 1956, quoted in Connelly, The Narrows (unpag.) / updates the romantic LA detective: Marling, “City of sleuths” 121 / Billy Kinsey: Connelly, The Narrows 372
1.12 — comeback: Elrick et al., Los Angeles River 93 / Scientists, philosophers, and restorationists: Wooley & Vincent, “The Conflicting Discourses of Restoration” 340 / looks like a river: Gumprecht, The Los Angeles River 245
1.13 — already substantially altered: U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Los Angeles River Ecosystem Restoration Integrated Feasibility Report 1-6 / looked up: Connelly, The Narrows 387 / end-of-the-world gloom: Connelly, The Narrows 345 / foreboding, broken loose: Connelly, The Narrows 348 / riding shotgun: Connelly, The Narrows 345 / hundred-year storm, something’s broken: Connelly, The Narrows 368 / could hear the river: Connelly, The Narrows 372 / containment, capture: Connelly, The Narrows 370
1.14 — changed its bed: Layne, Annals of Los Angeles 11 / main channel: Gumprecht, The Los Angeles River 137 / paradox: McWilliams, Southern California 6
1.15 — culverts were overflowing: Connelly, The Narrows 345 / Stay out of the narrows: Connelly, The Narrows 372–73 / water had claws: Connelly, The Narrows 388
Chapter 2. Willow Street Transition Zone — Historical records: Salazar, “The LA River and the Corps: A Brief History” (unpag.) / Gumprecht, The Los Angeles River 224 / ordinary and sacred: Anonymous, A Zen Forest: Sayings of the Masters 110
2.1 — concrete-banked lowland reaches: Garrett, The Biota of the Los Angeles River 5 / unrestricted tidal flow … Wet concrete … clean concrete … soft-bottom: Garrett, The Biota of the Los Angeles River 5 / nicest spots: Linton, Down by the Los Angeles River 127 / baffles: Linton, Down by the Los Angeles River 141
2.2 — greatest attraction: William Mulholland, quoted in Kahrl, Water and Power 20 / back to the top: Linton, Down by the Los Angeles River 140–41
2.3 — unmarked: Morrison, Río L.A. 21 / Federal flood: Gumprecht, The Los Angeles River 209 / Corps of Engineers data: Salazar, “The LA River and the Corps: A Brief History” (unpag.) / concrete banks: Gumprecht, The Los Angeles River 235 / geographic marker: Sánchez and Pita, “The literature of the Californios” 13 and 19 / vital role: Deverell, Whitewashed Adobe 97 / prominent feature: Deverell, Whitewashed Adobe 98 and 99 / final and complete: O’Donnell, “Postwar Los Angeles: suburban Eden and the fall into history” 60 / coffin for a river: Gumprecht, The Los Angeles River 129
2.4 — species of fish: Swift & Seigel, “The Past and Present Freshwater Fish Fauna of the Los Angeles River” D-5 / thriving and wild: Wilcox, “Stalking Carp” 157
2.5 — river water: Isaman, Tourist Tales of California 108 / Years ago: Gumprecht, The Los Angeles River 1 / strange place: Wilcox, “Stalking Carp” 149 / strangers were laughing: Hughes, City of Angels 23
2.6 — Look on my Works: Shelley, “Ozymandias,” Miscellaneous and Posthumous Poems of Percy Bysshe Shelley 94
2.7 — thousands of settlers: McWilliams, Southern California: An Island on the Land 350 / call that a river: Hughes, City of Angels 24 / climactic scenes: Gumprecht, The Los Angeles River 216 / new wilderness: Hughes, City of Angels 15 / glow all over: Hughes, City of Angels 294 / waterless: Hughes, City of Angels 19 / absent dragon: Hughes, City of Angels 23 / dying of thirst: Hughes, City of Angels 23–27 / a Paradise: Hughes, City of Angels 61–62 / steady supply: Hughes, City of Angels 119
2.8 — his own time: Anonymous, Kirkus Reviews Sept. 1, 1997 (unpag.) / all this reading: Villarreal, Pocho 63 / all creation: Hinton, Hunger Mountain 74 / dragon appears: Hinton, The Four Chinese Classics 13 / Dragons of light: Snyder, Mountains and Rivers Without End 62 / uncle of Howard Hughes: Kemm, “The Literary Legacy of Rupert Hughes,” 4 / dean of the literary colony: Carr, Los Angeles 350 / once celebrated: Kirkus Reviews Sept. 1, 1997 (unpag.)
2.9 — Federal flood control: Gumprecht, The Los Angeles River 215 / 4,761,548,800,000 pounds: McWilliams, Southern California: An Island on the Land 196 / ceaseless zeal etc.: Hughes, City of Angels 321–23 / army of engineers: Hughes, City of Angels 345-47
2.10 — rotating motion: Lugt, Vortex Flow in Nature and Technology 18 / All things: quoted in Lugt, Vortex Flow in Nature and Technology 6
Chapter 3. Rio Hondo Confluence — Life started: Lugt, Vortex Flow in Nature and Technology 4
3.1 — Vernon to Long Beach: Linton, Down by the Los Angeles River 127 / De Lis, Frommer’s Los Angeles 317 / abruptly, at Willow Street: Roraback, Los Angeles Times Oct. 27, 1985
3.2 — something uneasy: Didion, Slouching Towards Bethlehem 216 / From the earliest: Lugt, Vortex Flow in Nature and Technology 3
3.3 — citizens suggested: Deverell, Whitewashed Adobe 107 / from below: Linton, Down by the Los Angeles River 187 / in name only: Gumpreht, The Los Angeles River 120 / overloaded with wastes: Gumpreht, The Los Angeles River 124
3.4 — rare caprices: Lugt, Vortex Flow in Nature and Technology 3 / cause of the coming: Lugt, Vortex Flow in Nature and Technology 6 (Lugt here quotes Diogenes Laertius in discussing this principle of Democritus)
3.5 — The cyclone: Baum, The Wonderful World of Oz 20 / Paradoxically, Los Angeles: Davis, Ecology of Fear 187 / rotating motion: Lugt, Vortex Flow in Nature and Technology 18 / vortex carries matter: Lugt, Vortex Flow in Nature and Technology 162 / rotating gas: Lugt, Vortex Flow in Nature and Technology 184 / Statistics on L.A. County tornadoes, 1952–1998: County of Los Angeles, “Hazards and Threats, Tornadoes and Twisters: History of Tornadoes, Funnel Clouds and Waterspouts that Impacted the L.A. County Operational Area” (unpag.) / One F2 twister: Ferguson et al., “Tornado 1982: A Near-Record Year” 1673 / highest tornado incidence; alien presence: Davis, Ecology of Fear 157, 159 / environmental memory: Davis,Ecology of Fear 155 / explosive mixture: Davis, Ecology of Fear 54 / dangerous vortices: Davis, Ecology of Fear 166, 167, 176 / secret Kansas: Davis 154, 194
3.6 — Fluid motion: Lugt, Vortex Flow in Nature and Technology 31 / giant whirpool: Lugt, Vortex Flow in Nature and Technology 4 / solid-body vortex: 131 / Sargasso Sea: Vortex Flow in Nature and Technology 176 / abstract and bizarre: Vortex Flow in Nature and Technology 218 / gigantic vortices: Vortex Flow in Nature and Technology 212 / rotating black hole: Vortex Flow in Nature and Technology 221 / related to dragons: Vortex Flow in Nature and Technology 5 / dragonlike serpent-god: Vortex Flow in Nature and Technology 5
3.7 — made of words: McNamara, “Introduction: Landmarks” 1 / lovely makeshift city: Fenton, A Place in the Sun 101 / No city: Davis, Ecology of Fear 278 / visual and verbal: McNamara, “Introduction: Landmarks” 1 / ongoing cross-pollination: McNamara, “Introduction: Landmarks” 9 / a hope and a symptom: McNamara, “Introduction: Landmarks” 7 / destruction of Los Angeles: Davis, Ecology of Fear 276 / gated subdivisions: Davis, Ecology of Fear 354 / uniquely explosive: Davis, Ecology of Fear 54 / the jeremiad: Seed, “Los Angeles’ Science Fiction Futures” 124
3.8 — unique among tributaries: Linton, Down by the Los Angeles River 187 / Water from rivers: Lugt, Vortex Flow in Nature and Technology 34–35 / would not dare: Soseki, “Old Creek,” Sun at Midnight 27
3.9 — garden spot: Luther, The Boosters 9 / urban and nature: Bryson, “Surf, Sagebrush, and Cement Rivers: Reimagining Nature in Los Angeles” 167 / phony nowhere: Lurie, The Nowhere City 37/ historical imperatives: McLung, “The Anglo Invention of Los Angeles” 23 / pioneer spirit’s mutation: McLung, “The Anglo Invention of Los Angeles” 25 / uniquely hospitable: Wyatt, “LA Fiction Through Mid-century” 35 / conspiracy of development: Wyatt, “LA Fiction Through Mid-century” 37 / novel of speed: Wyatt, “LA Fiction Through Mid-century” 38–39 / contradictions and fractures (ff.): O’Donnell, “Postwar Los Angeles: Suburban Eden and the Fall into History” 60–62 / novels from the period: O’Donnell,“Postwar Los Angeles” 65–67 / writers on the periphery: Scruggs, “Los Angeles and the African-American Literary Imagination” 84 / power and fictitiousness: Lee, “Pacific Rim City: Asian-American and Latino Literature” 99 / bio-mystical force: Bryson, “Surf, Sagebrush, and Cement Rivers” 168 / human shortsightedness: Bryson, “Surf, Sagebrush, and Cement Rivers” 168 / whimsical and powerful: Bryson, “Surf, Sagebrush, and Cement Rivers” 170 / No matter: Bryson, “Surf, Sagebrush, and Cement Rivers” 172
3.10 — built river: Deverell, Whitewashed Adobe 124 / Rio Hondo Diversion Channel: United States Army Corps of Engineers, Los Angeles River Ecosystem Restoration Integrated Feasibility Report 2.1 / absence of the usual: Tobar, The Barbarian Nurseries 205
3.11 — Box channels: Wilcox, “Stalking Carp” 151 / very real: Jones, “A River without a Chuckle” / Most people: Waldie, Holy Land 154 / relatively new: Trice, “Daylighting Streams: Breathing Life into Urban Streams and Communities” 1 / Throughout Southern California: McWilliams, Southern California 184
3.12 — Eerie at times: Gumprecht, The Los Angeles River 236 / Until recently: Lugt, Vortex Flow in Nature and Technology 3 / blue dragon: Soseki, “Old Creek,” Sun at Midnight 27 / Nothing is concrete: Montoya, Water & Power 44
3.13 — On some maps: Coburn, “Whose River Is It, Anyway?” 18 / Breaking through: Bartlett, The Better City 32 / Southern California landscape: Davis, Ecology of Fear 19
3.14 — cyclone-type flows: Lugt, Vortex Flow in Nature and Technology 144 / river water to drink: Isaman, Tourist Tales of California 108 / Cement will take: Morales, River of Angels 102 / What’s that: Tobar, The Barbarian Nurseries 165 / rain beat down: Pynchon, Inherent Vice 153
3.15 — green Jaguar: Fitch, White Oleander 559 / I look: Fitch, quoted in Miller, “Making a Monster” (internet) / spent my days: Fitch, White Oleander 125 / small girls: Fitch, White Oleander 558 / squatted by the water: Fitch, White Oleander 557–58 / river was a girl: Fitch, White Oleander 558–59
3.16 — Since no vortex: Lugt, Vortex Flow in Nature and Technology 37 / Line in nature: Emerson, “Uriel” 22 / more the river: Frost, Never Fear 374 / one escape: Ruiz, “Lorca Green” 92 / this river was none: —Fitch, White Oleander 558–59 / virtually empty: Towne, Chinatown 12
Chapter Four. “Chinatown” — I wish: Emerson, “The Transcendentalist,” 332 / one after another: Van Dyke, Millionaires of a Day 137
4.1 — Looking north: Robinson, Los Angeles 25 / for the worse: Roraback, Los Angeles Times Nov. 7, 1985
4.2 — people of Yangna: Morales, River of Angels 7–8 / lines loomed: Tobar, The Barbarian Nurseries 256
4.3 — primary requirements: Neville, “Preface,” Properties of Concrete (unpag.) / first concrete: Neville, Chapter 1: Portland Cement, Properties of Concrete (unpag.) / grow together: Oxford English Dictionary / concrete banks: Gumprecht, The Los Angeles River 235 / artificial waterway: Gumprecht, The Los Angeles River 129
4.4 — bleached sky: Frost, Never Fear 32 / Verde que: García Lorca, Selected Poems 64
4.5 — jacketed by concrete: Metabolic Studio, “What is Concrete Is Fluid?” (web) / fluid is concrete: Marco Kusumawijaya, quoted in Rosenberg, Under Spring 9 / L.A. artist: State of California, Los Angeles State Historic Park (web) / difficult to see: Linton, Down by the Los Angeles River 109–10 / features ornate: Linton, Down by the Los Angeles River 270 / Nothing is concrete: Montoya, Water & Power 44 / giant concrete storm drain: “Can Frank Gehry Fix the L.A. River?” Los Angeles Times, September 21, 2015 / shunned by nearly everyone: ibid. / may be able: ibid.
4.6 — No other city: Morrison, Río L.A. 83 / my SUV: Morales, River of Angels xi / this side of the river: Ruiz, “Lorca Green” 91
4.7 — ultimate urban location: Dana Plays, “Summaries,” IMDb (web) / Many Los Angeles neighborhoods: Gottlieb, “The Present as History” 288 / bleak concrete: Dickey, The Rough Guide to Los Angeles & Southern California 48–49 / edited video film montage: Gottlieb et al., “Re-Envisioning the LA River” 22 / violence and danger: quoted in Gottlieb et al., “Re-Envisioning the LA River” 2
4.8 — all was fuzzed: Pynchon, Inherent Vice 46 / most of the Chinatowns: McWilliams, Southern California 94 / many layers of history: Linton, Down by the Los Angeles River 112 / strong scent: Frost, Never Fear 369
4.9 — Anonymity was: Sallis, Drive 18 / These miles: Wilcox, “Stalking Carp” 150 / wanna see something: Refn, Drive(film) / Connecting each: “Synopsis” for The Blue Hour, Brooklyn Film Festival (web) / bizarre landscape: Strangers in Los Angeles (film)
4.10 — everywhere and everything: Lurie, The Nowhere City 244 / All the good: Waits, “Misery Is the River of the World” (song) / core of LA’s: Dickey, The Rough Guide to Los Angeles & Southern California 52
4.11 — earliest date: McWilliams, Southern California 186 / brilliant thriller: British Film Institute, “The 100 Greatest Films of All Time” (web) / Los Angeles drought: Stewart, “‘The Long Goodbye’ from ‘Chinatown’” 27 / Noah walked: “Genesis,” The Bible (King James Version) 6:9 / 21st on “Hollywood’s 100 Favorite Films”: The Hollywood Reporter (web) / 16th on msn’s: Mahmud, “100 Best Movies of All Time” (web) / 19th on the American Film Institute’s: “The 100 Greatest American Movies Of All Time” (web) / updated to 21st: American Film Institute, “The 100 Greatest American Movies Of All Time” (web) / rates it 42nd: Rothkopf et al., “The 100 best movies of all time” (web) / 78th on their 2012 list: British Film Institute, “The 100 Greatest Films of All Time” (web) / virtually empty: Towne, Chinatown 12 / nothing at all: Towne, Chinatown 12 / water commissioner drowns: Polanski, Chinatown (film) / bring the water: Polanski, Chinatown (film) / modern American Noah: Stewart, “‘The Long Goodbye’ from ‘Chinatown’” 31
4.12 — walk north: Benson et al., Lonely Planet Los Angeles, San Diego & Southern California 74 / all dragon: Hinton, Hunger Mountain 76 / vacancies between fragments: Spolsky, Gaps in Nature 2
4.13 — water equaled money: Lurie, The Nowhere City 283 / water famine: McWilliams, Southern California 187 / collaborated to create: Monaco, A History of American Movies 168 / negative light: Novak, “The Chinatown Syndrome” 268 / demonic parody: Stewart, “‘The Long Goodbye’ from ‘Chinatown’” 31 / magisterial: Davis, City of Quartz 35 / Owens Valley project: McWilliams, Southern California 187 / no one disputes: Shetley, “Incest and Capital in Chinatown” 1094 / realm of the unnatural: Belton, “Language, Oedipus, and Chinatown” 941 / led step by step: Belton, “Language, Oedipus, and Chinatown” 937 / You may think: Polanski, Chinatown (film) / can’t always tell: Polanski, Chinatown (film) / Western, white, and male: Novak, “The Chinatown Syndrome” 276 / Forget it: Polanski, Chinatown (film) / specter of Chinatown: Stewart, “‘The Long Goodbye’ from ‘Chinatown’” 28 / place where corruption: Belton, “Language, Oedipus, and Chinatown” 947–48 / subtle ways: Novak, “The Chinatown Syndrome” 271–72 / confines us [and following]: Shetley, “Incest and Capital in Chinatown” 1101–03 / principal aims: Novak, “The Chinatown Syndrome” 269
4.14 — genie of the river: Morrison, Río L.A. 123 / down in the narrows: Connelly, The Narrows 387 / people of Yangna: Morales, River of Angels 7–8 /Tao originally: Hinton, Hunger Mountain 16 / Everything does not: Villarreal, Pocho 65 / your footsteps: Machado, Border of a Dream 281
4.15 — facts which loomed: Emerson, “Circles” 290 / good work of fiction: Powell, “Land of Fiction” 141 / got down real low: DeRoche, The Ballad of Huck and Miguel 100 / reality is surreal: The New York Times Magazine, “The Decameron Project” (web) / discovery of paradox:Quine, The Ways of Paradox & Other Essays 1 / ever-present real: Galchen, “An Introduction to The Decameron” (web) / Reality is easy: Galchen, “An Introduction to The Decameron” (web) / this Land of Fiction: Powell, “Land of Fiction” 141 / right bully: DeRoche, The Ballad of Huck and Miguel 10 / garage door: DeRoche, The Ballad of Huck and Miguel 139 / garbage trucks: DeRoche, The Ballad of Huck and Miguel 136 / river turns: DeRoche, The Ballad of Huck and Miguel 139 / proper river: DeRoche, The Ballad of Huck and Miguel 181 / Regular folk: DeRoche, The Ballad of Huck and Miguel 182 / people warn’t: DeRoche, The Ballad of Huck and Miguel 181 / paradox of Boccaccio’s: “An Introduction to The Decameron” (web) / field cannot: Emerson, “Circles” 291