La Cañada History: Tennis stars play benefit exhibition; FBI raids cocaine ‘stash house’

Ten Years Ago

An 8-year-old La Cañada Elementary School student was rescued by a Los Angeles County Fire Department team after falling into a seepage pit when the ground beneath him gave way in the frontyard of a home on Lenzgrove Lane. The pit was estimated by rescuers to be about 45 to 50 feet deep, causing concern that the youngster might have suffered fractures in the fall. But there was a happy ending when he was pulled out within 12 minutes and was found to be in good shape.

Twenty Years Ago

It was slow going for drivers along Foothill Boulevard during the early fall of 1995 as General Telephone was installing a new pipe down the center of the road, from Tujunga to the Pasadena border. While the work was ongoing, commuters to La Cañada High School, the Jet Propulsion Laboratory and St. Francis High were dealing with traffic left practically at a standstill on the Michigan Hill at the easternmost end of Foothill, where only one lane was open.

Thirty Years Ago

The Federal Bureau of Investigation searched a La Cañada Flintridge house and found 210 kilograms of cocaine with an estimated street value of $48 million to $50 million. The house, located on Foothill Boulevard adjacent to the 2 Freeway offramp, had reportedly been under surveillance for some time prior to the raid. It had been identified as a “stash house” for a large Los Angeles cocaine trafficking operation.

Forty Years Ago

The Costello family of Beulah Drive were given an unexpected 2:30 a.m. wake-up call one October morn in 1975 by their beloved pet horse, Wilbur, who decided to cool off with an apparently loud swimming session in the backyard pool.

Fifty Years Ago

The Davis Cup Tennis Team, which included rising star Arthur Ashe, paid a visit to the La Cañada Country Club courts in 1965 for a benefit exhibition in support of the Verdugo Guild of Children’s Hospital.

Sixty Years Ago

It was announced the architects for the new public elementary school planned for Palm Drive would be the Pasadena firm of Neptune and Thomas. The chairman of the elementary school board then governing La Cañada’s campuses, Roger B. Smith, reported that he and other members of the board had been favorably impressed by the company’s work on Upland High School. About 22 architectural firms had applied to be hired for the La Cañada project.

Compiled from the Valley Sun archives by Carol Cormaci.