GLENDALE : Neighbors Defending Their Lights

As the sun began to rouse Glendale resident Elizabeth Molo from her sleep, she heard a low and ominous rumbling.

Suddenly, there was a loud pounding at the front door. Molo bolted out of bed and rushed into the street to protect one of the neighborhood’s most prized possessions--four antique lampposts.

Molo joined about 20 of her neighbors on Marion Drive in the Adams Hills neighborhood Thursday in successfully saving the four lamps from a demolition crew. The light fixtures had been on their street since the 1920s.

The “stay of execution” was granted by Glendale City Councilman Larry Zarian, who rushed to the scene on Marion Drive on Thursday. Then, the Public Service Department decided against tearing down the lampposts at all.

“I love those lampposts,” Molo said. “They are a small part of our history that is virtually disappearing.”

One Adams Hill resident, Rebecca Rees, who is six months pregnant, volunteered to chain herself to one of the posts if necessary. “I had the chain and my bicycle lock all ready for it,” said Rees, who had gathered a portable toilet, water, food and a hat for the occasion.

“Nobody else wanted to do it, and I was raised in the ‘60s, so it didn’t bother me,” said Rees.

Zarian said the lampposts were to be removed because of the potential for safety and liability risks. But after the commotion by irate neighbors, the lamps were re-examined and pronounced safe.

“We’re not going to let this happen until hell freezes over,” Zarian said.

After Molo learned earlier this week that the lampposts were in danger, she contacted the city Public Services Department, which told her that nothing would be done until Monday at the earliest.

“I feel greatly enraged,” said Molo, who was among those neighbors caught by surprise Thursday, when the wrecking crew arrived.

In February, Adams Hill residents were informed that some of the streets in the neighborhood would be widened, but were assured that nothing would happen to their lampposts, Rees said.

Zarian attributed the confusion over the fate of the posts to a “lack of communication.”

According to Margaret Hammond of the Adams Hill Homeowners Assn. and the Glendale Historical Society, other antique lampposts removed from Glendale have been spotted in the city of Perris, Calif., and even in Alaska.

Zarian explained that when the city hires a company to remove an object, it also pays for it to be disposed of and, therefore, the objects end up being the property of the company doing the work.

Regardless, Zarian said, “I’m not going to Alaska to find out.”