A Warm Glow

Almost half a century ago, in an otherwise ordinary neighborhood next to the Ventura Freeway, some neighbors met over coffee to plan how to decorate their homes for Christmas.

What they hatched that day wasn’t much: Buy some metal stovepipes (costing about $3.50 a pair in 1951), slap on some white paint and wrap them with red ribbons to create giant candy canes.

Those residents of Lubao Avenue, later dubbed “Candy Cane Lane,” could not have predicted how their tradition would grow. Or that it would endure through four decades to become one of the city’s most popular and lasting holiday events, drawing tens of thousands of passersby who come to see the elaborate lighting displays.

As another December begins and the families of Candy Cane Lane prepare for another holiday season, old-timers such as Jean Harwood experience a familiar mix of pride and excitement.

The neighborhood, which is south of Oxnard Street and west of Corbin Avenue, is made up mostly of ranch-style homes built on half-acre lots. Many are longtime residents, like Harwood, who have lived in the neighborhood for 30 to 40 years.

“Kids [who grew up here] have gotten married and they’re bringing their own kids back,” beamed the kindly, silver-haired grandmother. “That’s the type of area this is. It’s just wonderful here.”

Harwood ought to know. She still lives in the house she and her late husband built after they had to move from the path of the Ventura Freeway.

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Present for the birth of Candy Cane Lane, Harwood has seen just about every holiday display, including elaborate light shows, wooden nativity scenes, laboring elves, flying reindeer, a blue-robed Hanukkah Claus, a motorcycle-riding Kris Kringle and even a bubble machine outside the home of a neighbor who played in Lawrence Welk’s orchestra.

Through decades of changing fads, new neighbors, earthquakes, recessions and boom times, the displays continued. Growing numbers of visitors made annual pilgrimages to the neighborhood, like New Yorkers who swarm Rockefeller Center for the lighting of the Christmas tree.

For residents, the decorating chores usually begin the first weekend after Thanksgiving, though the most serious designers begin work well in advance. Some labor clandestinely in closed garages, sawing and sanding in the months preceding Christmas.

Rose Marie Rush is one of those. Come September, the Lubao Avenue resident is at work carefully cutting and painting figures of elves, candy canes and sleighs that make up her family’s elaborate display.

“I change them every year,” Rush said. “We put our heart and soul out to the public.”

A block to the east, on Oakdale Avenue, Peter Borck’s family was joined by nearly a dozen friends this past weekend, stringing white lights along the front bushes and setting up a phalanx of candles on the lawn.

Candles, Borck explained, are an Oakdale Avenue tradition that began decades ago when homeowners lined the street with “candles” fashioned out of cemented tires, stovepipes and a lightbulb.

Two nearby streets have been part of the tradition, as well. Penfield Avenue came to be known as “Caroler’s Way” because residents there have for years put up 4-by-8-foot placards labeled with the title of a Christmas carol. The carols are piped out to the street by stereo.

On Jamilla Avenue, which is known as “Avenue of the Bells,” residents erected miniature churches on their lawns. Jewish residents joined in with tiny synagogues aglow in blue lights.

At its height, in the 1950s and 1960s, residents held dinner parties with big pots of simmering stew. Actor Mickey Rooney, a former neighborhood resident, would march down the middle of the street, neighborhood children in tow, and plant the big, wooden sign announcing to Los Angeles that Candy Cane Lane was open for business. Afterward, the actor would open his home to the neighborhood, serving punch and cookies.

By the 1970s, however, the candles and lights began to dim somewhat as new occupants moved in. And when the oil crisis hit in 1973, Candy Cane Lane went dark in an energy-saving gesture prompted by a request from then-Mayor Tom Bradley.

By the late 1980s, other problems cropped up. Vandalism turned into large-scale thievery with holiday hooligans wrecking displays and making off with wooden Santas.

Traffic became a problem, too. Each night, so many motorists jammed the neighborhood that the bottleneck affected traffic on the Ventura Freeway. Older residents bristled as visiting motorists shouted at them to get out of the way.

In 1994, the Northridge earthquake forced many residents out of their homes. For some, this will be the first Christmas home since the quake.

And a host of newcomers to the neighborhood have strengthened the tradition, say residents. “It’s one of the reasons we moved here,” Linda Sviridoff said as she strung white lights and arranged reindeer in her yard this weekend.

To help ease the congestion this year, residents have agreed to turn off the lights at 10 p.m., said Los Angeles Police Officer Steve Kegley. He added that Devonshire Division may sponsor extra patrols of the neighborhood.

In addition to the home displays, visitors may hear carolers, a high school band or other impromptu celebrations.

“When Christmas is over, a part of me drops,” said Rose Marie Rush. “You wish the decorations could stay up all year long.”