A chance to step back into Torrance’s past

“Ninety-nine per cent of architectural ornamentation expresses, not art, but the fear to leave it off,” Modernist architect Irving Gill was quoted as saying in a 1913 Sunset magazine article on the founding of Torrance. This weekend, a docent-led walking tour highlights several buildings designed without “fear” in what is billed as the West’s first planned industrial city.

The tour, sponsored by the Torrance Historical Society, stops at a number of historic buildings within an eight-block radius downtown, including the original public library and City Hall, the Pacific Telephone & Telegraph Co. building and Torrance High School, which is on the National Register of Historic Places.

The tour begins at the Torrance Historical Museum, 1345 Post Ave., at 1:30 p.m. Sunday and lasts about an hour and a half. It ends with a view of a graceful railroad bridge designed by Gill. The walk is free.

Call (310) 328-5392 for more information.

-- Lisa Boone