Adams-Normandie, Los Angeles

West Adams is a historic neighborhood in the South Los Angeles region of Los Angeles, California. The area is known for its large number of historic buildings, structures and notable houses and mansions. It contains several Historic Preservation Overlay Zones as well as designated historic districts.

The Van Buren Place Historic District, located in the West Adams section of Los Angeles, California, is a Historic District listed in the National Register of Historic Places. The district is located in the 2600 block of Van Buren Place and consists of Craftsman, Shingle-Craftsman and Tudor-Craftsman style homes built between 1903 and 1916. The area was founded by Percy H. Clark who built six of the homes. The district is significant, for the purpose of the National Register Historic District designation, in the area of community planning and development and the area of architecture.

The Frederick Hastings Rindge House is a historic house located in the West Adams district of Los Angeles, in Los Angeles County, California. The Rindge House was built in 1904 for Frederick H. Rindge and wife Rhoda May Knight Rindge and designed by Frederick Louis Roehrig and E.C. Shipley in a Renaissance Revival-Romanesque Revival Victorian style. In 1986, the Rindge House was listed on the National Register of Historic Places based on architectural criteria.

The First African Methodist Episcopal Church of Los Angeles (First A.M.E. or FAME) is a megachurch in Los Angeles, California, United States, part of the African Methodist Episcopal (AME) Church. It is the oldest church founded by African Americans in Los Angeles, dating to 1872. It has more than 19,000 members.

Engine House No. 18 is a fire station in the West Adams section of Los Angeles, California. Built in 1904, the station was designed in the Mission Revival style by architect John Parkinson, whose later works included Los Angeles City Hall, Union Station, and Bullocks Wilshire. In 1915, Engine House No. 18 was one of a dozen stations closed because of budget cutbacks resulting from the "two-platoon ordinance" passed by the Los Angeles City Council in 1915. The station re-opened in 1920 and remained an operating fire station until 1968. In 1932, former fireman James F. Fourong was arrested for burglarizing Engine House No. 18. Fourong had looted other fire stations by phoning in false alarms and then entering the firehouse while the men responded to the call. In February 1932, Fourong attempted a robbery at Engine House No. 18 but was surprised by a fireman while burglarizing the lockers. After the building had been vacant for sixteen years, the Community Redevelopment Agency in 1984 agreed to a $28,000 contract with Woodford & Bernard, architects, to prepare construction documents for the restoration of Engine House No. 18. The plan was to restore and convert the firehouse into a community-oriented professional training center at a cost of $225,000.Through a competitive bidding process that began in December 2009, the Community Redevelopment Agency of the City of Los Angeles (CRA/LA) awarded the Exceptional Children's Foundation (ECF) the opportunity to purchase Engine House No. 18. ECF purchased the property in 2011 with the goal of converting the cultural landmark into a fine arts training center for adults with special needs and a community creative space for the residents of South Los Angeles. Renovations of the site began in June 2012. ECF re-opened Engine House No. 18 as its South L.A. Art Center in the spring of 2013. Approximately 50 participants with developmental disabilities annually are provided with daily fine art instruction, life skills training, and case management services at this location. The center also hosts exhibits of the participants' artwork along with creations by other community artists.

Founded in 1983, the West Adams Heritage Association (WAHA) is an historic preservation organization in Los Angeles, California that is focused on the preservation of the Historic West Adams section of the city. As stated on their website: "West Adams is located just south and west of Downtown and contains the city's largest concentration of Victorian and Craftsman homes, five of the city's Los Angeles Historic Preservation Overlay Zones, and a concentration of Los Angeles Historic-Cultural Monuments." The organization is known for sponsoring neighborhood tours as well as speaking out about preservation issues affecting West Adams.

The Golden State Mutual Life Insurance Building is a landmark 5-story, 84 ft (26 m) office building in the Late Modern style built in 1949 as the headquarters for its namesake company. The building was designed by Paul Revere Williams, the noted African-American Architect. The building is located in the West Adams district of South Los Angeles about 3.5 miles southwest of Downtown Los Angeles and 2 miles northwest of Exposition Park and USC. This was the company's second building to bear this name, the first having been built in 1928.

West Adams Heights is a neighborhood in Central Los Angeles, California. It contains one Los Angeles Historic-Cultural Monument.

The Ramsay-Durfee Estate, also known as Durfee Mansion, Durfee House or Villa Maria, is a historic Tudor Revival style mansion on Western Avenue in Los Angeles, California. It has been designated a Los Angeles Historic-Cultural Monument and listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

Angelus-Rosedale Cemetery is a cemetery in Los Angeles at 1831 West Washington Boulevard in the Pico-Union district, southwest of Downtown. It was founded as Rosedale Cemetery in 1884, when Los Angeles had a population of approximately 28,000, on 65 acres (260,000 m2) of land running from Washington to Venice Boulevard (then 16th Street) between Normandie Avenue and Walton and Catalina Streets, and often used by California politicians, notably former Mayors of the City of Los Angeles. The interments include pioneers and members of leading families in Los Angeles and the state.Rosedale was the first cemetery in Los Angeles open to all races and creeds, and was the first to adopt the design concept of lawn cemeteries. This is where the grounds are enhanced to surround the graves with beautiful trees, shrubs, flowers, natural scenery and works of monumental art. Among the more traditional structures, headstones and mausoleums, the cemetery also has several pyramid crypts. In 1887, the second crematory in the US was opened at Rosedale Cemetery. It was also the first crematory west of the Rocky Mountains. The initial cremation took place on June 16, when the body of Mrs. Olive A. Bird (c. 1845–1886), wife of prominent physician O.B. Bird, was cremated. By 1913, there had been 2,392 cremations performed at Rosedale. Next to the cemetery at 1605 S. Catalina Street is another cremation facility, the domed, observatory-shaped Chapel of the Pines Crematory.In 1993, Rosedale was bought by the Angelus Funeral Home on Crenshaw Boulevard and renamed Angelus-Rosedale Cemetery.

North University Park is a neighborhood in Los Angeles, California. Located just north of the University of Southern California, North University Park contains two historic districts that are both on the National Register of Historic Places: The North University Park Historic District and the Menlo Avenue–West Twenty-ninth Street Historic District.

The Menlo Avenue–West Twenty-ninth Street Historic District is a historic district in the North University Park neighborhood of Los Angeles, which is itself part of the city's West Adams district. The area consists of late Victorian and Craftsman-style homes dating back to 1896. The area is bounded by West Adams Boulevard on the north, Ellendale on the east, West Thirtieth Street on the south, and Vermont Avenue to the west. The district is noted for its well-preserved period architecture, reflecting the transition from late Victorian and shingle-styles to the American Craftsman style that took hold in Southern California in the early 1900s. The district was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1987.