Groceteria.com

Sorry guys, I wasn't sure where this went. If its in the wrong spot, move it.



A fire destroyed a historic building in Alhambra yesterday at 925 W. Valley Blvd. Currently a chinese strip mall, the LA Times reports that it was a market first. At one point, two markets where here, one on the northside (the building that was destroyed yesterday) and one on the south side of the street (still operating as a market).

I don't know much about the history of markets at this corner maybe we can get some


Article From LA Times


Live Local View

Looks like it was a really nice and somewhat intact building. Based on the construction date and the relatively large size for that time, I'd guess that it maybe didn't start out as a chain store, but as an early independent supermarket. But that's just speculation.

Anyway, sorry to see it go.

There was a Crawford's store at 910 W Valley but nothing that I could find in the LA Times archive on the other side of the street at 925, or anything else on the odd side of the 900 block for that matter.

Update: I searched through the Times classified ads and found several references to 925 W Valley in 1949 and 1950. It was the office of a commerical real estate broker called Belmont Company. As for the 910 store, in 1939 it was known as Parkett Market.

I lived in that area for a short time in the early 1980s. The former Crawfords store was operating as a Market Basket at the time. Accross the street was another shopping center that had an Albertson's in it (which closed shortly thereafter). If this shopping center is across from the old Crawfords that could be the store in question but I am not 100% sure.

klkla wrote:I lived in that area for a short time in the early 1980s. The former Crawfords store was operating as a Market Basket at the time. Accross the street was another shopping center that had an Albertson's in it (which closed shortly thereafter). If this shopping center is across from the old Crawfords that could be the store in question but I am not 100% sure.

I think you're thinking of the shopping centers at the eastern end of Alhambra. Market Basket (later Vons, now an Asian store) was in Crawford's Corner at Valley and New and Albertsons and its later incarnations was at the shopping center at Valley and Almansor. There are extensive discussions at http://www.groceteria.com/board/viewtopic.php?t=249 and http://www.groceteria.com/board/viewtopic.php?t=124

The store in question is at Valley and 9th, a block east of Atlantic. I am drawing a complete blank about it, even though I grew up in the area.

Update: Upon further searching, i found that there was a Safeway at 927 W. Valley Blvd in 1931. However they stopped printing locations in their ads in 1931 (they had too many locations) so I don't see any locations after that. My guess is that the store that burned was a Safeway and either the store was built before 1932, or the 1932 store was a replacement store and the address has just changed over the years. Often you will see LA-area buildings referred to as being "pre-1933" because that's when the building codes were changed in response to an earthquake in Long Beach, so perhaps "pre-1933" was translated to "1932".

We should also not forget the human trajedy in this story. The news today is that a body was found in the rubble of one of the shops.

Wow that's sad about the one person.

On a side note, I remember going to this place when it was a huge fabrics store in the early 80's. I don't recall when it closed. The market across the way was an american market as late as the early 90's.