Photo of Toluca Lake from Los Angeles Times History Before Europeans arrived in the San Fernando Valley in 1769, the Tongva people had been living in the area surrounding Toluca Lake for 8,000 years. The Tongva village of kah-Ween-gah (Cahuenga) located on the banks of the Los Angeles River had trade connections with other Tongva villages in Southern California. At the time, the Los Angeles...
Bel-Air, a neighborhood in west Los Angeles, was founded by Alphonzo Bell, an oil tycoon, who purchased 600 acres of land and named it Bel-Air, or "Beautiful Air," after the original Mexican land grant, Rancho San Jose de Buenos Ayres, and the Italian word "Bellissima," meaning "beautiful." The area attracted celebrities such as Clarke Gable, Judy Garland, Marilyn Monroe, Tony Curtis, and Burt Reynolds....