Jack Smith's L.A.

by Jack Clifford Smith

Book by Smith, Jack

Genres: Nonfiction

200 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1980

About the author

Smith was born in Long Beach on Aug. 27, 1916, grew up in Bakersfield and Los Angeles, and spent some time in the Civilian Conservation Corps before joining the merchant marines at age 21. He went into journalism, first for the Bakersfield Californian, then for the Honolulu Advertiser, United Press, the Sacramento Union, the San Diego Journal, the Daily News, Independent and Herald-Express, all in Los Angeles, before joining the Los Angeles Times in June 1953. He remained with the Times until his death.

He got to the Honolulu Advertiser by working his way there on a passenger ship. In World War II, he joined the Marine Corps and was a combat correspondent who took part in the assault on Iwo Jima, going ashore with his rifle but without his typewriter, which had been lost at sea.

At Belmont High School in Los Angeles, Smith served as editor of the student newspaper, the Belmont Sentinel. He said later that was the highest position he ever reached in his career.

Posthumously, some of his books are listed for sale using his middle name, Jack Clifford Smith.

For more details see:
Jack Smith's Obituaries
Jack Smith (columnist)

Reviews

[David Allen · Rating 4 out of 5]

Marvelous collection of 1970s pieces about places and people by the quintessential L.A. Times columnist. Observational and devastatingly witty. His last sentences so perfectly sum up each piece they're often laugh-out-loud funny.

[Mark · Rating 4 out of 5]

I truly enjoyed Jack Smith's L.A. Being a life-long Angelo myself it was fun to read Los Angeles Times columnist Jack Smith's memories and ruminations on our fair city. This book is a compilation of short newspaper columns written in the 1970s. Jack Smith was born in 1916, a combat veteran of World War II, and journalist in Los Angeles for 40 years. I enjoyed his stories of covering the Black Dahlia murder investigation, various personalities of old Los Angeles, his thoughts on the city. Reading a book in 2020 written in 1980 from newspaper columns from the 1970's reminiscing about the 1940's was interesting. You get a type of gravitational lensing by reading history in this fashion. Smith is a nascent architectural preservationist; he notes that Los Angeles loses it historical buildings like baby teeth. He writes several columns about the old hotels on skid row (Old Bank District), the untimely fate of the mansions on Bunker Hill, the wonders of the Bradbury Building. All in all a good read.

[Greg · Rating 5 out of 5]

I’m between 4 and 5 on this one, but I’ll round up for the sheer rarity of what this book offers. It’s a bridge between the olden days of Los Angeles (1910s-1940s) and today. Smith writes about everyday life in LA, things that would never make a proper history book. And it’s generally fascinating. I learned a lot.

That being said, there are some columns I found less interesting, and I don’t love the cutsie ending he felt compelled to slap on every story. I wish it was a bit more “Up in the Old Hotel,” but alas, this is LA, not New York, and this is pretty damn good.

[Marianne · Rating 5 out of 5]

A must read for anyone who loves L.A.! I am very partial to Jack Smith. :)

[Lisa Church Sielen · Rating 4 out of 5]

Written in 1980 as a tribute and guide book to LA, it's a little dated, but still interesting. If you're a native or interested in old LA you will enjoy this book.