Scorched Los Angeles

First came the wind. Swooping down on the Los Angeles district last week at 65 m.p.h., it toppled oil derricks, flattened orchards, roiled the harbor until shipping ceased, caused wide damage. Then came the fire. Started apparently by fallen power-lines, blazes flickered up in the night on three broad fronts, spread out through the dry, brush-matted hills of Altadena, Capistrano, Malibu. Soon the tawny, tumbled country on all sides of Los Angeles was a mass of crackling flame. Beneath huge billows of smoke, it sprinted across the arid hills, licking up bungalows threatening oil depots, stealing down lush valleys to frizzle acres of fruit.

In Altadena, frantic nurses moved 60 patients from La Vina Sanitarium before the $150,000 buildings collapsed in embers.

At Malibu, favorite watering place tor cinema folk, the conflagration crept within a mile of the cluster of rich houses before it turned aside with a change of wind. As it was, the homes of Cinemactors Charles Farrell & Lionel Atwill burned flat.

In Capistrano, a dust storm added to the woes of the firefighters. In Los Angeles itself, a mantle of ashes settled over everything.

Destruction was not halted until 150 sq. mi. had been burned to a crisp in four days, nearly ten millions in damage done.

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