Fairfax High School - Colonial Yearbook (Los Angeles, CA)

Page 7 text:

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Page 6 text:

By Cou1'tesyLos A ngclex Museum illbeme HE lvloving Finger writes, and having writ, moves onf' said Omar. It is true that man has only to look about him to see evidences of Nature's hieroglyphics. On mountain side, river bed, sea coast, prehistoric forests and pre- historic animals have left their ineffaceable records. To the scientist, these footprints, these fossils are as an open book, while to every one, the evidence of former days kindles the imagination and quickens it with curiosity. At lllelrose and Fairfax Avenue, the site of Fairfax High School, is the edge of the La Brea Pits, the excavation of which was begun by the science teachers of Los Angeles High School. Our principal, Rae G. VanCleve, had no small part in this eventful work. Where the Hag proudly waves on our campus, and where the air is filled with the laughter of happy boys and girls today, in years gone by Nature presented a vastly different scene. This moving picture, this panorama of time, we have tried to throw upon our screen in this, our 1929 Colonial. The Art Department has carried out the idea of the passing of time, yesterday, today, and tomorrow, in all .their drawings, while the scenic section gives a picture of the campus and buildings today. Historically speaking, the editor and his assistants believe that the preservation of the memory of the unique features of this locality should engage the attention of all Colonials. For this reason we have chosen the theme, Now and Then, or From La Brea Pits to Fairfax High School.

Page 8 text:

ilfnremnrh R. G. VAN CLEVE, Prinripal LA BREA BEDS Turn back in your geography to one of its earlier pages, written perhaps a million and a half or two million years ago. Locate the site now occupied by Los Angeles, particularly the western portion of the city. Here you will find a tropical plain sloping down from the not distant mountains to the sea, whose shore lies some- where near the Western side of Catalina extending northward along the line of the other channel islands. Heavy tropical growth covers all this region now occupied by our school, and great herds of camels, oxen, horses, giant sloths and other grass- eating animals find abundant food and shelter from the heat of day. Uf course, where there are such numbers of grass eaters, the flesh eaters are also abundant, and during the early hours of twilight the roar of the lion and the scream of the tiger break the serenity of the brooding air. ' Y VVinding through this jungle are numerous streams which widen out here and there into small lakes. Hither the animals come to quench their thirst and immerse their bodies in the cool depths. One such pool, La Brea Beds, has collected over a mass of soft, sticky asphaltum. lf an animal wades into this pool, it is immediately caught in the asphaltum and held in its vise-like grip until it perishes. Picture, then,