The “Wizard of Venice” celebrates the life of Sonya’s grandfather, Arthur L. Reese, an inventor, decorator and businessman of Venice, California during the 1900s. The ‘Wizard’ decorated the town of Venice, designed gondolas for the Venice Canals and operated businesses in both Venice and Santa Monica.  The book uncovers how her grandfather’s passion to succeed in life, ked him to a friendly business relationship with Abbot Kinney and brought together the communities of Venice and Santa Monica through social clubs and events.

Soft-Bound, $19.99

Available at the following:
-Regular VHS events

Venice Historical Society proudly announces the second printing of our book authored by Venice's historian, VHS past-president and archivist Carolyn Elayne Alexander. 128 pages soft-bound with over 200 black and white photos chronicling our first 100 years.

From the back cover:
This pictorial retrospective illustrates Venice's history from its beginnings in 1880 through the Great Fire and Consolidation, to the advent of the rollerskaters and carnival-like ambience that characterize the Venice that we know today. Based on over 200 interviews of local and pioneer families, this volume contains many previously unpublished images from private albums and collections, all of which provide a unique glimpse into Venice's fascinating first century.

Soft-Bound, 128 pages, $19.99

Available at the following:
-Regular VHS events
-Small World Books in Venice
-Amazon.com

Explore hundreds of famous movie sites throughout Southern California. These wide-open spaces have transported moviegoers to exotic worlds for nearly a century, Hollywood Escapes unveils these exciting settings within a day's drive of Los Angeles.

The first comprehensive guide to Southern California's outdoor filming locations takes you to sixty of the Golden State's most cinematic mountains, lakes, deserts and beaches. This book shows you the way to the movies' and recommends places to dine and lodge along the way.

Soft-Bound, 410 pages, $19.95

Available at the following:
-Regular VHS events
-Bookstores around the Los Angeles area

Thousands of men, women and children owe their lives to the Los Angeles County Lifeguards. Made famous by the television show Baywatch, these lifeguards patrol 72 miles of coastline extending from Zuma Beach to the Los Angeles Harbor.

Author Arthur C. Verge, a full-time professor of history at El Camino College and a Los Angeles County lifeguard since 1974, has used official archival photos to trace the compelling history of the largest and busiest lifeguard service in the world. This photographic retrospective tells a fascinating historic account of this unique organization.

All proceeds from the sale of this book go to the Public Safety and Education Fund.

Soft-Bound, 128 pages, $19.99

Available at the following:
-Regular VHS events
-Borders Books in Santa Monica
-Barnes & Noble in Santa Monica
-Amazon.com

California was invented by dreamers. Like an old-fashioned postcard album with engaging historical narratives, this book explores the Venice landscape and its continuing evolution.

Soft-Bound, 70 pages, $19.99

Available at the following:
-Regular VHS events

A film company rips off a small redwoods town. When the checks bounce, the town is told there is nothing it can do. But then the residents go on a dogged hunt for unthinkable and truly wicked revenge.

Excerpts from Chapter 10
Venice, California, was built by Abbot Kinney, a dreamer and heir to the Sweet Caporal cigarette fortune, who decided to reproduce the Italian City on the mud flats of Southern California. With time, the canals silted in and oil companies killed the area for residential use by festooning it with working oil rigs. Mornings you could smell the canals from the dead fish. The beats arrived in the 60's to live in the cheap rents. Something about being next to the water; something about the way the light glanced off the waves, made people see things different.
 
Herb Boland's apartment took up the ground floor of what had been a two story one family house on a Venice walk street. The original dining room had a wood burning fireplace faced with stream-rounded boulders. The fireplace was why Boland rented the apartment and it made up, in his mind, for the inconvenience of having to sleep in the glassed-in front porch.
 
Boland was fond of telling colleagues that he got in a bathing suit on Friday at 6 p.m. and stayed in bathing suits until Monday.

Soft-Bound

Available at the following:
-Regular VHS events
-Borders Books
-Barnes & Noble
-Amazon.com

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