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Title
A day of horrors remembered
Alternative Title
Valley Times Photo Collection;
Creator
Dean, Gordon
Contributor
This project was supported in whole or in part by the U.S. Institute of Museum and Library Services under the provisions of the Library Services and Technology Act, administered in California by the State Librarian
Made accessible through a grant from the John Randolph Haynes and Dora Haynes Foundation and Photo Friends
Date Created and/or Issued
1962
Contributing Institution
Los Angeles Public Library
Collection
Los Angeles Public Library Photo Collection
Rights Information
Images available for reproduction and use. Please see the Ordering & Use page at http://tessa.lapl.org/OrderingUse.html for additional information.
http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/UND/1.0/
Description
Photograph was edited for publication purposes.
On January 31, 1957, a Douglas DC-7B transport plane crashed into the school yard of Pacoima Junior High School, 9919 Laurel Canyon Boulevard, after colliding with a Northrop F-89J Scorpion jet trainer plane. Debris was also strewn across the grounds of Terra Bella Elementary School, adjacent to the junior high, and Pacoima Congregational Church, next door to the school. Three students and five airmen died and many more students were injured. The radarman aboard the jet was the only airman who survived. See images 00147115 through 00147134 for all photos in this series.
Photograph article dated January 31, 1962 partially reads, "The tape, five years old today, spun slowly on the machine from one reel to the other. The girl's recorded voice was faint, hard to hear. 'The happiest days of our lives -' she said, but the rest was lost. Jumble. Static. The tape broke. Then: 'We all have but one life to live -' Suddenly there was a roar. Louder. The noise was deafening. A series of loud bangs. Fire bells. Then silence. 'That's where the power went out,' said William Albers, boys' vice principal at Pacoima Junior High School. He rewound the tape, shut off the machine. 'The girl was Linda Luttrell, 14, delivering the final of four graduation speeches. The banging was from doors slamming in the auditorium. The roar was the plane.' The plane - or pieces of it - smashed into the school yard. Five years ago today. Eight persons, three of them children were killed. More than 70 were injured. Two planes collided in mid-air near the school. One, a DC-7 transport on a test flight, crashed on the crowded playground between the junior high school at 9919 Laurel Canyon Blvd. and the Terra Bella Elementary School. The second plane, an F-89 jet, hit near 8811 La Tuna Canyon Rd. in the Verdugo Hills. The pilot of the jet and four crewmen of the transport were killed... 'I was in my office,' said Albers, who, at the time, was the school's head counselor. 'I heard this noise. I hit the deck. I went down on the floor. The plane had crashed. I ran outside. The sky was full of aluminum pieces.'" Photograph caption reads, "William Ambers - Remembers tragedy." See images 00147130 through 00147135 for all photos in this series.
Type
image
Format
1 photographic print : b&w ; 26 x 21 cm.
Identifier
00147129
Valley Times Collection;
HCNVT_d056_ f35_i31
http://173.196.26.125/cdm/ref/collection/photos/id/126116
Subject
Pacoima Middle School (Los Angeles, Calif.)
Pacoima Middle School (Los Angeles, Calif.)--Employees
Aircraft accidents--California--Los Angeles
Accident victims--California--Los Angeles
Middle schools--California--Pacoima (Los Angeles)
Schools--California--Pacoima (Los Angeles)
Playgrounds--California--Los Angeles
School employees--California--Los Angeles
Men--California--Los Angeles
Pacoima (Los Angeles, Calif.)
Portrait photographs
Time Period
1961-1970

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