You might wonder why East Whittier has a 2nd Street and a 7th Street but not a 1st, 3rd, 4th, etc. The answer is complicated, but here goes: When the East Whittier subdivision was platted in 1891 (and possibly as early as 1887), developers did indeed lay out some ordinal streets: 1st through 8th. Well, sort of – that 1891 plat map curiously had no 1st or 7th streets on it. But 1st Street was mentioned in the press in 1894 and 7th Street in 1895, so we know they soon existed in some form. Meanwhile, 3rd Street didn’t show up in reality until 1950! (It was short-lived: Tedemory Drive absorbed it sixteen years later.) When the Friendly Hills tract was laid out in 1941, its developers extended 4th Street into the tract and dubbed it La Cuarta Street – la cuarta being Spanish for “the fourth” – and in 1966 the rest of 4th Street adopted its name. Friendly Hills also had an extension of 6th Street called La Sexta Street, but both were merged into Mar Vista Street in 1956. Perhaps someone thought La Sexta was too sexy? As for the rest: 1st Street was coopted by Whittier Blvd. long ago, 5th disappeared after 1905, and 8th was renamed Linda Vista in 1955. Only 2nd and 7th remain blissfully untouched.
Find it on the map:
