No, Olvera is not the oldest street in Los Angeles. That distinction goes to good old Main Street – well, sort of. (It should really be Aliso or Cahuenga or Wilshire if we’re counting prehistoric paths.) The most plausible theory holds that Main began as one of the two anonymous roads that led from the original pueblo’s central plaza in 1781. It came to be known as Calle Real, then Calle Principal, then Main Street once the English speakers came to town. Alternatively, some historians have posited that surveyor Edward O.C. Ord made a mistake while laying out his famous map, or “plan”, of Los Angeles in 1849: they believe the young city’s Calle Principal was actually present-day Los Angeles Street and that Ord the non-Angeleno ascribed the “Main” name to a lesser street. I don’t agree with that hypothesis myself, but regardless, Ord’s Main is our Main.
Find it on the map:
