Driving through Altadena, I found a community gutted but determined to rebuild
| ALTADENA, CALIF.
On Jan. 10, three days after the Eaton Fire first started, I drive to Lake Avenue, the commercial heart of Altadena, just a few miles from where I live.
The surreal scene strikes me as a Hollywood set. This must be some postapocalyptic film, playing out with spectacular special effects. Almost the entire section of the upper business district is gutted. I somehow think that in a few weeks, when filming is done, the avenue and its shops will reappear.
Why We Wrote This
A story focused onOur reporter surveys fire-gutted homes and businesses in her neighborhood in Altadena, California, and ponders the future of this microcosm of Greater Los Angeles.
No residents are allowed here yet. It’s too dangerous. Power lines are down. Fires still smolder, and gas seeps. Toxic lead, asbestos, and arsenic lurk unseen in the ruins. My press pass gets me past the checkpoints, manned by California’s National Guard.
I drive by Aldi, the grocery store. My husband shops here for bratwurst. It’s completely hollowed out. Just up the boulevard is his other go-to, Grocery Outlet. It lies unscathed.
The store’s “Greetings from Altadena” wall mural shines in the afternoon sun. The town name is spelled out in postcard letters that depict its rich history. I wonder how Altadena will survive as a community with so many pieces now missing.
I park the car and walk to our favorite burger joint, Everest. It’s a pile of rubble. We would stop on the way back from a scenic drive in our little convertible, or from a hike, or when neither of us felt like cooking.
Chimneys are all that remain of an apartment house. The hardware store is obliterated. So is the quirky Bunny Museum, and three churches near the intersection.
It’s beginning to sink in. This is not a movie.
On Jan. 10, three days after the Eaton Fire first started, I drive to Lake Avenue, the commercial heart of Altadena, just a few miles from where I live.
The surreal scene strikes me as a Hollywood set. This must be some post-apocalyptic film, playing out with spectacular special effects. Almost the entire section of the upper business district is gutted – restaurants, churches, the post office, and a bank. I somehow think that in a few weeks, when filming is done, the avenue and its shops will reappear.
No residents are allowed here yet. It’s too dangerous. Power lines are down. Fires still smolder, and gas seeps. Toxic lead, asbestos, and arsenic lurk unseen in the ruins. My press pass gets me past the first checkpoint, manned by California’s National Guard. Then a second. Then a third.
Why We Wrote This
A story focused onOur reporter surveys fire-gutted homes and businesses in her neighborhood in Altadena, California, and ponders the future of this microcosm of Greater Los Angeles.
I roll slowly up the long hill toward the magnificent San Gabriel Mountains, where the conflagration began on Jan. 7. On my right is Eliot Arts Magnet, a public middle school for the arts. The art deco building looks untouched, its rectangular tower still rising triumphantly into the blue sky.
I look more closely. The roof is nothing but blackened rafter beams. I note to myself that the daughter of my book club friend goes here. She’s supposed to play the wicked witch in the school’s spring musical, “Shrek.”
I drive by Aldi, the grocery store. My husband shops here for bratwurst. It’s completely hollowed out. Just up the boulevard is his other go-to, Grocery Outlet. It lies unscathed.
The store’s “Greetings from Altadena” wall mural shines in the afternoon sun. The town name is spelled out in postcard letters that depict images of this eclectic enclave and its rich history. This town is a small mosaic within the much larger mosaic of Los Angeles County. I wonder how Altadena will survive as a community with so many pieces now missing.
That mosaic came to life at Grocery Outlet, which was filled with neighbors of all types: engineers from NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, artists just scraping by, seniors who shopped to Muzak they recognized, young people picking up trail mix for a hike. They came in all races: Black, Latino, Asian, white.
I park the car and walk to our favorite burger joint, Everest. No! No! No! It’s a pile of rubble, one wall standing. This is where we would stop on the way back from a scenic drive in our little convertible, or from a hike, or when neither of us felt like cooking.
I continue on foot toward the intersection of Lake Avenue and Altadena Drive. Chimneys are all that remain of an apartment house. The hardware store is obliterated, as are the quirky Bunny Museum and three churches near the intersection.
Only the Christian Science church, which I have attended on occasion, still stands. Once it reopens – no one has yet had a chance to inspect it – members plan to make their New England-style edifice available to other congregations.
It’s beginning to sink in. This is not a movie.
The list keeps growing
“The uncertainty is the brutal part of it,” says my book club buddy, Tracy Van Houten, whose daughter attends Eliot Arts. The school is heavily damaged and closed, but she texts later that the musical is on! Ash and soot blanket the inside and outside of her family’s Altadena home, and they can’t move back yet. But the house is intact.
That can’t be said of many others. Like the rocket scientist she is, Tracy is keeping a spreadsheet of homes destroyed and the friends and neighbors who lost them. She has about three dozen homes on the list, checking in with folks as she can. The list keeps growing.
So far, 16 people have been killed, and more than 7,000 structures have been confirmed destroyed in the Eaton Fire. The brunt of it has been borne by Altadena, a community of 42,000 people just above Pasadena, where I live and where homes also burned.
Although the Eaton Fire acreage is smaller, the damage so far is roughly twice that of the fire in Pacific Palisades, where there were eight confirmed fatalities and 3,500 structures destroyed. All the tallies are expected to rise as inspections continue.
Tracy says that her various Facebook community groups and chats are filled with conversations about how to rebuild and recapture Altadena’s essence, its beauty, and its free-spirit vibe.
“I’m very hopeful in that sense,” she says. But the question is how to do it. “How do we maintain what made this community so special when so much of it is gone?” she asks.
Altadena is a microcosm. There’s a mix of incomes and races here. There’s open wilderness and a funky, small-town feel. There’s a country club establishment and a visible counterculture. There are new residents and those whose families have been here for generations.
Decades ago, Black families moved here, funneled into an area west of Lake Avenue by an era of redlining. It grew into one of the most thriving Black middle-class communities in the country.
The mural at Grocery Outlet highlights Black artists who lived here, such as Charles White, a painter, and Octavia Butler, a science fiction writer.
The area west of Lake is gentrifying, and the Black community is smaller than it used to be. Many Blacks have sold their family homes after their parents died and moved to less expensive places like Las Vegas.
Still, they make up nearly 20 percent of Altadena’s population, and when the fire raged, about the same percentage of residents affected were Black.
Heartbreaking times, persevering spirits
I call my next-door neighbor, Gail Taylor. She and her sister, Janyce Valentine, own Woods-Valentine Mortuary, a third-generation family business and one of the oldest Black-owned businesses in the area.
Many of Gail’s family and friends have lost their homes, she tells me. She introduces me to one of her dear friends from childhood, Tonita Fernandez, who grew up in Altadena.
On Tuesday, Tonita and I talk. She has raised 12 children, some adopted and others fostered. Six years ago, health challenges began to mount, and the educator says she looked to the future – not her own, but her children’s.
Thinking ahead, she decided to remodel her home for her family, including her two boys, ages 12 and 15. She added a backyard dwelling for her adopted daughter, who she hoped would keep the property for coming generations. The project ended up draining Tonita’s retirement savings.
Still, this Christmas, she celebrated in her new place. The boys got new bikes. She was excited for them. She only had to wait for a final inspection to update her insurance.
That never happened, and days later, everything burned to the ground. It’s heartbreaking, but she has a persevering spirit. I ask whether I might take a photo of her. We agree to try to reach her burned-out place, which she hasn’t seen since she evacuated in a panic.
I drive us to the checkpoint on her street. My press pass, however, can’t get her into the restricted zone, even for press photos, so we’re turned away. I later learn that Tonita was finally able to see her house. Nothing’s left but the stairs, banisters, and porch railing.
“I’m hoping and praying that I can raise enough money to rebuild what I just lost,” Tonita says. “My biggest hope is that we all come together, especially the Black and brown community.” Like so many whose houses burned, she has a GoFundMe page.
But developers are already swooping in, urging people to sell. She understands the reasons some people would see this as a lifeline.
“I’m just hopeful they don’t let this money thing get in the way of rebuilding their home,” she says of the pressure on Blacks and Latinos to sell.
But rebuilding is hard, she says, speaking from her own experience with requirements and permits. “The process of building with the county is so taxing. My concern is no one will weather the storm.”
Resisting developers, pursuing dreams
At a community meeting just days after the Eaton Fire, residents voice concerns about developers possibly changing the face of Altadena as they try to scoop up land.
The possibility worries Marialyce Pedersen, an environmentalist and zero-waste expert.
After the meeting, she talked proudly about her 100-year-old Spanish-style house in Altadena, which she bought from a childhood friend. The house was destroyed in the fire, but she managed to save her camper, car, and cats. She, too, has a GoFundMe page.
“Apparently, people are getting messages from vultures wanting to ‘buy fire-damaged properties,’” writes Ms. Pedersen in an email exchange after the meeting. “We are trying to encourage everyone to resist.”
She wants to preserve Altadena’s character. She’s thinking of a “barn-raising,” sweat-equity model of rebuilding that involves the whole community and is sustainable.
Perhaps now is also the time to pursue her dream, she says.
“For a long time, I’ve wanted to create the rock-and-roll old folks home.”
She envisions homes for different income levels surrounding a community space that includes a library and music. She could even build three or four cottages around her pool for friends. “It’s going to be fun.”
Yes, I think. And so very Altadena.
Editor's note: This story was updated on Jan. 17, 2025 to reflect the most recent numbers of structures destroyed.
