Image
Source
Babcock, Elizabeth, and Naval Historical Center (U.S.) Staff. Magnificent Mavericks: Transition of the Naval Ordnance Test Station from Rocket Station to Research, Development, Test, and Evaluation Center, 1948-58. Government Printing Office, 2008
Language
English
English
This reproduction comes from Elizabeth Babcock’s Magnificent Mavericks. The photograph of the Foothill Plant was the Pasadena Annex of the Naval Ordnance Test Station (NOTS). Prior to the Navy, this site was owned by Caltech and was their rocket facility research station. At the end of World War II it, along with 400 employees, was transferred to the Navy.
I am interested in how historical images can impact present considerations. In this image employee parking is situated closest to the freeway, which means that the facilities for munitions development overlap the site where future apartment buildings are planned.
The photograph has an overhead viewpoint and, like Image 1, it is orientated northward toward the San Gabriel mountains. Although site carcinogens are understandably the focus of community activists, other aspects of toxic environments include the sites close proximity to automobile pollution. The 210 Freeway, with 1951 traffic, runs along the bottom horizontal edge.
This visualization is part of the Visualizing Toxic Places Design Project 2020 and Place as Palimpsest photo essay.