Speaker 1: Hello, and welcome to the show.
Speaker 2: This is the Cult of Conspiracy and I am the
Speaker 2: Cage to Night and today we are going to be
Speaker 2: talking about Los Angeles, more specifically the underground living city,
Speaker 2: of the tunnels in and around LA and all the
Speaker 2: controversy surrounding them. Basically, how do they get started? When
Speaker 2: did the digging really get kicking? And then we're going
Speaker 2: to go into the more obscure conversations, the organized crime.
Speaker 2: We're going to talk about the oil industry that's booming
Speaker 2: in LA. We're going to talk about the Lizard people. Yes,
Speaker 2: we're going there. We're also going to talk about Elon
Speaker 2: Musk because he has just dug.
Speaker 1: A new tunnel in LA. We're going to talk.
Speaker 2: About the Starbucks barista from Underground, all the things, all
Speaker 2: the things. I'm actually really excited about this episode, be
Speaker 2: honest with you, but not as excited as I am
Speaker 2: about the gift that Ravenlely and I just received from
Speaker 2: Kim from Kim's damn it loops cozy loops. I was
Speaker 2: gonna say cozy Knots, but I'm like, that's not it.
Speaker 2: I know it's not it. Cozy loops, Kim Loops. If
Speaker 2: y'all want to see this. First of all, you got
Speaker 2: to go to the Patreon. I'll give that plug in
Speaker 2: a second. But Kim, longtime listener of the show, Patreon supporter,
Speaker 2: cult member Throw and Through, actually knitted Raven Lee and
Speaker 2: I like figures of ourselves. She knitted me a Cajun
Speaker 2: knight with a sword and shit, y'all, a shield with
Speaker 2: a Florida Lee the backwards hat, and I get it
Speaker 2: because my face and hair and beard and everything. She
Speaker 2: pretty much had to make it look like he's wearing
Speaker 2: a backle butt. Look, I ain't mad at it. I'm
Speaker 2: not mad so much hair so like I.
Speaker 1: Did it, But like the fucking cape, the armor, this.
Speaker 3: Little knobs that she like detailed the little knobs of
Speaker 3: the armor on the knees and and stuff.
Speaker 4: Yeah, that's pretty cool.
Speaker 2: Oh my god, this is incredible, Kim, thank you so
Speaker 2: much for these gifts. I'm going to put it behind
Speaker 2: me in the studio, probably somewhere between the helmets.
Speaker 1: Or something like that.
Speaker 2: But it's not gonna be a today thing because I
Speaker 2: wanted to be able to get it close enough to
Speaker 2: the camera to showcase it, like the amount of skill
Speaker 2: and the amount of time that this must have taken.
Speaker 2: I you know, I'm afraid to even guestimate here, but
Speaker 2: needless to say, Kim has been a cult member for quite.
Speaker 4: A while, so we've had some awesome gifts.
Speaker 3: Shout out to Dirty Sanjez, Timmy two Toes for his
Speaker 3: epic all his cool shit that he's made, the pyramid
Speaker 3: and everything. Also Nelson with Flavors of the Forest for
Speaker 3: sending us all sorts of goodies.
Speaker 4: Also Royce for making me this epic situation back here
Speaker 4: behind my head.
Speaker 3: Who else? I'm trying to remember everybody. I think I
Speaker 3: got everybody so far, I'm not sure we've had. Yeah,
Speaker 3: we've gotten some really awesome stuff from everybody, and we
Speaker 3: thank you guys so much for you guys' support.
Speaker 2: Absolutely And also speaking of Nelson Flavors of the Forest show,
Speaker 2: if you want to get your own big Foot Breath,
Speaker 2: go to Lincoln the show notes below and use promo
Speaker 2: code Cults at checkout for fifteen percent off your order.
Speaker 2: And he sends us all kinds of awesome goodies. He
Speaker 2: just sent us rocks, nots of rocks, well for Raven
Speaker 2: Lee the rocks, but he also sent us both some
Speaker 2: some printed ar mags that were fucking They were.
Speaker 3: So cool and honestly, we were trying to like fight
Speaker 3: over them. I think my apron is like one of
Speaker 3: my favorite things too. The apron's sike as fuck.
Speaker 1: The leather apron.
Speaker 2: It's almost like it feels like a blacksmith's apron, but
Speaker 2: it's full, it does.
Speaker 1: It's fucking dope.
Speaker 2: So yeah, Nelson's a homie. The mushrooms that he sent us,
Speaker 2: I still haven't cooked with them yet.
Speaker 1: I need to. I feel it's okay.
Speaker 3: When I have my all my display up, I'll have
Speaker 3: all the gifts up and stuff, because man, there are
Speaker 3: so many cool things and I love it. Honestly, I
Speaker 3: just I'm a gift giver. That's a that's my lovelingu
Speaker 3: so like when I get gifts, I'm just.
Speaker 4: Like, oh my god.
Speaker 1: And Kim actually made Raven that a raven as well.
Speaker 4: Yeah, she made me a raven.
Speaker 3: My children have commedeered it because they have sticky fingers
Speaker 3: and they're like.
Speaker 2: What is this?
Speaker 3: What is this epic, cute, adorable raven? Yeah, my child
Speaker 3: snatched that. I knew she was gonna see it, and
Speaker 3: she snatched that right up, and I was like, oh,
Speaker 3: my god, it's for me. I was like, what not
Speaker 3: fucking for you? You know, I probably won't even see
Speaker 3: it again to the lad day. She'll have it hidden
Speaker 3: away with all of her little treasures.
Speaker 2: So dude, whenever we get to the new studio space,
Speaker 2: we're gonna have to just flip her room to find.
Speaker 1: It because that goes in the studio.
Speaker 4: But anyway, right, I want to make a little like
Speaker 4: wired nest.
Speaker 1: Yeah, ooh that would be pretty cool. Alright, So anyway,
Speaker 1: we love all our cult members.
Speaker 2: Thank y'all for the insane amount of gifts that y'all send,
Speaker 2: the insane amount of support that y'all give us. If
Speaker 2: y'all want to send us things to our PO box,
Speaker 2: Raven knows it because I don't.
Speaker 3: Like it's PO Box one one four Prairieville, Louisiana, seven
Speaker 3: zero seven sixty nine.
Speaker 4: Label it cult a conspiracy.
Speaker 1: That's the one unless you're.
Speaker 3: Doesn't matter the size of the box they give us,
Speaker 3: like a little ticket.
Speaker 4: Just hit me though.
Speaker 3: If you are sending us something, please message me on
Speaker 3: one of the platforms. I will look at the messages
Speaker 3: and said that way, I just know because I don't
Speaker 3: always go and check the mail every day and so
Speaker 3: I don't want to miss it or they think I'm
Speaker 3: dead again.
Speaker 4: That's the whole thing.
Speaker 1: So that was fucking hilarious, Like, okay, for the rest.
Speaker 4: We were both dead. And I was like, well, for.
Speaker 2: The record, okay, most of the content creators will go
Speaker 2: and check their peo box once a month and they
Speaker 2: will get all the things, and they'll make a big
Speaker 2: thing about opening the things in the peo box. We
Speaker 2: don't go and check for three weeks and they just assume, yeah,
Speaker 2: well they're dead now.
Speaker 1: So it's like, I'm sorry the fuck.
Speaker 4: I was like, well, it's the post.
Speaker 2: I'm here to my house every day.
Speaker 4: With the Yeah, I don't know.
Speaker 3: It was a vibe, but yeah, just let me know
Speaker 3: if you guys are Patreon members. I check the Patreon
Speaker 3: messages really frequently. We have all sorts of fun tabs
Speaker 3: up right now. Burke Burke, what was he saying? Bok Nerd,
Speaker 3: book Nerds. That's what I was trying to say.
Speaker 2: Well, all the old YouTube people know Id Burks.
Speaker 1: I know. That's all I heard.
Speaker 3: Well, that was the whole vibe that just happened. I
Speaker 3: got the we got the book Nerd Club, we got
Speaker 3: the Fat Kids at aka the Recipe Club, but we
Speaker 3: also have the Manic Teer Private messaging and stuff, and
Speaker 3: I also check all the other ones as well.
Speaker 4: Jacob does too, but not as much as me.
Speaker 2: So and if you want to be a part of that,
Speaker 2: and also see these amazing knitted art pieces that our
Speaker 2: Homegirl cult member Supreme Kim sent to us, and also
Speaker 2: all the videos that we're going to be showing this episode,
Speaker 2: the articles talking about the La tunnels. The wach you
Speaker 2: do is go to patreon dot com slash cult to
Speaker 2: Conspiracy Podcast. It is the only place to get the
Speaker 2: videos of our episodes, but also it is the only
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Speaker 1: Ads suck. We know that.
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Speaker 1: It's always a blast. We thoroughly enjoy our Tuesday nights.
Speaker 4: We talk a lot about food.
Speaker 1: We talk about.
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Speaker 2: just did one about the Great Wall of China and
Speaker 2: it was fun.
Speaker 1: I thought it was a blast.
Speaker 4: It is a really interesting episode. Honestly, Yeah, a lot
Speaker 4: of things.
Speaker 2: I think a lot of people don't really know about
Speaker 2: the Great Wall and all the things, but it's got
Speaker 2: so much controversy around it because the Internet be Internet
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Speaker 1: I thought it was great.
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Speaker 1: Value for that price.
Speaker 2: I challenge you and if you can find one, DMUs,
Speaker 2: I would love to know which one it is not,
Speaker 2: so I got start shading. No, I genuinely want to know,
Speaker 2: so we could probably reach out to these people and
Speaker 2: become homies. Beside the points, we're doing the most that
Speaker 2: we can for you are cult members, because honestly we
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Speaker 1: Everybody listening to this.
Speaker 2: On the Spotify, on the Apple podcast, on the wherever
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Speaker 2: and we want to hear more feedback from you. So
Speaker 2: without any further ado. Let's get to the LA Tunnels,
Speaker 2: all right, So we are actually going to start off
Speaker 2: because this guy, this YouTube channel called its History, did
Speaker 2: a bang up job of explaining the backstory here the
Speaker 2: official narrative, if you will, of how the LA Tunnels
Speaker 2: came to be, when they were started to really get
Speaker 2: you know, dug out and for what purpose and all
Speaker 2: these things.
Speaker 1: And I think that you know what, give credit where
Speaker 1: credits due. Go check them out.
Speaker 2: It's history on YouTube, and let's learn together cult members
Speaker 2: about these LA Tunnels.
Speaker 5: Let's go back to a time before Los Angeles became
Speaker 5: the sprawling metropolis it is today. You see, back then,
Speaker 5: it faced significant challenges due to its geography. For more context,
Speaker 5: in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, much of
Speaker 5: downtown was surrounded by hills like Bunker Hill in Fort
Speaker 5: Moore Hill, where wealthy families lived in mansions and exclusive neighborhoods. However,
Speaker 5: as the streetcar system grew and new suburbs like Hollywood emerged,
Speaker 5: these hills became a barrier to infrastructure development, limiting the
Speaker 5: city's growth merged, these hills became a barrier to infrastructure development,
Speaker 5: limiting the city's growth and expansion north and west. One
Speaker 5: major challenge came down to the fact that street cars
Speaker 5: which connected downtown with the suburbs couldn't really climb steep hills,
Speaker 5: so they had to go all the way around them.
Speaker 5: As an effect of this, traveling was unpleasant, with the
Speaker 5: routes prolonged and crowded when heading towards the rapidly growing
Speaker 5: areas of the city like Hollywood or Glendale. So naturally,
Speaker 5: engineers and urban planners of the time sought solutions to
Speaker 5: address this very issue, and it was then that they
Speaker 5: began to modify the terrain. So, with few alternatives to
Speaker 5: solving the city's traffic problem, underground tunnels became an indispensable
Speaker 5: solution for improving mobility within Los Angeles. One of the
Speaker 5: first was Hill Street Tunnel, inaugurated in nineteen oh nine,
Speaker 5: with construction dating back to nineteen oh seven, led by
Speaker 5: the Pacific Electric Railway, the electric streetcar company that connected
Speaker 5: Los Angeles to its suburbs. This project was funded by
Speaker 5: the one and only Henry E. Huntington. Anyhow, it was
Speaker 5: built with the Red cars in mind, which made up
Speaker 5: the largest streetcar network in the world back then. Spanning
Speaker 5: over one thousand miles of track in its prime, and
Speaker 5: hence the Hill Street Tunnel, which was approximately two thousand,
Speaker 5: six hundred feet in length, was excavated to allow streetcar
Speaker 5: to pass through the hill and avoid the surface traffic.
Speaker 5: Although much of the work was manual, excavation technologies already
Speaker 5: included using dynamite to break down rocks, as well as
Speaker 5: steam powered excavation equipment to move the displaced materials. After
Speaker 5: two years of work, the tunnel was complete. This tunnel
Speaker 5: was crucial for connecting downtown Los Angeles to growing areas
Speaker 5: like Hollywood and Glendale, and effectively reduced travel time by
Speaker 5: approximately fifteen minutes, a significant saving. This tunnel also allowed
Speaker 5: street cars to pass directly under the hills instead of
Speaker 5: circling around them, making the journey much faster and efficient.
Speaker 5: It also happened to reduce street congestion, which was becoming
Speaker 5: an issue with the increased number of automobiles in the
Speaker 5: city growing by the day. At that time, Other vital
Speaker 5: tunnels were also excavated, such as the Fourth Street Tunnel,
Speaker 5: which connected downtown with the western part of the city,
Speaker 5: whereas Imbunker Hill. In addition to leveling parts of the Hill.
Speaker 5: Additional tunnels were constructed to facilitate streetcar movement in rugged terrain,
Speaker 5: and like Magic, Los Angeles expanded into new residential and
Speaker 5: commercial areas. However, well tunnels like the Hill Street and
Speaker 5: Fourth Street were excavated for streetcar transport. Another lesser known
Speaker 5: network began to take shape beneath downtown. The Los Angeles
Speaker 5: City Administration and various private entities such as banks, commissioned
Speaker 5: the construction of other tunnels to facilitate the transportation of
Speaker 5: sensitive things like money, important documents, and even prisoners.
Speaker 2: I did want to make a mention at this point
Speaker 2: so I can understand why they started the first tunnel, especially,
Speaker 2: and I know you might be thinking yourself, why was
Speaker 2: La becoming this growing metropolis. Hollywood wasn't the place for
Speaker 2: movies to be made like it is today, or it
Speaker 2: was in the Golden Age anyway, not at nineteen oh seven,
Speaker 2: right like when they first started construction on this tunnel.
Speaker 2: So you might be asking yourself, a cult member, why
Speaker 2: is it that La was growing so rapidly. We're gonna
Speaker 2: get to that in a bit. It does, in fact
Speaker 2: involve crude oil and the ins they say oil and
Speaker 2: gold insane drilling operation, like and we're gonna get to
Speaker 2: that in a bit, but all right, the first couple
Speaker 2: of tunnels for transit purposes, okay, completely understand that, no
Speaker 2: no red flags on the play just yet. And then
Speaker 2: almost immediately they get into this, they start building tunnels
Speaker 2: for transportation of money, of prisoners, of important documents, whatever
Speaker 2: the case. And it was like, Okay, now we're starting
Speaker 2: to tiptoe into the potentials of some fuck shit going
Speaker 2: on as to why these tunnels are built.
Speaker 3: Well, remember though, because the other cities that we've discussed though,
Speaker 3: had already established tunnel systems prior to LA's tunnel systems, right,
Speaker 3: and we know that people were already down there because
Speaker 3: the gold Rush brought people all across the entirety of California.
Speaker 3: So you know, it's it's taken things out of the
Speaker 3: book of San Francisco, out of Portland, out of Seattle,
Speaker 3: you know, Santa Barbara, they have them.
Speaker 4: They're all over the place.
Speaker 3: We haven't touched on every single tunnel system in California,
Speaker 3: but there is well established tunnels and underground cities throughout
Speaker 3: the entirety of the state. So absolutely I could see
Speaker 3: them doing this just like everything else was Los Angeles.
Speaker 2: And forgive me for any of our West Coast listeners here,
Speaker 2: LA doesn't or there wasn't a lot of gold found there, correct,
Speaker 2: I mean, there may be some, but it's not like
Speaker 2: San Francisco. I completely understand. It's the closest port to
Speaker 2: the Sierra Nevada were again.
Speaker 3: Because I'm pretty sure that LA found the biggest one, right,
Speaker 3: like outside of LA if they have the biggest Eureka, right,
Speaker 3: Eureka was found there. That Okay, I think let me
Speaker 3: let me look it up for sure.
Speaker 2: I do love history, but the master of all things,
Speaker 2: I just as you're talking about the boom, like you
Speaker 2: said oil and gold, and I'm like, yeah, that makes sense.
Speaker 1: But I'm like, wait a minute. Did LA have a
Speaker 1: quote unquote.
Speaker 2: Gold rush for actual gold or was it people that
Speaker 2: had made their money decided to say.
Speaker 3: Two hundred and twelve pounds in the initial years which
Speaker 3: took which total historical gold production for all of Los
Speaker 3: Angeles County reached one hundred and nine thousand ounces almost
Speaker 3: one hundred and ten thousand ounces valued at two million
Speaker 3: to four million in the nineteenth century.
Speaker 2: It's not that's not like bad by any means, but
Speaker 2: it's not the same as like we got from more
Speaker 2: up north.
Speaker 4: But yeah, I'm.
Speaker 3: Pretty positive that Eureka was found in was found in LA.
Speaker 2: Interesting, like Eka mean the first gold nugget, Yeah, the biggest.
Speaker 4: Gold nugget, I think it was Eureka.
Speaker 3: Lemon was first found and propagated in LA in eighteen
Speaker 3: fifty eight.
Speaker 1: Got you okay?
Speaker 4: Fair so?
Speaker 2: Yeah you got a lemon sized nugget of gold. Yeah,
Speaker 2: people going to come to find a little snippet of it,
Speaker 2: Yeah for sure. Okay, fair enough. But anyway, like I
Speaker 2: was saying, we could understand why they started the tunnel
Speaker 2: transit system and then private entities, banks and wealthy business
Speaker 2: people started digging their own tunnels for their own purposes.
Speaker 2: And of course, on the record, it was for transporting
Speaker 2: money and transporting official things from point A to point
Speaker 2: B without the dangers of going top side.
Speaker 1: But is that the only reason I think not?
Speaker 3: I accidentally got it wrong. Eureka was a different nugget
Speaker 3: that was found. The biggest nugget was found is called
Speaker 3: the Majave nugget, which is similarly associated with Eureka, but
Speaker 3: that was found in nineteen seventy seven.
Speaker 4: The Mohave Desert and it is like four point nine.
Speaker 3: That says one point one hundred and fifty six. Troy
Speaker 3: ounces this is what it says. Cool. So yeah, so Eureka, though,
Speaker 3: is a part of it too, And I'm not really
Speaker 3: I glanced over that, so I didn't actually look at it.
Speaker 3: But the Mohave nugget is housed in La So that's why.
Speaker 4: Kind of got misconstruted. But yeah, fair enough.
Speaker 2: So that's a little bit of why the city started
Speaker 2: to grow so crazy. We're going to talk more about
Speaker 2: the oil industry there and all that here in a moment,
Speaker 2: but like I'm saying, at this point, we start to
Speaker 2: see private equities started digging their own tunnels, and things
Speaker 2: kind of just got sideways from there, but let's continue.
Speaker 5: Unlike the extensive public transportation tunnels, these smaller ones weren't
Speaker 5: built to move passengers across the city. Rather, they were
Speaker 5: meant to fulfill critical administrative and logistical functions. In particular,
Speaker 5: this secret network of tunnels connected critical areas of the
Speaker 5: civic center where courts, jails, and banks were located. These
Speaker 5: underground routes also allowed daily operations to occur efficiently without
Speaker 5: crossing the crowded streets of downtown. Although much shorter and
Speaker 5: more complex than the tunnels built for street cars, they
Speaker 5: were reinforced with concrete to insure stability, and hence the
Speaker 5: tunnels were gradually built connecting the buildings as the city
Speaker 5: ex expanded. Many of the entrances to these tunnels were
Speaker 5: hidden in the basements of buildings or beneath important structures,
Speaker 5: allowing easy and discrete access for those who used them well.
Speaker 5: The exact construction cost of this network was not well documented,
Speaker 5: they were likely part of a general expense associated with
Speaker 5: constructing buildings in the Civic Center and other private institutions downtown.
Speaker 5: By the nineteen twenties, it was estimated that there were
Speaker 5: around eleven miles of tunnel under the city of Los Angeles,
Speaker 5: particularly in the downtown area. Thus, what began as a
Speaker 5: solution to Los Angeles' geographic and traffic problems would soon
Speaker 5: evolve into a network of underground routes that shaped the
Speaker 5: city's transportation, but only to later play a role in
Speaker 5: its darker history.
Speaker 2: A and now, of course, we get to the underbelly,
Speaker 2: to the crime, to the bootleggers.
Speaker 5: Inter Prohibition nineteen twenty, the nation underwent a drastic change
Speaker 5: with the implementation of prohibition, which made the production, sale,
Speaker 5: and transportation of alcohol totally illegal. As the country adjusted
Speaker 5: to this new reality, the underground of Los Angeles became
Speaker 5: the perfect refuge for those seeking to evade the law.
Speaker 5: With over eleven miles of underground passages, these tunnels were
Speaker 5: repurposed as secret routes for moving smuggled alcohol. The tunnels
Speaker 5: connected to hidden bars, known back then as speakeasies, a
Speaker 5: term which apparently comes from speaking quietly to avoid drawing attention.
Speaker 5: These places were discreete and often hidden behind the ordinary
Speaker 5: facades of legitimate businesses like restaurants, shops, or warehouses. Many
Speaker 5: were located in basements or behind concealed doors, whereas some
Speaker 5: were connected directly to the tunnels under the city, making
Speaker 5: it easier to move the alcohol and people around without detection.
Speaker 5: And they also had a very strong cultural impact, as
Speaker 5: speakeasies offered more than just illegal drinks. Many featured live
Speaker 5: music such as jazz, and attracted people from all walk
Speaker 5: of lives, ranging from ordinary citizens to celebrities and figures
Speaker 5: from organized crime. Some of the most famous venues included
Speaker 5: the King Eddie Saloon disguised as a piano store, and
Speaker 5: the Executive Coconut Grove at the Ambassador Hotel, which attracted
Speaker 5: stars like Frank Sinatra and the Marx Brothers. We should
Speaker 5: also point out that skid Roll played a critical role
Speaker 5: in the alcohol smuggling that went on during Prohibition. Located
Speaker 5: in the heart of downtown and not terribly far away
Speaker 5: from the port, this area facilitated the illegal transportation of
Speaker 5: liquor that arrived on ships. The alcohol was offloaded and
Speaker 5: discreetly moved through a network of underground tunnels once it
Speaker 5: approached skid Row. Many bars and warehouses here had secret
Speaker 5: entrances to these tunnels, which not only provided safe access
Speaker 5: to alcohol, but also offered quick escape routes in case
Speaker 5: of raids. Additionally, since this was a somewhat marginal area,
Speaker 5: police surveillance in skid Row was said to be less
Speaker 5: strict than in other parts of the city, allowing speakeasies
Speaker 5: to operate with less risk of being discovered. And it
Speaker 5: needs to be emphasized that organized crime played a central
Speaker 5: role in running this network, controlling the smuggling and ensuring
Speaker 5: the operation of secret bars. At the same time, corruption
Speaker 5: within the police and local politicians helped minimize the number
Speaker 5: of raids, meaning over time, these tunnels became the center
Speaker 5: of corruption that dominated Prohibition era Los Angeles.
Speaker 2: They weren't so all right, like we've already discussed, of
Speaker 2: course prohibition, we got bootleggers, rum runners if you want
Speaker 2: to call them whatever, that are smuggling things directly from
Speaker 2: the port through tunnels to skid Row, which if you
Speaker 2: look at the map that was just on screen there,
Speaker 2: that is not a quick jaunt on land, let alone
Speaker 2: below the surface.
Speaker 1: So yeah, this was a very intricate network.
Speaker 2: There is officially an estimated eleven miles of tunnels, but unofficially,
Speaker 2: I mean, your guess.
Speaker 1: Is as good as mine, honestly, I mean that is I.
Speaker 2: Mean, especially with skid Row, has always been like you're saying,
Speaker 2: a bit of a you know, a grimy areas of
Speaker 2: the cops really kind of turned the other way, especially
Speaker 2: with the corruption that was going on at that time.
Speaker 1: But there we have.
Speaker 4: Yeah, skid Row now is just absolutely horrific.
Speaker 2: Yeah, which we're going to talk about that more towards
Speaker 2: the end of the episode, after we talk about Hugh
Speaker 2: Hefner and his underground tunnels from the Playboy Mansion to celebrities.
Speaker 2: But before we get to that, let's talk a little
Speaker 2: bit more about what is under the ground of Los
Speaker 2: Angeles itself.
Speaker 1: Right, we do in fact mean oils oil wells, and.
Speaker 2: These wells are actually being hidden in plain sight in
Speaker 2: Los Angeles. For anybody who does not know LA has
Speaker 2: I think it's like a trillion barrels of oil underneath it.
Speaker 2: And they have been extracting this for over one hundred years.
Speaker 2: And in the earlier days of LA there was no
Speaker 2: problem with seeing a bunch of drilling rigs just operating,
Speaker 2: because who the fuck cared. However, as the city grew
Speaker 2: up around it, they tried to find ways of hiding them.
Speaker 4: So here is buildings up around him.
Speaker 1: Yes, these are.
Speaker 4: They've hid them inside of buildings and now.
Speaker 2: They they are soundproofed buildings. There's a couple of islands
Speaker 2: that they have like artificial waterfalls going as just a
Speaker 2: way to like cut down on noise and shit. One
Speaker 2: of these actually has led to kids getting sick, which
Speaker 2: is crazy because it's in the middle of a high
Speaker 2: school and these kids they like painted the sides of
Speaker 2: it as a way to like show the kids support
Speaker 2: and then kids started getting cancer and shit, it's it's
Speaker 2: fucking hilarious.
Speaker 1: But let's talk about it here.
Speaker 4: So I mean, that's funny, but like I mean, it's you.
Speaker 2: Know, I guys, it's more of a cob sense of humor.
Speaker 2: But beside the point here. This is from Los Angeles Magazine.
Speaker 2: So here are four oil wells hidden in plain sight
Speaker 2: in LA. For the record, there's a lot. These are
Speaker 2: just four of the more well known. Okay, So first
Speaker 2: one the Packard Well site. So if you're just driving
Speaker 2: through LA and you see this building, you're not gonna
Speaker 2: think anything's really suspicious about it.
Speaker 1: I wouldn't. You know. It's a squirret building, no windows.
Speaker 2: It's fine, But believe it or not, it is a
Speaker 2: very active oil well. This was built in nineteen sixty
Speaker 2: seven and what looks like a windowless Beije office building
Speaker 2: along Peako in the mid Willshire neighborhood hides fifty two
Speaker 2: oil and gas wells owned by Sentinel Peak Resources. A
Speaker 2: Derek on tracks it moves from well head to well
Speaker 2: head within the roofless structure.
Speaker 1: It doesn't. This structure has.
Speaker 2: No roof, but that's wild and it's also like pretty
Speaker 2: soundproof as far as the walls are. Concerns why it's
Speaker 2: constructed with like these slits for air, but like no
Speaker 2: one would know that ever unless you knew what this building.
Speaker 3: Was, right, which poses the question like do you actually
Speaker 3: really know what you drive by every day?
Speaker 2: Absolutely correct, Raven. The next is the Beverly Center. It's
Speaker 2: just as big, almost looks like a big old brick warehouse.
Speaker 2: I guess it's very wily, a lot of industrial stuff
Speaker 2: on the outside of it, but actually this on the inside.
Speaker 1: From the outside of all you see is these brick walls.
Speaker 2: So tucked on the western side of the Beverly Center,
Speaker 2: the Sentinel Peak Resource Rig peaks out from behind tall
Speaker 2: walls and foliage, barely visible to passers by on San Vincente.
Speaker 2: From the top of the mall's parking garage, you can
Speaker 2: scope the site's full expanse, which includes fifty four wells
Speaker 2: that tap into Salt Lake and Beverly Hill oil fields
Speaker 2: and produced tens of thousands of barrels of black gold
Speaker 2: every year. So next we have the more uh what
Speaker 2: I think is funny but maybe not, The Tower of Hope.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's that's the name. Tower of Hope.
Speaker 2: And you see it's got a lot flowers on it.
Speaker 2: All these things and the one hundred and sixty five
Speaker 2: foot tall Derek at Beverly Hills High As in Beverly
Speaker 2: Hills High School was dubbed the Tower of Hope in
Speaker 2: two thousand and clad in a vinyl sound absorbing sheath
Speaker 2: festooned with flowers painted by hospitalized children. Lawsuits claiming chemicals
Speaker 2: associated with the rig caused cancer were either dismissed or settled,
Speaker 2: but after the owner of Venoco went bankrupt, the decades
Speaker 2: only drilling site was shut down in July of twenty seventeen.
Speaker 2: So why I'm saying it's funny is because the kids
Speaker 2: that they were painted it, they were hospitalized because of
Speaker 2: what this Derek did to them.
Speaker 4: I still don't see the humor in that.
Speaker 2: But like, I don't know, maybe I'm just fucked up here.
Speaker 1: You know.
Speaker 2: The Irony raven it's called irony anyway. They shut it
Speaker 2: down in twenty seventeen. But let's talk more about it now.
Speaker 2: The Cardiff Tower. This one is an interesting one. So
Speaker 2: the Pico Robertson neighborhood has been a Jewish enclave since
Speaker 2: the end.
Speaker 1: Of World War two, Jews. I know it's La Raven.
Speaker 1: It's like say, in New.
Speaker 2: York, we can't not bring up the Jews in some way,
Speaker 2: but anyway, so it makes sense that the then owner
Speaker 2: of the Occidental Petroleum disguised this drilling site at Pico
Speaker 2: and Cardiff as a synagogue in nineteen sixty six.
Speaker 1: It was rebuilt in two thousand and one. The pseudo Shule.
Speaker 2: Now the property of Pacific Coast Energy, is home to
Speaker 2: forty wells, which are as accessed by movable Eric's that
Speaker 2: taps the same oil field as the Tower of Hope.
Speaker 1: So all right, let me break this one down for you.
Speaker 2: They they needed to put a well in this area.
Speaker 2: This area happened to be a Jewish area. Two things
Speaker 2: that Jews love money and synagogues. I think that's a
Speaker 2: fair statement to say. And so the oil company was like, hey, listen,
Speaker 2: we're gonna pay y'all to just not ask questions, and
Speaker 2: we're gonna build this to look like a synagogue.
Speaker 3: In Hell.
Speaker 2: You could even open one of your shools here and
Speaker 2: it's all good. It's gonna be fine, and everybody basically
Speaker 2: getting the thumbs up, and that's that.
Speaker 3: So did you know that there's eight thousand oil and
Speaker 3: gas fells located in LA. There's actually one hundred and
Speaker 3: one thousand unplugged oil and gas fells throughout California, but
Speaker 3: eight thousand them, so eight percent is located in La County.