After more than a century in operation, the owners of the Phillips 66 Los Angeles Refinery officially closed down operations at its plants in Wilmington and Carson on Dec. 31, 2025. Union Oil owned the Wilmington refinery, located at 1660 W. Anaheim St., until 1997, when the company sold it to Tosco Corp. Tosco turnedContinue reading “Explosion and fire at Union Oil tank farm in Wilmington lit up the skies in 1951”
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Civil War tensions led to the creation of Wilmington’s Drum Barracks
The Drum Barracks in Wilmington was the first U.S. military base to be built in Los Angeles County. It takes its name not from the percussion instrument, but from Lt. Col. Richard Coulter Drum, the Adjutant General then based in San Francisco who commanded California’s militia forces. Drum played a key role in the creationContinue reading “Civil War tensions led to the creation of Wilmington’s Drum Barracks”
Panama Canal celebrations at the Port of LA were muted by the outbreak of World War I
The successful completion of the Panama Canal on April 1, 1914 stands as one of the most significant moments in the development of the West Coast shipping industry, and, in particular, the development of the newly minted Port of Los Angeles, founded just seven years earlier. The idea of linking the Atlantic and Pacific oceansContinue reading “Panama Canal celebrations at the Port of LA were muted by the outbreak of World War I”
Wilmington Airport underwent a startling transformation in 1958
My recent post about Bay Cities Airport, a long-gone airfield in north Torrance, tipped me off to the presence of another one-time local airport further south in Wilmington. The Wilmington Airport opened in 1929 on roughly 80 acres of land west of Figueroa and L streets.The land was adjacent to Bixby Lake and the largerContinue reading “Wilmington Airport underwent a startling transformation in 1958”
