The California Botanic Garden of Mandeville Canyon

The California Botanic Garden in Brentwood's Mandeville Canyon. Courtesy of the Pacific Palisades Historical Society Clearwater Collection, Santa Monica Public Library.

A fascinating piece from KCET.org giving the history of what was planned to be Los Angeles's finest botanical gardens.  In 1928 the California Botanic Garden, the brain child of  businessman and naturalist H. C. Oakley, opened  in the hills of Brentwood.  The aim was to plant 800 acres of land in the Mandeville Canyon, part of the Santa Monica Mountains, and to create a huge botanic garden.  Sadly the Great Depression got in the way and the gardens closed in 1935.  A sad story but an interesting one nonetheless.