Next month I'll be attending a multi-day business meeting in Los Angeles. The meeting will be held at the Wilshire Grand Hotel, which is now owned by the same corporation that owns Korean Air. Way back in the late 1950's, the same hotel was the centerpiece of the great Hilton lodging empire (after Hilton had acquired the Statler chain) and was known as the Statler Hilton Los Angeles.
The top photograph is from 1959. I believe the hotel continued to be known as the Hilton Los Angeles until the early to mid (and perhaps even late) '70s. The second photograph shows a view from one of the Wilshire Grand's rooms, taken in more recent times. This photo is taken from the rear of the hotel, so the white tower building you see (towards the middle) is likely the same one that is more visible in the 1959 photograph (to the left).
Note: "On October 27, 1954, the Hilton Hotels Corporation officially acquired control of the Statler hotel system. It consummated the greatest merger in hotel history, the largest real estate transaction the world (had) ever known. It brought the number of Hilton-operated hotels in the United States and abroad to twenty-eight." From the book Be My Guest by Conrad N. Hilton, written in 1957.
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