I was an original Mallrat

Here's another small excerpt from the book I'm writing about growing up in the San Fernando Valley in the 60s. It's 1964 and I'm too young to drive. My guess is today nothing's changed.
The Topanga Plaza opened!

Finally! A place for teenagers to loiter in air conditioned comfort!

The Topanga Plaza was L.A.’s first indoor mall. So take that West Covina and Terminal Island! It’s one thing to just call yourself a great suburb, but now we had an Orange Julius, Montgomery Wards, and Morrow’s Nuts to prove it! No wonder the Soviet Union viewed Woodland Hills as a target!

The mall was about the size of a city block, two tiered, flanked by Broadway and May Co. department stores with a Monkey Wards in the middle. There was also an ice skating rink (a reminder that in other parts of the world they had this thing called “winter”), Don Paul’s Seven Seas food court (affectionately known as Seven Sewers), and the world’s coolest fountain.

Beads of water (actually glycerin) ran down these ceiling-to-floor thin transparent plastic or nylon tubes creating a rainforest effect. When psychedelic drugs became fashionable a few years later this fountain became a big attraction. Just staring at it for ten hours became very commonplace.

On the opposite end of the mall there were kiosks with exotic birds and monkeys in large circular cages. That might not sound like a big deal but I don’t know one kid who didn’t love those monkeys.

But the real attraction to anyone under 20 was the Wallichs Music City record store. Owned by the ubiquitous Clyde Wallichs, his Music City stores were an L.A. institution. The main branch was at Sunset & Vine and was the hang-out capitol of Hollywood. It stocked the most complete collection of records anywhere and far more important – had listening booths! This was a revolutionary concept. You could take a sample album into this little glass booth and play it. Without having to buy it!! Why not just pass out free crack?

Every kid flocked to the Topanga Plaza for one simple reason. Most of the time we were all bored. Despite what you’ve read about how exciting the 60s were, those of us who grew up in it spent a great deal of time looking for crap to do. When our children were out of school we filled their summer days with karate lessons and dance classes. Back then we just hung out, sitting around the food court, wandering aimlessly through stores (like I gave a shit about the “Raj of India’s” Pooja Accessories Sale).

From time to time they filmed WHERE THE ACTION IS at the Topanga Plaza, which was quite ironic considering there was no action there ever. This was a daily afternoon dance show on ABC that was all shot in “groovy” locations. If anything helped perpetuate the California Myth it was this show. They’d be at the beach, the zoo, Marineland, drag strips, Pacific Ocean Park, Knotts Berry Farm, Griffith Park stables, Pickwood Pool, Busch Gardens (a combination tropical forest/brewery – Disneyland for tosspots). I say “myth” because if you didn’t have a car (or worse, not know how to drive) you were shit out of luck. In all those anthems to Surf City never once do they mention getting there by city bus.

Frequent guests were Paul Revere & the Raiders. It would be a thousand degrees and they'd be on the beach in Malibu in their heavy wool revolutionary war garb. Too bad they didn't have shorts and tank tops in the 1700s.

Tomorrow: David Hyde Pierce guest blogs and answers one of your Friday questions.