“A new concept arrived in the 1930s, the motel — a portmanteau word made out of motor + hotel. They sprang up all over, and in the early years they were usually family owned.
“A classic example of an early bungalow-style operation was the Topanga Ranch Motel. Built in the mid ’30s and once owned by William Randolph Hearst, it was one of the first Topanga-Malibu hostelries to cater exclusively to the motorcar crowd.
“We know a screenwriter who would stay at the Topanga Ranch Motel for weeks in winter. [It was] a gently decaying relic, but cheap and quiet and there were no distractions — just a TV that only received three stations on a good day. But by then, the era of the motel was over.”
— from an excellent piece in Topanga New Times, dated 11.4.22 and titled “Hotel California.” Written by Suzanne Guldimann.
