Naud Junction

On a crisp Los Angeles morning in 1878, a French-American warehouseman named Edouard Naud stood at the junction of Main and Alameda Streets. He surveyed his newly built warehouse, a sturdy structure poised at the very spot where Southern Pacific Railroad trains diverged onto Alhambra Avenue, following the course of the Los Angeles River. This, my friends, is Naud Junction. Naud couldn’t have known then that his name would forever be etched into the fabric of this city. Naud Junction quickly became a bustling hub of activity. It was more than just a transit point. It was a place where commerce thrived and history unfolded. In 1898, a signal tower rose at Alameda and Ord Streets, a sentinel overlooking the burgeoning junction. This tower, a symbol of Naud Junction’s importance, stood for over 40 years before being dismantled in 1940, overshadowed by the grandeur of the newly constructed Union Station. But Naud Junction had another claim to fame, one that resonated with the roar of the crowd and the thud of gloves on flesh. From 1905 to 1913, Naud Junction housed Los Angeles’ primary boxing pavilion, built by the legendary promoter Thomas McCarey. Here, under the open sky, boxing history was written. Champions like Tommy Burns, Marvin Hart, and Abe Attell battled for glory. McCarey himself recounted witnessing a legendary bout between two “Negro fighters,” Jack Johnson and Denver Ed Martin, a fight he declared one of the greatest exhibitions in ring history. Naud Junction also bore witness to a different kind of spectacle. In 1909, the evangelist Billy Sunday held a crusade here. The very ground that reverberated with the cheers of fight fans now echoed with the fervor of religious revival. But like all stories, Naud Junction’s has an ending. The boxing arena met a fiery demise in 1915. Eventually, the area was transformed. The once-bustling hub was subsumed by progress, its vibrant past fading into the background of the city’s narrative. As we stand here today, little remains of the original Naud Junction. Yet, by knowing its story, we can almost hear the rumble of trains, the roar of the crowd, and the impassioned sermons. Naud Junction may be gone, but its legacy lives on in the rich tapestry of Los Angeles history.