The project to restore the Manning’s Coffee Store sign in the Highland Park neighborhood of Los Angeles will be among a dozen or so honored by the California Office of Historic Preservation, according to an email from Future Studio.
Several officials from the Highland Park neighborhood will attend the awards ceremony in Sacramento in November.
Manning’s Coffee went out of business in the 1960s, and the sign’s neon hadn’t functioned for many years. A cost-share grant from the Route 66 Corridor Preservation Program helped restore the sign, and it was relighted in January. It’s believed the sign dates to 1933. Las Cazuelas restaurant occupies the building now.
The area is part of the North Figueroa Street corridor in Los Angeles, which included Route 66 from 1931 to 1934 and again from 1936 to 1960.
It’s the second such honor for the neighborhood; the moving and restoration of the Chicken Boy rooftop statue was lauded by the state in 2010.
(Hat tip: Scott Piotrowski)