Tail o' the Pup
8512 Santa Monica Boulevard,
West Hollywood, California
90069
(Opening Soon)
The 1933 Group intends to bring back the historic Tail o' the Pup hot dog stand! The famous hot dog stand was last open back in 2005, but has been in storage, mostly over at Valley Relics Museum until the 1933 Group acquired the stand and the rights to the name back in 2018. If the 1933 Group sound familiar to you, they are the same people who acquired and restored the Idle Hour Cafe over in North Hollywood and own the Bigfoot Lodge in Los Feliz, plus several other locations!
Now, in early 2022, the 1933 Group intends to restore and bring back the iconic Tail o' the Pup! The new location at 8512 Santa Monica Boulevard in West Hollywood is a 2,700 square foot lot and in addition to the hot dog stand will include a beer garden. Route 66 fanatics may realize that this stretch of Santa Monica Boulevard is along the historic Route!
While most everyone is probably excited for the return of the 17 foot long hot dog stand, some of you may not even know what the Tail o' the Pup is. Back in the 1920s and 1930s Los Angeles was well known for its programmatic architecture. What is programmatic architecture, you ask? Well, it's when the building is designed to look like or represent what it sells. Such as in the case of the Tail o' the Pup, where a hot dog stand was designed to look like a seventeen foot long giant hot dog! Other examples included giant oranges that sold orange juice and even a giant doughnut drive thru.
This brings us to 1938 when Milton Black designed the 17 foot long hot dog stand. Despite this, due to World War II, it wouldn't be until June 1946 that finally the Tail o' the Pup would open at 311 North La Cienega Boulevard, supposedly having been commissioned by the dance team Veloz and Yolanda, (Frank Veloz and Yolanda Casazza).
Eddie Blake and his son, Dennis Blake, later acquired the hot dog stand in the seventies. However, Hotel Sofitel was eventually built at the location upon which the Tail o' the Pup stood, so in 1986, the stand relocated to 329 North San Vicente Boulevard. It stayed there until 2005, at which point the property the stand sat on along San Vicente Boulevard was purchased and by December the hot dog stand was sadly evicted.
Eventually, first Dennis Blake passed away in 2013 and then his father, Eddie Blake, passed in 2017. Eddie Blake's grandson, Jay Miller, thus inherited the Tail o' the Pup. He made an attempt to reopen it, but when that failed, he donated the stand to the Valley Relics Museum in Van Nuys, although it was mostly kept in storage. By 2018, the 1933 Group purchased it, and here we are today, hoping that the iconic stand will finally reopen more than 16 years later in 2022.
The Tail o' the Pup has appeared in a few movies and TV series including: the 1984 movie thriller "Body Double", the pilot episode of Pamela Anderson's TV series "VIP", the 1991 Steve Martin movie "L.A. Story", Colombo's pilot episode, and the 1986 movie "Ruthless People". Celebrities certainly had a liking for the hot dog stand as several were on the stand's wall of celebrities back when it was open. Jay Leno was present for the stand's reopening in 1986, and Whoopi Goldberg is supposed to also be a fan. Orson Wells is rumored to have literally had his limo pull up to the stand in order to get some hot dogs. And there's also a famous picture of Sigourney Weaver eating a hot dog, apparently from a documentary on the stand.
The new location, 8512 Santa Monica Boulevard, was also once the location of The Doors recording studio during the late 1960s and early 1970s. It's been a whole long list of businesses since then including a nightclub, a cafe, and a Mexican restaurant. While it was the Mexican restaurant, the business claimed that the ghost of Jim Morrison haunted the location, particularly the bathroom. Apparently, the men's restroom had formerly been the vocal booth where Morrison had recorded. The restaurant even hung up a plaque commemorating the location and the recording of The Doors 1970 song, "LA Woman". Supposedly, the restaurant staff felt the presence of Jim Morrison! No idea if his ghost will get hot dogs at the Tail o' the Pup!
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Outside References:
- Roadside Giants (2005) by Butko, Brian and Sarah, p: 12 - 13
- The Ruby Slippers, Madonna's Bra, and Einstein's Brain (2006) by Epting, Chris, p: 108
- Weird California (2006) by Greg Bishop, Joe Oesterle, Mike Marinacci, p: 158
- California Crazy and Beyond (2001) by Heimann, Jim, p: 74, 76, 101,
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- New Roadside America (1992) by Wilkins, Mike; Smith, Ken; Kirby, Doug, p: 226
First Created: 2021-11-11
Last Edited: 2021-11-11
