Greyhound Bus depot was at Brand and Colorado in 1950s and ¿60s

The Greyhound bus line, with its well-known logo of a leaping greyhound, has been around since before World War I and Greyhound buses were making regular trips from New York to California by the late 1920s, according to Wikipedia.

The Greyhound line came to Glendale in the early 1930s. Two stations were listed in the city directory in 1934, one on East Broadway and another on South Glendale Avenue, said George Ellison of Glendale Public Library’s Special Collections.

By 1952, when Lola Archer and her husband, Clifford, came to town to take over the Greyhound bus depot, the station was located at the northeast corner of Brand Boulevard and Colorado Street.

The depot shared a building with a used furniture store and Billy’s Delicatessen. The Masonic Temple was just down the street on Brand and between the bus depot and the temple was a large parking lot used for boarding.

“Cliff ran the day-to-day operations and I was a stay-at-home mom until our youngest son, Ron, was in preschool,” Archer said. “When our boys were old enough, they were engaged to load and deliver baggage to earn their spending money.”

At the time there only a few restaurants in town and Archer recalled that Billy’s was very popular.

“It was famous for pastrami sandwiches, potato salad and coleslaw, and drew diners from all over the Southern California area. Billy’s was owned by two guys; one was called ‘Big Joe,’ because he was tall, and the other was ‘Little Joe,’ because he was much shorter.”

The huge Masonic Temple building brought a variety of businesses to the corner over the years. The Sands movie theater was on the ground floor of the temple when the Archers took over the depot. Actor Michael Landon occasionally attended movies at the Sands, coming into the depot to pay the 25 cent parking fee, which was collected by the honor system.

“Not everyone was honorable,” Archer said.

Later, a disco night club called “Under the Ice House” opened in the temple’s basement. The entrance was in the alley behind the building.

“They had an antique airplane hanging from the ceiling.”

For a brief period, a small restaurant called “The Carriage House” was on the temple’s mezzanine floor.

“It was a charming little place, open only on weekends and served fondue, which was popular at the time,” Archer said.