Talk:Tarzana, Los Angeles

Sundown town
I didn't look through all the versions but in James Loewen's book he identifies Tarzana as a Sundown town. This information helps explain the current racial demographics in the city, and ought to be included in the article.--Rockero 17:07, 9 November 2005 (UTC)
 * I'd bet it was a restrictive covenant town as much as a Sundown town. jengod 19:17, 9 November 2005 (UTC)
 * Almost 7 years later; turns out you were both right.&mdash; alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 21:48, 19 August 2012 (UTC)

The entire San Fernando Valley was founded under a racially restrictive covenant, as were thousands of other communities of this era, as detailed by Prof. Loewen's book (this was standard practice in the U.S.A. in the era of segregation). This covenant pre-dated Edgar Rice Burroughs' purchase of the property (per Catherine Jurca, "White Diaspora", Princeton University Press, 2001), and did not originate with him. Unless EVERY community in Southern California (Glendale, Burbank, etc.) is going to have a section on racial covenants, this isn't unique or germane to Tarzana's history. Also, Barraclough's claim that ERB "promoted" the town with "white supremacy" language (one sentence in her book) is unsourced--she doesn't provide any of the original realty advertising to support this statement. The original advertising materials and concept (per Irwin Porges, John Taliaferro, Scott Tracy Griffin, and other Burroughs biographers) were to promote Tarzana as an artists' and literary colony--if anyone can find the original realty advertising materials, this would be the definitive reference, rather than Barraclough. Since her book doesn't provide a source for the "white supremacy" claim, I have removed it.Carolann Wright (talk) 04:53, 28 March 2015 (UTC)

Tabloid Crap
The hair salon where, on February 16th 2007, Britney Spears infamously shaved her head is located in Tarzana.

WTF is this doing in an encyclopedia? Brain dead trivia. 100% Wikiality. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.141.211.24 (talk) 16:58, 5 December 2007 (UTC)

Jeremy Hotz does not actually live in Tarzana. It's a joke because he thought the name was funny. I took this info out. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 129.100.209.133 (talk) 02:04, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

The unanswered question
The question I expected to find the answer to here is about the name? Who chose the name, apparently after Tarzan? --CodeGeneratR (talk) 04:45, 1 October 2009 (UTC)
 * http://www.snopes.com/lost/tarzan.asp Koro Neil (talk) 09:06, 13 May 2011 (UTC)

If that Snopes article is correct, then isn't the information in this article wrong? Lots of people come to this article looking for that piece of information ("which came first, Tarzan or Tarzana?") — Preceding unsigned comment added by 98.119.36.64 (talk) 04:19, 26 June 2011 (UTC)

Although, I have my doubts as to whether the Snopes article is correct. In any case, I took out the part at the beginning that addressed the origin of the name because it didn't cite the source. But I am looking for a reliable source and if it turns out to be right then I'll put it back. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 98.119.36.64 (talk) 04:29, 26 June 2011 (UTC)

Nevermind everything I just said. I'm sorry. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 98.119.36.64 (talk) 04:36, 26 June 2011 (UTC)

The Snopes article was written as an example of a VIRAL HOAX. It is untrueCarolann Wright (talk) 04:55, 28 March 2015 (UTC)

notable residents inclusion criteria
I propose that if the person's wikipedia article doesn't say anything about tarzana and there is no independent source that says they live in tarzana that they be removed. it's just a neighborhood; people move in and out all the time. I will do this soon if no one objects.&mdash; alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 16:50, 19 August 2012 (UTC)

Dubious tag regarding Hebrew language bookstore
My problems with this sentence is that assumes without a source that the Jewish community in Tarzana supports the Hebrew language bookstore. Non-Jews read Hebrew too and almost certainly shop at the store. Also there are Jews all over Los Angeles who almost certainly support the store as well. Tarzana has under 30,000 people in it. Even supposing that all of them were Jewish, it's almost certainly not enough to support a Hebrew bookstore, otherwise we'd see one in every city with 30,000 Jews. If this is the case, why is this only the second one? Anyway, it makes no sense to me, so I'm bringing it up here.&mdash; alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 14:31, 20 August 2012 (UTC)

Citation in the lead
I'm kind of turned off by citations in the lead (see WP:LEADCITE for MOS opinion on this). On the other hand, GeorgeLouis's rewrite of the lead got changed by an IP who obviously didn't know what the standards for inclusion are, so possibly a cite, which GeorgeLouis put in after I reverted the IP's reversion, would have stopped the IP from removing the material. On the third hand, citations in the lead scream "edit wars" to me (probably from my having wasted so much time editing articles on the Middle East). Thoughts on removing the cite from the lead and relying on WP:LEADCITE to keep the phrase intact? This is mostly an aesthetic issue for me, and not one I'm strongly fixed on. &mdash; alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 16:54, 12 May 2013 (UTC)
 * I don't like them either. Revert if you want, with a nice, friendly Edit Summary. Or leave it there and see who else is unhappy. GeorgeLouis (talk) 17:38, 12 May 2013 (UTC)

"Zoned" schools.
I have never heard this word used in connection with schools outside of Wikipedia. Also, there are no sources for listing these schools as "zoned," whatever it means. GeorgeLouis (talk) 21:14, 12 May 2013 (UTC)


 * I'm guessing they're trying to say that kids in Tarzana go to LAUSD schools. Some kids in West Hills go to Las Virgenes USD schools even though West Hills is part of LA, so I suppose that's why the information is important.  On the other hand the usage doesn't seem to appear outside of Wikipedia.  The only hit I found that wasn't on Wikipedia or a mirror was this forum post.  The LAUSD itself uses the term "associated with" to convey this sense (see e.g. LAUSD resident school identifier). I'm not sure what to do about it in the article, though. &mdash; alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 21:36, 12 May 2013 (UTC)
 * My preference would be to include only those schools that actually lie within the subject neighborhood. That would allow for accuracy and for the ability to check the sources. (I've never seen any serious sourcing of this "zoning" stuff.) I am not going to crusade for wholesale abolition of such information, but whenever I develop a new article or do serious editing to an old one, that's the path I would prefer to follow. GeorgeLouis (talk) 01:13, 13 May 2013 (UTC)
 * That sounds like the best thing to me. It seems as if you and I are the only editors who really follow this article closely, so maybe you should just go ahead and do it and we'll see if there's any outcry.&mdash; alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 02:18, 13 May 2013 (UTC)
 * One source cited in the present section is deceased, and the other goes to a map of the LAUSD school board districts, which has nothing to do with where students go to school. If there is no objection, I will rewrite the section to concentrate on the schools actually situated within the neighborhood. GeorgeLouis (talk) 04:47, 13 May 2013 (UTC)
 * If I get sourced information, I would list schools outside of the community that serve it because LAUSD also assigns neighborhoods to certain middle and high schools. In the case of Encino, Los Angeles I got sourcing from a book stating that there are no public high schools in Encino and that Encino is zoned to specific high schools outside of the community.
 * However the problem is that LAUSD has not regularly posted zoning maps (there have been a few such maps posted when school zones change and those are very valuable). The "source" was the online program mentioned where you can type in an address and get zoning info. However that service can go down anytime. In the case of Houston Independent School District all zoning maps are posted so it's easy to tell where a community is zoned for all levels of school.
 * The way I list schools is to do so:
 * If it resides in the community boundaries
 * If the school's attendance boundary includes all or a portion of the neighborhood (this is why I wish LAUSD would post this information) - Can be sourced from school district boundary maps and/or from secondary sources
 * If a reliable source mentions a relationship between the neighborhood and the school
 * If the school meets one of the three criteria, it's listed.
 * WhisperToMe (talk) 09:39, 23 March 2014 (UTC)
 * My preference is to describe the neighborhood and what it contains. If the school is not in the neighborhood, it is not listed. That would be like listing the Los Angeles County Museum of Art in all the neighborhoods because anybody in the city can go there. No, let's keep the neighborhood articles pristine, with only actual, physical presences listed in each one of them. In all else there lies madness. GeorgeLouis (talk) 20:10, 8 April 2014 (UTC)
 * Well, the museum analogy isn't really relevant; museums aren't things that have zones or areas. Schools are a bit different; every location is expected to have a public school associated with it; some nabes have one school whose zone overlaps the entire neighborhood, but since the neighborhoods have little real existence, it makes sense to point out Tarzana high schoolers go to certain schools (it used to be Taft and Birmingham, but I don't know anymore). It's a thing people want to know about when they read about communities. --jpgordon:==( o ) 22:31, 8 April 2014 (UTC)

Bigotry
" is a predominantly white, highly educated, affluent district" are you kidding me? This is unacceptable. Please keep the racism and bigoted descriptions to your self.
 * That's not very nice. GeorgeLouis (talk) 04:30, 5 July 2013 (UTC)

Affluent in lead
What does anyone think about the use of the word "affluent" to describe Tarzana? It seems both wrong and silly to me. I know the LAT has the median income higher than average, but really, "affluent" is like Bel Air or Beverly Glen or something, not Tarzana. Thoughts?&mdash; alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 22:30, 26 January 2014 (UTC)
 * I've taken it out before -- as well as the other unnecessary characterizations in the lede -- but someone else put it back. But a good question is, do we characterize other towns and neighborhoods in this fashion if they are not particularly exceptional in this regard? For example the lede also used to mention Tarzana's ethnic majority ("70% white"), as well as its degree of education, but what is that in context with the rest of the Valley? Or the rest of LA? Why not just let the reader continue on to the demographic descriptions below? But -- what do other articles say? --jpgordon:==( o ) 00:09, 27 January 2014 (UTC)
 * I don't know, I noticed that "white" part was gone, and that's good. I agree with letting the reader continue down to the demographics.  Many of the other Valley neighborhoods start with the same sentence we have here now, but others seem to have accumulated a lot of weird descriptors.  E.g. Reseda was said to be "highly diverse" and to "have a lot of residents born outside of the US" because of something the LAT said about it, but looking at the demographics it's obviously not highly diverse in relation to the rest of LA.  I took it out of there and I guess we'll see what happens.  I will say that 70% white is high for neighborhoods of LA in the Valley.  It may be that the whiteness would be important in the lead if there were some sourced material discussing it in the article, but there's not, other than the part about how it was founded with restrictive covenants, which hardly seems weighty enough to go in the lead these days.&mdash; alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 00:26, 27 January 2014 (UTC)
 * This neighborhood is distinctly different from other nabes in L.A., and the description is from a good source. It really sums up what Tarzana is like, compared to the rest of the city. GeorgeLouis (talk) 03:27, 25 February 2015 (UTC)

Refer to Burroughs' biographers, please!
A lot of erroneous or irrelevant information has popped up on this page over the years (that Snopes hoax continues to circulate around the internet).

Author Edgar Rice Burroughs, who purchased Harrison Gray Otis's ranch, and whose efforts led to the founding of Tarzana, kept diligent business records. His life has been extensively biographied, most definitively by Irwin Porges in the 820-page "Edgar Rice Burroughs: The Man Who Created Tarzan" (Brigham Young University Press, 1975), and more recently by Scott Tracy Griffin, in "Tarzan: The Centennial Celebration" (Titan Books, 2012). There is a wealth of information in these books on the town's history that can be incorporated into the text here. I may get around to it eventually, but if others want to take a crack at it, please do so. It's a shame that there is so little of the town's rich history here. Carolann Wright (talk) 05:07, 28 March 2015 (UTC)
 * Thanks for your messages. I hope you keep on correcting the content on the page. Sincerely, BeenAroundAWhile (talk) 18:11, 28 March 2015 (UTC)

Help me find some sources for these Tarzana residents, please!

 * Eric Braunn, Iron Butterfly guitarist
 * Neil Diamond
 * John Sebastian

These three musicians all owned one after another the same house on Caritina Drive; I knew this as a teenager because I lived down the street from them, and it was local lore. But the only confirmation I've been able to find so far is this really unusable source. I'd love it if someone could find something usable. --jpgordon&#x1d122;&#x1d106; &#x1D110;&#x1d107; 01:16, 6 March 2018 (UTC)

Can someone add Benny Urquidez to the list of notable people?
I have never edited Wikipedia and don't want to mess it up, but if someone could add Benny "The Jet" Urquidez to the list of notable people from Tarzana, that would be awesome. He is one of the greatest martial artists alive, with only one defeat in his 27-year career (and even that one wasn't totally clear, depending on who you ask). I feel that leaving him off this list is an injustice. Here's his article on Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benny_Urquidez

Thanks! 67.177.175.51 (talk) 03:13, 9 September 2019 (UTC)