I keep meaning to go to that LA modern committee meeting but missing the meetings. Damn, why don't they ever notify people by email?

I'm pretty sure the original FF color scheme was white on navy blue. The guy to ask would be John Baker ( john14@cougartown.com ), who maintains a nostalgia website devoted to his (and my )old high school, Hawthorne High, and has a wild stash of old photos of Hawthorne landmarks.

Fosters played a big role in Hawthorne because it was the Beach Boys' hangout of choice. This franchise is still there, and it has only recently changed its old sign:

http://www.cougartown.com/fosters.html

Believe it or not, there are still Hawthornians (I might term them Branch Hawthornians) who still in 2004 get together in vintage 1950's sturdy Detroit iron and cruise from Fosters Freeze down Hawthorne Boulevard. They have staged ten such cruise nights in the past five years. Lynn's sister has a mint 61 Continental convertible with suicide doors, and so I have been quite tempted to join them during one of these episodes.

Branch Hawthornians heh heh...

Here's what the sign museum starts with:

The sign is a double-faced, neon-illuminated sign with an ice cream cone graphic in which the ice cream is actually inset white plastic illuminated with an incandescent bulb. It's been painted over several times and is currently blue with white text. owever, an orange border around the edge of the sign is discernible underthe paint layers.

Might give your link to the Friends of the Raymond website a look, it comes up as Not Found when clicked and in the status bar shows as http://www.laobserved.com/www.raymondtheatre.com

Works now. Thanks..

As it happens, I was purposelessly driving down Fletcher today and saw what I think is an original Fosters sign, and sure enough it was navy blue with white text. This sign is so old it has a drawing of a cone on it, which I think precedes even the old and now-gone sign in Hawthorne. I took a photo with my old Nikon F but who knows when I'll develop this roll.

What an FF is still doing on Fletcher just south of San Fernando Road, in a tawdry, traintrack tainted commercial strip of masonry lots and strip bars is an amazing story in itself I'm sure.

Sadly, it seems that most of the Foster's Freezes left survive in less desirable spots. Not counting the bogus FF's that share rent with El Pollo Locos. Those are FF's in signage only.

I seldom indulge a Foster's Freeze craving, but sometimees -- usually when I'm on on the road -- it's the only thing that will do.