There are a couple of spots on PCH that still look (almost) like they did decades ago, which sometimes seems like a miracle. There's the Adamson House, of course, and the Malibu pier. And in the Castillamare area, there's the building that started out as this -- Thelma Todd's Roadside Cafe.

The bridge is gone, PCH is wider and there's development on all sides. The brightly-tiled building, though, as striking as ever, is still instantly recognizable.

The photo's from 1935, from the LAPL collection *. Todd's death at the cafe -- was it murder? -- remains a mystery, and from the five pages of related photos in the LA Public Library's collection, you get a sense of what a huge story it was.

*The link to the photos sometimes 'expires', but if you type "Thelma Todd" into the search box here, the story unfolds.