It was best known as U Pick Parts and for gearheads in the greater Los Angeles area, the 26-acre location was a place they had either visited once or perhaps frequented in searches for stuff that they needed for their own cars or stuff that they needed for projects (both real and imaginary). In a sad bit of news, future generations will not be able to continue on with that tradition because the yard has been closed, completely cleaned out and we’re guessing that the land will be sold and the half century old business will be all but gone aside from the memories of those who worked or shopped there.
Losing junkyards is almost as tough as losing drag strips. Junkyards are the fields of dreams for gearheads. Those are the places we go to investigate the past as well as to dream about the future and how we are going to use the parts we have acquired on that trip.
The family claims that business is slow and that the depressed state of the Chinese economy has driven the price of scrap steel down through the floor and apparently that made the business untenable. If you have scrapped a car or anything else these days you’ll understand their pain. It is rough. You may be familiar with this place if you watched the old Hot Rod Unlimited show. They did an episode at the yard. It is shown below.
Outside of the normal car stuff they had at the place, U Pick Parts (the actual business name is Aalden Auto Salvage) became a bizarre place for Hollywood props and other items to end up. We’re talking some cool stuff like the sharks from Jaws, huge radios, and whatever else that a movie maker needed to complete the look of a scene. Speaking of scenes, the yard was a hot bed of movie and film production appearing in dozens of movies and television shows.
One less junkyard in SoCal. Some people are celebrating this fact. We’re not.
Click here to see the news story about the closing of the junkyard
Terrible I hope some stuff was saved. The guy seemed to like cars. Chinese are even screwing us out of old cars and parts and stuff. Crap city councils too F’em!
1967 I purchased a 390 Mecury Marauder engine from them and stuffed it in a ’57 Ford short wide pickup. My first swap, first hot rod, and a long series of speeding tickets capped with an exhibition of speed ticket. Lived in Sun Valley. Thanks for blast from past.
When I was a kid stuck w/ helping my elementary-school teacher mom at her work during my vacation days, the daily commute involved driving by Aalden Bros. Auto Wrecking and you could see their giant sign and huge yard from the I-5 freeway. I always wanted to go in there…Dad sold ’em a couple cars at the end of their lives but no children allowed inside. Much later when Pick-Your-Part opened up the road a bit and was cleaning their clock, they (as well as other yards in the Valley) started their own similarly-named help-yourself division and I finally wandered the place but by then yards were mostly import and fwd, the golden era of finding Muncie 4-speeds and posi rears for dirt-cheap was already over. Years later and in a different city an old retired man I’d become friends with was telling me stories and it turned out he’d worked for Aalden all those years, picking up a car with a forklift and flipping it over like breakfast ham (I’d seen him do it) was nothing to this guy and it was a kick to find out where he’d come from. I’d probably walked right by him once.
There were in fact a lot of junk and scrap yards in that area, many built on top of old landfill dumps. Nobody cared once, then the EPA came in and oil couldn’t just lay around on the dirt anymore even on top of old trash…the whole place, acres and acres, had to be concreted-in. A huge expense and definitely a change of character (and out-the-door prices).
Anyhow, just stories of a place you thought would always be there, but times change. A local hoarder scrapped out a huge amount of old cars a couple years ago because as much as we think stuff out to be saved, that doesn’t necessarily translate to decent money for the owner. My favorite steel scrap yard now is looking like they’re about to throw in the towel too. Tough business.
Back when I was looking for parts for my 67 Coronnet I probably went to every Pick a Part in So Cal. With good results !!
Is Christine buried there?
What a shame. This guy is nothing but short sighted. What were they doing 10-12 years ago when scrap was about the same “low” price it is now? I guess you can’t cut back your staff or start specializing your business to make a living. His dad started the business so not like this guy is worried about money. Damn shame.
I had been going there for years, but stopped some years ago. At one time you could get TH400’s, 12 bolts, and various V-8 engines. But since nobody junks cars of the 60’s or 70’s anymore it was rare to even find a 3rd gen Camaro, and if you did it was already picked clean. Unless you needed parts for clapped out V-6 Thunderbirds or Oldsmobiles there wasn’t much of value to gearheads. No great loss.
The only bad thing about this if you needed an ECM for a Ford Focus or a Cadillac injector the prices were good. Way cheaper than the Ecology Center.
The Aadlen Family is super loaded with cash so don’t feel too sorry.