According to Wikipedia and multiple other sources, "the service became a part of the Pacific Electric system by 1911, terminating at the Pacific Electric Building. Tracks were extended to Temple City on July 29, 1924. Cars began bypassing the Mission in 1928.
"The last trips occurred on November 30, 1941. After passenger service ended, tracks were retained for freight until removed in 1951."
To have made that trip one must have been born before November 30, 1941, which would probably have made one too old to be in the TCHS Class of 1956. A person born in 1937 would have been 18 in the fall of 1955 when the first class attended what is now Oak Ave Intermediate School. In previous years TC children attended junior and senior high in Pasadena. If you are the sole exception, please send in your birth certificate and diploma and two boxtops from any 1940s cereal package, and we'll retract this article.
It is likely that a few older alumni, like this author, recall the tracks along Las Tunas from early childhood, but if we went to Alhambra or L.A., it was on a bus.
(The adjacent image shows an early mail delivery via the PE. The genius decision of the founder, Henry Huntington, was to use standard gauge tracks, which allowed freight deliveries during the night when passenger service was closed.)
—RC
