Featured image credit: ValleyRelicsMuseum.org
The San Fernando Valley can feel like its own world… maybe even its own dimension. Is there anywhere else quite like it? It has its own identity, its own culture. For a time, it seemed to even have its own accent. While characteristics of the Valley come and go, one man is leading a mission to preserve the rich pop culture history of this unique enclave of the Greater Los Angeles area. And you can admire his efforts by visiting the Van Nuys airport and asking someone to point you to the Valley Relics Museum.
A Valentine to the Valley

Tommy Gelinas grew up exploring the San Fernando Valley with his considerable brood of brothers and sisters. Imbued with a natural instinct for pop culture, he would grow up to run a highly successful t-shirt printing business in North Hollywood. And while t-shirts kept him busy, they didn’t quite scratch a growing itch to profess his deep fascination with the unique culture of the Valley.
At first, this obsession manifested as a blog in which Gelinas shared his complex thoughts and feelings about the Valley’s rich, nostalgic history. But even that wasn’t enough to encapsulate his profound love for the stomping grounds of his formative years. So, in 2013, after amassing an impressive personal collection of Valley-based memorabilia, he established the Valley Relics Museum as a 501(c)3 nonprofit organization.
Gelinas serves as not just the Valley Relics Museum’s founder but also as its curator, scouring the area’s cities, neighborhoods, and unincorporated corners for forgotten treasures. Or, at least, almost forgotten. And if the Valley Relics Museum succeeds in its mission, the distinct essence of the Valley won’t be lost to the steady march of time.
The Valley Relics Museum Finds Its Place

When you walk into the duo of airplane hangars that house the Valley Relics Museum at Van Nuys Airport, you’ll be instantly overwhelmed by a roughly assorted collection that’s literally climbing up the walls. Gelinas estimates he has upwards of 20,000 pieces in his collection, though only about 45 percent of these are displayed at any given time. Gelinas and crew maintain the rest in an undisclosed storage area.
Until 2018, Chatsworth had been home to a smaller Valley Relics Museum, which allowed Galinas to display less than one-third of his still-growing collection. The move to the hangars at the Van Nuys Airport in Lake Balboa gave the museum a little more room to spread out with its 10,000 square feet of floorspace.
Remembering the Changing Faces and Spaces of the Valley
Many visitors who grew up in the Valley will no doubt recognize some familiar items alongside partially forgotten pieces. But with some of the collection stretching back to the 1800s, Gelinas also offers plenty for guests to discover for the first time.
If an item ties into the history or culture of the San Fernando Valley in any way, the Valley Relics Museum considers it fair game. A deep dive into the collection on display reveals troves of Valley-related memorabilia, including:
- Apparel
- Art
- Automobiles
- Books
- Fast food restaurant collectibles
- Photo negatives
- Postcards
- Signage
- Statues
- Yearbooks
Sign of the Times
Surprisingly, it’s the signage that seems to give longtime Valley residents the biggest nostalgic kick. For example, the sign from the iconic Palomino Club, a beacon for country music that glowed over North Hollywood for half a century, now radiates from the wall of the Valley Relics Museum. But it faces stiff competition from the likes of vintage signs from Nacho’s Restaurant, Ben Frank’s, The Sherman Room, Don’s, De Soto Pharmacy, and Pioneer Chicken, just to name a few. And most cast a burning neon.

From Big Boy to BMX
Gelinas also explores the Valley’s history as a major producer of BMX bikes with several vintage models from the 1970s through the ‘80s. Extending even further back, you’ll find a couple of cars on loan from the family of renowned rodeo tailor Nudie Cohn, a NoHo resident whose “Nudiemobiles” were instantly recognizable. You can see both his longhorn ornamented 1975 Cadillac Eldorado convertible and his equally be-horned 1964 Pontiac Safari station wagon.
At the Valley Relics Museum, you’ll find a Big Boy restaurant statue across from old photos from aviation manufacturers like Rocketdyne and Lockheed Martin. The restored twin cowboys waving from horseback juxtapose a letter penned by Van Nuys’ namesake, Isaac Newton Van Nuys. The blue glow of an original Van de Kamp’s Bakery windmill competes with the full-scale (and fully playable) vintage video arcade.
The Valley Relics Museum Takes Its Mission to the Community
But a mission as big as Gelinas can’t be contained to a couple of airplane hangars and some off-site storage. Rather he’s still bouncing around the Valley when needed, whether that be to assess a new potential addition to the collection or do what he can to help keep the Valley’s rich history intact in the wild. For example, when programmatic architecture icon Tail o’ the Pup was nearly lost to time, Gelinas stepped in. It’s still around for Angelenos to appreciate today.

Yet, not all of Gelinas’s ventures end on such a positive note. Case in point: the controversial Old Trapper’s Lodge statues locked into place at Pierce College by a decades-old agreement made between parties that are no longer around. The college doesn’t want them. The artist’s family can’t afford to have them removed. It seemed like the perfect situation for the Valley Relics Museum. But when Gelinas began to transfer the immense boot hill installation from the Pierce College campus, a local tour group found issue with his methods of removal. Once lawyers got involved, Gelinas bowed out, and the statues continue to decay in obscurity.
Making Time for the Past
But who knows? Maybe the Old Trappers Lodge statues will make their way into the Valley Relics Museum in the distant future. It seems for most of the Valley’s rapidly changing civic landscape, the choice is between prolonged reverence in an airplane hangar or an unceremonious landfill grave. One lesson we return to in this blog time and time again is that time marches ever onward. And while we can never truly go “home” again, we still have the luxury of our memories. If that’s at all important to you, then the Valley Relics Museum should be high on your list of local attractions to visit.
You can currently visit the Valley Relics Museum on weekends between the hours of 10 am and 3 pm. Admission is $15, with children 10 and under enjoying free admission. You can find the museum at the Van Nuys Airport, 7900 Balboa Boulevard, Lake Balboa, CA 91406, in Hangar C 3 and 4, easily accessible by entering on Stagg Street.
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