PB Images

Pacific Beach...

The human body is seventy percent water. So is the surface of the earth. Each summer, we feel that primordial pull to the Sea. The sun rises high in the sky, a salt breeze brushes the cheek, and down to the sea we go.

In the twenties Pacific Beach began to take root as a farming community amidst the lemon groves.

As the town grew and as the structure we know now as Crystal Pier was built in 1927, there were great dreams of the community turning into an amusement attraction such as Pacific Ocean Park in Santa Monica, CA. The Pacific Beach pier officially opened on the weekend of July 4th, 1927 with great hoopla and most of San Diego flocking to see the new pier and the dazzling Crystal Ballroom.

It was a time of joy experiencing the growth of Pacific Beach and surrounding areas. As Mission Beach had opened Belmont Park's Giant Dipper just two years earlier with great fanfare... The reality of it all was that the Great Depression was just around the corner, rocking the world...

Pacific Beach -
By Eve Smull,

"PACIFIC BEACH IS OFFERED TO INVESTORS FOR THE FIRST TIME!"

1887 - Golden Era magazine touted the glories of our all-but-vacant land just north of False Bay, extolling PB's "magnificent beach, unsurpassed in California and the bay for yachting, fishing and duck-shooting." The Pacific Beach Company offered its first 25' x 125' lots on December 12, 1887. The land boom extended to neighborhoods throughout the San Diego area. Others who celebrate 1887 as their founding year include Ocean Beach, La Jolla and Coronado.

* January - 1888 - The San Diego College of Letters laid its cornerstone in formal ceremonies. (The site of Pacific Plaza II today.)

* March -1888 - The Pacific Beach Weekly Newspaper was first published. It survived one year. The PB Community Church (now PB Presbyterian Church) rose on the corner of Garnet and Jewell.

* April - 1888 - The San Diego and Old Town Railway was extended to PB. Round trip fare from downtown to the beach was 25 cents and took just 30 minutes.

* May, 1888 - The American Driving Park (racetrack) opened, complete with a grandstand, stables and clubhouse. Wyatt Earp raced his horses there.

In the summer of '88, world-famous poet Rose Hartwick Thorpe arrived to lend prestige to the "college town." She wrote a poem about our bay-then know as "False Bay," renaming it forever "Mission Bay." Meanwhile, buyers continued to invest in vacant lots.

PB's boom was short-lived, however. The Depression of the 1890's saw the collapse of The San Diego College of Letters. Land sales quickly halted as people lost their properties and moved away.

IInstead, a "sea of lemon trees" sprouted, as the remaining families turned to farming. Alas, at the turn of the century, lemons from Sicily began to arrive on the East Coast, ending our brief fame as "the Lemon Capitol of the World."

Meanwhile, O.W. Cotton of the Folsom brothers Realty was still hawking land. In 1904, the realtors turned the former college into the Hotel Balboa, using it to woo prospective clients.

And instead of lemon trees, gingerbread houses began to sprout here and there across two square miles. PB would continue to retain it's semi-rural, seaside flavor until the beginning of World War II.

JUST $25 A LOT!
During PB's Centennial Celebration in 1987 interviews with older residents included Lenore Carroll. Recalled Lenore, who came to PB in 1904, "Grandma wanted a home, so for $25 a lot, she bought two lots on Shasta Street from Folsom Brothers Real Estate firm."
"We lived in a tent then, no water, no electricity—no nothing!"

"BRAEMAR," THE F.T. SCRIPPS' ESTATE
The large estate on Sail Bay's northwest corner often hosted local meetings. Its dining room welcomed the PB Women's Club before its clubhouse, Hornblend Hall, was built in 1912. That dining room later became the Catamaran Hotel's Wedding Chapel when Braemar was torn down to make way for the hotel in 1959.
In October 1987, the chapel was moved to Garnet Avenue at the foot of Soledad Mountain Road. Renamed "Rose Creek Cottage" it was preserved and restored by PB Town Council members and volunteers.

CRYSTAL PIER——A LANDMARK SINCE 1927
Earl Taylor, a Kansas native, arrived in PB in 1923. He purchased and developed many parcels of land in the business district. Dunaway's Drugstore was one of the first.

Unfortunately for local dancers, uncreosoted pilings allowed marine borers to nibble the pilings from below, closing Crystal Pier for repairs.

After 10 years of financial hardship that paralleled the Great Depression, the Pier reopened. This time, the midway was gone and 10 motel cottages had been added along with promenade decks.

A severe winter storm on January 27, 1983 tore away 240 feet of the Pier. In 1987, the City replaced the lost section adding a sturdier, raised and widened fishing deck.

THE COLLEGE OF LETTERS
In the center of Pacific Beach, the San Diego College of Letters opened its doors in 1889. It became the Hotel Balboa in 1904, then morphed into the San Diego Army-Navy Academy in 1910. Referring to itself as the "West Point of the West," the facility once boasted 500 students, most of whom lived on campus.

Once again, the school at Garnet and Lamont changed hands. Brown Military Academy was its final occupant, remaining until the site was razed in 1958 to make way for Pacific Plaza shopping center. A portion of this same area was rebuilt as Plaza II in 1989.

KATE SESSIONS, PB's MOST HONORED GARDNER
Kate Sessions, the "mother of Balboa Park," purchased land for a nursery down on Garnet Avenue at Soledad Mountain Road. Miss Sessions, who had spent a lifetime gathering seeds and specimens collected from her trips around the world, moved to Pacific Beach in 1914.

Recalls Earl Taylor's son, Vernon Taylor, "My newspaper route included Kate Sessions Nursery. She was an old woman by then," he said. "She wore long skirts with big pockets in them and heavy work boots." The City of San Diego had begun to blossom with the trees and shrubs Kate planted throughout Hillcrest, Mission Hills and other city neighborhoods, in addition to her vast plantings in Balboa Park.

Her big white house remains on Los Altos Road, along with several gardener's cottages, which are tucked behind later developments. Many gardens in the Los Altos area display shrubs and vines she planted, a legacy for us to enjoy.

Kate Sessions Nursery site is marked by a huge Tipuana tree and historical marker at Garnet and Soledad Mountain Road—directly across the street from Rose Creek Cottage.

MISSION BAY'S MUD FLATS
PB's southern boundary was formed by the mud flats of Mission Bay. At high tide, residents could row across; at low tide, they could practically walk to what is now the Sea World Adventure Park.

In 1942, World War II brought thousands of people to sleepy San Diego, helping to build the planes and equipment needed in the war effort. All national and local resources were directed to that goal.

After the war, in 1945, attention turned back to Mission Bay. Under the guidance of City Planning Director Glenn Rick, a $2 million bond issue was passed to dredge and improve the bay. The goal was to provide recreation—and jobs—for the growing population.

The years following World War II brought tremendous growth to the entire city of San Diego. Many servicemen stationed here decided to remain. Thousands of small cottages in the flat areas of PB were rapidly constructed to house some of the influx.

From Vernon Taylor's memories of just two paved streets during the early '20s, Cass and Garnet, PB continued to progress steadily. His father, Earl, subsequently purchased parcels along Garnet and Mission Boulevard, paving streets nearby and constructing sidewalks.

The population, around 500 hearty souls in 1920, grew sufficiently to warrant a new elementary school at Ingraham and Emerald in 1922. PB Junior High opened in 1930 at 1234 Tourmaline (PB Elementary today), followed by PB's first Fire Station in 1934.

Three Navy housing developments were created during the war years: Bayview Terrace, Los Altos, and Cyanne, down on Crown Point. The Roxy Theater became PB's first movie house in '43, while Bayview Terrace and Crown Point Elementary Schools opened to accommodate the war babies.

By 1950, the population of Pacific Beach reached 30,000 and the average home sold for $12,000. A neighborhood fund drive to build a local library convinced the City to multiply the collection, thus constructing our PB Library at Ingraham and Felspar.

In 1953, the community finally had its own high school, when Mission Bay High opened its doors. Until then, students attended La Jolla High or Point Loma High. Kate Sessions Elementary opened in 1956.

MISSION BAY, AN AQUATIC PARK
Meanwhile, dredging to form the new outline of Mission Bay was completed. Hotels like the Catamaran were sprouting on new points of land. Sea World first brought its marine shows to San Diego in 1964, thus ensuring the popularity of Mission Bay Park.