Making the city beautiful starts with a little creativity

JERRY PERSON

I understand that there is again talk of closing down Main Street to

vehicle traffic in the first two or three blocks from Pacific Coast

Highway as a way to beautify our Downtown visitors and diners.

Have these people forgotten that it is hard for some seniors to

walk that distance?

If they want to beautify Downtown, there could be some kind of

contest for who could best clean up their property, commercial or

residential, and award a prize for their efforts.

Oh wait! They did just that, as we’ll see this week.

Who better to kick off such a contest then our own Huntington

Beach Chamber of Commerce?

Main Street and parts of Downtown were beginning to show their age

in 1952. There was a mix of remodeled stores that reflected the

modern styles of postwar America and others that looked like they

were relics from our 1920s oil boom days.

In 1952, no one thought about preserving their historic

structures, so when the chamber came up with a beautification

contest, the business community stood up, pulled up its sleeves and

began to spruce up the town.

The Southwest Exploration Company offered a $50 trading

certificate for the best-looking residence and a trophy for the best

beautification of a commercial building within the city limits of

Huntington Beach.

The chamber picked the month of May 1952 to run the contest, as it

would be just in time for the summer crowds to begin going to the

beach.

One of the first to join in the contest was the Southern

California Edison Co. office at 309 Main Street. Edison officials’

plans called for extending the building all the way to the alley and

to spend $25,000 in remodeling the exterior, including a modern

glasswork front with an entrance at the left side instead of the

middle. There would be corrugated plastic in a pastel shade along the

walls to diffuse the indirect lighting, and as an aid in

soundproofing the interior.

Edison’s manager, C.D. Shedenhelm, wanted his building to have the

latest interior embellishments that could be had at the time.

Pioneer baker John Eader put in a chrome steel front door, painted

the stucco a gem green and added red brickwork to his bakery at 209

Main St. The Huntington Beach News at 208 Main St. knocked out its

ancient wooden entrance and replaced it with a fashionable chrome and

glass door, then added new flagstone decoration and slanting plate

glass windows.

In just six months since opening his grocery store at 207 Main

St., Mike Vidal added new glasswork, a new paint job, chrome doors

and brick trim to give his Mike’s Market a California-Spanish look.

Our own radio and TV repairman, Harold Harding, did his part by

adding red Norman brickwork under his front windows and added

stainless steel doors and a new coating of paint to his repair shop

at 206 Main St.

Robert DeBritton and Lawrence Boudreaux remodeled the Standard

Market at 126 Main St. and in turn saw business improve.

A nice new coating of paint brightened up Vic Terry’s H.B. Cut

Rate Drugstore at 127 Main St.

H.B. Plumbing’s contribution was to remove all the old paint from

the building at 221 Main St. and when that was completed, Paul

Biedebach and Rudy Beard had a yellow trim added to the front.

Charlie Sarrabere added new tile work to his Huntington Cleaners &

Dryers building at 122 Main St. and so did Chick Wilson to his Boogie

Woogie Malt Shop at 508 Pacific Coast Highway.

Wid Conklin’s barbershop at 106 Main St. added a flagstone boarder

around the bottom and put in slant plate glass windows. He replaced

the inside floor covering and added new wood paneling around the shop

walls.

Howard Wright’s furniture store (212 Main St.) and Berrell Ries’

H.B. Auto Supply (210 Main St.) were in a race to see who could

finish beautifying their business first.

The owner of the building at 215 Main St., Jack Heaston, put on a

smart new facade for his tenant, Crosby’s Music Store.

Ray and Johnny Dolan’s 107 Club (107 Main St.) were thinking about

putting up a new sign while Merle and Marie Lester were trying to

talk their landlord into a new paint job for their Lester’s Variety

Store (305 Main St.).

Residents were getting into the spirit and Vernon and Ethel

McGuffin did a remarkable renovation to their home at 302 Huntington

St. New aluminum paint was applied to the Clifford Sturgeon’s Orange

County Ceramic Tile Mfg. Co. building at Alabama and Frankfort.

This just goes to show you how our community joined in to make our

town more beautiful without redevelopment.

After the contest ended in May, many more businesses and

homeowners continued to modernize their property and that feeling of

pride continues today.

Just a little contest by the Huntington Beach Chamber of Commerce

was all that was needed to spark a little civic pride in the hearts

of our citizens and the winners for all their efforts are “us” and

the visitors to our city.

* JERRY PERSON is a local historian and longtime Huntington Beach

resident. If you have ideas for future columns, write him at P.O. Box

7182, Huntington Beach, CA 92615.