San Clemente

A 1950s postcard of downtown San Clemente.

The town of San Clemente was very much a product of the “Roaring ‘20s,” when the economy boomed, optimism was the order of the day, and Spanish Colonial Revival architecture was all the rage in Southern California. It was also very much the product of the imagination of former Washington State legislator and Seattle mayor Ole Hanson, who, in 1925, purchased 2,000 acres of coastal land at the southern tip of Orange County from financier Henry Hamilton “Ham” Cotton for development. Hanson and his real estate syndicate – which included Cotton and fellow State legislator Thomas F. Murphine -- planned, developed and promoted the new “Spanish Village” of San Clemente.

A "Spanish" home in San Clemente, 1920s.

“I am going to build a beautiful city on the ocean where the whole city will be one great park,” Hanson wrote in a letter to a friend. “The architecture will be all of one type, and the homes will be located on sites where nearly everyone will have his wonderful view preserved forever. … I can see hundreds of white-walled homes bonneted with red tile, with trees, shrubs, hedges of hibiscus, palms and geraniums lining the drives, and a profusion of flowers framing the patios and gardens. I can see gay sidewalks of red Spanish tile and streets curving picturesquely over the land. I want plazas, playgrounds, schools, clubs, swimming pools, a golf course, a fishing pier, and a beach … I have a clean canvas and I am determined to paint a clean picture.” 

Ole Hanson (1874-1940) was the son of Norwegian immigrants and was nationally known for his stance against the Seattle General Strike of 1919. 

Many of Hanson’s restrictions regarding architecture, paint colors, plantings, and curving roads would go by the wayside during the Depression, when it was hard to find anyone willing to buy a lot. But the earliest years of San Clemente presaged the many planned communities that would later typify South Orange County. 

The rising village of white stucco buildings, each in the Spanish or Moorish style, was scrupulously watched over by Hanson’s hand-picked team. And when the owners of code-violating buildings couldn’t afford to make their properties conform, Hanson himself would sometimes pay to have the buildings repainted (white), re-roofed (with hand-made red tile), or even remodeled. 

Street and lot boundaries were marked, fences were erected to keep out grazing cattle, and eighty-foot wide streets were graded, revealing the level of Hanson’s optimism.

Beach parking at San Clemente, circ 1928

Hanson himself gave sales pitches to crowds of prospective buyers in tents set up for that purpose. Rather than loads of real estate puffery, he simply shared the facts, including his vision for the town. People seemed to appreciate not getting the hard-sell nor being treated to something like an old time fire-and-brimstone revival meeting. If arm-twisting went on, it was by the salesmen, led by Ole Hanson, Jr., who took the prospective buyers on tours of the area in snazzy new Lincolns or Cadillacs. Sales were brisk.

Unlike most communities, the water district, infrastructure, sidewalks, community clubhouse, pool, and even the community hospital came with no bond debt attached. Hanson had paid for these and other amenities as part of the planned community. 

By 1927, the community was really taking shape. Numerous clubs and organizations formed and the town added a bank, a post office, a telephone exchange, and a fishing pier. The town’s first newspaper, El Heraldo de San Clemente, had launched the previous year but still read like a real estate brochure. 

Highway 101 (now El Camino Real) in the 1930s. The building with arches, on the left, was San Clemente’s first City Hall.

San Clemente incorporated as a city in 1928. That same year, Hanson and his associates built the town’s beach club, golf course, yacht club, and baseball diamond.

The city was well-established, with all of its first three stages sold out and new buildings going up right and left when the Great Depression hit.  So although San Clemente (and Hanson) took a beating like the rest of the country, the young town survived and eventually rebounded. Over the years, San Clemente grew to become home to President Richard Nixon's "Western Whitehouse;" a state beach; companies like Pick Up Stix, Surfing Magazine and Rainbow Sandals; and more than 62,000 residents. Some of the buildings and amenities built by Ole Hanson remain today, including his own bluff-top home which is now the Casa Romantica Cultural Center and Gardens.

San Clemente Pier, circa 1960s.

[Post updated 2-27-2025]