Street car construction reveals street car remnants

Pacific Electric tracks uncovered. (Photo Bob Walker)

Bob Walker just sent me these great photos of the old Pacific Electric Railway ties and railbed being uncovered on Santa Ana Blvd. near Bristol Street as the road is chopped up for the new Santa Ana/Garden Grove street car project. This neatly cut cross-section is a peek back into a time when Orange County was very different.  

When the Pacific Electric's "Red Cars" were at their peak, each city or town was its own little population cluster, had a business hub or downtown at it's core, and there were miles of fields or orchards between the edge of town and the edge of the next town. 

Pacific Electric tracks uncovered. (Photo Bob Walker)

The notion of urban/suburban sprawl wasn't even on our radar. Southern California was somewhat sparsely populated, there were relatively few roads (many of them bad), and a large portion of the population did not have regular access to an automobile. The Red Cars filled a real need and new development often popped up on the open land along their tracks.

Early rail lines through Santa Ana (by Steve Donaldson and Bill Myers)

By comparison, today almost every inch of Central Orange County is built out. Nearly everyone has a car. Roads are good and ubiquitous. And nothing is centralized. The businesses you patronize, the points of interest, the places you and our friends and family work and live are sprawled out will-nilly over a vast manmade environment that stretches from somewhere in Ventura County down to Camp Pendleton and all the way inland to the desert. And with the death of even our shopping malls, there really are no truly functional downtown or town square-like environments. Everyone needs access to everywhere.

Pacific Electric "Red Car" on W. 4th St., Santa Ana, circa 1920

After World War II, the already waning Pacific Electric Railway system slowly declined and was dismantled, with busses (which could be re-routed as needed and were were not reliant on tracks) and freeways helping take their place. The demise of the "Red Cars" was not a conspiracy, as some (including the film Who Framed Roger Rabbit) suggest. It was primarily a matter of the unavoidable market forces of supply and demand, combined with the march of time and technology.

Map of the new Street Car system, under construction, 2020.

At this point, it's hard not to see trolleys as somewhat romantic and colorful rather than strictly utilitarian. So it's hard not to smile when you see a long-hidden piece of track uncovered after all these decades.

Modjeska, Pleasants and "Arden"

Helena Modjeska at Arden

We often hear about stage actress Madame Helena Modjeska’s home, “Arden” in what’s now called Modjeska Canyon. In fact, it's now a County historic park. But it wasn’t always called Arden, even by Modjeska herself.

Originally, Joseph Edward "Judge" Pleasants (1839-1934) and his first wife, Mary Refugio Carpenter Pleasants (1845-1888), lived at that idyllic spot in a little pioneer cabin which they cleverly named “Pleasant Refuge.” 

After Mary’s death, Judge Pleasants sold the land to family friend Helena Modjeska and her husband, Count Bozenta. The new owners hired architect Stanford White to design a new and larger home, built around the existing Pleasants homestead cabin. (This juxtaposition of rustic and fancy still makes for some of the most interesting features in the house.)

The Los Angeles Evening Express, July 19, 1888, described the house-warming party Modjeska's new canyon home saying, "The Madame has named her mountain home "El Refugio" -- a place of rest--after her dear departed friend, Mrs. Pleasants, and in the grandeur of its mountain seclusion it would seem to have reached the goal which she desired of it. The house is not quite completed, but it will be a marvel of beauty and convenience when finished."

Mary Refugio Carpenter Pleasants, 1868 (Courtesy UCI)

Apparently, she gave her home the name Arden only later, inspired by the Forest of Arden in Shakespeare's As You Like It. It retains that name today.

Modjeska would go on to be not just Orange County’s first celebrity resident, but also a beloved local figure for her kindness, hospitality, and community spirit.

The Judge (already a well-known figure in the region) went on to be the elder pioneer everyone turned to when they needed stories about Orange County’s Wild West years. He also became a founding member of the Orange County Historical Society. And in 1892, he married Mary Adelina "Addie" Brown (1859-1943) -- a local school teacher with her own keen interest in history. In 1931, Adelina would publish the three-volume set --History of Orange County, California -- which most local historians simply refer to as “Pleasants.”

Applicable to historical work...

“What are the facts? Again and again and again – what are the facts? Shun wishful thinking, ignore divine revelation, forget what 'the stars foretell,' avoid opinion, care not what the neighbors think, never mind the unguessable 'verdict of history' – what are the facts, and to how many decimal places? You pilot always into an unknown future; facts are your single clue. Get the facts!”

― Robert A. Heinlein

Orange’s Plaza: What’s in a Name?

Postcard of the Plaza in Orange, circa 1910.

Is the intersection of Chapman Ave. and Glassell St. called “the Plaza” or “the Circle?” That controversy, regarding the center of historic Downtown Orange, has been a sore point in recent decades. The short answer is this: It’s been the Plaza since 1871 and remains so. But the use of the nickname “Circle” or “Orange Circle” ramped up sometime around the 1960s and is now heard frequently. Not satisfied with that answer? Then buckle up for the long version,…

Detail of 1883 Richland Farm Lots map, showing empty plaza.

The Plaza or Plaza Square has been at the heart of Orange since Captain William T. Glassell laid out the townsite (originally called Richland) on paper in 1871. In the book, Orange: The City ‘Round the Plaza, historian and proud Orange native Phil Brigandi wrote, “Despite its Spanish name, the original Plaza Square was envisioned more like an Eastern ‘common’ or ‘green,’ with all the businesses facing in toward the center.”

January 1885 Sanborn map shows Chapman and Glassell crossing in a large open area.

Why a “plaza” rather than a town square or some other more conventionally middle-American-sounding label? Because all the way back to the Mission Era, it had been the tradition for Southern California communities – like Los Angeles and San Juan Capistrano -- to have a plaza at the heart of town. It came from our Spanish and Mexican roots. Keep in mind that Alfred B. Chapman and Andrew Glassell (William’s brother) had acquired the land on which they created Richland/Orange directly from the Rancho Santiago de Santa Ana. Using the word plaza was not an affectation – it was part of the local culture at the time.

A plaque at the fountain in Plaza Park. Placed in 1976.

In the early years, the two streets intersected directly in the middle of the Plaza – a poorly tended, weed-choked square of public land. Pioneer Alice Armor recalled, “Some of the earliest settlers planted pepper trees in the four corners and water was piped from a reservoir on East Chapman avenue to the center of the square. There was always a miry puddle about the hydrant, where travelers stopped to water their teams. The pepper trees were used as hitching posts and in their shade, wood was piled and packing boxes were stacked. Castoff boots and shoes, old hats, broken crockery and dead hens were scattered here and there. Such was the Orange plaza in the good old days.”

In 1886, two proposals were made to improve the Plaza. One plan kept the intersection as it was but created four parks – one on each corner of the Plaza. Another plan substituted a Plaza Park in the middle of the square, surrounded by an oval (not circular) traffic roundabout. Obviously, the roundabout plan won.

Survey map of the Plaza, 1893, by H. Clay Kellogg (courtesy County of Orange)."The Plaza” is literally in the shape of an oval. Go measure it," notes local Larry Hockensmith. "If you want to misname The Plaza, at least misname it correctly as 'The Oval.'". 

Among the many community efforts to raise funds for these improvements – in particular the expensive fountain -- was the writing and performance of a play, fittingly titled, “The Plaza.” Some time after the park, fountain, roundabout and other improvements were completed, an official survey map of “the Plaza in Orange” was filed with the county. (The streets weren’t actually paved until 1912.)

In a 1970 interview, early Orange resident Florence Smiley remembered "the Plaza was used, and people walked,... It was a pretty little place -- and there was no traffic and no trouble getting across into the plaza."

The Plaza, looking northeast, 1892

From the very beginning, each official reference or designation to the square and its park and roundabout used the term “Plaza.” Newspapers consistently referred to “the plaza.” Businesses facing onto the plaza had (and still have) “Plaza Square” as their address. And in 1973, when the 1910 Street Fair was revived and made an annual event, it too was held “at the Orange Plaza.”

1922 Sanborn map shows part of Plaza Square.

Even proposals to change the very fabric of downtown still gave a nod to the historic name. In 1965, the city commissioned a study to determine the feasibility of turning the area into a pedestrian shopping area called “Plaza Mall.” Another 1967 concept proposed redeveloping the area into a “Super Plaza.” 

Happily, the city never got the redevelopment funds it wanted, forcing them to lean into adaptive reuse instead. What was nearly demolished to become another short-lived mall instead became the Plaza Historic District – recognized as a State Historic Landmark in 1981 and placed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1982.

Plaza Historic District marker on South Glassell.

So where and when did the nickname “Orange Circle” arise? 

The first reference I can find is in a May 1, 1940 classified ad in the Santa Ana Register, hawking a "6 rm home" on "E. Chapman Ave., 2 mi. east of Orange Circle." But the term wasn’t in widespread use at that point. 

Eventually the term "Orange Circle" appeared in the newspapers again – this time in an ad in the Jan. 6, 1963 L.A. Times promoting Vista del Playa Estates. It offered the following directions: "From City of Orange Circle, take Glassell north to Taft. Then east to Shaffer, then north to Vista del Playa St." (How one could have a view of the beach from there is beyond me. Perhaps the developers were a little hazy on geography to begin with.)

Rare example of the term "Orange Circle" used in print downtown.

“Orange Circle” appeared again in a Sept. 20, 1972, Tustin News article about a meeting "in Happening Hall at the Teen Challenge Center, 78 Plaza Square, where Chapman and Glassell intersect in the Orange Circle." 

Indeed, it was during those years between the 1963 ad and the 1972 article that the "Orange Circle” nickname gained momentum. The city had grown exponentially in the post-World War II years and new arrivals living in freshly constructed tract homes and apartments now vastly outnumbered longtime residents and their offspring. The newbies appreciated many of Orange’s charms but weren’t familiar with its history.

The cover of this 1965 City of Orange directory shows the town's nickname: "The Plaza City."

Thus, the rise of the phrase “Orange Circle” began “somewhere in between the first episode of ‘My Three Sons,’ and the last episode of ‘Bewitched” according to Roger Fitschen, longtime Orange fireman local history maven, and member of an Orange pioneer family. Or to put it another way, “If you remember the Lionettes (a popular local women's softball team) it was ‘Plaza’ and if you don’t it [might be] the other thing.”

Indeed, to those with deep roots in town, use of the term “Circle” was an easy-to-spot indicator that the speaker had “just fallen off the turnip truck.”  

View from the Plaza, circa 1910s.

When the Orange Community Historical Society held a program discussing the Orange Daily News building (44 Plaza Square), they invited not only historians and past owners but also the manager of Dietrich’s Coffee, which was then housed in the building. “She got up to speak and said how happy she was to be on ‘the circle,’” remembers longtime local business owner Judy Schroeder. “A low grumble passed through the whole room.”

“I didn’t arrive here until 1967 from Los Angeles County,” says Lisa Baldwin of the Society, “so I was part of those newbies who called it the circle growing up. I think the shape of the roadway is so descriptive that it became popular. … It wasn’t until I started working at A & P [Antiques], met Adrienne [Gladson] and then the folks of the Orange Community Historical Society that I learned, ‘them's fightin’ words!’  … Once appropriately schooled, I have adapted to correctly referring to it as The Plaza. It is out of respect to Mr. Glassell and Mr. Chapman I call it the place they named it.”

The famous bumper sticker -- Designed by Orange High alumni over bacon and eggs at Watson's.

Adding fuel to the fire, a few local businesses began using the word "Circle" in their name, just as many others used "Plaza" in theirs. "Circle" establishments included Orange Circle Antique Mall and the Circle City Club. (This nightclub's name ignored the fact that "the Circle City" was already the well-established nickname of the nearby city of Corona.)

Some felt education was the answer to the controversy. Around 2002, the remaining members of the Orange High School Class of 1943 (who still met regularly for breakfast at Watson’s Drug Store) printed and distributed 1,500 bumper stickers declaring “It’s the Plaza, not the circle!” The old timers even twisted arms to get the stickers placed on city trucks and police cars. 

But by then, the original term, Plaza, was already regaining some of the position it had lost to Circle. 

“I think the [Orange Community Historical] Society’s influence was felt politically at City Hall certainly in the 1990s, with staff seemingly instructed to use Plaza when referring to downtown,” said Lisa Baldwin. “Did Joanne Coontz have anything to do with that as a past President of the Society? Perhaps. The Old Towne Preservation Association certainly embraced the Plaza moniker too and as their influence began to be felt more and more in the ‘90s this educated a whole bunch of new-to-Orange folk who were sensitive to history...”

Notable in the Plaza/Circle battle was the great City of Orange Historian, Orange native, Orange County Archivist, and E. Clampus Vitus member Phil Brigandi, who made his case with wry faux-earnestness and humor.

"Among true old timers of Orange there are few sins worse than calling the Plaza park ‘the circle,’” wrote Brigandi in 1997, “Only a few newcomers (and some Santa Ana people) persist in calling it by that awful name.”

Huell Howser interviews Phil Brigandi at Plaza Park, 2007

Phil also sent form letters to errant newspaper reporters on joke letterhead from the “Society for the Prevention of the Term ‘Circle.’” One line read, “Surely you noticed more than just its shape.”

Later, he admitted, “The tongue-in-cheek battle between the locals and newcomers is simply a way for the hometown folks to say, ‘This is my town, and I care about its past.’ Try saying ‘Frisco’ to a true San Franciscan and you’ll get the idea.”

The original Orange Street Fair, at the Plaza, 1910.

Personally, I have no dog in this fight. I like Orange but have never lived or worked there. As far as I’m concerned, you’re welcome to call the Plaza by any pet name you want, (e.g. Hub of Happiness, Stonehenge II, Big Jim, Snookie, etc). I know that despite the facts and nearly 150 years of tradition, some folks just can’t bring themselves to say “Plaza.” As L.A. Times columnist Jerry Hicks once wrote, “I do care about honoring history. But doggone it, I just love the name Circle.”

But now, at least, you know the story. 

Two t-shirt designs from the weirdly-named Team Swollen. 

*Sigh*

Thanks to endless spam, I'm shutting down the "Comments" here for the first time since I launched this blog, over fourteen years ago. The blog will continue, but (maddeningly) it will be more difficult for you to share your observations and insights. Your comments were my favorite part of this blog.

Luckily, most of my posts are linked from Facebook, so you can comment there. Or you can email me. (If you're not a bot from Pakistan, you'll be able to find my FB account or email address without much effort.)

Blogger's paper-thin defenses were constantly breached by spammers, and the comments had turned into a playground for scams and crap adverising. Your REAL comments simply got lost among the mountains of garbage. Some posts were loaded down with over 600 spam messages. I don't have time to moderate them all. Worse yet, the only way to remove spam from a post is a six-step process that must be repeated separately for each individual spam comment.

If Blogger ever gets its act together, or if I find some other workaround, rest assured that comments will be return ASAP. But until then, find other ways to drop me a line. I really DO want to hear from you!

John Williams demonstrates the CORRECT way to spam.

A bit of housekeeping...

I finally cleaned up some of the links (at right) and added new separate sections for historical preservation, state/regional history, and historical local newspaper resources. The list of links had just gotten way too long and unwieldy, and I hope these revisions will make navigation a little easier.

Of  course, it was also time to add and remove links as needed. 

I was sad to finally remove the link to the Orange County Agricultural and Nikkei Heritage Museum at Cal State Fullerton. A lot of people worked their butts off to make that museum a reality and many people donated a lot of money to get that place off the ground. But the fact that the website is (still) devoid of information and the complete lack of buzz in the community tells me it's probably not really a thing anymore. But as hope springs eternal, I *do* still provide a link to the Fullerton Arboretum, where the museum is located.

Similarly, I was sorry to take the Orange County Heritage Coordinating Council off the list of links. I haven't heard about any activity in the group in at least five years. HCC was a nice networking tool for those working in the local history and heritage services field. A lot of cross-pollination of ideas and mutual assistance and problem-solving went on among the members. But when one generation of leadership stepped down, nobody stepped in to take over. The idea behind HCC seems to be reborn at least once a decade under another name, although it may have to wait until this COVID mess is over.

Meanwhile, I also noticed  that one of our friends at the Buena Park Historical Society must have goofed. For many years, they've had THE best domain name imaginable: HistoricalSociety.org. I've never known how they managed to snag that plum before any other historical society in the world got their hands on it! But for a long time the site has been down, and now it seems they didn't renew the domain, since their new site is at BuenaParkHistory.org.

I've also added a few new links that somehow slipped through the cracks in the past. I'm particularly sorry for having NOT provided a link to the Olinda Oil Museum and Trail until now. It's a fascinating place to visit and is run by some good people.

Anyway, if you see anything else I've missed, let me know. Thanks for your continued readership!

The Heine House (1902), Santa Ana

The Heine House, at 820 W. 4th St. in Santa Ana, is long gone now – but it was something of a landmark for over 70 years. Louise Hoffman of the Santa Ana Historical Preservation Society is related to the Heines and asked what was known about the house. The answer is “not enough.” But here’s what I found,…

On July 21, 1902, C. M. and Ollie Nash sold an empty residential lot on the southeast corner of W. 4th St. (now W. Santa Ana Blvd.) and N. Flower St. in Santa Ana to Mrs. Mary S. Parker. She, in turn, had a house built for herself on that lot (820 W. 4th St.) during the last half of 1902. 

Mary was born in Maine around 1850. Her maiden name is unknown. She was living in Massachusetts in 1879, when she gave birth to her son, Charles E. Smith. They moved from the East Coast to Santa Ana in 1884. Later that year, her daughter, May O. Parker (later May Heard), was born. Mary did not arrive in Santa Ana with a husband, suggesting that she had either been widowed or separated from Mr. Parker very shortly before her move west and the birth of their daughter, May. 

Ultimately, Mary would live forty-seven years of her life in Santa Ana, where she would establish her own business as a dressmaker and become active in the First Baptist Church. 

She must have had some money put away, because building such a large new home would have been difficult if not impossible to afford on a dressmaker’s income.

On November 11, 1908, Mary -- now going by Mrs. Mary S. Chilson (and listed as "divorced" in the census) – sold the house to Electa Phillips Perry and her son, Elma H. Davis.

In 1909, Charles, who was by then farming in Valley Center (San Diego County), got married. Mary went to live with Charles and his wife for a while, but soon moved back to Santa Ana. From at least 1920 until her death in 1931, Mary lived at 821 N. Van Ness Ave.    

Meanwhile, the story of the house at 820 W. 4th St. continued, with the Davis family using it as a rental property. Some of the tenants there included C. A. Riggs (1909), Rev. Amos Fowler Roadhouse (1910), Maurine E. Baker (1912), John Rhea Baker (1913), C. A. Bowers (1917), H. M. Penn (1918), and Ada C. Walters (1919).

On February 6, 1920 Elma H. Davis sold the house to Frank H. and Ora Kennedy Heine. (It appears they swapped land, with Davis receiving Lot 344, Block 13 of Irvine's Subdivision from Heine.) Rather than renting out the whole house, as Davis had, the Heines moved in around late 1921 and stayed through at least 1960. They did, however, lease out a room or two to boarders in the early 1920s. Frank worked at a local fruit packing house, where he was in charge of manufacturing crates. 

Frank H. Heine died in 1963, with his estate going to Ora. She remained in the house until 1971, when she moved to a smaller house at 1121 N. Flower St. In early 1972, she deeded the old house at 820 W. 4th St. to John N. and Max K. Heine. John and Max, in turn, sold the lot to the City of Santa Ana in March 1975. The house was torn down around that same time. Ora K. Heine died on March 28, 1980.

There is now a rather boring office building called the "888 Building" where the house once stood.

Birch Street

South Birch St., Santa Ana, circa 1910

Someone recently asked if any of Orange County's many Birch Streets are named after the anti-communist John Birch Society. 

Actually, the Birch streets, lanes, roads, etc, located in the cities of Orange, Brea, Fullerton, Anaheim, Newport Beach and Santa Ana all predate the 1958 founding of the John Birch Society. 

Specifically, Birch Street in Brea is named for Albert Otis Birch of the Birch Oil Company, and Santa Ana's Birch Street and Birch Park are named for his family.

Promotional flier for the John Birch Society, 1960s

Orange County's other Birch streets -- located in Irvine, Yorba Linda, Mission Viejo, Fountain Valley, Cypress, Aliso Viejo and Westminster -- are in areas where all or most of the streets are named for trees.

In other words, no. There's no connection.

But all the above-named cities DO have fluoride in their water supply, so don't let your guard down, patriots!