On this date in 1941, the Long Beach Independent reported that Sam’s Seafood at 2501 Pacific Coast Highway had recently opened a new building in the back to handle its overflow crowds of weekend diners. The new 30 by 94 feet addition could accommodate 200 patrons and also featured an orchestra and a floor show. The new addition would be christened The Neptune Room.
Sam’s Seafood – Now with more room around the back (just half a block from the red car tracks)
– Michael Dobkins
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On this date in 1932 at 12:55 a.m., a southbound Pacific Electric interurban train struck a man and woman on a curve between Seal Beach and the Surfside Colony. Depending on which newspaper account you read, the couple was either sitting on or walking along the tracks when the accident occurred.
This aerial photo taken on May 30, 1931 shows how the Pacific Electric tracks curve just after the Anaheim Bay bridge and then again as they approach the Surfside Colony. Either curve could be the location of the accident.
The Pacific Electric motorman, Lee Marshall, and conductor J. E. Beardsley told investigators they stopped when they saw what appeared to be a box on the tracks, only to discover the couple. Due to the early morning hour, the only other witnesses were the passengers in the street car.
The male victim was Jay P. Bassett, a 37 year old meat cutter, a prominent member of the Long Beach post of the American Legion and the father of three children. He was taken to the Long Beach Community Hospital where he died from a fractured skull at 2:30 a.m.. He never regained consciousness.
The woman was killed instantly and remained unidentified for hours at Dixon’s Chapel in Huntington Beach. She was described as approximately 25 years of age, well-dressed and wearing a dark brown coat and tan-colored dress, and having beautiful red hair. One newspaper couldn’t resist sharing that her body had been broken, with one foot completely severed and the other foot almost cut off, and that death was probably caused by a jagged hole in her skull.
Blood and gore sells newspapers.
She was identified later that night as Eloise Wilson at Dixon’s chapel by her ex-husband, Harry H. Wilson, and her 18 year old daughter, Marguerite, who fainted when she saw her mother. Eloise was actually 43 years-0ld and the mother of four.
No reporter from any of the newspapers covering the accident bothered to report how Jay’s wife, Isabelle, reacted to the news and details of her husband’s death.
Two days later, Coroner Earl Abbey’s jury exonerated Marshall and Beardsley of any wrong doing.
Whatever circumstances brought Jay and Eloise together on that last night of their lives, they’ve been kept separated in the years since. Jay is buried in the Long Beach Municipal Cemetery, and Eloise’s final resting place is in the Westminster Memorial Park.
courtesy of findagrave.comcourtesy of findagrave.com
– Michael Dobkins
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On this date in 1936, the Arizona Republic ran this ad for the Surfside Colony from the Ord Land Company.
Imagine facing daily triple digit temperatures in Phoenix in a decade where air conditioning is mostly a feature in offices and department stores. You open the newspaper, and there on page 24 is an ad for a place called Surf Side Colony (even the name sounds cooler) that promises an affordable private beach home with swimming, fishing, and boating enticingly ensconced on the ocean front side of Coast Highway between Seal Beach and Sunset Beach. How could you resist?
– Michael Dobkins
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On this date in 1956, newspapers all across the country published a “Bugs Bunny” comic strip that leaves a minor Seal Beach historical mystery.
“Sam’s Seafood” in Surfside is now an empty building after a few years operating under different ownership as “Don the Beachcomber,” but there have also been different versions of the “Sam’s Seafood” name over the decades it was in business. It was originally called Sam’s Seafood Cafe, most people remember the restaurant as simply as “Sam’s Seafood,” and local newspaper ads, reviews, and stories have used “Sam’s Seafood Restaurant,” “Sam’s Seafood Tavern,” and, perhaps most uniquely, “Sam’s Seafood Grotto.”
The restaurant name used in this 1956 comic strip might be a pure coincidence, but the odd specificity of it makes a coincidence unlikely.
All Rights Reserved Warner Bros.
It’s not unusual for a comic strip creator to include references to real life landmarks, people, and organizations. E. C. Segar, creator of Popeye, had a running gag of references to the “Santa Monica Rod and Reel Club,” of which he was an enthusiastic member.
The mention of “Sam’s Seafood Grotto” becomes even stranger when newspapers ran these two “Bugs Bunny” comic strips months apart in 1976.
All Rights Reserved Warner Bros.All Rights Reserved Warner Bros.
So who made these references to Seal Beach’s local fish eatery twenty years apart? My theory is that the culprit is comic artist Ralph Heimdahl because he worked long term on the “Bugs Bunny” comic strip from the late forties to the late seventies. The writers assigned to the comic strip varied quite a bit, and the span between the 1956 strip and the 1976 strips points to someone who was worked on the strip for decades.
So was Ralph Heimdahl a regular “Sam’s Seafood” customer, or did he just eat there once and “Sam’s Seafood Grotto” struck him as a funny name? (And let’s face it, these comic strips needed as much funny as they could get.) Heimdahl lived in the San Gabriel Valley, so he was local. Or is this just a coincidence? Ralph Heimdahl passed away in 1981, so we’re never going to get a chance to ask him.
– Michael Dobkins
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On this date in 1944, The U.S. Navy formally established an ordnance depot at Anaheim Landing.
The Orange County war housing commission chairman, Philip Norton (who also had a real estate office at 710 Ocean Ave), announced the seizure of thirty-five thousand acres of beach and tidelands in January of 1944 for the construction of the twenty million dollar ordnance depot. Real estate would be purchased, bridges would be demolished, Anaheim Bay would be dredged to a depth of fifteen feet, and the Pacific Electric line that crossed Anaheim Bay into Surfside would be rerouted.
The decision meant approximately 2,000 people living in Anaheim Landing would need to vacate by March 21st. The housing commission helped residents relocate, and many Anaheim Landing homes were moved to lots in Westminster and Seal Beach. The popular Glide ‘Er Inn would move a few blocks east to 14th Street. The Seal Beach Airport would be permanently abandoned.
The speed and urgency applied to the project is understandable considering that the United States military was engaged in a worldwide conflict. Today the outcome of World War II seems inevitable, but in 1944 the future was uncertain, and wartime efforts required full commitment. For most of 1944, the Navy would be transforming what had been a casual small boat harbor into an efficient first class naval installation.
And Anaheim Landing’s time as a civilian port and recreational attraction came to an ended. The seventy-five year history of what is now known as the Seal Beach Weapons Station was just beginning.
– Michael Dobkins
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On this date in 1940, The Santa Ana Register reported that a yellow taxi cab had been stolen from in front Don May’s cafe on the coast highway between Seal Beach and Sunset Beach. Huntington Beach police recovered the abandoned cab a short time later in the Wintersburg after a California highway patrol car “slid through the mud of a dirt road and landed in a ditch while en route to the scene of the abandonment.”
At this date, the culprit still remains at large.
– Michael Dobkins
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On this date in 1945, The Long Beach Independent reports that a thirteen-year old Surfside resident, Rodney Middleworth, fell off the old 101 Highway bridge into the water. When Seal Beach Fire Chief Sperry Knighton and Seal Beach police officers arrived with lifesaving equipment, they discovered that he had already been rescued by Lester Buchalz of Santa Paula and an unidentified fourteen-year old boy who had already left the scene. The two had heard Rodney’s cries for help and saved him.
– Michael Dobkins
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