Posts Tagged ‘John D. Spreckels’

The City of San Diego today took steps to force the San Diego Electric Railway company to continue railway service on Adams Ave. “War to the limit” on the illegal and unlawful methods of the street car company, which on Saturday night started to tear up its tracks in defiance of the law, was declared at the city hall.  —-San Diego Sun, August 28, 1922.

It was cars versus streetcars in The Battle of Adams Avenue.

A streetcar from the San Diego Electric Railway

When the Brooklyn bridge was built it was pronounced the “eighth wonder of the world,” and now California has another “wonder” to add to the list. This wonder is the biggest dam in America, and so far as I have been able to learn from mining and civil engineers, it is the largest in the world. –Harper’s Weekly, January 8, 1898.

The wonder dam that quickly became a dam fiasco: Building Morena Dam.

Setting rock in position at Morena, 1897.

Spalding is perhaps the world’s most recognized name in sporting goods. Less well-known is the man who founded the famous company: Albert Goodwill Spalding, a member of the baseball Hall of Fame, business magnate, and prominent San Diegan.

The story of A. G. Spalding and San Diego.

San Diego Union

In 1909, a dry wave was growing in America. Temperance laws were slowing liquor sales in cities throughout the country. Saloons were a particular target. . .

This is the story of San Diego’s Anti-Saloonists Campaign.

The arrival of the British tall ship Dudhope in San Diego harbor on November 30, 1914 was an impressive sight.  Describing her “massive yards and mast and the white sails hauled tight by the brisk breeze” the Union called the 2000-ton tall ship a “marine spectacle.”

 The steel-hulled bark had the historic distinction being the last cargo-carrying windjammer to enter San Diego via the storied Cape Horn route.  But the ship would be better remembered for a surprising mutiny.

Read more about “The Dudhope Mutiny”

A redwood pipe past its prime.

There wasn’t a lawn in the city. But some people went without baths so they could water their pet shrubs. Everybody with money left town. Those who remained became water experts . . .

Read about the Wooden Pipeline to San Diego.