Lie down in darkness The night sea off the coast of La Jolla was smothered in fog on December 18, 1917, and in those pre-sonar days the American submarine F-1 had no way of knowing …
April 9, 2023
Articles by Bob Owens
Sunken submarine forgotten off Imperial Beach
White Berkeley math major falls for Tecate drug-addict, woman-beater
When opposites attract In Tecate I cooked over fires, on a camping stove, on a two-burner Mexican propane rig, and with electric “stingers,” as circumstances allowed. I bought cooked food from the other side, we …
September 25, 2022
Author Richard Rodriguez crosses turnstiles into Tijuana
Taken together as one, Tijuana and San Diego form the most fascinating city in the New World My first trip across: the late 1950s. We were on our way to visit relatives in Ensenada. We …
September 11, 2022
San Diego's love of country music
Out there on the dance floor is a bit of paradise Almost everybody in East County knows about the place, but not nearly so many visit This is because the Renegade has a reputation. Rumors …
August 8, 2022
Spreckels and the train over Carrizo Gorge, Ike and S.D. Country Club
140-Mile Mistake Ritz calls the Chinese the railroad’s “unsung heroes,” but new evidence suggests that labor problems were perhaps the major reason why the railroad took so long to be built. The route of the …
January 17, 2022
Luman Gaskill and the bloody gunfight at Campo, Americans invade Baja
Captain Billy Hunts a Human Martinez escaped in the brush. But his wounds— three buckshot near his right lung, two lower down — and the December cold forced him to the Gaskills’ house at 4:00 …
January 15, 2022
Truth about TJ taxis, cut-throat upholstery competition
I am my own queen "Once, a guy, a drunk guy took my taxi from downtown. He wanted to go to this particular colonia, this neighborhood. It was raining, I remember. When I got there, …
October 4, 2021
Subs off Imperial Beach, Yamamoto's killer, a kid in WWII San Diego
Lie Down in Darkness The submarine had been discovered by two San Diego State students who were financing their educations by salvaging objects. They had located S-37 about 300 yards off the coast and in …
September 20, 2021
Caliente racetrack, Jorge Hank and his Tijuana zoo, Mexican baseball
Porno King Tied to T.J. Hot Spot Reached by phone on May 14 at his residence in Rosarito (he also owns and rents a gated luxury condo in Tijuana, directly behind the American consulate building), …
September 6, 2021