Loser's Guide to LakesideLakeside has tried desperately to overcome its redneck image, and it has, to a certain extent. There is plenty of new development in the city, bringing more middle-class families who want to …
September 2, 2023
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Stories by Ernie Grimm
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When crystal meth was big in Lakeside
General Grant's heirs made mark on San Diego
San Diego's least-remembered great man – U.S. Grant Jr. On a Sunday in September of 1929, 15 members of San Diego’s elite gathered to carry the coffin of an old friend. Among the pallbearers were …
August 26, 2023
Author of the novel that shook Mission Hills
Oakley Hll explains The Corpus of Joe Bailey In San Diego, Corpus of Joe Bailey also made a noteworthy entrance. The book was denounced from San Diego pulpits for being too sexy and provoked Mission …
August 6, 2023
Old Otay Mesa
Otay before 50,000 homes In 1954 I sat on the school bus every day next to my best friend, Mark Robson. The ride home from Montgomery Elementary School in Otay was a straight shot east …
July 30, 2023
933 more bedrooms for Rolando stirs up locals
San Diego sides with Carmel Partners in Rolando project The Boulevard at 63rd, formerly known as Centrepoint Luxury Apartments from developer Carmel Partners, has been at the center of a controversy that so far has …
May 29, 2023
From Baja Malibu to San Miguel – best Baja surf
Waves bigger than your house We are on the road to Playas de Tijuana, the stretch where the border fence acts as guardrail on the right. Jeff has agreed to tutor me in the ways …
May 21, 2023
Julian wants to put out its own fires
Are the volunteers getting hosed? Nicio Aguilera is blunt: “Nobody up here trusts the county. We don’t trust them, we don’t like them.” Aguilera, who spent 15 years fighting fires in Philadelphia and another 15 …
May 15, 2023
Poolside shooting near UTC involving Selis and Wilf clans
University City massacre done by developer family donor They are the crème de crème of San Diego business and political society, giving hundreds of thousands of dollars to both Democrats and Republicans, and in turn …
March 20, 2023
Descanso shelters Border Fire animals
Behind the Border Fire fire wall Behind the lines at the Border Fire, neighbors, volunteers, county animal-control crews, and Border Patrol agents are caring for the animals left behind during the fire's sudden spread. By …
March 6, 2023
Guitarist Rob Logic transforms the neighborhood
Spring Valley is the new North Park About three months ago, the bar donned a large sign reading “The Bancroft” next to Fannie’s old marquee, which now entreats — perhaps tongue-in-cheek — “I assure you …
February 6, 2023
Peutz Valley – the fire did not kill our spirit
Alpine's Secret Valley Here we could raise animals and grow a garden, learn the old arts of canning, butchering, milking, and cheese-making. The '70s provided this back-earth movement, and our few neighbors, like my family, …
January 30, 2023
Del Cerro tries to stop graffiti
Does the Junk House encourage junk art? The Junk House was designed to "fit into the neighborhood," general manager Richard Langlois said in a May 1 interview. The architect called for graffiti panels, and the …
December 31, 2022
Allied Gardens invaded by 2000 sq ft houses
Too many mansions Boyer's 1400-square-foot house sits on 50th Street, immediately to the east and uphill from the proposed development, where bulldozers are currently grading the land into terraces on which will sit 25 new …
December 4, 2022
Mexico fire comes up canyon to Campo
How they fought 2004 Campo fire After it crested, the fire started "running pretty hard" east along the ridgeline. "We were coming along holding it with engines," Scully says, "and we were actually being very …
November 26, 2022
San Diego's ostrich ranchers
Long-necked bonanza We had reached our first destination, about two miles due west of the San Diego Wild Animal Park, the semirural home of a pediatric dentist who’s been raising ostriches as a sideline for …
August 22, 2022
Imperial Beach horses ride on the sand
You're always the cowboy “I took riding lessons the way some people play golf. I was the only one in my family. I started doing weekend trips. I’ve led pack trips in the Sierras for …
July 25, 2022
1939 Australian Sixteen pops up in San Diego, falconry on Fiesta Island
The Simple Magic of Being Pushed Forward By Wind Norm was still alive. From photographs Annie had sent, he identified the skiff as his own creation by the unique placement of ribs just aft of …
February 13, 2022
Personal history of La Mesa, the charm of Encanto
Where Sweet Peace and Love Abidith During school vacations, Carl and I hopped the freight train that chugged through twice a week. It stopped in La Mesa to unload flatbeds of planks to the lumberyard. …
February 5, 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
Santa Ysabel dairy land ebbs away, Jamul casino dreams
Moo Twilight Feed he buys directly from farmers in the Imperial Valley. Because he trucks it himself, it costs around $80 per ton for sudan grass, $100 for alfalfa. But with a herd of 200 …
January 16, 2022
Jamul townies vs. Indians, Santa Ysabel honors Steve Ponchetti
Jamul Residents Wage Indian Blood Battle over Gaming Site Back in 1963, Shipek says, the Jamul band asked her to assist them in establishing their California Indian ancestry. “I took oral histories from some of …
January 8, 2022
Fallbrook school bus driver, firemen at 32nd and Lincoln
Stop Food Fights, Clean up after Motion Sickness When Renee drives the pink route, she wears a white visor and shorts that make her seem calmly athletic, like the directress of a tennis camp. Twenty-four …
January 3, 2022
Bombs emerge in Carrizo Impact Area, the happy little town of Bombay Beach
Risky Wasteland Because the ordnance littering the Carrizo Impact Area was dropped from planes, a lot of it imbedded itself in the sand as far as 30 feet down. Over the years, the earth has …
December 25, 2021
SDSU frats scrub their image, UCSD profs get home loan perks
Escape from the Chicks and Beer Image “Monday night the actual rush starts, but we can’t give out bids on Monday. That gives everyone a chance to get around and see where they want to …
December 13, 2021
San Diego – city of shame, University Avenue, roommates from hell, writers write about moms
Roommates from Hell I walked outside to the storage door. I pushed on the door and opened it. I saw the rope around John’s neck and John’s face looking at me. I screamed and ran …
December 5, 2021
Mike Doyle, Rusty Preisendorfer, Skip Frye, Chris O'Rourke
Wave Gangsters Socially, Van Artsdalen became a marked man. His reputation as a brawler traveled beyond the predominantly white population of La Jolla to tougher neighborhoods. Butch had already proved himself among the few black …
November 14, 2021
The hated game warden, the essential weatherman
We’re the New Wardens "A gray fox is a small animal, so usually the trap breaks their leg bones, and the only thing holding them in the trap is the skin that gets pinched between …
November 7, 2021
San Diego actors' worst stories, he guards Volcan Mountain, community college adjunct
Break a Leg In 1993, Hal Holbrook was performing King Lear in the title role. Tom Hall, a San Diego actor, likes to tell the story. Hal came on too soon and started a completely …
October 24, 2021
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
Country fans at the Renegade, fireworks fanatics, the troubles of apartment ownership
San Diegans at the Renegade explain country music The Renegade does not hide behind that generic tyranny of the latest urban middle-class version of good taste. The tavern is in-your-face like Willie Nelson with his …
September 5, 2021
Where to park downtown San Diego, loiterers at the library, high-rise top floors
Adult Orphans A Wednesday afternoon, hot. Half the stools at the State Hotel Deli are taken. Talk is quiet, desultory. Mama Sofia perches on her stool near the cash register, her daughter — mending again …
August 23, 2021
Kate Sessions' tree man, C. Arnholt Smith's repairman
Beneath the Bunya Bunya They lived on the ranch [Scripps Ranch] for six years. He supervised teams of men in planting thousands of eucalyptuses, all together about forty percent of those that were set out …
August 8, 2021
Sky diving above Otay Mesa, roller blading at Civic Center garage
Just Flop The camaraderie among skateboarders goes beyond advanced skaters tolerating beginners and into the realm of solidarity. “Totally,” he said, “because there’s an us-against-the-world feeling. It’s the last kind of rebel-spirited outlaw activity that …
July 31, 2021
Herbert Marcuse ends up in lotus land, Ishmael Reed visits Quincy Troupe at UCSD
Angel of the Apocalypse During that long, violent spring of 1968, leftist student leaders around the world began to quote Marcuse and claim his ideas as inspiration to their movements. By June worldwide media had …
July 26, 2021
San Diego's highway landscaping, how to beat avocado thieves
Ground Cover One of the Brazilian peppers, a 20-foot umbrella of lacy foliage, blocks an exit sign for Genesee Avenue. “Look at that sign. Kind of hard to see what it says, isn’t it? You’ve …
July 18, 2021
Pt. Loma's rich Portuguese, who would live on Mt. Soledad, OB's motorhome gypsies
Tunaville Times Crew members, nearly three-quarters of whom were Portuguese, addressed each other in the idioms of their native villages while they laid the huge black purse seine nets on the docks. Nautical designers and …
July 17, 2021
Integration of Encanto, 125 freeway ruins Lemon Grove, Allied Gardens ambivalent about mansions
Everybody I Need to Know I Met in Kindergarten “My dad told me that blacks were moving in because they couldn’t go anywhere else,” Kenny recalls. “But he told me they were just like us.” …
July 4, 2021
North County's tiny airports, Palomar Mountain water war
San Diego is no place for cows "You should see the casino [the Pala Band] are building up there," Verboom says. "It's the Taj Mahal. They're going to employ something like 1200 people. And they …
June 21, 2021
Wholesome and off-beat homeschooling, Helix High football, Mission Bay High reunion
The Only Kid at Whitebread Central Who Listened to Danzig Many people have asked me why I’m not in school, and when I explain that I am on home study, they want to know why. …
May 1, 2021
The bass at Lake Cuyamaca, the ducks at Niland, where to fish in San Diego Bay
Largemouth lust The casters trade rods back and forth. Watching them, I can feel more sympathy for the obsession with equipment. I’m obsessed too; it’s impossible to be a serious fly fisherman and not be. …
April 25, 2021
Miramar's F-14s, MCRD officer's club as pick-up venue, Richard Meltzer goes to sea
Wing Men On June 15, 1988, they headed north to the Aleutians, where the F-14s played their usual games with Russian MiGs and bombers: VF-51 pilots shot excellent video of the Soviet planes on patrol …
March 29, 2021