Bruce Henderson— stadium prophet "Every time they raise ticket prices it gives them more and more money to do what? To buy what they hope is a better and better team. The council will have …

The Sport with No Clock Mexican baseball, like the Mexican economy, is just a half-step ahead of the creditors. The precipitous decline of the peso against the dollar has virtually destroyed the league’s ability to …

Cars that are lemons The assumption that most of us bring to the table when buying or selling a car, new or used, is that we will be defrauded, which is usually the case. One …

Set a needle on my heart and play those songs of love and pain My record collection is a minefield of potential pain: stacks of Ray Charles, Robert Johnson, Otis Redding, Elmore James, Muddy Waters, …

War! “Automobile headlights were painted out except for tiny slits. You could see cars oncoming, but the driver couldn’t see. Panic would occur when people thought attack was under way. Then if a light was …

Broderick vs. Broderick But when Judge Howatt’s decision to bar the press and public was challenged by the Reader's attorney at a January 5 hearing, Betty Broderick reversed herself and told the judge that the …

It’s a Gas During the war, Bob recalls, "A-card owners got four gallons of gas a week. We had tires ordered when the business opened, but when the war came, they put them all in …

Shipyard blues "With all the stuff you say these guys have to endure at NASSCO, anyone would believe the place is hell. But I don't understand what all these queers thought they were getting into. …

The whole area was the city dump They chose St. Martin as their patron saint, the señora explains, because he was a friend of to the poor — because he was black and they too …

Coyote — king of the smugglers You can catch a bus on Beyer Street or the trolley at the Iris Street station, avoiding the “Migra” around the congested central San Ysidro area. Stay out of …

Was the WPA a Boondoggle or Saving Grace? It's hard to look around San Diego and not see evidence of the WPA: the city library, Scripps Institution of Oceanography, the dredging of Mission Bay (and …

Copley, Morgan Depositions Show Loose Reins at Tribune Copley maintained she makes it a policy not to attend any board meetings. When an attorney asked, "Under what circumstances would [Morgan] discuss with you matters that …

The Partch Reverberations The instruments are in varying states of sickness and health. While some can be replaced – improved even, as is the case with the New Boo built by local composer Cris Forster …

Surfboard Shapers Eaton didn't invent the Bonzer, but is responsible for its refinement. It is a strangely old-fashioned board (in the sense that Chuck Berry is old-fashioned), yet as different from conventional surfboards as the …

The Little World That Almost Was “I was dressed in my ‘Little Lord Fauntleroy’ suit, and playing with K.T.’s dog (Theosophists are fond of using their leader’s initials). Suddenly, I looked up and said ‘I …

Preserving the Masters One day when he was on the top of the scaffolding in one comer of the hall, he came upon an inscription on a battle flag. It read, cerca trova — he …

Bill’s Memory Machine “My mother and father,” Mike said, “were very frugal. They were very cost-conscious, so my mother didn’t have money for carpeting, obviously, or even rugs, so she’d take old pieces of clothing …

The Last Rewrite That night I spoke to winos and street types who talked about murder, to councilmen and cops who spoke of shooting “to incapacitate,” and to people at the Knickerbocker Hotel who knew …

The Debris of What You Really Do When I was in high school, the Summer of Love hit, and grudgingly I became a hippie, tried to pull off laid-back when in my heart of hearts …

Mr. Jello Will See You Now While we have been talking, the sun has been relentless, but Jack remains impervious to my discomfort in my heavy clothing. At one point, I ask whether I can …

Dead Reckoning The coroner’s longest day on the job was, of course. September 25. 1978, the day of PSA Flight 182. When the airliner crashed at 9:04 that morning. Stark was in his office, finishing …

The Polio Years I began to wonder whether I would just be a cripple the rest of my life or permanently stretched out in an iron lung. While I lay moaning in the back seat …

Shifting Sands The boaters are all for the proposed harbor expansion. Many of them surf themselves, or are ex-surfers who switched to boating in their later years — but they say surfing is a "one-on-one" …

God’s Country Remembered My wife and I are driving up El Cajon Boulevard. It hasn’t changed much, not really. Businesses come and go (there wasn’t anything remotely like the Hung Vuong Pho restaurant back then), …

The Great Families Who Created This Town Are Still Angry “I’d rather have a monarchy than a republic. The majority of people here cannot rule themselves. We Californios didn’t support the idea of the Mexican …

Seals A girl was called (sometimes you can still hear it in Coronado) a toad. As in "Hey, there were a lot of good lookin' toads at Bully's last Thursday" or "Hey, where's my toad; …

A Quiet Place South of Here The sea urchin is a major object of the villager’s sea harvesting. The wind and sea are calm enough for harvesting sea urchins fewer than half the days of …

So I’ve Heard When I was having my appendix taken out a few years ago, the anesthesiologist put the mask over my face, asked me to count backwards from a hundred, and then, assuming I …

The Idealization of Jessica Trump She paused for a moment. I could hear her thinking, and then she said, “My spring break is next week, and I haven’t made any plans. I could catch a …

Silver Screens: A Short History of San Diego Cinemas The years preceding America’s entry into World War II introduced more neighborhood theaters like the Roxy (1939) in Pacific Beach, the Strand in Ocean Beach, and …

Morale Seemed So High Mark said he’d had some bitter experiences with black sailors on the ship. When a group of recruits came on board, he lined them up to get some paperwork information. “Hey, …

Did Somebody Call a Cab? There was a strike. Yellow Cab drivers walked out in August, 1976, and by October they were crossing their own picket line. The strikers burned some Yellow Cabs, assaulted some …

Starting at State At faculty meetings he would administer avuncular homilies on absence from our offices during the period we were expected to assign for conferring with our students (“Now, ladies and gentlemen, you know …

The Eyesore Inventory Thoryk and his partner, a real-estate development company owned by San Diego Gas & Electric, found a co-conspirator in San Diego City Hall, which solicited and approved Thoryk’s remodeling of the historic …

Pop the Hood and Open Your Wallet Drive in at midday. See the gas attendants, red rags dangling limply from their grease-stained back pockets, leaning against pumps, waiting. But after a Padres or Chargers game …

Sandals, Bell-Bottoms, a Medallion The canyon was just a dream for a little boy. We had trails, paths, and forts. There was a lot of bamboo growing in the canyon, which isn’t indigenous to this …

Prehistoric Gas Station an Eyesore? It's the newer Old Highway 80, built in 1932, that Miller's fronts. A visit to the site reveals two things: the buildings are in better shape than they appear to …

For Big Kids Only The foot of Redondo Court was a focal point for a couple of reasons. It was the end of a line when streetcars ran through Mission Beach, creating a natural stopping …

Some People in This Town Don't Like Herman Baca Baca's aptitude is in organizing his friends. At Sweetwater High School in the late Fifties, he was president of “Los Solteros” (“The Bachelors”), a club of …

A Lullaby of Broadway “I was sitting in my room,” declared one hotel resident, “when I heard a knock at the door. I opened the door and three or four men forced their way in. …

The Deadly Circle The fear of ejecting over the heavily populated Red River Valley and of becoming prisoners of war kept Cunningham and Driscoll in the plane until it began tumbling and burning just over …

Survivors "We tried to have a respectful pow-wow," agrees John Rouillard, head of American Indian Studies at San Diego State. "There's a definite trend, starting probably with the Alcatraz takeover in 1969, of young Indians …

Light Housekeeping Our man Downen evidently has been slowly phased out of his lighthouse-keeping duties by automation. A fog sensor device is now used to trigger the fog horns automatically when visibility is less than …

A Sword for Its Army and a Lily for Its Heart Dorothy had a floral display at Art Alive to worry about; one of the iris-show clerks backed out because her horse was due to …

John Steinbeck Was My Father One of us, a doctor's son, mentioned that his father had urged him to follow in his footsteps. Was there pressure on John to become a writer? He shook his …

Creation of the Salton Sea Rockwood tried to construct a jetty between the half-mile-long island in the river — soon to be called “Disaster Island” — and the Mexican cut. In theory, log pilings, sand, …

When Men and Mountains Meet Julian was at least a four-day trip from San Diego, even for the fastest of team drivers. The trip from Old Town to Foster (above Lakeside, now covered by San …

Just Say Nay As a "matter of confidentiality," the board will not release test-positive trainers' names, though if information is obtained from other sources, they will confirm it. Harvey Furgatch, a former boardmember, thinks the …

My Life of Crime I married my third wife in ’78. She was pregnant. We went to the swap meet in Spring Valley, and I was doin’ dealings for some turquoise rings, and I looked …

Offbeat Tourist Spots You don’t have to go to Northern California in order to see redwoods. A substantial stand of trees estimated to be about seventy years old and ranging up to eighty feet tall …