California Dreaming: A Postcard Pictorial

Harbor Boulevard alongside the newly opened Disneyland in the mid-fifties.  I went to Disneyland for the first time in about 1959 or 60 at age five with my best friend Joey. 

The Golden Gate Bridge, San Francisco, Calif. Completed in 1937, at a cost of three and a half million dollars. Center span is the world's largest - 4200 feet. 

Bel-Aire Motel at 3201 Steiner St., San Francisco, Calif. One block off Lombard St. (U.S Highway 101).

This is the motel I most often stayed at during my many visits to SF in the late 70s and 80s.  This postcard is the late 50s or early 60s, I think. It was re-named the Bel-Aire Travelodge when I stayed here.

LOOKING NORTH ON PALM CANYON DRIVE

PALM SPRINGS, CALIFORNIA

I lived here in the summer of 1993 in the Warm Sands area where Shirley Temple once own a home. Warm Sands was and is home to many Gay resorts.

North Palm Canyon.
I also lived in Palm Springs from December of 1994 to the fall of 1996. 

Tunnel Tree

Sequoia National Park, Calif. 

Back when The International House of Pancakes always had a Blue roof. 

Orange County California.

Newport Beach in the 1960s.

CAPRI By The Sea

Ocean Front Apt.-Motel

4777 Ocean Blvd., Pacific Beach, San Diego, California.

Balboa Island, California.

SEVENTH AND BROADWAY

Los Angeles, Calif.

HOLLYWOOD BOULEVARD AT NIGHT

Hollywood, California

SUNSET BLVD -- HOLLYWOOD, CALIF.

HOLLYWOOD AND VINE

Hollywood, Calif.

HOLLYWOOD, CALIFORNIA

DOWNTOWN SACRAMENTO, California

K Street near 10th

BLUE JAY, CALIFORNIA

in the San Bernardino Mountains.

Salton City, California

on the shores of the Salton Sea.

My family camped here a few times in the early 1960s.

Post Office, downtown San Bernardino.

My Mom used this post office often when she worked at The Sun Newspaper a couple blocks away. She hurt herself pretty bad when she fell down those steps one time.

McMahan's Furniture Furniture on E Street in downtown San Bernardino.

My Mom worked here for several years in the mid and late 1960s.

SAGE'S DEPARTMENT STORE

Del Rosa and Highland Ave.

San Bernardino, California

Twenty-two departments including a full grocery store. The best toy store in town and a great coffee shop with a strawberry pie to die for.

California Hotel on Fifth and E St., San Bernardino, California.

J. Dale Gentry owner-operator.

The California Hotel was an overnight stop for celebrities in the golden age of Hollywood on the way up to The Arrowhead Hotel in the San Bernardino Mountains.

There would be no reason for a stop today but in those days a trip from LA on surface streets  (Foothill Blvd., old Hwy 66) and a two-lane road up the mountain made for a long journey on a Friday night after a long day of starring in the movies.

The Inland Center Mall 

San Bernardino, California.

Opened in 1965.

My Grandmother worked at the House Of Fabrics in this mall in the mid-sixties.

I worked there at Slavick's Jewelers in the early eighties.

It has been expanded and modernized many times and is still a vibrant shopping center even in the age of Amazon.com.

HIGH GEAR GARAGE

Service Station and Cafe

Rim of the World Drive, San Bernardino, California.

San Bernardino Mountains

San Bernardino, Calif.

Downtown Street Scene Near 3rd and E Streets.

My Mom worked at that Sears store in high school to earn Christmas money.

There was a very steep staircase in that store that scared me as I stepped down holding my Mom's hand. 

It's all gone now after a downtown mall took out this whole area in the early 70s.

Downtown E and 3rd Streets, looking south.

Art Deco Woolworth's.

Fontana, California.

Looking north on Sierra Ave.

Home to Kaiser Steel and Kaiser Hospital.

Central City Mall, later rebranded Carousel Mall

Opened in the early '70s.

I worked at Arthur's Jewelers in the mall in 1979 for about a year. My first jewelry store experience.

It is now empty and an eyesore in a once beautiful city.

Downtown San Bernardino in the 1950s.

Forth and E street.

This section of E Street for several blocks both ways was a Friday and Saturday night car cruising scene just like in the movie American Graffiti, from the 1950s through the 1980s. 


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