Newport Beach in the Rearview Mirror

At the end of the Balboa Peninsula, the Wedge is internationally recognized as the world's best (and most dangerous) bodysurfing spot. In this episode, learn: How the Wedge was created by a manmade accident in 1936. Why no one dared to ride the Wedge for decades. Why bodysurfing at the Wedge faced extinction twice. How a rag-tag group of bodysurfers formed the Wedge Crew and has ruled the bre...

In this pop quiz on Newport  Beach's origins, you’ll be tested on: Why Newport Landing (Newport’s Plymouth Rock and first port, which is on the site of what’s now the Lower Castaways) became a ghost town virtually overnight after a successful 18-year run. What ingenious method did Newport’s pioneers use to widen and deepen the entrance to Newport Bay in 1876. (It's mindboggling!) How the...

This multiple-choice test covers the earliest days of Newport Beach history.  The six questions are:  Despite explorers and merchants sailing off the coast of California beginning in the mid-1500s, why was there no mention of Newport Bay in the historical record for 300 years? (The answer will surprise you.) Why in 1870 did Capt. Samuel S. Dunnells decide to turn into Newport Bay and search for a...

Episode 14, "The Coastal Freeway: A Concrete Monster that Almost Destroyed Newport," has generated some amazing responses on social media.  Some expressed disbelief  at how close Newport was to having a freeway (12 lanes at its widest) run through the center of town. Others simply wanted to thank the Freeway Fighters and others who thwarted this plan more than a half-century ago. And fin...

In 1970, the Newport Beach City Council and California Department of Highways signed an agreement to build a coastal freeway—12 lanes wide in places—that would run through the heart of Newport and include a five-level interchange at MacArthur Boulevard and East Coast Highway. The route had been decided upon, funding was in place, and the Coastal Freeway appeared to be a fait accompli.  But then, t...

In 1954, Dora Hill, housewife and grandmother, reluctantly entered the Newport Beach City Council race just 10 minutes before the filing deadline and unexpectedly won in a landslide. Garnering the most votes in city history, the victory surprised even her husband, who only agreed to her run for office because he was convinced she would lose. At her first council meeting, she was appointed the city...

In our fourth, multi-choice pop quiz on Newport Beach history, find out: Why you would find horses on the beach at between the the late 19th Century and the 1930s. What was the castle on Collins Island converted to in the 1940s. Who were the previous tenants of the Mariners Mile building (a classic in Southern California modern architecture) now occupied by the upscale A'marees boutique. What...

Newport Beach history is littered with fun, weird, amazing and/or mindboggling stories that are too thin to make into an entire episode, but too good to pass up. In "Newport Nuggets: Three Short Stories Lost to History," we explores a trio of tales from the early part of the 20th Century:  Newport Beach's first doctor and the Spanish Flu pandemic. The summer camp on Little Balboa Is...

Joe Beek is known as the Father of Balboa Island and operator of the Balboa Island ferry for a half century (his family still runs it after more than 100 years). But he was so much more than that. Here's just some of his feats:  He was Newport's first harbor master; he marked the bay's channels, built the channel-marker buoys himself, and, in 1923, climbed jetty rocks to place warni...

The Corona del Mar jetty is in the process of getting a much-needed makeover. The tattered, 12-foot-wide boardwalk running 750 feet from Pirate's Cove to the rock section of the jetty is getting a new coat of cement, and more boulders are being added on the harbor side so they'll be at the same level as the boardwalk.  The work now being done by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers caused me...

Frank and Fran Robinson, an unassuming couple who moved to Newport Beach in 1962, learned about the already-approved plans to turn the Upper Newport Bay—also known as the Back Back—into a massive development of extended shorelines, homes, a marina, businesses, and a waterskiing and rowing venue. Even though the dredging had already begun, the Robinsons decided to take on the Irvine Company, one of...

On the morning of May 23, 1896, a 38-year-old man known as Fisherman Pete was found dead on the floor of his 10x12 shanty, about a 100 yards south of McFadden Wharf (now the Newport Pier). The right side of his head had been crushed, 40 gashes and cuts marked his body, and a number of his fingers had been chopped off.  It was Newport Beach’s first murder. It also was the grisliest homicide ever in...

A five-question, multiple-choice pop quiz on Newport Beach history. Here are the questions (no Googling before listening): Which Newport Harbor island was allegedly won in a high-stakes poker game by a Hollywood celebrity? Note: The seller was a hard-betting horse-racing aficionado, which gives some credence to the popular legend. What was the original use of the El Cholo restaurant building in Co...

In a traitorous act to bodysurfers, Newport Beach Lifeguard Chief Bob Reed asked the City Council in 1962 to permanently close the Wedge because the world's most dangerous bodysurfing spot was, well, too dangerous. The council voted 6-1 to approve the new ordinance to ban bodysurfing at the Wedge. But at the next City Council meeting, where the ordinance would get a required second reading (u...

We take a visit to Newport Beach's quirky, beloved, doomed-from-the-start and (by today's standards) wildly politically incorrect Newport Harbor Buffalo Ranch. Guest: Author and local historian Duncan Forgey who fondly recounts attending a birthday party at the Buffalo Ranch as a 9-year-old.

A five-question, multiple-choice pop quiz on Newport Beach history. Here are the questions (no Googling before listening):  What eyesore did the  City Council nearly approve in 1956 that would have been just off the coast of Newport?  What year were Corona del Mar's parking issues first brought to City Hall? Who was Bob Henry, the namesake of the park on the Castaways bluff? What amazing find...

If Newport Beach had a Mount Rushmore, Judge Robert Gardner would be on it. Among his legacies: Pioneering bodysurfer, groundbreaking judge and master storyteller whose tales of early Balboa provide the best (and most entertaining) account of the city's early days. Guest: Nancy Gardner, the judge's daughter.

In 1961, a wayward killer whale named Wanda was trapped in Newport Harbor by Marineland dolphin hunters, earning her the dubious distinction of being the first orca in the world to be taken into captivity.  The sensational story, which has had a tragic international legacy of more than 50 years, is a largely forgotten chapter in Newport Beach history.