A Mission Beach centennial celebration will begin in March with a monument dedication and end in September with a Belmont Park festival.
\nThe months-long beach birthday is appropriate given the community\u2019s character, said Wendy Crain who, along with co-chairwoman Debbie Watkins, is heading the centennial gala.
\n“It goes with the spirit of Mission Beach, which is a celebratory town,” said Crain, noting beach residents are “very active,” always wanting to be involved in the community and leading “outdoor lifestyles.”
\nCrain said the genesis of the centennial celebration goes back to May 2013 and the influence of local historian Phil Prather, who co-wrote “Images of America: Mission Beach” along with Terry Curren.?
\n“We started going to community organizations \u2014 Mission Beach Town Council, Mission Beach Women\u2019s Club, OMBAC (Old Mission Beach Athletic Club) \u2014 to get community support and they gave 100 percent, which is wonderful,” said Crain. “We\u2019ve tried to make it community oriented with horseshoe and volleyball tournaments, as well as doing things with our oldest icons, the roller coaster and The Plunge swimming pool at Belmont Park.”
\nIn March, the centennial celebration kicks off with a monument dedication.
\n“We\u2019re hoping to have a proclamation from the mayor to go along with our monument, a big boulder with an oxidized bronze plaque placed between Belmont Park and the south lifeguard restroom on the beach,” said Crain. The monument, she said, is being paid for by both the Mission Beach Women\u2019s Club and the Mission Beach Town Council.
\nIn April, the celebration continues with a Taste of Mission Beach, featuring food samples from local restaurants.
\nIn May, festivities take a maritime turn with a surf contest and “meet the legends” event, followed in June with a Father\u2019s Day vintage car show at Belmont Park and a movie viewing at The Plunge pool in July. August will feature a sandcastle event and September will wrap up the festivities with a volleyball\/horseshoes beachfest, as well as the gala finish, a Sept. 27 Centennial Festival at Belmont Park\/Ventura Blvd.
\nCordelia Mendoza, head of the centennial\u2019s Museum Committee, said plans are in the works to convert Belmont Park\u2019s ticket booth for use as a Mission Beach museum with “all new pictures that have never been seen before” donated by local families.
\n“We\u2019re also making a DVD that we\u2019ll be selling at the museum, as well as selling our own T-shirts,” Mendoza said.
\nWork on the new museum, Mendoza said, is expected to be completed by the celebration kick-off in March.
\nOn June 14, 1914, a syndicate headed by John D. Spreckels and managed by George S. Barney submitted a subdivision map surveyed by D.A. Loebenstein to the Common Council of San Diego for approval and acceptance. On Dec. 14, 1914, the first official map of Mission Beach was signed and adopted.
\n“In 1915, a bridge was built across the bay entrance between Ocean and Mission beaches,” said Prather, co-author of the Mission Beach historical book. “Previous to that, in order to get to Mission Beach you had to enter from the Pacific Beach side \u2014 a long trip in a horse and buggy or a Model T from San Diego.”
\nPrather said the bridge changed the demographics and future of the beachfront.
\n“Until the bridge was built, Ocean Beach was the beach of choice with its many restaurants and businesses,” he said. “The main attraction was Wonderland, an amusement center built in 1913, which was washed out a couple of years later by a large winter storm. People began taking the trolley across the bridge once it was built to old Mission Beach.”
\nFor more information about Mission Beach\u2019s centennial visit www.missionbeachcentennial.org. Mission Beach Centennial celebrations throughout the year<\/b>
\n\u2022 Saturday, March 22 \u2014 Mission Beach Centennial Monument and plaque dedication and resident walk, 10 to 11 a.m. Location TBD. \u2022 Thursday, April 10 \u2014 Centennial Taste of Mission Beach, 4 to 9 p.m. \u2022 Saturday, May 17 \u2014 Mission Beach Centennial Surf Contest\/Meet the Legends, 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. \u2022 Sunday, June 15 \u2014 Mission Beach Centennial Father\u2019s Day Car Show at Belmont Park, 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. \u2022 Tuesday, July 15 \u2014 Mission Beach Centennial Dive-In Movie at the Plunge, 8 to 10 p.m. \u2022 Sunday, Aug. 17 \u2014 Mission Beach Centennial How to Build A Sandcastle Clinic, 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. \u2022 August (date TBD) \u2014 Mission Beach Centennial OMSHOES \u2022 Saturday, Sept. 6 \u2014 Mission Beach Centennial OMVOLLEY, 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. \u2022 Saturday, Sept. 27 \u2014 Mission Beach Centennial Festival at Belmont Park, 10 a.m. to 8 p.m.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
A Mission Beach centennial celebration will begin in March with a monument dedication and end in September with a Belmont Park festival. The months-long beach birthday is appropriate given the community\u2019s character, said Wendy Crain who, along with co-chairwoman Debbie Watkins, is heading the centennial gala. “It goes with the spirit of Mission Beach, which […]<\/p>","protected":false},"author":726,"featured_media":284261,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"11559","_seopress_titles_title":"One hundred years of Mission Beach","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"jnews_override_counter":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[11559,11551],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-284260","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-beach-bay-press","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/284260","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/726"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=284260"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/284260\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/284261"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=284260"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=284260"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=284260"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}