Category: 2025

Historian and Huntington Beach City Archivist Kathie Schey will tell stories of the many Huntington Beach residents of who served in World War I at the next meeting of the Orange County Historical Society, Thursday, April 10, 2025, 7:30 p.m., at Trinity Episcopal Church, 2400 N. Canal St., in Orange. The public is welcome!

American Legion Post 133 in Huntington Beach is among the oldest continually active posts in the nation and is only a few months younger than the Legion itself. It was built on a remarkable legacy of service: Those who left a sleepy coastal farm town to fight an international war they could never have imagined amidst the threat of an international pandemic.

The small group of veterans who founded Post 133 represented a cross-section of the community. One was an attorney, another a land developer and most of the rest had small businesses or farms. Some had seen the horrors of battle, while others hadn’t even made it off their troop transports. Each of their stories shine a light on the lived experience of that time.

More than one hundred local men joined the Service after the U.S. entered WWI in April 1917 – a staggering number for a tiny city less than a decade old. They served on land, on sea (and under it), and in the air. Most went to France while others were sent to China or were members of the occupying force in Germany.

Scouring newspapers, letters, diaries and more, their stories have unfolded. Among them, heroism in the sky, mastering new technologies, lying “doggo” in a muddy trench while artillery roared overhead, witnessing the burial at sea of a Spanish Influenza victim. Introductions to just a few examples follow:

• Three boyhood friends met serendipitously in a French battlefield, then separated, their fates unknown to each other and to their frantic families at home.
• Another soldier wrote to his father to watch for him in a newsreel.
• One infantryman disembarked at the very port his father immigrated from decades earlier.
• The first African American graduate of Huntington Beach High School was proudly assigned to one of only two Black units allowed to bear arms.

Some returned home to jubilant welcomes. Others returned in coffins. All their stories are worth knowing and sharing.

Kathie Schey is currently the Archivist of the City of Huntington Beach. She holds a master’s degree in history, receiving the Nicholas Perkins Hardeman Prize for her work. Subsequent awards include two nationally competed Visiting Research Fellowships. Kathie has served on numerous history-related boards – including OCHS – and holds certification in archives, historic preservation and urban planning.

Please join us to hear this important presentation on service given by Huntington Beach residents during the turbulent years of Word War I on  Thursday,  April 10, 2025, 7:30 p.m., at Trinity Episcopal Church, 2400 N. Canal St., in Orange. The public is welcome!

Hunter Fuentes will discuss “Paradise Found: Early Laguna Beach Architects and Their Work,” at the Orange County Historical Society on March 13, 2025, 7:30 p.m., at Trinity Episcopal Church, 2400 N. Canal St., in Orange. The public welcome!

Laguna Beach gained early fame as an art colony, but art is a very broad category. While most associate art with painting and sculpture, one could take inspiration from Frank Lloyd Wright’s assertion that “The mother art is architecture.” In the April 1944 edition of Architect and Engineer magazine Sewell Smith, A.I.A., wrote, “Laguna Beach in normal times has more smart architects per square inch than any place I’ve ever visited ….” This presentation celebrates the work of a few of those “smart architects” whose work helped transition a summertime campground of ramshackle cabins and tents into a year-round city with world class public and private architecture. These include Aubrey St. Clair, Charles A. Hunter, Manfred DeAhna, and Jean Louis Egasse.

Hunter Fuentes works in the real estate industry for Zillow and is a resident of Laguna Beach. He developed a passion for the coastal town and its historic housing many years ago and has created a website called “Historic Laguna” (www.historiclaguna.com). The website celebrates the architects and architecture that help give the city its distinctive charm and personality.

Please join us to learn more from Hunter Fuentes about “Paradise Found: Early Laguna Beach Architects and Their Work,” at the Orange County Historical Society on March 13, 2025, 7:30 p.m., at Trinity Episcopal Church, 2400 N. Canal St., in Orange. The public welcome!

Historian Paul R. Spitzzeri will present “What Do Brazil, Maui and Orange County Have in Common?  Some History of the Olinda Ranch and Oil Field,” at the February 13, 2025 meeting of the Orange County Historical Society, 7:30 pm, at Trinity Episcopal Church, 2400 N. Canal St., Orange.

In the 1880s, William H. Bailey bought land in what was still part of Los Angeles County (and is now part of Brea) and bestowed the name Olinda on his ranch. From there came a boomtown called Carlton and then Orange County’s first oil field with the moniker best known today with Brea-Olinda High School. Come learn some of the history of this northeastern corner of the county, including a display of artifacts related to the area.

Born in Chicago, raised in Fountain Valley, Huntington Beach and Placentia, and with a B.A. and M.A. in History from CSU Fullerton, Paul R. Spitzzeri is Museum Director at the Workman and Temple Family Homestead Museum, where he’s worked since 1988. In addition to writing extensively about greater Los Angeles history, Paul, a resident of Carbon Canyon has delved deeply into the history of the Canyon and environs over the last twenty years and maintains the Carbon Canyon Chronicle blog.

We look forward to you joining us on Thursday, February 13, 2025 at the meeting of the Orange County Historical Society, 7:30 pm, at Trinity Episcopal Church, 2400 N. Canal St., Orange. The public is welcome!

Historians Christopher Merritt and J. Eric Lynxwiler will discuss their new book, “Knott’s Bear-y Tales: The Complete History of the Whimsical Attraction”, at the January 2025 meeting of the Orange County Historical Society on Thursday, January 9, 2025, 7:30p.m., at Trinity Episcopal Church, 2400 N. Canal St., in Orange. The story of this creative and well-remembered dark ride shines a light on a period of major change for Knott’s Berry Farm and for Orange County. The public is welcome!!!!

Designer and artist Rolly Crump came to Knott’s Berry Farm at the invitation of Marion Knott — one of the first top woman executives in a major Orange County business and was the first female head of a great American theme park. Marion Knott’s parents, Walter and Cordelia, had founded Knott’s Berry Farm decades before. Crump – long known as a prominent Disney Imagineer — was escaping the shadow of his previous employer and looking for an opportunity to spread his wings as a designer. Together these unlikely friends developed and organized a crew of talented artists to build a wild dark ride unlike anything seen (or smelled) before: Knott’s Bear-y Tales!

Christopher Merritt has more than thirty years of ride and show design experience, creating theme park attractions and environments around the world. He served as an Art Director and Production Designer at theme parks in California, Florida, Tokyo, Singapore, and Shanghai. His books include Pacific Ocean Park: The Rise and Fall of Los Angeles’ Space Age Nautical Pleasure Pier (2014), with co-author Domenic Priore, and Marc Davis in His Own Words: Imagineering the Disney Theme Parks (2019) with Pete Docter.

J. Eric Lynxwiler is an urban anthropologist and Knott’s Berry Farm historian. While attending UCLA, he spent one school year behind the counter of Knott’s electric shooting gallery and works today as a graphic designer on Farm signage, merchandise, and Knott’s Berry Market preserves. Lynxwiler has been a volunteer and Neon Cruise guide for the Museum of Neon Art in Glendale for 25 years. He has also co-authored books on the history of neon signs in Los Angeles and the history of Wilshire Boulevard.

Together, Merritt and Lynxwiler also wrote the critically acclaimed, “Knott’s Preserved: From Boysenberry to Theme Park, The History of Knott’s Berry Farm” (2010), which remains the leading book on the subject.

Knott’s Fans and everyone: Please join us on Thursday, January 9, 2025, 7:30p.m., at Trinity Episcopal Church, 2400 N. Canal St., in Orange!!