A Look Back

Jerry Person

This week we’ll finish up our look at the people who worked the three-day

grand opening celebration at the Chamness and Schuth market at 205 Main

in December 1933.

The last of the fathers and sons to be looked at is Leland (Lee) Chamness

and he was born in Chamness Town, Ill., a town founded by Lee’s

grandfather.

The Chamness family moved to Denver to operate their dairy business and

where Lee attended Arvada High School and Denver University. In 1917,

when the family was cattle ranching in Hereford, Texas, Lee married Effie

Guinn, a young lady he had met there.

But luck was not with Effie, for that year the world was at war and Lee

enlisted, as did most American boys at the time, into the service of his

country.

In June, 1917, Lee was sent to Fort Worth, Texas to train with the 142nd

United States Infantry, 36th Division for a year.

In 1918 he was sent to France where he fought in several battles at

Mihiel and Champagne and in the Messe-Argonne offensive.

With the war over, Lee returned to Fort Worth to be discharged in July

1919.

Lee and Effie moved to Colorado to work on his father’s dairy farm.

In 1924 they moved to Bakersfield where Lee worked for the Central

California Ice Company.

The whole family, which now included his wife Effie and three children,

Barbara Ann, Mary Louise and Leland Jr., left Bakersfield in 1926 to

settle in Huntington Beach.

He came to join his father Austin, and Frank and Harold Schuth, in their

grocery and meat market at 209 Main St.

Needing larger quarters, they relocated to 205 Main and on Dec. 21, 22

and 23 of 1933 held their big grand opening sale.

There was plenty of help by the Chamness employees that included their

bookkeeper Ulral Maxwell. Chamness placed McCoy Webb in charge of the

grocery section and Michael Vidal in charge of produce. Vidal would go on

to become a grocery store owner in later years on Main Street.

During the celebration extra help was hired. Chamness hired Cecil Dowty,

Herbert Preston and Mills Whittaker to out with the large crowd.

In the meat section, Schuth hired two extra people for this department.

They were Charles Schmeckle and Ray Vandevere.

Their customers were highly pleased with their purchases

Dalton-Chamberlin’s New Deal coffee at 15 cents a pound, T-bone steaks at

22 cents a pound, bacon at 14 cents a pound, and pork chops for 20 cents

a pound. For 45 cents you could get a pound of Maud Chamness’ freshly

baked fruit cake.

The three-day celebration turned out to be a huge success.

Jerry Person is a local historian and longtime Huntington Beach resident.

If you have ideas for future columns, write him at P.O. Box 9182,

Huntington Beach, CA 92615.