JUDGING THE 1930s -- robert gardner

* EDITOR’S NOTE: As part of our Countdown to 2000, Robert Gardner will

write special Saturday columns recalling the decade we have just covered.

This week, he looks back at the 1930s.

In the 1930s, Balboa was spared most of the effects of the Depression.

There is an old saying in the entertainment world that man may sacrifice

many things but will never give up drinking, gambling or dancing.

So, while desperate men in Los Angeles would jump on the running board of

your car at a stop sign and wash your windshield hoping for a nickel tip,

everything was normal in Balboa.

Huge crowds came down every Saturday night to dance at the Rendezvous.

The liquor flowed and the suckers still crowded the gambling dives to

lose their money.

Oh, we had some highly visible indications of the Depression. We had a

man who sat at the top of a flagpole one summer. He had a bucket

suspended from a long rope, hoping people would put money in it, but I

never saw anyone put as much as a penny in. We also had a man buried

alive and as far as I could see, he didn’t do any better than the man on

the flagpole. And one summer we had one of those utterly depressing

marathon dance contests at the Pavilion.

But outside Balboa, the Depression was in full swing. I was witness to an

incident I will never forget. One summer I had a job on the labor gang

during the construction of Newport Harbor High School. The labor gang --

two of us -- carried lumber from where the trucks had unloaded to the

place the lumber was needed during construction. We never walked. We

trotted or jogged. Usually we were carrying 2-by-4s that were 12 feet

long.

I hated going to work -- not because of the job itself, but because you

had to run a gauntlet of men trying to get jobs. They hated you because

you had a job. They just stood there every day hoping someone would not

show up. For all I knew, these were men with hungry wives and children at

home and they hated me because I had a job, and they didn’t.

The other member of the labor crew was an old man. I always thought he

was too old for the job, but he said he had to have the job because he

was the only support for his wife, daughter and two grandchildren. His

son-in-law just disappeared one day, which was not uncommon.

Somehow, men couldn’t handle the situation and would just ran off. Ever

notice the pictures of the soup lines in the Depression years? They were

all men who couldn’t face up to hungry faces and just took off.

Well, one day we were jogging along, carrying some 2-by-4s and the old

man, who was ahead of me, fell down. The foreman ran over and looked at

the old man, who was not moving. The foreman looked over at the crowd

around the gate, gestured with his finger, and a young man detached

himself from the crowd. He ran over to the old man, picked up the lumber

and took off almost running. As I passed the old man, I heard the foreman

say, “Go over to the gate and pick up the money you have coming.”

That was the last time I saw the old man, but I couldn’t help thinking

about his return to the home of which he had been the sole support with

the news that he had lost his job.

I will never forget the Great Depression.

* JUDGE GARDNER is a Corona del Mar resident and former judge. His

regular column runs Tuesdays.