LOOKING BACK

Young Chang

Robert Gardner speaks candidly about the old Hotel Balboa.

“It was not what you call a high-class establishment or any really

great contribution to our city or our history,” the longtime Corona del

Mar resident said.

But the hotel, plain and black and rickety as it was, was a pioneer

landmark on Balboa Peninsula. Before the Four Seasons, Hyatt Newporter

and the Newport Marriott hotels brought glitz and visitors to the city,

Hotel Balboa was it in this part of town.

It’s safe to call it Balboa’s first, since no history books nor

residents recall any other hotel built earlier on the strip.

But other than the hotel’s biggest claim to fame -- it was built in 10

days -- the old lodging place has become somewhat of a Main Street

phantom as it has disappeared from the peninsula and from people’s

memories.

No one remembers why or when the hotel closed. The construction of the

Balboa Inn in 1930 caught a lot of local attention, as the lodging place

was extravagant and luxurious. It was even placed on the Register of

Historical Property in 1985. But the history of Hotel Balboa was

apparently less treasured.

Here are the facts as we know them. A man named Chris MacNeil and his

construction crew erected the building in just 10 days. The hotel opened

on July 3, 1906, just a day before the Balboa Pavilion officially opened.

It was just in time to lodge the visitors who would stop by on the

eastward-expanding Pacific Electric rail.

The project was one of the city’s earlier attempts to draw visitors --

a commodity that’s still hot today with waterfront restaurants and

hotels.

The hotel stood near the Pavilion, a casino that took up the corner

and a set of apartments that still stand.

A restaurant in the lobby was called the Liberty Cafe, which referred

to the eatery’s Liberty Sandwiches (a post World War I incarnation of

hamburgers).

“The only thing it ever had going for it was that it was built in 10

hours or something [like] that,” laughed Gardner, who said he never set

foot in the building.

Oddly enough, the local judge doesn’t remember many visitors staying

at the hotel. Instead, he remembers the main patrons being employees who

worked on Main Street.

* Do you know of a person, place or event that deserves a historical

Look Back? Let us know. Contact Young Chang by fax at (949) 646-4170;

e-mail at young.chang@latimes.com; or mail her at c/o Daily Pilot, 330 W.

Bay St., Costa Mesa, CA 92627.