History notes

Mike Sciacca

When you engage Chris Epting in conversation, you soon learn that

the Huntington Harbour resident has an affinity for history.

You also discover that he has a keen awareness, an eye for detail

and a sharp mind that can recall things that have had some type of

social impact.

Epting has made it his passion to remind others of such noteworthy

events, bridging events of yesteryear and making them relevant to

today. He has done so through two recently published books.

His latest published work is titled “Images of America -- The Los

Angeles Memorial Coliseum.” The book chronicles through words and

archival photographs the history of the venerated stadium and some of

the events that took place inside its hallowed walls.

The book comes on the heels of his first venture, “Images of

America -- Huntington Beach,” which was released last year.

“After the book on Huntington Beach was completed, I was bitten by

the bug,” said Epting, 40, who, for 18 years worked as a writer and

creative director in an advertising agency.

He has since opened up the Surf City Advertising Company.

“I always had wanted to focus on writing outside of advertising

and owning my own company has allowed me the chance to manage my own

time and work on these projects,” he said. While working on “Images

of America -- Huntington Beach,” Epting discovered that Surf City had

pretty much gone undocumented.

He had pitched the book to a publishing company in Chicago, and

they gave Epting the green light to document Huntington Beach through

archival and up-to-date photographs.

The result was a 128-page book that contains nearly 200 images,

150 of which are from city archives. Epting took the others.

The book features before and after sections. In it, Epting

displays original photographs of various city landmarks. In each

instance, he went out and found the site where the original photo may

have been taken and then photographed that landmark to show how the

it looks in the present day.

“It was really cool to find these old photos, some that were as

old as 60 to 70 years old,” he said. “There’s a shot of the old train

station downtown and one of the old, original wooden pier. There are

some amazing shots in the book.”

His first published work is now in its fourth printing.

Epting admits to being a sports stadium buff. Once the Huntington

Beach project was complete, he went to work on his next book.

The Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum had always held a fascination

for the East Coast native.

“As a kid, I’d see the Coliseum on TV and in the movies, and there

was something about it that always appealed to me,” he said. “When I

finally got to see it for the first time, in the late 1980s, my jaw

dropped.”

Since that first, unforgettable visit, Epting said, he has been to

the Coliseum at least 100 times. He still gets goose bumps when he’s

there.

“I can’t explain it. It was a somewhat crumbling stadium, but I

knew that events of great importance went on inside its walls,” he

said. “Of course, there were the great sporting events, but

non-sports events, such as speeches, concerts and religious services,

also took place there.

“The Coliseum really was more than a football stadium -- for its

first few decades it really was a cultural center,” he said.

“Eisenhower, Patton, Billy Graham, even Evil Knievel, were big

headliners there. It was used for ski jumping and war maneuvers and

of course, the Olympics. I cover all of this in the book.”

Epting needed a vote of approval from the Coliseum Commission to

gain access to the Coliseum and its archives.

He received the commission’s blessing after a nearly six-month

wait and then went to work.

He was allowed to walk the stadium’s hallowed field and travel its

tunnels. He was even given a key to the stadium’s door if he needed

access when nobody was home.

Margaret Farnum, the Coliseum’s chief administrating officer, who

has worked for the stadium the past 33 years, praised Epting’s

dedication to the book.

The book took six months to complete and went into bookstores in

September. It is 128 pages and has 220 photos, 40 of which were taken

by Epting.

“His love of this stadium really paralleled mine,” Farnum said.

“He was a relentless worker and is an excellent historian. Chris’

book turned out beautifully and really captured the spirit of the

grand, historic Coliseum.”

Epting is close to finishing his next book, titled “James Dean

Died Here: The Locations of America’s Pop Culture Landmarks.” The

book is planned for release next spring, he said.

After that, he plans to begin work on a book about his true

passion: baseball.

“My hope is that these books compel people to remember a little

bit about history, to see the way things were in comparison to how

they are now,” Epting said.