Authenticity on the sands of Newport Beach

ROBERT GARDNER

* EDITOR’S NOTE: The Daily Pilot has agreed to republish The Verdict,

the ever popular column written for many years by retired Corona del

Mar jurist and historian Robert Gardner, in exchange for donations to

the Surfrider Foundation. This particular column was originally

published Dec. 26, 1992.

A few weeks ago, the “Thirty Years Ago” column in the Pilot said

that on Nov. 19, 1962, Superior Court Judge Robert Gardner won a

prize for the most authentic sand castle in the First Annual Newport

Beach Sand Castle Building Contest at Corona del Mar State Beach.

Actually, it was the Devine-Gardner family that won that prize.

Jack Barnett, secretary of the Chamber of Commerce, knowing that

Andy Devine and I were friends, asked if I could get Andy to enter

the contest for the publicity connected with Andy’s name as an

immensely popular movie, radio, television and stage personality. I

said I’d try.

I propositioned Andy, and he agreed to go along on condition we

make it a family affair. There was one minor drawback. Andy had grown

up in Arizona. He knew how to ride horses and hunt buffalo or

whatever young people did in that part of the world, but he didn’t

know diddly about building sand castles. On the other hand, my wife

Katie and I had grown up on the beach building sand castles -- Katie

in Belmont Shore, I in Balboa. We assured the Devines that with our

expertise, they’d have no problem mastering the art.

And so, on that fateful day, we arrived at Big Corona, were

assigned a plot of sand and told to start building a sand castle.

Andy said that with his vast executive experience, he would be

building superintendent, and his wife Doagie, Katie and I would be

the coolie laborers. No fool he.

Andy settled his considerable frame into a comfortable beach

chair, and Doagie, Katie and I started a sand castle. As countless

thousands of children have done on Southern California beaches, we

dug a hole in the damp sand, put the dug sand in a nice round pile,

then as water seeped into the hole, scooped out the liquid sand and

carefully dripped it into cute little spires on our pile of sand.

Voila! To me, that was a sand castle.

About that time, I looked around and to my horror saw that the

other contestants were armed with trowels and T-squares and measuring

tapes and shovels and rakes and were building honest-to-God castles

with walls and turrets and battlements and moats. Others were carving

out whales and dragons with scalpels and other sculptors’ tools.

I looked at our pitiful little offering and suggested we get the

hell out of there. This was embarrassing. Andy was made of stronger

stuff. “Drip!” he ordered, so Doagie, Katie and I dripped and dripped

and dripped.

Finally, the judging time came. A crowd of men carrying clipboards

arrived. Each appeared suitably serious, wise and sagacious. The

leader, obviously an architect or structural engineer of note, looked

at our pitiful little drip castle and said, “What is that?”

In retrospect, I must admit that compared with all the other

architectural and construction feats they had seen, our cluster of

drip spires must have looked something like a large porcupine.

Then, Andy Devine had his finest hour. Andy was a large man. As he

rose to his feet, he towered over the judges. He glared at them from

under the most formidable set of eyebrows in the entertainment

industry. His voice, ordinarily a husky squeak that couldn’t quite

find its pitch, dropped a full two octaves as he rasped, “That, sir,

is a sand castle, an authentic sand castle!”

Thoroughly cowed, the judges prompted awarded us a prize for the

most authentic sand castle -- which it was. I’ve gone to several of

those contests since and seen some imposing and impressive

constructions, and never have I seen another authentic drip sand

castle. So, I guess the Devines and Gardners are the retired unbeaten

champs of authentic sand castle building.

* ROBERT GARDNER, a Corona del Mar resident, is a retired judge

and a longtime observer of life in Newport Beach.