Society : ‘Twas a Grand Ball at The Grant Hotel

Little Kay Hall, a member of Mrs. Ratcliffes’ dancing class, made her debut at a tea-time romp on the roof of the U.S. Grant Hotel.

She was all of 3 years old. Her forte was ballet, and when Terpsichore called, she answered. It became a memory that the turmoils and triumphs of a life filled with community work were never able to dim.

Little Kay grew up to become Mrs. David Porter, the heiress to a legacy of connections among the oldest of San Diego’s Old Guard and a doyenne of local Society, the kind that really warrants a capital “S” and shows itself in public only on very special occasions. She swears that when she took those first tentative steps in her frilly tutu, she never dreamed that one day she would return to the hotel as the mistress of one of the grandest parties the city had ever seen.

But there she was at the Grant on Saturday night, resplendent in sequinned silk, enjoying to the hilt her role as Madame Chairman of The Grand Ball, a smashing entertainment that reintroduced social San Diego to the reigning dowager of the city’s hostelries. Chief among her privileges and pleasures was the role of leading the first couples onto the dance floor in the hotel’s newly refurbished ballroom.

The Old Guard turned out en masse to cheer her on. The New Guard showed up, too, although in diminished numbers, since the party sold out at a beyond-capacity 520 guests, and anyone who failed to get his reservations in on the double was turned away. Even the City Guard Band, looking quite dashing in red military tunics trimmed with enough gold braid to light up Cartier’s window, was on hand to musically shepherd the arriving guests through the hotel’s floodlighted front door.

The Grand Ball was given for the benefit of the San Diego Historical Society, but it has to be said that the party really focused on the Grant, which looked serene and stylish after its $80-million face lift. The party officially began at 6:30 p.m., but for once, very few people opted to be fashionably late. Everyone came to see--and to be seen, of course--and the crush was on by 6.

Crowds jammed both sides of Broadway to witness a scene that hasn’t been enacted on that venerable stretch of pavement for the longest time. As madly whirling arc lights highlighted the stories-tall lengths of bunting that draped the hotel’s front, a procession of vintage autos pulled up and disgorged glitterati dressed in white tie, tails, and the drop-dead lace-and-feather confections of the Gibson Girl age, worn as commemorative compliments to the hotel’s original opening in 1910.

When Anne Ledford Evans drove up in her Brush two-seater, the band struck up the “March of the Bersaglieri,” which seemed to suit Evans just fine. Patrick Abarta pulled up just behind her in a 1936 Buick “8,” which he said was just like the one his father bought shortly after young Master Abarta attained the tender age of 2. Patrick said he was fortunate to make it to his third birthday; a week after his father bought the Buick, the 2-year-old experimenter introduced water to the gas tank, an action that did not sit well with Dad.

The guests streamed into the hotel with the intention of seeing as much as possible as quickly as possible. With a schedule of entertainment that called for stops on four floors, scattered from basement meeting rooms to 10th floor suites, the program called for quick thinking and quicker feet. But no one entered without first passing through a receiving line that included Grant restorer Kit Sickels and his wife, Karen, and hotel operator Terry Brown and his wife, Charlene. Scylla and Charybdis were never more vigilant, but certainly never so jovial, either.

Sickels, if truth be told, looked and sounded as nervous as a bridegroom. Although the Grant actually opened last month, Saturday night was the opening, and no verdict regarding its virtues or defects could have been more important to Sickels than that agreed upon by The Grand Ball’s guest list. He ended the night with his face wreathed in smiles.

The crowd, meanwhile, zoomed upstairs and down, alternating between the penthouse suites and the basement reception rooms, where many a wise soul followed his nose to the classy vintages laid out in the wine tasting room. (Those patrons who contributed a healthy surcharge received complimentary rooms for the night; Audrey and Ted Geisel were awarded the Presidential Suite, an honor that had its amusing moments. Audrey’s experiment with a bubble bath in the Jacuzzi ended in near disaster when she switched on the apparently rather powerful water jets. She says that she “shot half-way across the room,” and that her gown, hanging nearby, was soaked. A portable hair dryer saved both costume and hair style.)

These rambling peregrinations were for many guests a jolly tour down memory lane. (Orchestras, bands and quintets were stationed throughout the hotel, but no drumbeats rolled loudly enough to silence the echoes of the past.) Nearly everyone seemed to have some remembrance to share. Jane and Gen. Louis Metzger became engaged in the hotel’s lobby in 1942, when the then-captain returned home on leave from action in the South Pacific. Kathy Guymon, who first visited the hotel in 1956, said that returning “was like opening a door to the past.” Karen Sickels stayed there 30 years ago, when her parents came to town for a convention.

The nostalgia at times grew so intense that it was surprising the carpets weren’t soaked with tears of joy.

Fifteen period-costumed couples, with Kim and Marilyn Fletcher at the fore, led the crowd in a grand promenade up the staircases to the ballroom. The moment--like so much of the evening--recreated one of the details of the Grand Ball that opened the hotel on Oct. 15, 1910.

The ballroom drew its share of oohs and ahs; drawn to human scale, it was dimly lit, and the tables had been set with wildly Sybaritic profusions of camellias, tulips, and waxy green leaves, which spread out like so many miniature Edens. San Francisco’s Royal Society Jazz Orchestra drew oohs and ahs, too, but more importantly, it drew dancers in droves. Cool, jazzy jazz of ‘20s and ‘30s vintage issued from the horns and cornets, and even the staidest feet kept time. It was not unlike one of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s more vividly described party scenes.

The menu started with the old Grant Grill’s signature mock turtle soup (made from a secret recipe), regular shipments of which once were sent to one of New York’s numerous Mrs. Rockefellers. Then came prawns in vanilla sauce, a Merlot ice, veal medallions and a spiffy dessert called “Julia’s White Chocolate Heaven.” The menu also printed the 1910 Grand Ball’s bill of fare, which offered eight courses, including something called “broiled boned hot house chicken.” It doubtless was well received.

Judith Smith was co-chairman for a committee that included Andie Bowers, Leslie Hokr, Tonnie Moss, Joan Streicher, Ilene Swartz, Carol Yorston, Klonie Kunzel, Jill Porter, Molly Eldredge, Michael Johns and Jerry Ferm. Among promenade couples were Bob and Tommi Adelizzi, Judge Mack Lovett and Donis, Lowell and Kay North, Don and Tricia Worley, Rodney and Gayle Eales, Bill and Ovie Cowling, Ken and Fran Golden, and William and Rosemary Logan.

Serving as hosts and hostesses were Harold and Nancy Starkey, Don and Lois Roon, Gordon and Karon Luce, Philip and Detty June Klauber, Everett Gee Jackson and his wife, Eileen; Dallas and Mary Clark, Dean and Emily Black, and Jo Bobbie MacConnell with John Siglow, who sported a two-day growth of beard and evidently thought himself in Miami.