Old Town Museum Opening Gives Some a Sense of Their Own History

As a teen-age bride in 1919 visiting Old Town for the first time, Mabel Oliver Cerda--of Spanish, German and Apache descent--had no clue she would become part of the history of the original San Diego.

She couldn’t know she would go on to live in Old Town for 50 years, or that her home would be turned into a newspaper museum, or that in 1988 she and her family would become a part of the community’s history through a second museum.

But a smile brightened her wrinkled face, and tears slowly welled in her eyes, when Cerda, 84, saw her wedding picture on display in the new museum, which highlights the people and lives of San Diego’s first community.

The sidewalk museum, an outdoor installation in the 3900 block of Conde Street, officially opened Thursday night after a ribbon-cutting ceremony and reception. In attendance were more than 200 community residents, city and county officials, and Cerda, who lives just one block away.

The $85,000 museum, created for the Old Town Mexican Cafe by historian and archeologist Linda Roth, consists of kiosks and window scenes along one side of the block. It features 18 displays of artifacts, old and new photographs, and miniature models interspersed with trees, flowers and two fountains.

The 3,000-square-foot museum is about two blocks south of Old Town San Diego State Historic Park, which attracts about 4.5 million visitors a year, said Patricia Autrey, regional administrative officer for the California Department of Parks and Recreation.

Roth said she intended to show through the museum that the people of early San Diego were not very different in their concerns and worries than San Diegans today. They also complained about crime, schooling and dirty streets, she said. “I wanted to take away some of the mystery and romance of the past.”

Cerda, who once lived in what is now the Union-Tribune newspaper museum a few blocks away, is not the only member of her family with a connection to the new museum.

Her son-in-law Joseph C. Toiga, 69, built all of its one-eighth-scale models, including a reproduction of an old jail that was created with some of the original jail’s stone. And it was Cerda’s daughter Carmen who had the honor of cutting the ribbon at Thursday’s ceremony.

The displays, which feature quotes and historical information, show the entire range of San Diego’s inhabitants. Included are artifacts from the settlements of Native Americans who were in the area up to 2,000 years ago, as well as examples of garbage from the people who live in the community today.

Roth said the museum, which had been under construction since March, was created by the cafe as a front for its parking lot to maintain the atmosphere of the community, which contributed many of the photos for the museum.

It is free and open to the public at all times, she said.