CLIPBOARD : Neighborhood Profile: Wilshire Square

Santa Ana’s 31 neighborhoods reflect Orange County’s diversity and cultural richness. The city’s central section boasts two areas with houses dating back more than half a century: Wilshire Square, south of McFadden Avenue, and Heninger Park to the north.

Aside from their physical proximity, the areas have two other features in common. They were developed in the same time period and have a quality of architecture that has all but disappeared from Orange County. Wilshire Square alone, however, has prevailed over the exploitation of developers.

Wilshire Square is held together not by crises but for social reasons. Although residents successfully blocked a Santa Ana Public Works Agency plan last February to remove a large number of trees along their streets (the city agreed to allow one couple to hire a professional outside the city crew to trim a 70-year-old cedar tree in front of their house) and also shut down a medical clinic (whose purported physicians had no medical credentials) operating out of a private home at Broadway and Russell Avenue, they also built a sand castle in the recent contest at Corona del Mar State Beach.

Wilshire Square is held together not by crises but for social reasons. Residents successfully blocked a Santa Ana Public Works Agency plan last February to remove a large number of trees along their streets (the city agreed to allow one couple to hire a professional outside the city crew to trim a 70-year-old cedar tree in front of their house). They also shut down a medical clinic (whose purported physicians had no medical credentials) operating out of a private home at Broadway and Russell Avenue. On a lighter note, residents built a sandcastle in the recent contest at Corona del Mar State Beach.

About 600 families live in Wilshire Square in 60-year-old homes with old-fashioned charm and character, said Guy Ball, a neighborhood resident of five years and editor of the city newsletter Eye on Santa Ana. Neighbors know one another. Ball describes the neighborhood as safe and relatively inexpensive: The selling prices for homes are $160,000 to $190,000, he said.

His explanation for his move to Wilshire Square sounds almost like an advertisement: He didn’t “want to move to Riverside, can’t afford to live in South County, and (didn’t) want to live in a condo,” Ball said. The choice within his price range in Costa Mesa was “a bare-bones tract home” for $120,000. In 1985, Guy and Linda Ball’s home cost $104,000 for 1,500 square feet and a back yard. Today a three-bedroom home in Wilshire Square costs about $190,000.

Wilshire Square dates back to about 1920, when the land was subdivided into lots for sale. More than 50% of the homes in present-day Wilshire Square were built before 1936. They are constructed of sturdy lath and plaster, with crown-molded ceilings, hardwood floors, curved archways and wood moldings.

The Cheney House at 1102 S. Ross St. stands out among the Spanish Colonial-style homes in the area. William J. Cheney, a founder of Farmers Insurance Co., built this handsome home--with its red-tile roof, stucco walls and pegged oak floors--for his retirement in 1938.

English Tudor Revival is exemplified in the multi-gabled roof line and large front window of the Jasper Farney House at 1134 S. Van Ness Ave., built in 1929 for $3,500. A building contractor and real estate broker, Farney helped construct more than 500 homes in Santa Ana.

Wilshire Square is “a real neighborhood, the way it’s supposed to be,” said Ricki Older, neighborhood association co-chairwoman. “We take care of each other,” she said. And it’s “still a neighborhood people can afford.” There have not been a lot of intrusions by developers or the city into the neighborhood, Older said. “There’s no apartment building in the middle of the block.”

And the homes are pretty unusual, she said. “It’s a bonus; (there’s) not one house that looks like another.”

Wilshire Square shares the quality of architecture and relative age with its northern neighbor. Houses in Heninger Park may be even fancier than those in Wilshire Square, Guy Ball said.

In Heninger Park, however, the outcry in the neighborhood is about overcrowding and traffic, said Charlotte Thomas, chairwoman of Heninger Park Neighbors. The area has had severe problems with the physical deterioration of older structures. The rehabilitation of those buildings and the streets is the neighborhood’s top priority.

Indeed, it was an instinct for self-preservation that drove Heninger Park Neighbors to ask the city to declare the area a historic district. Old Victorian-style homes were being torn down, Thomas said, to make way for high-density apartments. The neighborhood was designated a historic district in 1986.

“It’s mostly bungalow homes constructed for the middle man,” Thomas said, “as opposed to Victorian homes that were for the elite.”

These modest California bungalows, made of wood, stone or occasionally brick, were erected between the years 1905 and 1920, though some date back as far as 100 years. They are generally a single story with a horizontal emphasis in their floor plans.

Like houses in Wilshire Square, Heninger Park homes were custom-designed and built in subdivided tracts. Among the builders catering to ordinary buyers were the Heninger Brothers, who would build a six-room bungalow for no more than $1,500.

The Heninger House at 602 Birch St., in which one of the brothers briefly resided and from which the neighborhood takes its name, is unusual in that it is Victorian in style--more formal and vertical than its immediate neighbors. Today the Heninger House has received new siding, windows, paint, sidewalks and landscaping--and looks almost as good as new.

The city of Santa Ana gave special recognition to the 500 and 600 blocks of Birch Street: The houses have signs posted on each building stating the date they were built and the original owner’s name. Two apartment buildings with no aesthetic value, probably marking the demise of some treasures before the area’s historical designation, now share the area. Birch Street today is also the site of major reconstruction with the asphalt resurfacing of an originally concrete street, new curbs and gutters.

Several homeowners are making major rehabilitations to their properties. The Crane house, at 506 Birch St., is being restored, Thomas said. Another house at Sycamore Street and Chestnut Avenue has also been restored inside and out, with its exterior painted shades of peach and white. Thomas has lived in Heninger Park since 1968. She started the neighborhood association in 1982 to stabilize the area. The neighborhood has “stayed pretty stable and has even (been) upgraded in the last couple of years, with people taking more pride,” Thomas said. “That’s what our main goal is--to make the neighborhood better than it is.”

Population: Total (1990 est.): 4,631 1980-90 change: +6.1% Median age: 27.7 Radical/ethnic mix: White (non-Latino): 32% Black: 1% Latino: 62% Other: 5% Income: Per capita: $10,583 Median household: $26,966 Average household: $27,262 Income distribution: $100,000-and more: 1% $75,000-99,999: 1% $50,000-74,999: 8% $25,000-49,999: 45% Less than $25,000: 45% By sex and age: in hundreds Males: Median age: 27.9 years Females: Median age: 27.4 years