An exposition to remember

JERRY PERSON

It will not be long before Easter is upon us, and with the coming

holiday, the stores will be featuring new merchandise.

Huntington Beach businesses will brighten their display windows

with bargains to entice shoppers. This has happened here since the

early days of the city’s history, and it was back in the fall of 1932

that our merchants held their first Merchants and Industrial

Exposition to promote Huntington Beach merchandise.

It was also to acquaint the surrounding towns of the many values

to be found in the shops of our town merchants. This event was so

successful that the sponsors wanted to hold one every year.

But Mother Nature had other ideas in 1933, when the ground

shuttered and many of our buildings were damaged during the

Newport-Inglewood earthquake. So the second annual exposition had to

wait another year, until April 1934, which turned out successful

enough to our merchants that a third annual was planned by the

Windsor Club of Huntington Beach along with the civic and business

community in early 1935.

In February 1935, a meeting was held at the Edison Company’s

office, 309 Main St., and John Africa was elected general chairman.

His planning committee included Howard Hepburn, A.W. Frost, Vic

Terry, Willis Warner, Lawrence Whittaker, Herb Woods, and no planning

committee would be complete without William “Bill” Gallienne.

The committee’s plan would be to keep the exposition almost the

same as 1934, except in 1935, which would include a full-fledged auto

show in front of Memorial Hall on Sixth Street, in a 60- by 100-foot

tent.

Africa and his committee chose to hold a four-day event beginning

April 9 and lasting until April 12. On each of these days, Memorial

Hall would include a program that featured a different show nightly

at 7 p.m.

The first performance on Tuesday night would be “Trade at Home

Night” and this would be followed on successive nights with Ranchers’

Night, Oil Mens’ Night and climaxing with School Night on April 12.

To kick off this elaborate exposition, Gallienne and “Cap” Sheue

organized a Booster Parade, a caravan of some 150 automobiles that

would drive throughout our neighboring towns on April 8 during the

afternoon.

Gallienne secured the SERA band to furnish the music along the

route. This 40-piece band came from Santa Ana. Our local residents

drove their vehicles from the coast to inland towns in one long

procession to promote our merchants and our town.

The ladies of the 20th Century Club were engaged to operate the

lunchroom in Memorial Hall to serve sandwiches, soft drinks, popcorn,

peanuts, candy and coffee to a hungry crowd.

Frank Helm’s radio and electrical display booth featured a home of

tomorrow with a modern refrigerator, electric ironer, range and small

appliances. Helm planned to give out souvenir towels that the ladies

would iron on the new 1935 ironer.

On opening night, Mayor Tom Talbert, Warren Bristol and Delbert

Burry welcomed the record-breaking crowd. Next came vaudeville acts

by the Ben and Sally Dance Studio of Long Beach.

Jack Robertson’s Men’s and Boy’s store took first prize for the

best decorated booth, with Sam Bowen’s booth taking a second and

Howard and Smith’s Red & White grocery a third place with the awards

presented by Marcus McCallen.

During “Ranchers Night,” Miguel Verdugo’s 30-piece accordion band

from Long Beach entertained the huge crowd. Eve Druxman’s Mi Lady’s

Shoppe staged a style show of the latest spring fashions that earned

hearty applause from onlookers.

Modeling the clothing were Charlotte Eader, Grace Peak, Ruth

Kettler, Kathryn Bartlett, Mary Mendenhall, Adelle Allen, Frances

Bergey, Lucille McNeal and Evelyn Lindstrom.

Sheue came onstage to render his special rube act and this was

followed by a musical skit by the merchants and ranchers from Talbert

(Fountain Valley) under the direction of Bob Harper and included

Merle and Marjorie Robinson, Gladys Ross and little Dode.

Modeling suits, beach and sportswear were Africa, William and

Wallace Blaylock, Wilbur Griffin, Glenn Lee, John Onson, James

Quiggle, Dick Warner and William Wardwell. The exposition climaxed

with “School Night,” which featured Agnes DeBusk and Cleo Smith doing

selections from the hit musical “New Moon.”

Bea Freeman from O.B. Drug arranged for nine local youngsters to

do a series of dance numbers before a crowd of some 1,000 people. Arl

McCormack Jr. won a new Stewart-Warner refrigerator in a grand-prize

drawing.

The schools of Huntington Beach Elementary and Huntington Beach

High School, along with Ocean View Elementary, had a display of their

student’s handiwork on the second floor of the hall.

When the exposition ended, all the merchants in the city

proclaimed that this year’s show was the very best ever to be staged

in Huntington Beach. But there was a hint the next day that maybe

next year’s exposition might even be better, and in some later

column, we’ll see if they did make it better.

* JERRY PERSON is a local historian and longtime Huntington Beach

resident. If you have ideas for future columns, write him at P.O. Box

7182, Huntington Beach, CA 92615.