Mr. Beyer's Merry-Go-Round Truck

Bonnie submits a memory of the merry-go-round truck that used to offer rides for 10 cents...

Hi Steve, I grew up in Santa Ana in the 50's and 60's. We lived on Oak Street and then in the mid 50's moved to Bristol Street. I attended Edison school and after the move Glenn Martin. I attended Smedley Jr. High and then we moved to Ventura.

I found your site today, after finding an item on Craigslist. When I was a little girl a man named Mr. Beyer drove a truck around town with a little Merry go Round on the back. It cost 10 cents to ride the Merry Go Round. I went to school with his son Richard. Anyway, I was looking on Craigslist today and there is Mr. Beyers Merry Go Round truck for sale for $9,999.

In later years he would dress like a clown and people would hire him to bring the truck to birthday parties. In fact my children attended a birthday party in the 90's and there he was!

In the 1960's my dad open a billiard room, called the Bristol Cue. It was in the shopping center on Bristol and McFadden. It was quite the hang out for teenagers. It was during the Vietnam war and many of the young men were drafted but kept in touch with my dad, Neal Crooks. I have lots of memories of Santa Ana, those are just a couple. I really am enjoying reading all the comments. Sincerely, Bonnie

I managed to find the Craigslist ad Bonnie mentions. It's described as, "12 Horse Merry-go-Round mounted on Truck with Built in Music Player. Colorful Hand painted Antique wooden horses well preserved, excellent condition."

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Night Cruising the Streets of OC

Scooter recalls cruising the boulevards at night in his 1930 Model A coupe, with the radio on, and taking in the scene...

As it was said by Huey "Piano" Smith, "Dont Ya Just Know It"! for sure, til this day, growing up in the early days of Orange County, is always a close to the heart, memory! The smell of orange and lemon to this day lingers, cruising Main street in Santa Ana in the 30 model A coupe, flathead powered, three carbs, lowered to the ground, that old Delco radio blasting away, KRLA, KFWB, Hunter Hancock, "Slippin and a Sliden" Ooooohhhhh Yeah! Little Richard! And then? well! "Smoke Gets in Your Eyes" and "Lets Go Strollin"! Should you like to step back in time for a little visit and spark up some old pleasant times past, I suggest another evening viewing "American Graffti"! Pretty close to the truth for that era! I'll be back!

The closest I got to "cruising" the streets of OC at night was on my motorcycle with my friend Greg. We'd head out at night on our Kawasakis and rode all over OC, going from one place to another. Shooting pool at Linbrook Family Billiards was favorite hang out, then grabbing a late night snack at Norm's in Santa Ana, catching a movie at the Villa Twin theater in Orange, or riding out to the Newport Beach pier.

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Old Van Clubs of Irvine Park

OCThen reader "TimS" who grew up in Santa Ana submits some memories of hanging out in Irvine Park during the 1970s with the van clubs, and wants to know if anyone else has similar memories...

Hi All.

I have spent most of my 49 years living in OC, and have really enjoyed some of these comments.

I was wondering if anybody remembers anything about the van clubs that used to have weekend night, or caravans, way in the back of Irvine Park back in the early to mid 70's?

I was sort of a wild wander as a kid (bad home life...), and at 12 or 13, I tagged along with someone, who owned a really tricked out Ford Econoline van, to a Van rally that I recall was way in the back of Irvine Park. It seemed to be a long ways out there, but as an adult, now it doesn't seem like Irvine park extends as far as I remember traveling. Do any of you remember this? The guy who let me tag along with him and his girlfriend was a long haired guy with the first name of Randy, and, at that time, worked at the gas station on the corner of Main and St. Gertrude Plc.

And then he goes on to talk about dealing with gangs and tough guys in the schools of Santa Ana...

I also wanted to comment to those who have posted about violence in OC HSs. I went to Saddleback and Mountain View HSs in the mid to latter half of the 70s, and there was some violence from blacks and Mexicans, and sometimes even the sportos. Having long blonde hair, and a smart mouth, I got my ass kicked more than once before I finally learned how to stare guys down and act like a bad ass so people would leave me alone. That didn't always work though because with the mexicans it was always a gang of at least 3 or 4 to 1, so you always ended up on the losing end. I can clearly remember being 14 and walking down Warner Ave from McFadden Jr High, and how I flipped off the 4 low riders who had just said something foul to me about being white and having blonde hair, and how these guys flipped a U turn in the middle of Warner and came after me. I ended up being thrown into a rose bush after they caught me, tore my books in half and pounded on me for a while.

Anyway, I took ROP at Valley HS, and had trouble with the blacks hanging out in the parking lot every time I went on the campus from the greenville entrance, and knew white guys from SA HS who were always fighting with Mexicans, so I always viewed both of those schools as being much worse than Saddleback, or even Mountain view, which was a continuation school. Nobody was ever shot at that time, but some guys got knifed, or seriously pounded on. However, there was one guy at saddleback that I will never forget. He was dark skinned, but I couldn't be sure if he was mexican or samoan. But he used to hang out with an entourage of mexican semi-toughs. This guy clearly knew martial arts at that time, and used to wear some strange flamboyant clothes, like a cape. I later realized he wore the loose baggy pants so he could kick really high. Anyway, I witnessed this kooky guy start, and finish, several fights with big guys that usually got left alone.

A lot of us hung out at Memorial Park, and saw first hand that we had a lot of Mexican gangs rising up including the Delhi boys, F-Troop, Shades of Brown, and others from north Santa Ana. Some of these guys were pretty hard core, in my view, and I think were early Mexican mafia.

What a childhood that was! That's why I joined the navy at 17, and got out of dodge as quickly as I could.

TimS from Woodland Plc, Santa Ana.

Click on "Post a Comment" below if you have anything to share...

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Santa Ana Drag Strip at Orange County Airport

Before it was called "John Wayne Airport" it was called "Orange County Airport", and during the 1950's it was the place for drag racing.

A man named C.J. "Pappy" Hart was credited as having built the world's first commercial drag strip, named "Santa Ana Drag Strip" or "Santa Ana Drags", and held races there every Sunday. The drag strip operated from 1950 to 1959, until the County of Orange forced it closed due to increasing air traffic.

When Hart passed away in 2004, several newspapers rans articles that documented his fame in racing circles and told the story of how he started the first commercial drag strip. A site called, "We Did it for Love" has archived them all...
http://www.wediditforlove.com/cj-2.html

While going through the e-mails we received during the old days of OCThen, I found one that talked about the Santa Ana Drags...

Before it was called the John Wayne airport and before it was called Orange County Airport, it was just a sleepy little landing strip used by private planes, charters and the Martin Aviation Company. When I was a teenager in 1955 the airstrip would close down on Sundays and NHRA (National Hot Rod Association) sanctioned drag races were held on the runway. I remember seeing the "Green Monster", Art Arfons jet powered drag racer, screeming down the runway. It was probably the first jet to ever "land" at SNA. The drags moved to Lyons Speedway in Long Beach sometime in the late 1950's. They did return later on, for a few years, as the Orange County Raceway located at the I-5 and Sand Canyon.

By: Richard M. Cowan, 10 Aug 2002

If you can remember the drag races at Orange County Airport, click on "Post a Comment" at the bottom of this article, and share your memories with us.

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Fullerton in the 1950's and 60's

An OCThen reader named "Tol Bert" submitted his memories of growing in Fullerton during the 1950's and 60's...

I moved to Fullerton with my parents in 1955 and still live in Orange County.

I remember going to Disneyland the first summer it was open on perhaps the hottest day of the year. The only place to escape the heat was in the movie theater on Main St. which I have forgotten the name of. I still have some of those 85 cent "E" tickets.

In the 60's cruising up and down Harbor Blvd was popular - from Hillside Drive in ( now a parking lot) to Taco Villa and back. Gas was 30 cents a gallon. You'd pass under the Welcome to Fullerton bridge where Berkeley street now intersects Harbor. I'd like to find a photo of that bridge. Sunny Hills High School would open soon.

Drag racing was popular both on and off the streets in the 60's . Lions Drag strip in Long Beach was great for Saturday night and then Pomona on Sunday. The eastern edge of the 91 freeway ended and began at Lemon street in Fullerton so it was a good place to start a short street race with no traffic behind you. I don't recall any accidents that occur ed from street racing. Perhaps that was because then everyone had to take drivers education in high school.

The Model Market was on the western side of Harbor Blvd off Valencia Mesa in Fullerton. It was an old wood floor place with hitching posts outside. Before Bastanchury road was built connecting Harbor and Euclid there were horse trails through the orange groves.

Going east on Yorba Linda Blvd you were out in the country by the time you got to the old Nixon House. Driving west on Artesia past Buena Park would take you through Dairy Valley and its aromatic cow pastures. To get to Newport Beach you had to snake along Newport Blvd and right by the old blimp hangars at the Tustin Marine base. Jamboree Road near the Santa Ana freeway could be a little slow at times when farmers were taking their sheep across the road.

Orange County was a nice semi-rural area then. Great to grow up in, but you knew it would change. Nothing that nice could avoid the inevitable urban growth.

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Duck Clubs of Orange County

Skip Fleming, who grew up in Orange County during the 1950's, shares his memories of "duck clubs", Disneyland, drag strips, and other stuff...

I found this site looking for info on duck clubs in orange county. I was born in orange December 1947. Went to Irvine elementry school.

I grew up on the Sprigg duck club. There were five duck clubs in a five mile area close to John Wayne airport. My uncle Clarence Jessee ran the Aliso duck club and farmed about 150 acres; some of land was where the Fluor corp. is now. Mostly he grew barley. The Irvine company had a ranch with cows and cowboys.

I had another uncle who ran a duck club on what is I think the San Joaquin bird sanctuary. I also had an uncle Paul Plavan farmer inventor who in the 1930s farmed land around the Santa Ana river, which flooded and was covered with silt making the land almost unusable. The land was covered with 2 or 3 feet of silt, and he built a giant plow to turn up the good soil it took three cat 60's to pull the plow. He restored a lot of farm ground back to being productive again.

My dad was a carpenter who worked on many projects including Disneyland. All of the employes and family got into Disneyland before the public. I remember going there in 1955. I also remember my dad saying Disney wanted to pay employees with stock in Disneyland but my dad wasn't about to take stock from a guy with his head in a cloud and trying to borrow money to pay the workers.

I remember the Santa Ana drag strip only a couple of miles from the duck club where I lived. I remember Oscars drive in, Merle's drive in on Jamboree, and the Coast Hiway Halls drive in on south main in Santa Ana, Lions drag strip in Long Beach.

I remember when you got into Knotts ghost town for free.

I remember meeting Andy Devine on my uncles duck club. I also met Andy Carey who played for the New York Yankee's 1957. A member of our duck club was Newt Bass who was famous for his part in Apple Valley.

We moved from Tustin in 1989, too many people, too crowded. My mother moved with us she was born in Santa Ana. Most of the old farmers and their families are gone or have moved. I went back 6 years ago I couldn't envision in my mind what it was like when I was kid in the fifties. The bus ride to school took almost an hour sometimes. We drove three miles between picking up the next kids.

What a great place to grow up we had the mountains, the beach, hunting, fishing, but it is all gone now.

Skip Fleming

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