Springing up in the middle of the peninsula, at the foot of what’s now 62nd Place, was the magnificent (for the time) Alamitos Bay Pavilion, which would stand for a couple of decades as the jewel of the Peninsula and Belmont Shore.
More than 100 years ago, 50 people died when a large section of the upper deck floor of the Pine Avenue Pier collapsed.
It was more than a day of sartorial swappage. Bands and residents took to the streets in parades and celebration.
The city was originally incorporated on Feb. 10, 1888 and there are a few of us still alive who recall that in 1988, the city appropriately threw a massive 100th anniversary bash—a year-long civic celebration costing nearly $2 million.
A May 1, 1922, ad in the Long Beach Telegram warned, “There will not be enough apartments for everyone—some will be disappointed. Don’t let it be you.”
Mabel Steed and her husband Robert built their home on this spot in 1932. It was the first house on what would become Geneva Walk at a time when Naples was out in the sticks and yet to become the high-priced fashionable neighborhood that it has grown to be in the intervening years.
