The Coronado Historical Association And Museum of History & Art Newsletter Vol. 4, No. 3; Fall 2010


City Council Candidates Forum 5:30 p.m.


Board of Directors Meeting, 5:30 p.m.


November 18


Holiday Open House for the Museum Store, 5-7 p.m.


Spreckels Society Holiday Parade Viewing,


5:30 p.m.


January 22 Arts Ball 6:00 p.m.


December 3 October 21


CALENDAR October 14


Coronado 1910 A


Appearing in your mailbox soon!


few days after receiving this newsletter,


you should find


something else in your mailbox that we’re very excited about — a souvenir newspaper we’re calling


CORONADO 1910. Employing the


John D. Spreckels, an important Coronado resident in 1910; his newly-completed home, a hub of social life.


great resources of the CHA and several expert guest writers, we hope to show Coronado residents what island life was like 100 years ago and why this history matters. The more we’ve learned, the more fascinated we’ve become. The year 1910 was a time when automobiles were owned by many Coronado residents but horses and buggies were still a common form of transportation on Coronado’s unpaved streets. Candlestick telephones were used in almost every home on the island, but radios weren’t widely available yet. L. Frank Baum was spending his last winter here and would create two children’s books based on a big event he witnessed. The vacant scrub land we call North Island today, was being used for practice flights by a handsome pilot and early airplane designer named Glenn Curtiss. He was evaluating conditions here and found them ideal to teach the first U.S. military pilot to fly the following year. The rest as they say is history... Besides Glenn Curtiss, two other


very influential people in San Diego’s past lived in Coronado in 1910, while making decisions that would change the course of the region’s history. One you have probably heard of -- John D. Spreckels. But the other was a big surprise to us. You’ll have to wait to read the CORONADO 1910 newspaper to find out just who we’re talking about! The population of Coronado today is just under 30,000. We know one of the things people love most about living here is our colorful history. Professionally researching, preserving and presenting that history is the primary mission of the CHA. And yet membership in our organization is surprisingly low -- under 450. So we concluded a better case for membership needs to made. That’s how the idea for a souvenir newspaper, CORONADO 1910, was born. Since you’re reading History Matters,


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