1949: The Waning Days of Summer

A look back at Lemon Grove, 62 years ago this week.

Fire Power: Lemon Grove relied on the U.S. Forestry Service for fire protection, but a petition circulated at local schools, Grove Pastry Shop and Lemon Grove Food Market sought at least 1,000 signatures to persuade the County Board of Supervisors to set a date for a hearing on a Lemon Grove Fire Protection District.

Inflaming the petition drive was a Sept. 4 fire that destroyed a house on Imperial Avenue while all Forestry Service equipment was out in the backcountry and a bucket brigade by desperate neighbors failed to extinguish the blaze.

Horse Power: With some 1,000 horses in Lemon Grove, the local equestrian club readied for a busy fall season. A gymkhana for kids, a barbecue (“come on down and see our open pit”), participation in dozens of county horse shows, planning the annual fall dance at the Wagon Wheel in Santee, and overflowing enrollment in L.W. Leonard's (Leonard's Saddle Shop, Encanto) saddle-making and repair class at Grossmont High School all demonstrated the devotion to horses that had characterized Lemon Grove since 1890.

Launching the fun was a Labor Day parade down Main Street highlighted by eight matched shetland stallions from Texas, pulling a handmade, chrome-trimmed parade wagon.

Bank Power: Lemon Grove's first bank, First National Trust & Savings, opened on June 29 and wracked up a 35 percent increase in deposits in August alone.

Said bank manager Jack W. Koop, ”The number of real estate loans approved confirms our belief that the town will grow at a rapid rate. We've already reached more than 60 percent of our first-year goal for deposits.”

Preppie Power: The Petite Shop run by Vera Chafee and Bertha Orth at 7852 Broadway offered back-to-school specials—girls' dresses and sweaters $1.98 to $3.98, boys' slacks and plaid shirts $1.50 to $3.50, and free cookies for shoppers on Friday evenings (“open 'til 8”).

Diamond Power: The Lemon Grove Comets finished second in the American Legion baseball season against teams from La Mesa, El Cajon, Jamul, Lakeside and Spring Valley.

Manager Edwin Sonka, of Sonka Bros' General Store fame, treated the team to dinner at the Avalon Café (today it's Por Favor).

The players were all boys, ages 14 to 16. They raised a toast in lemonade to “a better season next year” and to their manager, whose team won trophies in 1919 and 1925 (the 1919 silver trophy can be seen at the Parsonage Museum).

Bird Power: “Talks and Walks With Mother Nature” by Trixie Treganza was a weekly column syndicated by the San Diego Union and carried in the Lemon Grove Review.

“Trixie” was a pseudonym of Antwonet Treganza, a respected ornithologist, first woman postmistress in Lemon Grove and wife of famed architect and “Big Lemon” designer Alberto Treganza.

Her Sept. 8 column on "Mr. and Mrs. Goldfinch" noted that Mr. G had a bright yellow coat with black sleeves and a jaunty black cap while Mrs. G was a ”dainty little puritan in olive gold tinged with gray and no cap.”

Treganza noted, “As parents they are tender and watchful and as mates they are solicitous and devoted to each other and so have a charming home life.”

Compiled by Helen Ofield, president of the Lemon Grove Historical Society, from newspapers archived at the H. Lee House Cultural Center.