Newport Beach

By Jeff Delaney

Newport Beach, with its picturesque harbor and 10 miles of sandy beaches, has seen great change since its beginnings in the post-Civil War era. Originally a shipping port, it evolved into a haven for movie stars, rumrunners, and gamblers and finally transformed into today's exclusive beach community and popular vacation destination. In his third book on Newport Beach, author and longtime resident Jeff Delaney opens a door between Newport's past and what remains.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Arcadia Publishing
• Release date: Apr 18, 2011
• ISBN: 9781439640654

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INTRODUCTION

As I write this, a backhoe is demolishing the Balboa Market, a fixture on the Balboa Peninsula since 1938. As the Daily Pilot put it, here for 72 years, gone in two days. Change, for better or worse, is inevitable, and that is what the Then & Now series is all about. Some of our treasured landmarks are remarkably preserved, others evolve over time, and many are lost to the ravages of time, or an enthusiastic backhoe.

The Balboa Market was originally a Safeway grocery store catering to residents of Balboa Village and its annual influx of summer beachgoers. In the 1950s, new owners renamed it Bob’s Village Market, but it will always be remembered by its final name, the Balboa Market. In 1995, artist Donald McDonald painted a mural covering the entire west side of the building depicting Balboa’s past, featuring the Rendezvous Ballroom, the Balboa Inn, the Pacific Electric Red Cars, the Fun Zone, and the Balboa Pavilion.The grocery store closed without fanfare on a November weekend in 2006, leaving loaves of bread still lining the shelves and green apples stacked high in the produce department. In 2009, the City of Newport Beach purchased the property with the intention of expanding the adjacent parking lot, or perhaps building a two-story parking structure. Today, as McDonald’s mural fell to that backhoe with the rest of the Balboa Market, a few longtime residents grabbed a brick or two as treasured souvenirs of a vanishing landmark.

Across the street and down the block from the market stands the Balboa Theater. In 1928, J. P. Greeley built the Ritz Theater, at 707 Central Avenue, on land previously occupied by the back half of the original Rendezvous Ballroom. When the Ritz first opened its doors, it was considered a state-of-the-art theatrical facility for vaudeville and small theater productions. During Prohibition, the building housed a speakeasy that became a popular meeting place among high society and Hollywood celebrities. In 1939, the Ritz became the Balboa Theater, when a new Ritz was built on the current site of the Lido Theater. That same year, the Balboa Theater shifted its focus back to first-run motion pictures. Its colorful history includes a two-year stint in the early 1970s as part of the Pussycat Theater chain. Later operated by Landmark Theaters, it found new life as a revival/art film house and the home of popular midnight screenings of The Rocky Horror Picture Show. The theater closed its doors in 1992, and the building was purchased by the City of Newport Beach in 1998. For 18 years, the building has stood empty, its interior gutted. In 1996, the Balboa Performing Arts Theater Foundation was formed. Its mission is to remodel the theater into a 300-seat multiuse venue boasting the latest in sound and lighting design, while keeping the style and look of the original theater. The Balboa Theater has managed to evade the backhoe and may very well return one day to its former glory as a jewel of Balboa