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A History of Neighborhood House in Logan Heights: Mary Hart Taylor and the Health Clinic, 1914 to 1938

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SDFP exclusive series The History of Neighborhood House: From 1918 to the occupation in 1972

By Maria Garcia

For over two decades Mary Hart Taylor directed the health clinic and various core health programs at Neighborhood House. She was well liked and respected by the community. It was a well-known fact in Logan Heights that if your child became ill in the middle of the night, you knocked on Miss Taylor’s door and you would be allowed in or she would follow you to your home to administer medical advice and care.

One of the reasons that Neighborhood House was established was to address the high mortality rate of Mexican children in Logan Heights.   [Read more…]

A History of Neighborhood House in Logan Heights: Mary and Helen Marston

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By Maria Garcia

Editor Note: New installments in the continuing History of Neighborhood House in Logan Heights will resume on Saturday January 17, 2015. This is an encore of an article published earlier in the series.

The Marston family history is synonymous with the history of San Diego. Volumes have been written about their philanthropy and their contributions to the history of San Diego. For those of us that grew up in San Diego, we remember the Marston Department Store. My biggest memory of the department store is of the escalator and the smell of perfume.

I am sure we never bought one thing there. Despite her fear of escalators, my mother would take us there for the express purpose of riding the escalator. It was our simple version of the “E” ride at Disneyland. We would walk around the store, go up to the second floor and ride the escalator down with that beautiful smell greeting us at about the halfway point. In my mind the “Marston” name and “rich” are one and the same.   [Read more…]

A History of Neighborhood House in Logan Heights: Joe Serrano

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SDFP exclusive series The History of Neighborhood House: From 1918 to the occupation in 1972

By Maria Garcia

From the moment Joe Serrano tasted bread for the first time he loved it. Until he attended kindergarten at Neighborhood House in the 1920’s Joe had never eaten bread. He remembers their snack of milk and bread coming from Mike Amador’s store, right across the street. I have surmised that there was some type of an arrangement between the Neighborhood House and Mr. Amador.

After kindergarten at Neighborhood House, Joe attended Burbank Elementary. His principal was Miss Barbara. If students did not behave, Miss Barbara would put her hands on your shoulders and dig her rather long fingernails right into your skin. Even today, almost 80 years later, Joe remembers when a black woman came to enroll her son at Burbank and was told by Miss Barbara that her son would have to have to go to “their” school–Logan Elementary, which was a mere three blocks away.   [Read more…]

A History of Neighborhood House in Logan Heights: Dr. Armando Rodriguez and Bea Serrano Rodriguez

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SDFP exclusive series The History of Neighborhood House: From 1918 to the occupation in 1972

By Maria Garcia

Armando and Bea Rodriguez welcomed me into their home to look at old newspapers clippings about Neighborhood House that I had brought. Those clippings set off a conversation filled with memories and untold stories from the 1930’s and 1940’s. One of the pictures that received the most attention was taken at a party at the Marston House. The Marston family played a seminal role in providing both financial support to Neighborhood House and direction. Their garden parties were particularly memorable.

A group of dancers in traditional Mexican dress are all lined up together in one of the clippings. I had no idea who the dancers were other than boys and girls from the Neighborhood House. Much to my surprise, Bea states “Oh my God, that’s my sister and me.” Taking a closer look, the boy with a zarape over his shoulder and a fake mustache was indeed a girl. Bea and her sister Consuelo were the dance partners.   [Read more…]

The History of Neighborhood House in Logan Heights: Bill Breitenstein, Athletics Director

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SDFP exclusive series The History of Neighborhood House: From 1918 to the occupation in 1972

By Maria Garcia

This history of Neighborhood House has introduced readers to some of the programs and activities that placed this organization firmly at the center of life in the Logan Heights community in the 1920’s and 30’s. Past articles have referred to the popularity of formal sports training at Neighborhood House, particularly for baseball. Neighborhood athletes were coached, provided with the required equipment and could participate in tournaments. The team was a source of enthusiastic neighborhood pride.

The Neighborhood House baseball team provided children with tremendous opportunities while it also exposed them to discrimination, as the recent interview with Dr. Bareño revealed. Memories of Coach Bill Breitenstein are inextricably intertwined with the accounts of so many people I have interviewed for this series. Mr. Breitenstein died in 1928, but his influence was felt well into the 1930’s. This “shining star,” as Dr. Bareño called him, deserves a special place in the history of Neighborhood House.   [Read more…]

A History of Neighborhood House in Logan Heights : John Bareño, 1930’s

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SDFP exclusive series The History of Neighborhood House: From 1918 to the occupation in 1972

By Maria E. Garcia

One conversation about Neighborhood House always leads to another. When I told Kiko I was working on a research paper about Neighborhood House he told me “You have to talk to John Bareño.” “Kiko” is Frank Peralta, one of the people who spearheaded the effort to construct a war memorial in Chicano Park. I took Kiko’s advice and on a Thursday in May I drove to Spring Valley to interview Dr. Bareño in his home.

I found a man with a wealth of information about Logan Heights, baseball, discrimination and Neighborhood House. Dr. Bareño was born in Loreto, Baja California. His father had been offered $500.00 to move the family to Mexicali. They were going to work picking cotton there.   [Read more…]

The History of Neighborhood House in Logan Heights: 1930’s, the Maids’ Story, Art Classes and More about Summer Camp

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Part of the ongoing series The History of Neighborhood House: From 1918 to the occupation in 1972

By Maria Garcia

The Maids’ Class

During the 1930’s a maids’ training program came to Neighborhood House. It was established under the Adult Education Department at San Diego State University. This portion of the paper was very difficult to write in the 1970’s when I was doing my first research on Neighborhood House. My first reaction was to jump up and feel anger that these women had been put in such a class. I have had to evaluate my biases and try to put myself in the place of young girls and women of the 1930’s who needed employment. I also reviewed pictures of their graduation to try and understand their point of view and sense of accomplishment.
  [Read more…]

2014 Primaries: It’s #Ididnotvote by a Landslide

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By Doug Porter

Yesterday San Diego non-voters elected a district attorney personally embroiled in a criminal case, a county clerk supported by anti-gay bigots and a supervisor known for using taxpayer dollars to support religious causes. Call it a resounding victory for apathy and a defeat for advocates of the two tier/jungle primary voting system as a near-record low number (I’m guessing 22%) of voters cast ballots.

Approximately 12% of the city’s registered voters agreed with a corporate campaign almost completely based on lies to overturn a five-year-long community planning process. Incumbents were triumphant everywhere.

There will be runoff elections in November for San Diego City Council District 6 between Carol Kim and Chris Cate, the 52nd Congressional District between Carl DeMaio and Scott Peters, along with Mary Salas versus Jerry Rindone vying for the Mayor in Chula Vista. A stealth campaign by teahadist Donna Woodrum for a seat on the San Diego Community College Board failed to unseat Maria Nieto Senour.   [Read more…]

Junco’s Jabs: San Diego’s Maritime Industry Feeding at the Electoral Trough

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A History of Neighborhood House in Logan Heights: Angel Negrete, the 1930’s

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SDFP exclusive series The History of Neighborhood House: From 1918 to the occupation in 1972

By Maria E. Garcia

Mr. and Mrs. Angel Negrete were kind enough to invite me to their home to discuss his memories of Neighborhood House. Most of Mr. Negrete’s memories are from the 1930’s. He asked me several times why I wanted to interview him. He is one of the most modest men I have had the privilege of interviewing.

Mr. Negrete learned wrestling at Neighborhood House. It was a skill that he took to San Diego High School, where he became Southern California Champion. Their team went to San Francisco for this event and he remembered it was “a big deal.” Later in the late 1940’s he would become a volunteer wrestling coach at Neighborhood House.   [Read more…]

“Yes” on B & C is the Way to Support the Barrio Logan Community

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By Ernie McCray

Here we go. Same old same old politics in San Diego. The “Big Boys” have to get their way. They want us to vote “No” in opposition to a plan that was created to make a community healthy and safe. And mayor, Kevin Faulconer, who has billed himself as an “independent” leader, has, as such, been going around talking about how when Propositions B & C are voted down, “it will be our opportunity to pass a plan that works to protect our families, to protect our economy.”

Hey, dude, we already have a plan to keep toxics, pollutants, carcinogens and flammable chemicals, a safe distance away from Barrio Logan schools, playgrounds, and homes. So what does your plan look like? Oh, you don’t have one? And a new plan can’t happen for at least a year?

The Barrio Logan community worked diligently for years to bring about reasonable land use and zoning changes and it happened. It’s on the books right now. There’s a five-block buffer zone that bans new residential and industrial suppliers, while allowing such existing uses to remain in place and expand by no more than 20 percent.   [Read more…]

One-Day Art Show Highlights Fight Against Toxic Pollution in Barrio Logan

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“Until Our Last Breath” features more than 20 barrio artists at Chicano Art Gallery

By Mia Bolton

Artists, residents and friends of Barrio Logan, with the help of Chicano Art Gallery, join forces this Saturday for a one-night-only art exhibit to tell the story of how corporate greed and pollution affect the health of Barrio Logan community members.

The exhibit, Until Our Last Breath: Barrio Artistas Contra San Diego’s Toxic Maritime Industry, features original paintings, drawings and sculpture from local artists and many Chicano Park muralists, such as Victor Ochoa, Mario Torero, Berenice Badillo, Armando Nuñez, Stephanie Cecilia Cervantes, Hector Villagas, Patricia Aguayo, Mario Chacon and Isaias Crow.   [Read more…]

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