Huntington Beach jail cells from the 1920's

The single jail cell from the 1920's, in an alley off main street.  #steveemigphotos

 Back about 2006 or 2007, when I was driving a taxi in Huntington Beach, I made a big, thick, zine called The Very, Very Unofficial Guide to Huntington Beach.  Initially it started as a giveaway to a bunch of college age Irish kids who came to H.B. for the summer.  They lived in several houses and apartments, 8 or 10 people in each house, to keep rent cheap.  I met them by getting calls for taxi rides from the various houses.  They kept asking where different things were in and around H.B., so I decided to make them a little guide book.  As a longtime zine publisher, that seemed the cool way to do it.  It ended up being my most popular zine ever, and I gave away over 250 copies, making my money back in taxi rides.

As I listed the weird and fun things about H.B., I got more into it, and actually went to the library and looked up the history of Huntington Beach in local history books.  The town, originally called Pacific City, got going right around 1900.  But it stayed small, until oil was discovered in 1920, near where Huntington High School is today.  Suddenly H.B. became a little oil boom town.  While those old books didn't go into a lot of detail, it came across as a pretty rowdy town in the 1920's and into the 1930's.  Guys came to get rich, either finding an oil claim, or working on oil rigs of others.  The house I knew as the H.B. Hostel, on 7th or 8th Street, was called Hotel Evangeline back then, which sure sounds like the name of a brothel.  In any case, there was a lot of money to be made, and a lot of partying going on in Huntington Beach.

The three connected cells from the 1920's.  #steveemigphotos

One of the local history books described four jail cells, or overnight drunk tanks, that were in the alley behind the Longboard bar.  One was separate, and three were joined together.  So I drove my taxi back there, and, much to my surprise, they were still there.  

Built in the early 1920's to handle drunk and/or rowdy people downtown, these four cells were where the troublemakers of any given evening would end up.  So these are photos of the old jail cells, circa 1920's, now used as storage. If you got to hammered back then (during prohibition, not that that stopped anyone from drinking), the cops would hall you into one of these cells, and let you sleep it off overnight.  From what I read, it didn't sound like these were used for long stays in jail.  My guess is they'd throw a bucket of water on the guys in the morning, and let them stumble home.  In any case, these 100 year old jail cells are still standing in downtown H.B.  If you want to know more about these cells, and the history of the Longboard bar building, check out this episode of Hidden Huntington Beach by Chris Epting.  I discovered his videos while writing the Lloyd Wright tombstone post.  There's a little movie history bonus you learn if you watch his video. 

So there you go, a weird little piece of cool Huntington Beach history from 100 years ago, tucked among all the new hotels, restaurants, and shops that have reshaped downtown Huntington Beach over the last 20 years or so.

Here's a wider shot of all four cells, in the alley behind the Longboard.  #steveemigphotos