1966 Oceano Dunes
August 29, 2008 – 8:40 am
People have had big ideas for the Oceano Dunes for a long time.
The Chumash Indians were the last sustained civilization on the dunes, living on the abundant clams and fish.
In the early 1900’s real estate speculator’s maps carved the beach up into lots. On July 4, 1907 a celebration was held at a pavilion called La Grande Beach.An advertisement in the Telegram trumpeted the event on July 1, 1907.
Within 8 years the development was abandoned.
Apparently folks found the access through sand and across the flood prone Arroyo Grande Creek difficult.
Even today drivers sink trucks during the rainy season in the creek, imagine what it was like before Lopez Dam tamed the worst of the flooding.
The dunites lived in wind scoured huts built out of scavenged lumber in the early to mid 1900’s. Norm Hammond wrote a book on the subject.
By the 1960’s the dunes were owned by a patchwork of corporations and the state.
PG&E was giving serious consideration to building a nuclear power plant in the dunes.
The story by Pat Keeble says:
“Conservationists and would-be industrializers are engaged in a tug-o’-war over use of the dunes.”
A previous post documents the united efforts of off road advocates and the Sierra Club to keep access to the dunes open to recreational users.
Check out the state of art graphic, a picture plastered with white tape and typewritten labels.
This Sunday, The Tribune begins a three-part series on the Oceano Dunes that has been more than 6 months in the making.
The stories will present the various sides of the debate over whether the state should continue to allow vehicle traffic on the Dunes, in light of the county’s recent consideration of selling Dunes land to the state.
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5 Responses to “1966 Oceano Dunes”
By Shawno on Aug 29, 2008
By Kevin P. Rice on Aug 30, 2008
Canned picnic sounds like something you would have on the shelf of your fallout shelter. “No kids, you can’t go outside for another 3,000 years but we do have canned picnic.”
I posted a higher resolution scan of the 1960’s page. I have been trying to save storage space and improve page loading time by shaving file sizes. The new file is 3x larger.
For folks who are really into reviewing these neat old papers, the Cal Poly Kennedy Library has microfilm and a copier. I think the City/County library has microfilm but I’m not sure about a copier attached to the microfilm reader.
By David Middlecamp on Sep 1, 2008
Any easy way that you know of to search old records at the library for dunes articles?
By Kevin P. Rice on Sep 1, 2008
Day three publishing tomorrow covers economics and may have voices closer to your viewpoint.
Three writers and four photographers did the primary reporting while at least 4 editors reviewed the material.
It will be interesting to see the comments.
Finding things would be a whole lot easier if there were an index. A few years were indexed by a librarian at Cal Poly but otherwise it is a matter of scrolling across pages. The county historical society may have some clips organized in folders. They inherited some files when a librarian at the Tribune did a housecleaning.
Any time I run across long lived stories I try to save them for the blog.
By David Middlecamp on Sep 1, 2008