THE NORTH COAST TIMES EAGLE, FRIDAY, 21 MARCH 1980
Nineteen Twenty-five brought a record crowd fo r the
spring season, and in A p ril the golf course issued 300
tickets in one weekend.
Page 7
Nineteen Thirty-seven brought a nervous month o r two
when Seaside businessmen had to fight a law proposed in
the state legislature to close most places of business on
Sunday. Obviously, that would cripple a weekend town. The
businessmen won.
$$$
On September 6, 1937, following Labor Day weekend,
bank deposits reached $650,000, the highest in the history
of the Seaside bank.
New transportation methods also brought wealth to Sea
side. In 1927 Cell Line A ir Service Company announced
plans for the following summer fo r regular a ir service,
with four trip s a day to Seaside and Clatsop beaches from
Portland, passengers and express “ to be carried in mod
ern enclosed planes.” The plan met with insurmountable
d ifficulties, however, in that there was no suitable place
to land a large passenger plane. Although consideration
was made by Rankin Flying Service to outfit th e ir planes
with pontoons to land in the Necanicum River. The a ir
service never materialized and neither did the expected
flying field and aviation school planned for the Seaside
area.
And what were the new attractions bringing five thou
sand people to the Clatsop beaches over one Labor Day
weekend? Perhaps it was watching three loggers from
Bend climb to the top of Haystack Rock with hooks and
ropes to hoist an American flag on its peak in 1927. Or
the festivities of the annual Scotchbroom Festival held in
June and featuring sports events between the Seaside K i-
wanis, Rotary and Chamber of Commerce. Maybe it was
Seaside’s “ only illuminated beach on the Pacific Coast”
in the summer of 1928, when four blocks of beach were
lighted for night bathing; or maybe it was the bumper
cars which bumped into the resort in 1929.
A t any rate, advertising was being recognized as a
powerful force during this time. In 1926 the Chamber of
Commerce asked the voters of Seaside to support a mea
sure appropriating $500 of city funds fo r advertising pur
poses. Opponents won a court decision declaring the fund
election illegal and the city without the authority to levy
taxes fo r that purpose. (Do we see some hope fo r the
little people here?)
Undaunted, in 1927 Seaside sponsored a radio ad three
times a week on Portland’ s KEX, and a canvass o f the
city was made to secure two dollar pledges from 50 peo
ple to pay fo r it.
In 1927 came another shred of hope for the ‘ ‘little peo
ple” who had moved there to get away. Seaside voters
turned down a proposed $2,500 fund for advertising pur
poses which had been placed on the ballot by petitions
prepared by the Chamber of Commerce.
The comeback from that admirable defeat was the
Chamber’ s ‘ *9 holes of golf and 9 holes of fishing” event
This happening was arranged fo r professional golfer
Frank Dolp and Portland news editor Fred Boalt, in which
the party invaded the Seaside Golf Course fo r nine holes
followed by the fishing event, a ll carefully noted and re
corded fo r Boalt’s United Press story which would go the
rounds of many newspapers in the country.
Ambitious advertisers tend to get careless, however,
and in 1929 an “ attractive” ad was printed in the Ore
gonian to promote Seaside, but the beach photo used
turned out to be o f four Hoquiam g irls bathing on Pacific
Beach in Gray’s Harbor, Washington.
Meanwhile the “ festive” town worked on its party
atmosphere and in 1927 streamer lights on Broadway
were left on the entire month of September to lengthen
the season and avoid even the “ appearance of a closed
town.” Then, in 1928, street decorations of colored
flags were strugn over Broadway to give a “ gala” ap
pearance” over the summer months.
In 1929 a building was constructed to house an amuse
ment concession with 15 “ scooters” to give tourists
“ fun in plenty.”
■
TOURIST TENT CAMP O N SHELL ROAD
September 5, 1929. An estimated 50-ihousand people
were in Seaside over the weekend.
to the southern end of Cannon Beach.
The Seaside Signal of 1934 noted an increase in foreign
ers visiting the Clatsop beaches and a large number of
cars d riving up the coast highway from California.
$$$
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The tourist trade in Seaside hardly faltered during the
hard times of the Thirties.
In 1931 the second minature golf course was built, and
in the same year a “ Walkathon” contest was proposed,
sim ilar to the one that was being held at Lotus Isle in
Portland. Couples were to start walking and keep at it
until they were unable to “ pick ’ em up and lay 'em down.”
Rules: walk one hour, rest 15 minutes, day and night.
And, due in part to the Depression, even tourists rev
erted for awhile back to more nature oriented entertain
ment. People rediscovered walking. In 1934 more than one
thousand persons had walked over Tillamook Head in the
month of June alone. In 1936 hundreds of hikers gathered
fo r the annual T ra ils Day hike over the Head and a special
lowfare excursion was run between Portland and Seattle
on the SP&S fo r the event, which brought 625 passengers
in one Sunday.
In 1934 the fir s t surfboard arrived in Seaside. It belong
ed to Lifeguard Jim Reed and was 20 feet long. Also dur
ing that year finding Japanese glass floats became a major
“ sport.” In fact, by 1935 the discovery of the floats was
considered both a sport and an avocation, bringing sales
from a nickle to five dollars. Three years later they were
being hunted by airplane along the beaches from Seaside
Nineteen T hirty-fou r recorded business volume up 25
percent.
$$$
The Seaside Chamber of Commerce did not stop dream
ing during the lean years and the Signal reports in 1935
that, after six years of effort by the cham ber, the project
to build a breakwater at Seaside was finally being consid
ered by the U.S. Corps of Arm y Engineers.
$$$
August, 1936 showed bank deposits reflecting business
30 percent above the previous year.
$$$
W OM ENS CR ISIS SERVICE
OF C L A T S O P c o u n t y
A V O L U N T E E R O R G A N IZ A T IO N
H elp
and
refckals
fo r
P R O V ID IN G
v ic t im s of
FAMILY V IO L E N C E A N D R A P E
W E
O FFER,
•E M O T IO N A L S U P P O R T -
to a g e n c ie s a n d s h e l t e r h o m e s -
• c o m m u n i t y e d u c a t io n & s p e a k e r s -
• n e re R A L S
•C N 6 O IN S
SUPPORT &
RAP G R O U PS-
COMPLETE CONFIDENTIALITY
3 2 5 -5 7 3 5
C latso p
county
w omens
J
Remember the advertising fund? Well, in 1942 the
Chamber o f Commerce tried once more to establish a
business advertising fund, this time through a business
tax to raise the money. The tax was approved at a city
council meeting.
C o n tin u e d
on
Page
E ig h t
H aystack
H ouse
$$$
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The Cannon Beach area contributed to the promotion
of the Clatsop beaches when, in 1938 a feature film was
released by Universal Studios entitled “ Stranger than
F iction,” which was filmed the previous summer at Hay
stack Rock.
Tourist industry promoters of the area tackled a big
problem in 1938. Representatives o f two south Washing
ton coastal counties and two northern Oregon counties
met to discuss the problem of tra ffic from California
being diverted before it reached the northern coastal
tourist traps. The committee decided to post a man fo r
the summer at Crescent C ity to contact tourists and urge
them to continue on up the coast.
Nineteen Thirty-nine was a promising year fo r the
tourist industry. During that year Seaside sponsored the
Northwest Jitterbug Contest; was chosen fo r the 1940
convention of the Oregon Department o f the American
Legion; the fir s t shopping guide fo r tourists was publish
ed by the Seaside Signal; “ as usual, the ja il capacity was
fa r short of requirements over the holidays” (always a
good sign); the city installed a blinking light at the Broad
way and Holladay intersection; tra ffic congestion on
Broadway was a big problem due to tourists driving up
and down to go around the Turnaround and watch the
crowds (another good sign); and, cf course, the final mea
sure of a successful season:
Deposits at the bank were up by 19 percent
Twenty-four thousand, 174 dollars were marked in
building perm its for the fir s t three months o f the year.
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THE TWENTIES
Resturant & Lounge
at tljp (Tultiuaita 3tu t
S o lo u a tta fja rk 436-1111
Tolnvana Park
4 3 6 -2 6 1 6
c r is is s e r v ic e
GREEN
ELECTRIC
E le c tr ic a l C o n tra c to rs
M O U N T A IN
IR O N W O R K S
547 N. ELM , C A N N O N BEACH
4 3 6 - 1320
D E C O R A T IV E & P R A C T IC A L IRONWORK
P.O. B ox 6 4 9 , C a n n o n B o o th
4 3 6 ” 2853
SAM & H IS CART
by A rth u r Honeym an
L a g e rq u is t & S o n s
B ric k M a so n s
<«>,
^0* *1
Box 2 3 2 3 3 «
4 3 6 -2 7 2 6
T ig a r d ,O r e .
SOON TO BE A MAJOR
M O T IO N P IC T U R E
In C a n n o n B each
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ILLUSTRATED BY
M IC H A E L DEW AIDE
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