Built Upon the Sand

CRYSTAL COVE —  About 75 people came to this doomed seaside settlement Saturday to wave goodbye to a piece of California.

The visitors took what might be a final tour of the Crystal Cove National Historic District, a fancy name for a sun-dried stretch of cottages slated for oblivion.

The hamlet rests on land owned by the state, which wants to evict the residents of the 45 bungalows, fix the buildings up and rent them to tourists. The residents want to stay.

The people who came Saturday feared the state would probably prevail. So, it seemed, did the cove itself, which offered its visitors a brilliant sun and a blanket of flowers.

“I wish it could be saved this way,” said Mary Trautmann, a Laguna Beach artist who has come to the cove many times for inspiration. “Sometimes I take photographs and bring them back and paint from them. Other times I just paint from what I remember.”

The tour, offered as part of Laguna Beach Heritage Month, was led by Bud Carter, 71, a part-time resident since his family came here in 1939. He tossed out bits of lore along the way.

“There was time the whale washed up on the beach here, and it started to smell, so they blew it up with dynamite,” Carter told the group. “The blubber went everywhere.”

Carter and the group made their way through a village that seemed little changed in the past half-century. They walked down a path of wooden planks, past an old general store and onto a beach unmarked by modernity. Only the noise from Coast Highway disturbed the illusion.

“There aren’t many places left like this anywhere,” Carter told the group. “Anywhere.”

As he spoke, an old biplane with British markings droned overhead.

Many of the cottages date back to the 1920s, when the Irvine Co., which owned the land, opened the beach to its employees. A group of Japanese American farmers worked the slopes above the beach, and one of the cottages was once a school for their children.

The state bought the land from the Irvine Co. in 1979 and has been negotiating with the tenants over occupancy ever since. Residents have been allowed to stay in the cottages as long as they pay rent. A recent lease expired Dec. 31, but the tenants refused to leave, saying the state should allow them to keep and maintain the cottages until work begins.

Under the latest edict, tenants are being allowed to stay in the cottages on a month-to-month basis as the state finalizes plans to restore the area.

Many of the people who toured the cove expressed sympathy for the residents who are fighting their eviction.

“The fairest thing to do is to just let the people stay,” said Charles Irwin of Corona del Mar.

Irwin said the state could follow the example of the federal government, which has sometimes allowed people to continue living on property converted into national parks.

Some of the visitors snapped pictures and took notes.

“I’m here to see it for the last time,” said Dorothy Russell of Newport Beach.

As an extra treat, Carter led the group into his own cottage, whose wooden floors and wood-burning stove harked back to another time. Carter came to the cottage as a 15-year-old in 1939, and now his grandchildren come to play there.

Carter said he might not give any more tours of Crystal Cove if he is forced to leave.

“I don’t know if I could come down here again,” he said. “You can’t go back when your home has changed so much.”