GOOD OLD DAYS:

An inauspicious storefront on Newport Boulevard was once the home of what is called the oldest civic organization in Costa Mesa, which evolved into the Women’s Club.

“Originally they called it the Friday Afternoon Club, but then it became affiliated with the national Women’s Club,” Costa Mesa Historical Society Director Mary Ellen Goddard said.

The club made the rolls of “Who’s Who Among the Women of California 1922,” in a list of state women’s organizations described by the volume as “the most comprehensive and complete roster of women’s organizations, clubs and societies of California, ever published.”

Out of nearly 800 organizations, there were seven versions of the Friday Afternoon Club, in locations such as Fresno, National City and Elk Grove.

At the time, the Costa Mesa organization wasn’t listed as a member of the California Federation of Women’s Clubs.

First organized in 1910, the club was incorporated in 1922; its clubhouse was constructed in 1923, according to the Costa Mesa Historical Society, between 17th and 18th streets on Newport Boulevard.

Construction began in February and the building was dedicated the evening of April 17, according to “A Slice of Orange: The History of Costa Mesa,” by Edrick J. Miller.

The club was formed during a period of rapid expansion in the town’s history.

“The area was beginning to assume the appearance of a city,” Miller wrote.

In 1922, the Costa Mesa Bank opened its doors; the following year, the downtown area saw its first sidewalks, and the predecessor to the Daily Pilot, the Costa Mesa Herald, printed its first issue.

That same year, the Costa Mesa Grammar School opened one block away from the new Women’s Club, at the northwest corner of 19th Street and Newport Boulevard.

In the following decades, a bleak addition attached to one side of the structure obscured its architecture.

The clubhouse was converted into various furniture stores as the area developed into a business district, featuring stores such as Con Rev and Borders.

The club’s present headquarters is at 618 W. 18th St., but the building is also leased out to church groups and other organizations.

CANDICE BAKER can be reached at (949) 494-5480 or at [email protected].