Finding Meaning

Remembering the Cabrillo

Laguna’s long-gone Cabrillo Ballroom fascinates me. A century ago romantic dancing—a man and a woman embracing as they moved to music—became popular. It’s sadly now out of style, but it was once part of the Laguna experience.

The 1918 Laguna city directory lists a George E. Hebard, dance instructor and proprietor of Hebard’s Dancing Pavilion on Forest Avenue. If you follow Hebard’s life, you’ll find him hosting or teaching dancing in a string of beach resorts including Long Beach’s Pike, the Strand at Hermosa Beach, and Santa Cruz’s Boardwalk. For the young at heart, an evening dancing appears to have been the perfect finish to a day at the beach.

Ballrooms and dancing became a social movement in post-WWI America. Over on Catalina Island, the Sugarloaf Casino, built in 1919, was upgraded to the iconic Catalina Casino, big enough for 3,000 dancers, a decade later. (There was no gambling.) Up at Balboa, the Rendezvous Ballroom opened in 1928. Laguna Beach’s Cabrillo Ballroom, built on Main Beach near the present Hotel Laguna, opened around the same time.

The Cabrillo Ballroom was a class operation; it boasted the tagline, “Clean dancing every night but Sunday.” I think that meant they closed on Sunday. It’s said that up-and-coming stars Judy Garland and Mickey Rooney danced the night away at the Cabrillo. Rooney was known to also sit in with the band playing the drums.

Benny Goodman played a role in the evolution of dance. Bigger ballrooms needed bigger bands and in contrast to the improvisation of jazz, bigger bands required arranged music. Goodman, seeking a new sound, took his band on a 1935 cross-country trip that met with mixed results. He finished at L.A.’s Palomar Ballroom, where the lukewarm reception, per the legend, led drummer Gene Krupa to tell Goodman, “If we’re gonna die, let’s die playing our own thing.” They played their thing, a foot-tapping energetic rhythm, and the crowd at the Palomar went wild. It was the birth of Swing, the sound that made the Big Band Era.

Down in Laguna Beach, they were swinging at the Cabrillo. I have a vision of couples walking on the boardwalk, the moon shining on the ocean, the murmur of the surf, an orchestra playing, lovers dancing. There is something about dancing, two people in love moving together to the music, alone in their intimate bubble, drifting between Earth and heaven. You can almost smell the perfume.

Then everything changed. In the hardest time of the Depression, the Cabrillo was converted to a bowling alley, and eventually torn down. That generation fought and won another world war, but the war changed them and the world in a way that would take time to grasp. They returned home, married, reared families, and built a prosperity that didn’t satisfy. The sexual revolution rattled our institutions of marriage and family. Our society is a bit adrift these days.

I think the problem began when people in love stopped dancing together. Maybe we should build a new Cabrillo. There could be meaning in that.

“Skip fell in love with Laguna on a ‘50s surfing trip. He’s a student of Laguna history and the author of “Loving Laguna: A Local’s Guide to Laguna Beach.” Email: [email protected]

Places to worship (all on Sunday, unless noted):

Baha’i’s of Laguna Beach—contact [email protected] for events and meetings.

Calvary Chapel Seaside, 21540 Wesley Drive (Lang Park Community Center), 10:30 a.m.

Chabad Jewish Center, 30804 S. Coast Hwy, Fri. 7 p.m., Sat. 10:30 a.m., Sun. 8 a.m.

Church by the Sea, 468 Legion St., 9 & 10:45 a.m.

Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, 682 Park Ave., 10 a.m.

First Church of Christ, Scientist, 635 High Dr., 10 a.m.

ISKCON (Hare Krishna), 285 Legion St., 5 p.m., with 6:45 feast.

Jehovah’s Witnesses, 20912 Laguna Canyon Rd., 1:00 p.m.

Laguna Beach Net-Works, 286 St. Ann’s Dr., 10 a.m.

Laguna Presbyterian, 415 Forest Ave., 8:30 & 10 a.m.

Neighborhood Congregational Church (UCC), 340 St. Ann’s Drive, 10 a.m.

United Methodist Church, 21632 Wesley, 10 a.m.

St. Catherine of Siena (Catholic), 1042 Temple Terrace, 7:30, 9, 11, 1:30 p.m. (Spanish), 5:30 p.m. There are 8 a.m. masses on other days and Saturday 5:30 p.m. vigils.

St. Francis by the Sea (American Catholic), 430 Park, 9:30 a.m.

St. Mary’s Episcopal Church, 428 Park Ave., 8:00 & 10:30 a.m.

Unitarian Universalist, 429 Cypress St., 10:30 a.m.