Opinion: The Alley Kids 

By Annlia Hill

Late in 1924, the Hills (Carrie, Merton and kids) drove south from town on a narrow two-lane oiled road (Coast Highway) and turned toward the ocean on a street curving toward the beach (Oak Street).

At the foot of the street was a small cottage on a fairly large corner lot extending down to the beach. Next door to the north was a larger stucco cottage and a wooden cottage at the top of the hill. But vacant land primarily filled both sides of the “highway.” 

A canny and wily ole Scotsman named George Laidlaw owned the white stucco house and three other oceanfront lots on the block. These were on Seaview Avenue, later named Gaviota Drive, a street little more than a dirt alley between and parallel to the beach and Coast Highway. Merton and Carrie bought the 50-foot oceanfront property with the small cottage for $5,000. And Laidlaw recouped all the money he paid for the four lots.  

The upshot of this was the Ocean Avenue property was sold in 1924, and the winter was dedicated to building the cottage to make a summer home. The cottage had a kitchen/utility room, two small bedrooms, a tiny room with toilet and washbasin. The first addition was a “big” living room. For a few summers, until a bathroom was added, the ocean was the bathtub. Although the cottage had indoor plumbing, the water was undrinkable. Back to the well in Laguna Canyon. Cooking was done on a coal oil stove. No sewer, but the septic tank had a leach line in the always green well-fertilized yard with overflow down on the beach. 

Laidlaw’s other three properties stayed in his family. His only child Katie had married Hobart Alter and occupied the white stucco house. Hobart’s brother Harry got the lot between the stucco house and the Hills’. The remaining lot on the north remained vacant. At about the same time, Edwin and Rachel Price bought the next lot north and had a summer house built by Ropp & Mackey, well-known Laguna contractors. The total cost for the lot and house was $4,877. 

The summer of 1925 was the beginning of life-long friendships and adventures among the “Alley Kids.” These included the Hills (10-year-old Walt, 8-year-old Mert, 7-year-old Margaret and 2-year-old Edith). The Hobart Alters (two-year-old Lillian, Carolyn, born in 1929, and Hobart “Hobie,” the little kid on the block in 1933). The Prices (seven-year-old Nelson, five-year-old Gifford, one-year-old Frankie, and Alice, born in 1926). Finally, the Pritchets (13-year-old Margaret, 9-year-old Lillian, and 7-year-old Oliver) from across the highway on Brooks Street. Later the Harry Alter family (Bob, born in 1926) and the Wentz family (10-year-old Vincent, 7-year-old Bob, six-year-old Betty and two-year-old Peggy) joined the group. Let the good times roll! 

Summer after summer, the Alley Kids spent great parts of the day together. Occasionally they would go to a movie ‒ 10¢ for children under 12. The Fred Aufdenkamp family operated The Lynn Theatre, a silent film house (named after son, Lynn) at 255 Forest Avenue. The theatre opened on July 4, 1916. With the arrival of talkies, they closed the silent house in 1922 and opened the New Lynn Theatre on Coast Highway. The original building on Forest Avenue was later demolished, and a new building was built in 1928 by Auldenkamp for Laguna Beach Hardware. In 2011, the building was modernized for a Quiksilver USA store, co-founded by Lagunan Robert McKnight. 

Although the kids loved going to the movies, it was better to be in one. When a movie was shot on location, the whole town gathered, and many citizens were picked as “extras.” One movie shot on Forest Avenue was “The Sap,” a Warner Bros. production, filmed in the late 1920s. The big scene was a fight between two youths at the local soda fountain. Another scene called for one boy to race and announce the fight to a group playing “duck on the rock” (a game whose rules inspired James Naismith when he developed basketball in 1891). All were to run to watch the fight. One little boy, tending a goat, was supposed to fall as he ran. He just could not get the hang of falling naturally. Unbeknownst to him, they rigged a trip rope across his path. It worked, except Mert danced up and down in his excitement and jumped in front of the camera at the critical moment. The director yelled, “Cut!” and threw his megaphone at Mert. Nonetheless, the director gave the oldest boy $5 to buy ice cream sodas for all. Since sodas were only a dime, each kid got a soda plus 27¢. 

But most often, the days would be spent in bathing suits on the beach, in the water, having fun. More to come on these Lagunatics at play, their boards and boats, the sea rescues, the Bugjuice Bulletin, and other adventures. 

Annlia is a 50-year resident of Laguna Beach and married to a fourth-generation Lagunan. Having walked nearly every street and alley in town, she has observed firsthand the artistic charm and imagination of residents.