Grossmont Center’s Kickoff Included Playboy Bunny, Chargers Season Tix

Almost 50 years ago, Montgomery Ward regional manager Eldon Peterson kicked off Grossmont Center as La Mesa’s anchor shopping mall. Literally.

Assisted by Miss La Mesa Geraldine Miller, Peterson placekicked a football through the ceremonial ribbons into a waiting crowd of shoppers. 

On Thursday, Oct. 5, 1961, 50,000 people—far more than La Mesa’s population of 30,000—converged onto the newest and largest retail shopping facility yet built in rapidly growing San Diego County.

The 110-acre Grossmont Center regional shopping mall represented a reported $20 million investment and by far the largest project ever undertaken in the 49-year-old city of La Mesa. 

The celebration started with a ceremonial flag-raising at 9:45 a.m. in the mall’s canopy-covered plaza outside Marston’s department store, still under construction. 

Overseeing the official raising in front of television cameras, a live band and a packed crowd were

Roy Drachman, a partner and leasing manager of the project developers and contractors, the Del E. Webb Co.; Marston’s President Hamilton Marston; and the mall’s new manager, Harold Logan.

Just a few minutes later at the secondary anchor Montgomery Ward’s store on the east end of the mall, Peterson kicked the football.

Mrs. Myrtle Cooper of Lakeside, who had squeezed into the front row, caught the ball—signed by many of the new “San Diego” Chargers professional players. 

(Mrs. Cooper also received two season tickets for the rest of the team’s inaugural 1961 San Diego season).

But the Oct. 5 event that grabbed the most attention—for the gentlemen in the crowd anyway—was the opening of the Harris & Frank men’s store. 

The 105-year-old high-end clothier garnered quite a bit of attention with its special guest ribbon-cutter it brought down from Hollywood. 

That ribbon-cutter was British actress and Playboy model June Wilkinson.  Known as England’s answer to Jane Mansfield, the buxom and platinum blond actress reportedly caused a queue of young men to form at the new store to “catch a glimpse.”

Other stores opening that day included Anita’s Frock Shop, Buddy’s Barber Shop, Dryer’s Furniture, Flagg Brothers Shoes, Gallenkamp Shoes, Grossmont Center Florists, Holiday Shoes, House of Fabrics, S.H. Kress & Co., Koven’s Jewelers, Longs Drugs, National Shirt Shop, Security First National Bank, Weatherby-Kayser Shoes, and Woolworth’s.

The opening of the first 18 of the 44 stores that had obtained leases provided the public’s first glimpse at the new retail center. 

In the meantime, work continued for the rest of the stores to be ready for the final milestone, the Nov. 6 opening of the anchor Marston’s Department store.

Local Institution Anchors the Center

The crowning jewel of the mall, Marston’s, was ready to open along with 11 additional businesses to bring the total tenants to 44 by early November. 

On Nov. 4, the Women’s Auxiliary of the Grossmont and Edgemoor Hospitals became the first groups to get a preview of the venerable San Diego business’ first branch store.  From 4 to 8 p.m. that Saturday, auxiliary members and special guests who had purchased tickets to the hospital fund-raiser were treated to refreshments of punch, champagne and cheese pastries. 

The Marston employees served as hosts, providing guided tours of the modern two-story department store.  Music was provided with an orchestra on the first floor and a roving set of Mariachis on the second.

In addition, Mrs. Rueben Padilla, the Marston’s official fashion model—and wife of the company’s publicist—was also on hand in her public role of Conchita, providing tours to Spanish-speaking guests.

Two days later—at 10 a.m. Monday, Nov. 6—company President Hamilton Marston officiated over the big ribbon-cutting ceremony. 

Also contributing to the program were Hamilton, his uncle and former company president Arthur Marston, his aunt Mary Gilman Marston, new store manager George Grey, La Mesa Mayor Earl Logan, Miss La Mesa Miller and her court attendants Jacqueline Nolte, Jan Akin and Ginger Crocker, and developer Del Webb and his new bride Toni Ince.  

An hour later, Mary Gilman Marston, daughter of George Marston, helped unveil the dedication plaque that named the plaza at the building’s north entrance to her father, the company founder back in 1878.

The San Diego Union and La Mesa Scout noted that the new store and its elegant décor had made a great impression.  The store’s interior featured more than 3,200 lineal feet of moldings, glass panels and large block letters all covered in 23-carat gilded gold leaf. 

The company also noted that five artists had spent two months painting murals that would beautify the interior and help customers find the many different store departments.

In addition, the second floor Orange Tree Dining Room added a sense of class similar to the popular Japanese tearoom of its downtown store.  The Orange Tree featuring espaliered orange tree murals on its walls with Italian wrought iron chandeliers shaped with leaves and oranges. 

In reverence to George Marston’s interest in California and San Diego history (the merchant, civic leader, and philanthropist was a founder of the San Diego Historical Society and promoter of historic sites such as Old Town and Presidio Hill), the adjacent coffee shop featured murals featuring local history icons such as Balboa Park’s California Tower and the Cabrillo Bridge.

This “high-class” store represented an “arrival” of sorts for La Mesa. 

The mall promised to create more than 2,000 jobs and provide at minimum a six-figure boost in sales and property tax revenues to the growing city. 

With La Mesa’s recent annexations and developments north of U.S. 80 in the 1950s, city leaders recognized the obvious value and good fortune to have been chosen as the site for this economic asset.

Bringing Modern Retail Design to La Mesa

The planning and construction of this major project was a five-year journey—but one that reflected the changing world of retail commerce.

As architectural historian Richard Longstreth has documented in numerous books and articles, retailers realized that the future rested in the markets found in the automobile-happy Post-WWII American suburbs. 

These new trends requiring retailers to move their stores from city centers to suburban regional malls.  

As such they moved from early car-oriented shopping centers with stores facing out toward the parking lots to stores facing onto well-landscaped pedestrian friendly “malls” with more in common to former “main street” business districts—but in a more cooperative and integrated way. 

Mall designers worked to create more than a series of shops with common parking—but one-stop “destinations” with their own character and strategically planned landscapes that provided retail, restaurant and entertainment opportunities.

For San Diegans, Marston’s was the region’s hometown high-class retailer.  By the 1950s, grandson Hamilton Marston was the company president. 

Marston’s and the other large San Diego department store, Walker-Scott, dominated the local market and downtown business district. But they both recognized the need to expand their companies into the growing suburbs for their future success.

In 1955, Scott was the first to act.  He announced that Walker-Scott would become the anchor for the county’s first regional center at the south foot of Chollas Heights adjacent to the new state Route 94 and College Avenue.  College Grove Center would open in July 1960.

In 1956, Hamilton Marston along with his family-led company directors recognized the need to do the same.  They hired the Los Angeles planning and design firm of Welton Becket and Associates to undertake a study to find a site for their first branch store. 

Looking for a large piece of property with good freeway access, the consultants’ two-volume report recommended a 100-acre parcel owned by another longtime San Diego family near La Mesa. 

Pioneer rancher Adolph Levi had acquired the 125-acre parcel in the 1890s.  His daughter Selma Levi Moore had held onto the property, and in the early 1950s had sold a 25-acre piece to the new Grossmont Hospital District (the hospital opened there in 1955). 

She placed the remaining 100 acres into a trust for her teenage grandsons Stephen and Lawrence Cushman, still the current property owners.

The Moores and Cushmans agreed to partner with the Marstons to create the new retail project, but they needed to find a developer. 

Phoenix developer Drachman was approached.  He had recently partnered with the nationally known Del E. Webb Corp. to develop two large shopping center projects in Arizona—including the fully enclosed and air-conditioned Chris-Town Center.  

Del Webb, a native Californian, already was one of the country’s most visible and successful developers known for his large projects including suburban residential and retirement communities (Sun City, AZ), hotel/casinos, golf courses, and apartment and office buildings.

(Webb also was a part owner of the New York Yankees at the time.)

In September 1957, Hamilton Marston along with Mr. and Mrs. Eliott Cushman announced plans for what would be the largest retail shopping center in San Diego County on the site just west of the hospital.  The partners would announce in January 1958 that the Del E. Webb Corp. would be the developers and Welton Becket and Associates the designers. 

Fighting Off Annexation Feelers by El Cajon, San Diego

The partners’ original plans called for a spring 1960 opening, but the challenges of such a large project would result in delays.

One of the first was the unincorporated site’s connections to local infrastructure. Cushman’s attorneys Jennings, Engstrand and Henrikson had initially announced and instigated the project’s intention to request annexation to the City of La Mesa.

By summer 1958, however, the city of El Cajon made a play to annex the proposed commercial property.  Having recently annexed land up to the end side of Grossmont High School in Fletcher Hills, El Cajon Mayor Earl Tuttle had asked city staff to find a legal way to possibly annex the land and to start negotiations with the property owners. 

Rumors also persisted that the city of San Diego had its eyes on the property.  San Diego had already annexed the land on La Mesa’s northern boundary that would become Carlos Tavares’ San Carlos development (started in 1959). 

La Mesa’s larger neighbor was reportedly investigating how to bridge the gap down to the Grossmont Center property along the right-of-way to the future freeway to Santee (now SR 125) corridor.

However, on Aug. 14, 1958, the Grossmont Center developers reiterated their commitment to joining the city of La Mesa.  And after more than a year of negotiations to secure the city’s commitment to improving Jackson Drive and access to U.S. 80, the mall owners filed an annexation request to La Mesa in December 1959. 

In arguably the most important economic decision the La Mesa City Council ever made, it approved the annexation of the future retail center property in January 1960, securing the economic engine that would provide the soon-to-be built-out city a steady revenue asset for the next 50 years.

Design and Construction

It was no easy task to turn the 100-acre site into one of the largest retail centers in Southern California.

Del E. Webb Corp. filed its initial building permit in May 1960 for a record $7.8 million project (eventually the permits would total more than $10 million).  

One of the largest costs was more than $500,000 and seven months needed to move and remove 1.4 million cubic yards of soil and material to grade and fill the site for construction.

The entire construction project took more than 16 months to complete and required 1,200 tons of steel and 25,000 cubic yards of concrete.  The project at opening also included 42 acres of asphalt parking lots.

Welton Becket and Associates of Los Angeles had been tasked with the design of the center.  One of the most revered planning and design firms of commercial architecture at the time, the firm looked to incorporate the latest in modern and contemporary design into the project.

Just a few of the firm’s most iconic projects were the Bullocks Pasadena (1944), Beverly Hilton Hotel (1953), the Capitol Records Tower in Hollywood (1956) and the Disney World Resort in Florida (1971).

At Grossmont Center, the two most distinctive buildings were Marston’s and Montgomery Wards.  Becket adorned the 156,000-square-foot Marston’s store with vertical “ribs” to accentuate the prominence of the building and to break up the decorative concrete block façade—a façade that was infused with mica flakes to make it “sparkle” in the sunlight.

Modern-style barrel vaults also were used to provide distinctive and contrasting horizontal features at the entrances to both anchor buildings.  These vertical lines and barrel vaults were incorporated into the mall’s initial logo and marketing materials.

The most iconic and memorable feature was found inside the mall.

Becket reportedly incorporated a Modern interpretation of Gothic vaults in the shade canopies over the fountains in the plaza on the north entrance to Marston’s.  These distinctive arch-shaped canopies would be the icons of the center for many decades. 

These shade canopies­—along with the extensive planting and outdoor seating plans created by project landscape architects Purdy & Fitzpatrick—set the scene for a cutting-edge but inviting shopping experience. 

It was this shopping experience that helped put La Mesa on the map as more than a bedroom community for the region. 

In many ways, the opening of Grossmont Center represented the maturing of La Mesa as an independent and self-sufficient city.

An Enduring Retail Legacy

Over the next half-century, Grossmont Center would continue to expand on the original 44 stores available to La Mesans and East County.

In 1965, the 1,000-seat Cinerama Theatre would open to a Hollywood star-filled premiere.  Major expansions in the early 1980s, including a three-story parking garage and additional anchor store on the west end, were built. 

In the late 1990s, the center refocused and expanded again to meet new trends and additional competition from big box centers (the eventual fate of College Grove). 

Today Grossmont Center features 110 retail and dining tenants.

Although such icons as the single-screen Cinerama Theatre would be replaced over the years by the high-tech 10-screen cinema complex of today, the memories of original tenants such as Coffee Dan’s, Food Basket, and Woolworth’s provide a collective past for many La Mesans.

Celebrating 50 Years

From 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. Saturday, Sept. 24, Grossmont Center will hold a special event to celebrate its 50th anniversary year.  The program will include period music, dance, fashion, food, crafts—and history.

The La Mesa Historical Society—in concert with Grossmont College Department of Art and Humanities—will have displays and booths in the former pet store where you can learn more about the history of this important commercial institution, take a photo in front of a 1961 Grossmont Center photo backdrop, and/or share and record your memories of the mall and La Mesa.

For more information check the Grossmont Center website: www.grossmontcenter.com/anniversary-bash.html