Old Town (July 2018) - Didn’t Expect to Find an Historic Park Here; We Thought It Was Just a
Neighborhood Description
My spouse and I visited Old
Town State Historic Park on a Friday afternoon in early July 2018. Old
Town is the
oldest settled area in San Diego and the site of the first European settlement
in present-day California. Old Town San Diego State Historic Park was added to
the National Register of Historic Places in 1971 because of its many historic
buildings from the period of 1820 to 1870.
In 1834 the Mexican government granted San Diego the status of a “pueblo”, or “chartered town”. The Old
Town area remained the heart of the city of San Diego until the 1860s, when
Alonzo Horton began to develop present-day Downtown San Diego. Residents and
businesses quickly abandoned "Old Town" for Horton's "New
Town" because of New Town's proximity to shipping facilities. In the
1910s, Old Town became one of the many San Diego neighborhoods connected by a
streetcar system built by John Spreckels (the Balboa Park organ is named after
him) that was spurred by the Panama-California Exposition of 1915.
The Old Town neighborhood has 27 historic buildings, 9 hotels, 32
restaurants, and more than 100 specialty shops (including 12 art galleries).
Five original adobes (accommodation made of sun-dried earth and straw) are part
of the complex; other historic buildings include a schoolhouse, blacksmith
shop, newspaper office, cigar and pipe store, houses and gardens, and a stable
with a carriage collection. The Old Town complex also contains stores where you
can see local artisans demonstrating their crafts, and an area called Fiesta de
Reyes ("festival of the kings") that offers dining and entertainment.
We walked around the dusty
“town”, peeking into several of the structures, but it was an extremely hot day
and we tired quickly. We stopped for a drink at the Casa de Reyes, and then for
lunch at the Old Town Mexican Café. (The latter restaurant is just outside of
the Old Town Historic Park.)
We enjoyed our brief visit to
the Old Town State Historic Park. We arrived on the Old Town Trolley Tour, and
because all passengers are required to disembark there, we thought we would
walk around a bit before getting on the next departing trolley. We wish that we
had been better prepared for what we found in Old Town! We had expected only a
neighborhood/suburb of San Diego, not an historic park that offered a few hours
of exploration. It was an unexpected find!
