The Street Seen: Crystal Pier
Hollister Avenue @ Ocean Front Walk
In 1913, the deteriorated Bristol Pier is shortened, remodeled, and renamed the Crystal Pier. For a few years, the Crystal Pier (and the Café Nat Goodwin) is very popular, but it never recovers from the 1917 prohibition on alcohol. After several unsuccessful attempts at repurposing, the Crystal Pier is abandoned in 1936, condemned by the City in 1943, and finally demolished in 1948.
In December 1911, the wooden Bristol Pier, weakened by wood borers and damaged by storms, threatens to collapse.1 Temporary repairs are made to stabilize the structure.
Crystal Pier (1913)
In January 1912, owner Lycurgus Lindsay decides to remove the outer end of the “L” shaped Bristol Pier back to the halfway “T”.
Lindsay hires the Milwaukee Building Company to reconstruct the pier for $0.5MM. The remaining old wood piles are reinforced with concrete. The shortened pier is widened to 60 ft (from 30 ft) and supported on new reinforced concrete piles. Lindsay renames the pier the Crystal Pier.
The large dining room at the end of the pier (the former Bristol Pier Café) is moved2 onto the shortened pier.
Café Nate Goodwin (1913)
In 1913, Lindsay leases the operation of the Crystal Pier to the State Investment Company.3 The State Investment Company leases the dining room to Dr. D.G. Turnbull,4 who obtains a liquor license. Vaudevillian comic Nat Goodwin purchases a one-third interest in the restaurant from Turnbull, and the pier restaurant is named the Café Nat Goodwin.5
With automobiles now more prevalent, a drive-up café entrance and 160 parking spaces are provided on the pier.
In 1915, Goodwin sells his share in the Café Nat Goodwin to Los Angeles attorney Paul W. Schenck, who keeps the Goodwin name.6 In 1917, Schenck’s partner, Baron Long, acquires a one-half interest in the Café Nat Goodwin.7 When Santa Monica goes dry in 1917, Schenck and Long move on to the Ship Cafe at the Venice Pier.8
Pier Franchise (1923)
By 1921, the Crystal Pier is closed and is being used for motion picture sets. Lindsay proposes a $1MM expansion of the pier to 1,500-ft long and 500-ft wide. Many legal tangles ensue. In 1922,9 to obtain income from the pier, the City initiates the sale of a franchise license. In 1923, Lindsay obtains the franchise from the City,10 however, he does not proceed with the pier expansion.
Crystal Pier Club (1926)
As part of the beach club fad of 1926, promoter Ralph E. Ford of real estate agents Ford & Becker announces the Crystal Pier Club - a beach club out over the water on the Crystal Pier. Ford acquires the Crystal Pier from Lindsay. Architect Leland A. Bryant,11 in association with Arthur E. Harvey, designs a $0.5MM facility for the Crystal Pier Club. The structures on the old Crystal Pier are demolished.
As with several other beach clubs of the time, the Crystal Pier Club is never opens.12 The bare deck of the Crystal Pier remains unoccupied.
Crystal Pier Sun and Surf Club (1932)
With the 1932 Olympics visitors in mind, a $50,000 1-story solarium is built on the end of the Crystal Pier in 1931.
Even with nude sunbathing,13 the Crystal Pier Sun and Surf Club only lasts two seasons.
Demolition (1948)
In 1935, the City finds that between 1929 and 1934, it has only received $33 in franchise fees from the Crystal Pier. The City considers that the pier has forfeited its 1923 franchise.
After an attempt to sell the Crystal Pier in 1936, the pier is abandoned.
In 1942, the City considers buying the Crystal Pier - with State funds - but the State doesn’t approve the expenditure.
In 1943, Santa Monica’s oldest surviving pier, the abandoned Crystal Pier, is condemned by the City, and in 1948, demolished.14,15
In December 1911, motion picture people offer $20,000 to burn down the rickety Bristol Pier for a movie. Lindsay, the pier’s owner, instead decides to repair it.
In 1913, Los Angeles premier house mover, William Knickrehm (1863 - 1933), moves the old Bristol Pier Café building - rotating it 90 degrees and positioning it closer to the pier entrance as the Café Nat Goodwin.
After the 1912 Ocean Park Pier fire, Ernest Pickering, president, and Harold P. Jennings, secretary/treasurer organize the State Investment Company to operate the concessions on the Fraser Pier and the Crystal Pier. The State Investment Company has a 15-year lease to operate the concessions on the Crystal Pier.
Donald George Kennedy Turnbull (1886 – 1934). Born in Scotland, Dr. Turnbull is a physician with a wide range of interests. He runs a skating rink on the Fraser Pier. After the pier burns down in 1912, he promotes Lithia Springs artesian water from a well behind the Schofield home on 4th St. In 1916, Turnbull joins the Royal Canadian Army Medical Corps and serves in France in WWI. Turnbull dies in a single vehicle accident in Tucson, AZ, in 1934.
Besides the Café Nat Goodwin, there are no other attractions on the Crystal Pier.
In 1916, the Santa Monica Looff Pier opens, providing competition for the Crystal Pier. However, there is no alcohol on the Santa Monica pier. The Looff Pier is a resort of character and refinement, lacking the “honky-tonk” ribaldry that characterized many other seaside resorts.
The City contends that the transfer of the liquor license from Goodwin to Schenck was not valid. In March 1917, on the grounds of selling liquor without a license, the City raids Café Nat Goodwin. Schenck keeps the liquor license till June 1, 1917.
In 1917, California experiences growing sentiment to restrict or ban alcohol, and Santa Monica votes to prohibit the sale of intoxicating beverages. Liquor remains legal in “wet” enclaves like Venice, then an independent city, until nationwide Prohibition is ratified in 1919.
In 1917, the State grants tide and submerged lands to the City of Santa Monica, allowing the City to manage these areas in trust. In 1921, due to changes in the coastline (e.g, sand accretion), a definition of the “mean high tide line” is adopted to resolve ownership disputes between the State, the City, and private owners.
In 1922, aiming to derive income from the use of public property, the City offers for sale a franchise for a pier at Hollister Ave. Lindsay is the only bidder at $250. The franchise only covers the City-owned submerged land, and Lindsay owns the beachfront property. Any other bidder would have to obtain the beachfront property from him. The City franchise allows Lindsay to build a pier up to 500-ft wide.
After the first 5 years of the franchise, the City is to collect a franchise fee of 2% of the pier income.
In a career cut short by the Great Depression, Los Angeles area architect, Leland Arthur Bryant (1890–1954), designs many large Châteauesque apartment buildings that are popular among Hollywood celebrities.
In addition to the usual beach club financial problems, the proposed Crystal Pier Club has public access issues that bring local scrutiny and debate:-
The Hollister pier, while privately owned, has always been publicly accessible. The Crystal Pier Club is a private club, and the pier would be closed to the general public.
While the club owns the beach near the Ocean Front Walk, the City considers the significant accretion of sand in front of it to be publicly owned.
The Crystal Pier solarium opens in July, 1931.
Murky ownership is a characteristic of the Hollister pier. In 1948, the City cannot identify the owner of the abandoned Crystal Pier. The City allocates $22,000 to remove the remaining pilings and wreckage of the Crystal Pier.
The Crystal Pier is remembered in 2011 on the side of the Hollister Ave beach public restroom.
