Community Corner

The Presidential Names of Carlsbad Streets

Bob Arnold wrote this "letter to the editor" after working with Amy Davis in the history room at the library. He hopes you can help him solve the "Garfield mystery."

Like many of my generation, I grew up playing Monopoly. Therein began my preoccupation with street names.  Not so much what they are, but why.

In 1972 the New Yorker magazine published an essay by the fine writer, John McPhee, titled “The Search for Marvin Gardens." A Monopoly competition was being held that year in Atlantic City, the place where, during the depression years, the game had been designed, using actual street names from that city.  McPhee entered the contest and lost (he came in fifth), but while there he turned it into a win by visiting all those streets from Baltic Avenue to Boardwalk.  He compared the ethnicity, socio-economic status, general street repair etc. for each, as they were then to how they had been in the 30’s. Even the City Jail did not escape his purview.  (Remember “Go directly to Jail.  Do not pass Go. Do not collect $200.00”)?  He found only a single inmate residing within.  (Did he have no “Get out of Jail free” card)?

But, alas, one street did elude him: Marvin Gardens.  Maps revealed no such place.  Citizens had no clue.  Later researchers learned it was all due to a typo.  It was intended to be “Mervin” gardens but the creator goofed and the error went undetected.  So to this day that yellow square remains in perpetuity as “Marvin” Gardens.

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Here’s an enigma to ponder.  In “Hamlet,” Shakespeare gave us two minor characters, courtiers named Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, seemingly as alike as Siamese twins.  Today, nearly every major city has a Rosecrans (Blvd. Ave, or St,) but never a Guildstern.  Why fame for one and anonymity for the other?  But I digress.

 The Hamlet of Carlsbad. 

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Anyone, be they resident or visitor, cannot help but notice many of our streets bear the names of presidents. In the 1880’s, our early founders gave us Lincoln and Washington Streets.  A poll taken in 1962 asked 75 historians to rank our chief executives.  These two were numbered one and two respectively; sound choices. 

By 1900 our east/west-ish* streets were named for trees (Pine, Chestnut, Elm, Oak, etc.).  North/south-ish* streets were numbered 1st through 5th; not too imaginative, the latter, but certainly not without precedent.  New York’s Manhattan uses numbers to this day in both directions.  North-south Avenues run from 1st to 13th, and east-west streets from 1st in lower Manhattan to 262nd at the top of the Bronx.  Of course, over the years some were renamed; 4th Avenue became Park and 6th Avenue, the Avenue of the Americas.  Carlsbad did some renaming too. (* the "ish" is because the Carlsbad Village grid skews about 20 degrees NW)

 In 1947-47 1st Street, after a brief flirtation with Tyler, became State, in recognition of its once having been the state highway.  In early discussions 2nd, 3rd, 4th and 5th were to be, respectively, Coolidge, Madison, Jefferson and Polk.  Coolidge and Polk didn’t make the cut.  5th became Harding and 2nd became Roosevelt.  As originally reported, and repeated in every subsequent history of Carlsbad, the latter was so named “In honor of either Theodore or Franklin D., depending on one’s political persuasion.”  True, Teddy was a Republican and FDR a Democrat, but both were progressives.  Not quite the win-win compromise intended. 

As our village grew, many more presidents found their way onto our map: Adams, Monroe, Harrison, Tyler (reassigned as what could have been called 1 ½  Street), McKinley, Wilson and Hoover.  In addition to the aforementioned Coolidge and Polk, who were dropped, we also had (briefly) Cleveland and Jackson.  Both were plowed under by a redevelopment.  I can accept Jackson, but Grover once owned land in Carlsbad.  He deserved more respect.

And then there is Garfield; my Marvin Gardens.  Oh, finding it is easy enough; it occupies prime territory just a block in from the coast.  No, the question is “why.”  James Garfield served as president for a mere 200 days, then was assassinated.  As one might expect, in that short time he accomplished little.  His ranking from the Presidential historians is ( - ).  Garfield Street appears on Carlsbad maps as early as 1915, well before the ambitious master renaming plan of 1947. For the next president to be so honored after Washington and Lincoln, why choose one as inconsequential as Garfield?  One can only speculate.

I offer two possibilities, both remote, both purely speculative. 

1- Garfield’s widow, Lucretia Rudolph Garfield, spent her final years in South Pasadena (in an elegant home designed by the famous architects, Greene and Greene), dying in 1918.  Could she have had some influential friends and/or admirers in Carlsbad? 

2- W.W. Borden, Carlsbad founder and publisher of our first newspaper, had a son named Charles Garfield Borden who conducted business in nearby Oceanside.  Could the street be named for him?

 How about some help here.


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