Huntington Beach and the 1938 flood

March 1938 was a bit soggier than March 2012, and the photos of said sogginess never fail to astound. There had been worse floods here in terms of sheer amount of water, but there were a lot fewer people (and no cameras) here when it happened. The photo above comes from Duane Wentworth, the son of my old friend, Huntington Beach City Historian Alicia Wentworth. The photo shows what's now Southeast Huntington Beach in the foreground, and old Downtown Huntington Beach and the oil fields in the background.

Duane writes, "Thought you might like this photo for the... site. ...For reference, the farm just left of center is Bushard and Indianapolis. This photo was in my mother's collection."

To make it easier to understand what we're looking at, I overlaid the locations major streets on the photo. You may want to zoom in on both the original and the edited version to see more details.
Search "flood" on this blog to find a bunch more information about the horrors of March 1938.