“In our age of bling this would barely register, but then it was like looking at a pot of gold. They glistened, they shone, they were as tempting as the ballet slippers in The Red Shoes. How could any little girl not covet those shiny gold sandals? And all you had to do was be like Cinderella–have them fit your foot. When the big day came, waiting in line with all the other little girls, I would check their feet, comparing them to mine while I hoped and prayed that this year I was Cinderella. Finally, it was my turn…”

“And so I had the good fortune to see the great iceman race in Balboa sometime during the late twenties. Bob Reed and a man from the Santa Ana Ice Company were the contestants. The race was around the block and started in front of the Green Dragon. Each of the contestants was attired in the traditional iceman’s costume, a long leather cape that hung down the back to keep water from the melting ice on his back from saturating the iceman’s clothes…”

“My family moved to Newport Beach when I was two years old, back in 1955. My grandfather, Donald G. Griswold, moved his manufacturing business from Alhambra to Costa Mesa. Cla-Val Company is still going strong on Placentia Avenue…”