When Annette Funicello died last week after a 25-year struggle with multiple sclerosis at the age 70, it seemed like the end of an era for the California lifestyle. Before Brittany Spears and Justin Timberlake, she was the first ultra famous star to come out of Walt Disney’s Mousketeers. However, I knew her mostly from her surfing movies like “Beach Blanket Bingo” with Frankie Avalon and their kooky adventures versus the silly motorcycle gang led by Eric Von Zipper. Before I even saw the movie “The Endless Summer,” which sealed the deal for me, I knew I wanted to live in California, on the western shore, in the shade of Disney’s Magic Kingdom, thanks to Annette.
It was a few years ago that I met Annette at a convention I attended as a journalist. I turned around and there she was, already bound to a wheelchair, but still very pretty and smiling at me as I said hello. She was truly a brave soul. I was sad to see her in that condition, but thankful for her movies. I was also happy she had the chance to make “Back to the Beach,” a few years before with Avalon to celebrate once more the California beach lifestyle. I liked the idea of the movie so much that when I started an entertainment publication in college with my late friend Randy J. Matin called Pacific News and Review (we called it “The Peaner”) for the Orange County coastal cities, we decided to dedicate an issue to the movie’s theme. To that end we decided to do a big beach party scene as the cover of one of our summer editions. We would shoot the picture in Seal Beach.
We assembled the party scene including a local Seal Beach band called the Don Hodads, girls in bikinis, a guy with bongos a few surfers and to top it off, had an immaculate woody drive right into the middle of everything on the sand to the north of the pier. Just when we were about to start snapping the pictures, Ed Knight, the city’s director of community development, appeared and asked what were doing. When we explained we were taking a photo for our magazine, he grinned and informed us that we needed a $500 permit. We said we did not have that kind of money for a photo and we would go somewhere else. Ed turned around and headed off the beach. We shot the photo, click, click, click … and ran! It was like a scene from one of those silly surf movies and we got the picture for the cover as well.
Hearing about Annette’s passing recently reminded me of that and also how I came from growing up and learning to surf during summer times on the south shore of Long Island, New York, to living in the golden state. It was the dream of a lifestyle that drew me and countless others of my generation to settle here. Now that lifestyle seems to become more threatened as rules and regulations are added to the mix.
Recently, the South Coast Air Quality Management District proposed a ban on bonfires in Newport Beach and Huntington Beach and the removal of the fire pits at their beaches. The AQMD board is supposed to vote on the new rules on May 1. What a shame for the dream of the California beach lifestyle if they decide to remove the fire pits. I can understand the desire to limit the size of “bonfires” in fire pits so that it does not resemble the looney “Burning Man” celebration out in the Nevada desert. What I don’t like is the idea of regular folks not being able to enjoy a night of friendship around a fire pit on the beach, strumming guitars, eating smores, and cuddling with someone special beneath a blanket, under the stars as the ocean waves lap the sandy shore. Some flashlights and a Coleman stove just wouldn’t be the same.
Those fire pits are part of the California dream. We’ve already lost enough of such innocence. I mean what’s next, regulating where and when people can fish on the Seal Beach Pier?
If you are interested in registering an opinion with the South Coast Air Quality Management District Board of Directors, call (909) 396-2000 or send an e-mail to webinquiry@aqmd.gov.
Dennis Kaiser is the editor of the Sun Newspapers.
