From the archives
Mission Hills
Village Square

Mission Hills – don't be fooled

Book lovers, architecture, Oakley Hall, Francis Parker, Five Points, South Mission Hills, Jerry Schad's view, the ultimate Halloween house

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Over the years, as many as 500 students have been enrolled at Francis Parker's Mission Hills campus at one time. (Joe Klein)

  • Book-lovers chew the fat at the Mission Hills Library

  • His watch tells him 6:45. This Mission Hills branch stays open tonight — it’s Monday. He slaps the book closed, reshelves it, glances to his left. The library is almost deserted. Tiny voices — two or three — from the children’s section, Washington Street traffic, just outside the door. Washed-out light through high windows. For a moment, nothing happens.
  • By Mani Mir, Sept. 21, 1989

  • South Mission Hills

  • The subculture of South Mission Hills is not all that obvious. Most of my neighbors are Hispanic. Central-Mexico Hispanic, as my Mexican-American friends are quick to point out. Somehow, they’ve gotten a toehold on Reynard Way, a cheap-rent zone below the luxe homes on the hill. For a few blocks, multiple families live crammed into single apartments. For rent money, they work car washes, stock drugstore shelves, hang Sheetrock, and wash dishes. A guy named Pedro sells them groceries out of his van.
  • By Dave Good, Dec. 24, 2003

  • Francis Parker School blocks traffic

  • "Hit any traffic on the way in?" asks Scott Borden, seated at the dining room table of his exquisite 1930s Spanish villa home on Randolph Terrace in Mission Hills. "No? Well, try driving down Randolph at 8:00 in the morning. You'll really get a show. People are all queued up there waiting to drop off their kids."
  • By Ernie Grimm, Dec. 6, 2001
By the 1920s, Mission Hills was in the throes of a “Spanish Colonial Revival” epidemic. Streets were now lined with white-washed stucco homes sporting low-pitched roofs, decorative ironwork, tiled floors and walls. (Sandy Huffaker, Jr.)

  • Coffins, gardens, and white folks

  • Before Captain Henry James “Ninety Fathom” Johnston plunked down $16.25 for 65 acres of prime Mission Hills real estate in 1869, the area was a wasteland of weeds, scrub, and chaparral; a “hopeless tangle of barren hills and ugly holes,” according to one early observer. Up to this time, only 40 Kumeyaay Indian families inhabited the land in an encampment they called Cosoy. Beyond their small village was abundant game—rabbits, opossum, deer, antelope, sheep, and raccoon—which the Kumeyaay skillfully hunted.
  • By Susan Vaughn, Feb. 5, 1998
Oakley Hall, 1949 (San Diego Historical Society)

  • Oakley Hll explains The Corpus of Joe Bailey

  • In San Diego, Corpus of Joe Bailey also made a noteworthy entrance. The book was denounced from San Diego pulpits for being too sexy and provoked Mission Hills residents to speculate who among them was the model for the haughty Con Robinson, the political Uncle Dick, and the tormented hero, Joe Bailey. At the same time, the San Diego Union, in April 1953, hailed the book as a "long, credible" novel.
  • By Justin Wolff, Nov. 8, 2001

  • The late, lamented Five Points

  • The Mission Hills residential area south of Washington to about Chalmers or Vine is sometimes referred to as "Five Points." Is Five Points technically part of Mission Hills or just an informal name for the less-affluent li'l bastard child of Mission Hills?
  • -- South Mission Hillbilly
  • Five Points is another old S.D. nabe killed by the freeway....
  • By Matthew Alice, Aug. 14, 2003

  • Mission Hills

  • As State Street crosses Laurel heading north, its name changes suddenly to Reynard, and a little blue street sign welcomes you to Mission Hills. Don’t be fooled. This is Baja Mission Hills, like Kensington too far south of Adams. Reynard winds its way along a canyon floor, carrying you past close-set single-story homes that share space with small businesses and big apartment buildings.
  • By Deirdre Lickona, Matthew Lickona, Dec. 24, 2003
Mission Hills (Sandy Huffaker, Jr.)

  • Letters from Persephone

  • Video reports included helicopter footage of around 30 firefighters battling the blaze at 1737 Fort Stockton Drive — four houses east of Sunset Boulevard — which nearly lit up nearby properties and parts of Robyn’s Egg Trail in the canyon behind the house to the south. Persephone and her mom had lived there since Persephone was born in April 1967.
  • By Jay Allen Sanford, Oct. 18, 2017
Burnt house. Comments ranged from “Good God how horrible” to “That’s what happens to hoarders."

  • By bicycle or by foot, discover the charms of Mission Hills

  • You can explore two of San Diego's most beautiful old neighborhoods -- Mission Hills and Banker's Hill -- on the seven-mile, self-propelled tour outlined here. We'll define "self propelled" as walking, jogging, or bicycle riding. It is impossible, and illegal in fact, for cars or motorcycles to complete a key link in the route described here.
  • By Jerry Schad, May 12, 2005
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