Long Beach in Vintage Postcards

Book excerpt: Long Beach successfully incorporated as a city in 1888, and would eventually become California's fifth largest city. Author Marlin Heckman has compiled over 200 vintage postcards to chronicle the history of the "Queen of Beaches." Competition between the Santa Fe and Southern Pacific Railroads brought great numbers of visitors to Southern California at the turn of the century. Resort hotels, apartments, pavilions, and band shells quickly dotted the landscape to accommodate the massive influx of tourists. Seen here are the more famous Long Beach attractions, including Rainbow Pier, the Sun Pavilion, the Hotel del Mar, and the great "Walk of a Thousand Lights," or the Pike, as it was better known.