I am the last person to know anything meaningful about construction—particularly the cement and/or concrete traipsed upon everyday. While I walked along Hamilton Street, between Madison and Monroe, in San Diego’s North Park neighborhood, a year etched in the sidewalk stopped my motion. Could that rectangle of pavement really have been placed in December 1921? Think about the century of feet pounding by.
As I stepped back, a gentleman and his basset hound came out of a residence. We spoke briefly, with my question asked, and he expressed how the neighborhood came to be over a series of waves, so to speak. He is correct.
Certain events, such as both World Wars or the Great Depression, were followed by periods of new construction, which timing can be somewhat identified by the size and type of structures (e.g., smaller or cottage-like tend to be older). A later wave of construction converted houses into apartments and/or added additional multi-family structures—typically behind the original building and along alleys. More recently, single-family homes are leveled and replaced with multi-level apartments or condos.
I marked the moment by using Leica Q2 to take three different shots of the sidewalk, each at a different focal length: f/2, f/5.6, and f/8. I chose the last, because the wider depth of field keeps more of the crack in the field of focus. Vitals for the Featured Image (warning: 35MB file), composed as shot: f/8, ISO 100, 1/160 sec, 28mm; 2:31 p.m. PDT.
Continuing on my walk this afternoon, I came upon another etched date along the next block (between Monroe and Meade): April 1924. That makes me wonder about the 3-24 in the photo you see here.