Remembering When
by
Jerry Person
Huntington Beach City Historian
Dedicated to the people of Huntington Beach
Remembering a very special lady Alicia Wentworth
This week let me remember someone I had known for some 30 years and I must admit you couldn’t find a nicer or more helpful person as Alicia Wentworth. She was our former city clerk when I first moved to Huntington Beach many years ago. She was the first city official I met when I attended city council meetings on Monday nights way back in the Stone Age before they were televised on the city’s cable channel. Don MacAllister was mayor of our city at the time and you could count on Alicia being there to answer any questions that the council may have had. Alicia also holds the distinction of being the city’s first woman city clerk.
Her family tree reaches all the way back to the Mayflower where two of her ancestors had been part of that first party of settlers to America. Alicia’s parents chose Rochester, New York as the place of birth for Alicia Mae Becker on December 1, 1926 and she would be one in a family of 10 siblings.
When she was 21 years old, a married sister was planning to move to California to live and since New York winters are a bit cold, Alicia decided to come along with her. The year was 1947, World War II was over and gasoline was available again for long motor trips.
This was also the year that another popular Huntington Beach city clerk, Charles Furr, retired from his job and little did Alicia know that years later she would hold that same job.
Alicia arrived in Huntington Beach and took up residence at one of our two coast highway trailer parks. Now with a view of our beautiful blue Pacific Ocean each morning why would anyone ever want to leave.
Not long after settling here Alicia met Vernon E. Wentworth and after a whirlwind courtship the two were married and nine months, give a day or two, the couple were the proud parents of twins- David and Donna and in the coming years two more children, Duane and Diane, were added to the family tree.
Through the 1950s Alicia raised her children in their home at 222 Joliet Avenue and in 1961 she became a city employee at the old civic center at Fifth and Orange while Vern worked at Huntington High as a bus driver.
Alicia had a passion for history, maybe it was her connection with the Mayflower or it might have been that her husband Vern was the grandson of Huntington Beach’s first mayor Ed Manning. I remember watching former Huntington Beach mayor Jack Kelly dedicate Manning Park on Delaware Street and seeing Alicia and her family on stage for the ceremony. This gave her children a special place in our city’s rich history.
It was on April 18, 1960 that Paul C. Jones was elected as our city clerk and in the years that Alicia worked for the city she became part of his office and by the early 1970s had become his trusted second in command.
During April of 1973 Paul Jones died and since Alicia was familiar with the office, the city council at that time appointed her on April 30, 1973 to fill Jones’ remaining term.
When the new civic center at Main and Yorktown was dedicated on March 30, 1974, Alicia moved in to her new offices on the second floor of city hall. Huntington Beach was expanding and with it came many more reams of paperwork that she and her staff needed to prepare for each council meeting.
I remember one of those long meetings into the early hours and one councilman that kept asking Alicia the same question over and over, making the suggestion that her office hadn’t done their homework. She softly told the councilman in no uncertain terms that the information was in his packet in front of him. This reminded me of a schoolteacher talking to a wayward student and needless to say that the councilman sat back and said no more about the subject.
For over 15 years Alicia occupied the position of city clerk of our city and when she retired from office on July 8, 1988, she was still able to have a small office there. She used this office to catalog historical photos and city records and once each week she could be found there answering questions about our city's history and its people.
One of Alicia’s favorite pastimes was working the daily crossword puzzle in the newspaper and she seldom used a book to find an answer, said her son Duane many years ago.
Alicia’s health began to decline and on Friday, September 1, 2006, Alicia passed away.
But the night before, said her son Duane, the family was with her at the hospital and as she was hooked up to tubes and an oxygen mask, the family watched Wheel of Fortune. Three letters were showing and nobody could guess the answer and that is when Alicia took off her mask and said “its Oysters Rockefeller” and calmly replaced her mask and she was right, Duane said.