Halls of History—The Hawthorne Historical Inn

Early last year when I was trying to find something to do with the rest of my life, I hired out to deliver people for Uber and packages for Amazon Prime Now. I knew that people and package delivery was not going to be my full-time adventure in my post-retirement life, but I did think that I would get to deliver people and packages to some interesting places that otherwise I would never visit. Whenever I found interesting places, I added them to my tablet’s electronic notepad with the intent of visiting them later.

One of those places was the Hawthorne Historical Inn at 2121 1st Avenue.

The Hawthorne Historical Inn was built in 1900 as a Dutch Colonial hotel with 31 rooms. Currently it is an apartment building comprising 11,951 square feet with 29 studio and studio bedroom units renting for $800 to $1,400 a month, all utilities paid.

Apparently some of the rooms don’t have kitchens, not totally unexpected in an Inn but a little unusual in today’s world of apartments, even studio apartments. However, onsite amenities include a kitchen in addition to a game room and laundry facilities. I don’t know where the kitchen is, but imagine living on the third floor and making your way down to the first-floor kitchen three times a day for breakfast, lunch, and supper. Wonder if the kitchen is open for midnight snacks….

The Hawthorne Historical Inn is pet-friendly, with just a one-time fee of $100 for either a dog or a cat. One source says “no size or breed restriction” while another source says “small dogs” and yet another says “40 pound limit.”

If you don’t want to hassle with street parking, you can get assigned surface lot parking for just $50 a month. Trust me, $50 a month is cheap cheap cheap for assigned parking in downtown San Diego.

Interesting “facts” about the Hawthorne Historical Inn:

1. The 1993 movie “Mr. Jones” starring Richard Gere, Lena Olin, and Anne Bancroft, was filmed in the house next door, which you can see at the left of the palm tree in the picture immediately above. According to one source, Richard Gere shot several scenes while balanced precariously on the Hawthorne’s roof but I believe he actually was on the house next door. I’ll know for sure once I watch the movie.
2. During World War II, the Inn was popular with Rosie the Riveters who built B-24 Liberators and PBY Catalinas in San Diego at the Consolidated Aircraft plant.
3. According to legend, Muhammad Ali and Sammy Davis Jr. stayed in the hotel.
4. Most recent sale was in April 2016 at $4,100,000.
5. The Hawthorne Historic Inn was listed in the National Register of Historic Places in 1982.
6. At least two people claim the Hawthorne Historical Inn is haunted. One guy, a photographer, posted online that he was taking night time pictures of the building and on picture revealed in one of the windows a partial face of a woman and an outline of the camera he was using.
   A woman replied to his posting: “I lived behind the building you are talking about for about a year. When I would sit in my kitchen in the morning drinking my coffee I could see the building clearly there was always a lady in her 30′s. I would say that would be in the window that was across from my window I could not see her clearly but I could see her I would think wow why is she always looking at me. when you walk by the building you always feel just creepy. well then I found out that no one was living there at the time it was being redone to get ready to rent out the apartments. The place is just really scary I always see for rent signs out side of it. its a beautiful place now that it has been finished but there must be a reason such a nice place cant keep tenants.”