Before the Gaslamp: Inside San Diego's Wild Stingaree District

Before the Gaslamp: Inside San Diego's Wild Stingaree District | San Diego Uncovered

San Diego Uncovered

Before the Gaslamp: Inside San Diego's Wild Stingaree District

Today, San Diego's Gaslamp Quarter is known for restaurants, rooftop bars, hotels, nightlife and historic architecture.

A little more than a century ago, many of those same downtown blocks had a very different reputation.

The neighborhood was known as the Stingaree—a notorious district associated with saloons, gambling, prostitution, crowded lodging houses and a collection of businesses that respectable San Diegans often preferred not to discuss.

Then, as San Diego prepared to present itself to the world, city reformers decided the Stingaree had to go.

What followed was one of the most fascinating—and complicated—urban cleanup campaigns in San Diego history.

Where Was the Stingaree?

Historical descriptions generally place the core of the Stingaree in the southern portion of what we now associate with downtown San Diego and the Gaslamp Quarter. One San Diego History Center account describes the district as extending roughly from Fifth Street west toward First Avenue and from K Street north toward Market Street.

In the late nineteenth century, this was close to the waterfront and the wharves that connected a young San Diego with arriving passengers, sailors, laborers, merchants and travelers.

That location was good for legitimate commerce.

It was also ideal for saloons, gambling houses, inexpensive lodging and other businesses catering to men arriving through the port.

Why Was It Called the "Stingaree"?

Even the neighborhood's name comes with a little mystery.

According to research published by the San Diego History Center, buildings on lower Fifth Street were being referred to as Stingaree Row or the Stingaree Block by the early 1880s.

Another explanation is more colorful.

The tidal flats along San Diego's waterfront were associated with stingrays, historically called stingarees. A person visiting the neighborhood, the joke went, might also wind up getting "stung."

The exact origin of the nickname isn't certain, but by the early twentieth century San Diegans clearly understood what people meant when they talked about the Stingaree.

This Was San Diego's Red-Light District

Like many growing American port cities, San Diego developed what officials often called a "restricted district."

Rather than eliminating prostitution and gambling entirely, authorities often concentrated them in a particular part of town where police believed the activity could be watched and controlled.

By 1912, the Stingaree had grown into a thriving vice district.

San Diego History Center research estimates that more than 100 women were working in the district at the time, living and working in everything from larger houses to tiny rooms commonly called "cribs."

Saloons and gambling establishments added to the neighborhood's reputation.

But there was another important part of the story that is easy to overlook: the area south of Market Street was also home to immigrant communities, including many Chinese residents who faced discriminatory laws, segregation and limited housing choices.

In other words, the Stingaree wasn't simply a collection of vice businesses. It was a complicated working-class waterfront neighborhood.

San Diego Was About to Invite the World to Town

By the early 1910s, San Diego had very big ambitions.

The city was preparing for the Panama-California Exposition of 1915 in Balboa Park, an event designed to advertise San Diego nationally and help establish the city as a major destination and commercial center.

Civic leaders wanted visitors to see sunshine, beautiful architecture, opportunity and a modern city on the rise.

A notorious red-light district sitting close to the waterfront didn't fit that image.

Reformers organized a Vice Suppression Committee, sometimes derisively called the Purity League, and pushed city officials to close the district.

More than 200 prominent residents reportedly signed a petition calling for action.

Police Didn't Necessarily Think Closing It Was a Good Idea

Here's where the story becomes more complicated.

San Diego's police did not initially embrace the idea of eliminating the district.

Police Chief Keno Wilson argued that keeping prostitution concentrated in one area made it easier for officers to know where the activity was taking place and who was involved.

Close the Stingaree, police warned, and the same activity might simply scatter into residential neighborhoods throughout San Diego.

That prediction turned out to be remarkably important.

The Great Stingaree Raid of 1912

Eventually, city officials ordered the red-light district closed.

On the morning of November 10, 1912, San Diego police surrounded the district.

According to the San Diego History Center, Chief Wilson was joined by approximately 30 patrolmen and the city's detective force.

Officers blocked entrances and began taking women from the district to police headquarters.

Some women apparently received enough advance warning to pack their belongings and leave by train before the operation began. Others remained and waited to see what would happen.

It was supposed to mark the end of San Diego's notorious Stingaree.

But eliminating a neighborhood was much easier than eliminating the behavior that had taken place there.

The Police Chief's Prediction Came True

After the district was closed, prostitution did not disappear from San Diego.

Historical accounts describe activity moving into other parts of the city, including residential neighborhoods and properties along El Cajon Boulevard.

Arrest records also suggest that prostitution-related enforcement continued well after the famous raid.

Research published in the Journal of San Diego History found 92 arrests for prostitution-related offenses in 1913, with that number more than doubling the following year.

In other words, the 1912 raid dramatically changed the neighborhood—but it did not instantly solve the underlying social problem.

The Cleanup Continued for Years

San Diego's effort to transform the Stingaree wasn't limited to one dramatic police raid.

Health officials also targeted deteriorated buildings and overcrowded living conditions.

Between 1912 and 1916, health inspector Walter Bellon supervised the removal of approximately 120 structures in the area and condemned more than 500 interior rooms, according to historical research.

State law also changed.

California's 1913 Red Light Abatement Act gave authorities additional tools to treat properties used for prostitution as public nuisances that could be closed through legal action.

Gambling Didn't Disappear Either

Vice enforcement continued after the red-light district was officially closed.

One particularly dramatic episode came in August 1915, when police conducted a large gambling raid in Chinatown near Third and J Streets.

Officers reportedly arrived with search warrants and axes, smashing through doors while other officers attempted to block alley exits.

Historical accounts say dozens of gamblers escaped through hidden exits while 49 people were taken to jail.

It's a scene that sounds more like a Hollywood gangster movie than the history of downtown San Diego.

From the Stingaree to the Gaslamp Quarter

If you walk through the Gaslamp today, it can be difficult to imagine how different this part of San Diego once was.

Historic Victorian-era buildings now stand beside restaurants, hotels, rooftop lounges, shops and entertainment venues.

The transformation didn't happen overnight.

Downtown went through repeated cycles of growth, decline, redevelopment and preservation throughout the twentieth century before the historic Gaslamp Quarter emerged as the district visitors recognize today.

But hidden beneath the polished restaurants and restored façades is the story of the Stingaree—a waterfront neighborhood San Diego once tried very hard to erase from its public image.

The Part of the Story Worth Remembering

It's tempting to tell the Stingaree story simply as a tale of colorful criminals, saloons and "shady ladies."

The real history is more interesting.

The district reflected many of the forces shaping early San Diego: immigration, segregation, waterfront commerce, poverty, policing, moral reform, rapid growth and the city's desire to reinvent itself as a respectable destination.

And when San Diego tried to solve one problem by wiping a neighborhood off the map, some of that problem simply moved somewhere else.

More than a century later, the Stingaree remains a fascinating reminder that the Gaslamp Quarter has always been about much more than nightlife.

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Sources & Further Reading

• San Diego History Center — When the Red Lights Went Out in San Diego
• San Diego History Center — Sin Diego: The Stingaree
• Journal of San Diego History — Prostitutes, Progressives, and Police
• San Diego History Center — SD250