A LOOK BACK:Long-time resident is remembered for service

Over the New Year’s holiday, I received word from Arline Howard that Mike Vidal, a member of a pioneer Huntington Beach family, had passed away.

Many old-time Huntington Beach High Oilers remember Mike as the scion of a pioneer family, while others knew him as the owner of Mike’s Market, 207 Main St., in the early 1950s.

Mike’s lineage dates back to when his parents were still living in San Jose.

Frank Vidal and his wife left San Jose with their children to settle in Huntington Beach in 1908, at a time when it was a small beach town far from any big city.

It was right here on May 8, 1912 that Michael Anthony Vidal was born.

Mike attended Central Elementary when it was still a wood-frame school on Orange Avenue, between Fifth and Sixth streets.

When Mike was 11 years old, he and his classmates had the honor of studying in the new grammar school at 14th Street and Palm Avenue.

While Mike was busy learning his ABCs and doing his homework in our elementary school, his father Frank was busy working for the Huntington Beach Company to help feed his family of five children.

Mike was the youngest of the Vidal children. Others in the family included his sister Pauline and his three brothers Bob, Dan and Ray.

After leaving grammar school behind, Mike later attended Huntington Beach High School.

The school had been recently completed with new classrooms and buildings erected in 1926.

Mike was active in high school sports.

He won 15 letters in track, baseball, basketball and football.

A year before he graduated from, Mike and his three classmates — Carl Conrad, Willard Green and Al Koenig — set a school half-mile relay record that lasted for years.

After graduating from high school in 1931, Mike went on to attend a year at Santa Ana Junior College.

In 1933, Mike married Kathleen Hawes, the daughter of Dr. Ralph Hawes. They had two children, a daughter Marnie and a son Torry Michael.

Mike worked at the Standard Market at Main Street and Walnut Avenue.

He worked with Bob DeBritton for 12 years and in 1944 became the owner of the grocery department with Homer Robertson at the Standard Market.

When the Howard and Smith market location became available at 207 Main St., Mike moved his grocery department into it.

On Dec. 31, 1951 Mike’s Market opened, with Mike running the grocery department and Harry M. Gelvin of 702 11th St. running the meat department.

Mike then lived off Beach Boulevard at 1742 Speer Ave., in Huntington Beach.

Mike joined our Huntington Beach Chamber of Commerce as a member of its retail merchants division. He also served on the annexation and suburban relations committee.

Mike taught a Sunday school class of teens at the Methodist Church, served on the church’s finance board and was also a church trustee.

He worked with many of our local boys through the scout program.

Mike was district commissioner of the Boy Scouts and chairman of the Rotary Club’s Boy Scout Troop 2.

After Mike moved to Newport Beach, he worked at Richard’s Market until he retired in 1974.

He moved to Sedona, Arizona to live in the sun.

There, he liked to putter about his garden, watch sports on television and was an active member at a church there.

In November 2003, Mike returned to Huntington Beach to live with his granddaughter Lisa Mock and her husband Michael.

Mike was proud to be a Huntington Beach Oiler and he attended one of their annual picnics in Lake Park.

But as Christmas day arrived this year, Michael left not only his loved ones, but also the town he had been born in some 94 years earlier.