The Hamel Brothers

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A stalwart old lady, pushing 80, cycles by. “Good morning, Virginia,” says Dan. “Need some air in those tires of yours?”

“I’ll be by tomorrow, Dan, thank you,” she replies.

Dan’s focus suddenly switches to the ocean in front of him. “See just beyond the break, just north of the buoy? Yeah, right there by those hungry seagulls. Dolphins!” A look of amazement comes over his face.

“We’re thinking of painting the castle peach,” he offers. Peach! Won’t people complain? “It’s our castle. We can do what we want. We’ve sold everything out of Hamel’s, from watermelons to waterbeds.”

“Police on bicycles originated at Hamel’s,” says Ray. “We provided keys to the cops looking for a cat burglar in the neighborhood. They would come after hours and take bikes in search of the burglar. He was eventually caught, and bikes on police beats caught on, too.”

Then there’s the annual Miss Mission Beach beauty contest. “The prettiest girls in town hung around here anyway, so why not have a contest?” says Ray. “Dan and

I learned never to judge because [if our girlfriends lost] they’d become our ex-girlfriends after the contest. At first, it was solely Hamel’s-sponsored. But after a while it attracted more than $50,000 in outside sponsorship. The Mission Beach Car Dealers Association threw in two Nissan hard-body pickups and $10,000 total cash prizes one year.”

“The first one got out of hand,” says Dan. “Guys were throwing stuff onto the stage, drinking, fighting and bordering on a riot. After that, the cops said they’d shut it down for good if that happened again. Well, I couldn’t have that, so I contacted the Hell’s Angels—everybody was using them. I told them I needed security for the event, that things were getting out of hand and the cops were going to shut me down. So Hell’s Angels were up on the roof of Hamel’s above the crowd, and they also mingled among the masses. Not so much as a catcall that year,” says Dan.

For a long time, the Hamel brothers were the closest thing Mission Beach had to a political action committee. Whenever locals wanted something, they called on Ray and Dan. “The only way to get something done as a private citizen is to have a press conference,” Dan says. “Put a banner up. Media is power. The media are extremely hungry. They have to find something to eat at all times. For example, I went on the air talking about how junkies get needles provided by the city, but the honest business owners like myself can’t get free sandbags to protect our businesses from El Niño’s wrath. A shipment of sand showed up within the hour, and the mayor was filling the first free sandbag for the business owners.”

But the boys are beginning to feel the pressures of time and age. “It’s not fun anymore,” says Ray. “Thirty years is a long time to do anything. I want to ride my bike on the Boardwalk and catch up on all the recreation time I’ve missed over the last 30 years working at ‘the castle.’ I’m a little burned out after 30 years.”

The castle is now on the market for $7 million.

“Boy, wouldn’t it be nice if some young go-getter with fire in his veins whipped this place into shape?” Dan asks. “There’s

a lot of things that can be done here. We used to have a $300,000 mail-order company. But I just didn’t need the headaches anymore. That’s where I am now. I want to retire. I want to load up my RV with Robyn, my wife; Hammer, my English bull terrier; and Brute, my pot-bellied pig. “

Dan is a happily married man. He and Robyn Swanson, a girl he met at the gym, dated for seven years and have been happily married for eight. They live in Pacific Beach, with another home in Julian.

Ray also lives in Pacific Beach, with a ranch in Julian. But alone. He married one of his beauty-contest contenders but divorced in ’97. “Marrying her was the stupidest thing I’ve ever done,” he comments.

What would Mission Beach do without the Hamel brothers? What would guys like me do without the Hamel brothers? I’m personal trainer to Dan now, so he’d be sorely missed. And Ray’s been a player in the evolution of San Diego’s beach culture for years. He’s the self-appointed spokesperson, the overseer of a once-vast empire.

The cars, the girls, the real estate—Ray’s been there and done that. He and his brother Dan own Mission Beach. With Ray’s politically incorrect jokes and Dan’s smooth storytelling, they’ve become legends.

Our interview is over. The boys have work to do in the store. I push on for the rest of my workout. Then I’ll hit the gym. But I can’t help hoping nobody has the money for that $7 million castle.
Don Fells is a personal trainer, avid athlete and observer of local lore. His privately published book, San Diego Beach Culture, is available at 858-488-5050.

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