History
The name "University" (both for the neighborhood and nearby University Avenue) derives from a plan, originally boosted during the land boom of the 1880s, to build a university in the area, to be located on a tract of land later used for the State Normal School (predecessor to San Diego State College). The headquarters of San Diego Unified School district currently occupies the site near the corner of El Cajon and Park Boulevards.
On the far northern edge of this mesa, at the scenic rim of Mission Valley, an ostrich farm and public garden spot was constructed near what is now the corner of Adams Avenue and Park Boulevard. The little neighborhood of homes subsequently built on the site is still called Mission Cliff Gardens and still sports the original garden boundary wall of rounded stones. The gardens were a popular tourist site.
In the 1910s, University Heights became one of the many San Diego neighborhoods connected by the Class 1 streetcars and an extensive San Diego public transit system that was spurred by the Panama-California Exposition of 1915 and built by John D. Spreckels. Built in part to exclusively serve Mission Cliff Gardens, these streetcars became a fixture of this neighborhood until their retirement in 1939.
Read more about this topic: University Heights, San Diego
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