One of the most famous bits of literary advice in the 20th Century was Sherwood Anderson’s suggestion that William Faulkner write not about aviators and New Orleans bohemians (the subjects of his first two novels) but about that “little postage stamp of native soil” he knew so well, Jefferson County, Mississippi, which he called Yoknapatawpha County, which became the subject of his life’s work.
Lorenzo Madalena is no William Faulkner, but he also knew “a little postage stamp of native soil” well, and that spot is located here in San Diego, bounded by Kettner Boulevard (called Water Street when Madalena lived there) on the west, Columbia Street on the east, Ash Street on the south, and Laurel Street on the north.
