When the work crews started pulling down the old buildings and barracks at the closed El Toro Marine base, they expected to find old appliances, faucets and hardware that, if they were lucky, might be worth salvaging.
But the unexpected turned up: a painting of the flag-raising at Iwo Jima, mess hall recipes calling for pounds of butter for shortbread cookies, faded photographs and street signs bearing the names of fabled military battles such as Inchon and Midway.
In some of the buildings, the Marines had taken everything. But in others, there were items that, aside from dust, looked as if the soldiers had left just yesterday.
"I was walking through a large office and found these recipes sitting there as if someone just had been working on them," said Carol Schroeder Wold, a community affairs official with Lennar Corp., which is razing the base for private development.
It's as if Wold and Habitat for Humanity workers, who are salvaging the sprawling 4,700-acre facility, opened a door into "The Twilight Zone" instead of drafty Marine barracks and warehouses.
"It's eerie sometimes," said Jason McKinstry, president of Habitat's resource center in Corona. "I remember walking into a classroom, and the desks were still there lined up, and there was chalk on the blackboard.
"It's like they had class on Thursday and decided not to return."
The base, which was officially closed eight years ago, is set to begin life anew as a community encircling a vast urban park that is expected to cost more than $1 billion.
During the demolition of the base, workers have come across Civil Engineer Corps plaques, ornamental signs listing each commandant since 1943, boxes of old radio parts, even ladders used by ground crew to service A-6 Intruders.
Habitat for Humanity workers found the Iwo Jima painting, which was used as a glass partition separating an aircraft ground equipment maintenance office from a conference room.
The Marines apparently had viewed the see-through glass as a distraction and in 1994, with a projector and knives, outlined the famed image and hand-painted the flag-raising, Habitat officials said.
The painting and hundreds of other items are being inventoried and stored for a proposed museum at the site.
Over the last year, Habitat has gleaned dozens of former military offices, buildings and homes, extracting more than 3 million pounds of materials. Doors, windows, appliances, cabinets and other abandoned items have been recycled to nonprofits, Habitat officials said.
