Glass Beach is a unique beach, not because nature made it that way, but
because time and the pounding surf have corrected one of man’s mistakes.
In the early 20th century, Fort Bragg residents threw their household
garbage over the cliffs above what is now Glass Beach. It is hard to
imagine this happening today, but back then people dumped all kinds of
refuse straight into the ocean, including old cars, and their household
garbage, which of course included lots of glass.
Beginning in 1949, the area around Glass Beach became a public dump, and
locals referred to it as “The Dumps.” Sometimes fires were lit to
reduce the size of the trash pile, however in 1967, the city leaders
closed the area. Over the next several decades the pounding waves
cleansed the beach, wearing down the discarded glass into the small,
smooth, colored trinkets that cover the beach today.