MAN and woman of the year, Damien Lorton and Jennifer Stewart, named by the Garden Grove Chamber of Commerce (Chamber photo).

Main Street Dept.: Downtowns are more popular than ever. Garden Grove and Huntington Beach have successful centers and Westminster and Stanton are seeking to establish their own.

Among the reasons that such areas persist as comfortable, hometown places that are cradles and resting places for memories and leisure are the personalities that populate them.

It’s therefore pleasant and appropriate that at Friday’s Garden Grove Chamber of Commerce Gala and Dinner, the honorees for Man and Woman of the Year were Damien Lorton of the Gem Theatre and Jennifer Stewart of Azteca Mexican Restaurant (and Crooners’s Lodge) on Main Street.

Garden Grove was founded in that area in 1874 and the Gem Theater dates back over 100 years, first as a silent film and vaudeville venue through a time as the only movie house at one time, to a period of closure and revivals (first in 1979 under the leadership of Tom Bradac) and more recently with Damien Lorton (and Nicole Cassesso) as the center of independent musical theater.

Lorton was honored not only for his artistic accomplishment as a director, performer, etc. but the degree that he enmeshed the Gem into the many aspects of local life. The center of town is now more illuminated than ever.

Stewart is not only a restaurateur but also a very talented artist, especially in the field of sculpture. The Azteca moved from another location in Garden Grove toward Main Street, and the successors (J.J. Jauregui) and now Stewart and partner Larry Vance sustain it as leaders of civic vitality with karaoke and Friday Night Car shows.

Both are doing much to bring and sustain the city’s original downtown and – appropriately enough – they have both served as presidents of the Garden Grove Downtown Business Association.

If you’ve not visited them or their king-(or queen)-doms, do it. There might be gold in that old backyard.