Saturday, April 30, 2022

Knave - Oakland Tribune, 03 Mar 1940

Wiedoeft and Tate

Show business lost two of its most colorful d figures last week in the deaths of Rudy Wiedoeft, the saxophone king, and Harry Tate, the vaudevillian. Wiedoeft, California-born son of an orchestra leader, was a professional clarinetist when he was 11 years of age. By the time he had reached manhood his saxophone playing was setting a standard for others to follow. A young Yale undergrad, for example, changed his own name of Hubert Prior to Rudy Vallee. Wiedoeft owed much of his success to the friendly aid given him by Paul Whiteman. The two had grown up together when Wiedoeft's father was an orchestra leader in Denver, but his lasting fame was due to his own proficiency both as a virtuoso and a composer. Wiedoeft's passing was tragic because of his comparative youth - he was 46 - and made even more poignant by the collapse and death of his aged mother when she heard the news. ... Harry Tate represented quite another school of popular entertainment, vaudeville, and his death at 67 was due to the war that left him unscathed when it was fought some twenty years ago. Tate died from a head injury sustained from a shell splinter during a German air raid on the Scottish coast. He was. watching the aerial action when the fragment struck, blindness in one eye setting in before death. For nearly 40 years Tate was a top figure in the English 'alls and the American two-a-day. His "Motoring” sketch, later done in the United States by Harry Langdon, was a masterpiece of slapstick satire; and his "Golfing" sketch was another bit of hilarity. He is said to have collaborated with W. C. Fields on the latter's version of golfing. The two men were great cronies in the old days.

What Is the Hidden Story of the Strange Indian Shell Mounds? - San Francisco Chronicle, 18 Dec 1904

What Is the Hidden Story of the Strange Indian Shell Mounds?

THE Indian shell-heaps, or mounds, of California have ever been a source of wonder. They are to be found from one end of the State to the other, wherever a beach, bay or estuary gave the savages an opportunity to gather the succulent bivalve. The origin of these mounds is shrouded in mystery, and, strange as it may seem, little effort-has ever been made to fathom it. Paul Schumacher of the Smithsonian Institution published a brief account of his investigations of a mound in San Luis Obispo county in 1874, since which time, no other article worthy of note dealing with the subject has appeared. The University of California has in preparation a pamphlet on the result of the investigations of the shell mounds of Berkeley and Shell Mound.

IS OF INDIAN ORIGIN. - The Alameda Mound Thus Described. - San Francisco Chronicle, 06 Aug 1894

See also ANCIENT RELICS. - Theo. H. Hittell Talks More About Them. - Alameda Daily Argus, 06 Aug 1894 and THE MOUNDS OF ALAMEDA - The San Francisco Call, 17 Oct 1894.

IS OF INDIAN ORIGIN

The Alameda Mound Thus Described.

Scientists Will Make More Research.

Views of a Local Student Upon Some of the Relics Found Lately.

It is not unlikely that the Academy of Sciences will take a direct hand in further excavations in the old mound on the Sather tract at Alameda. Some local scientists and members of the academy express the belief that valuable additions to the museum would result from a proper search of the soil of the mound. At present the excavations are made to little purpose, so far as scientific interests are concerned. Those who seek for curios are impelled more from a spirit of curiosity than scientific research.

THE MOUNDS OF ALAMEDA - The San Francisco Call, 17 Oct 1894

See also ANCIENT RELICS. - Theo. H. Hittell Talks More About Them. - Alameda Daily Argus, 06 Aug 1894 and IS OF INDIAN ORIGIN. - The Alameda Mound Thus Described. - San Francisco Chronicle, 06 Aug 1894.

THE MOUNDS OF ALAMEDA.

The paper which was read on Monday by Mr. Theodore H. Hittell before the Academy of Sciences on the kitchen middens in Alameda County increases our knowledge of those interesting historical remains. The existence of the middens was known long ago. They were noticed by the padres in the last century. But thus far they have furnished little material for the archæologist. They are simply mounds consisting of oyster shells mingled with a few clam shells - the refuse of the meals on which the aboriginal Indians lived. They are, in fact, reproductions of the Danish shell heaps which have been so often described, and of the mounds which have been examined on the shores of the Andaman Islands.

ANCIENT RELICS. - Theo. H. Hittell Talks More About Them. - Alameda Daily Argus, 06 Aug 1894

See also IS OF INDIAN ORIGIN. - The Alameda Mound Thus Described. - San Francisco Chronicle, 06 Aug 1894 and THE MOUNDS OF ALAMEDA - The San Francisco Call, 17 Oct 1894.

ANCIENT RELICS.

Theo. H. Hittell Talks More About Them.

When the Mound is Leveled a Competent Man From the Academy of Sciences will be Present.

Theodore H. Hittell, the ethnologist of the Academy of Sciences, who visited the shell mound on the Sather tract last week, was interviewed yesterday on the subject.

The first Californians - Oakland Tribune, 01 Apr 1951

This article's photos did not survive the transition to print, then digital archiving, then this blog very well. I've left two out, that are basically unusable, see newspaper clipping at bottom of this post. More about shellmounds here.

The first Californians

Shellmounds throughout the Bay area tell us local Indian history for thousands of years

Look below. Same locale (from different camera angle) before industry arrived.

Huge shipyards and booming industries cover the Richmond shellmound site today.

Relics of Explorer's Ship Wrecked at Drake's Bay in 1595 Reveal Historic Data - The Press Democrat, 19 Dec 1941

Relics of Explorer's Ship Wrecked at Drake's Bay in 1595 Reveal Historic Data

SAN FRANCISCO, Dec. 18 (UP) - The important historical discovery of corroded ship's spikes and fragments of 16th century Chinese porcelain on the shore of Drake's bay in Marin county was disclosed this week.

Marin's History Found In Mounds

Marin's wealth in historic Indian mounds is rapidly disappearing before the onslaught of bulldozers and new construction.

Dr. Herbert S. Salisbury of San Rafael has reconstructed a part of Indian life here in Marin through remains of the giant shell mounds built over thousands of years. He expresses regret that more mounds and skeletons have not been preserved for scientific study.

Knave - Oakland Tribune,14 Oct 1956

I've left out the first few paragraphs, which are current events of October, 1956. You can read them in the clipping at the bottom of this page. - MF

It's Never Too Late

A package from Oakland is on its way to the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.Ç., this week carrying what is believed to be a distress flag used by Lieut. Adolphus W. Greely's Lady Franklin Bay Expedition of 1881-84. The flag came to light in the Oakland home of Mrs. Ina Mae Wynn recently after more than 72 years of preservation at the hands of Mrs. Wynn and her father, the late Hiram Bates. It was saved as a relic of the Greely expedition by Mr. Bates along with a book of Common Prayer which contains the signature of Nathaniel R. Usher, a lieutenant aboard the steamer Bear and a member of the party which rescued the last seven members of the Lady Franklin Bay group. Eighteen of their comrades had died of starvation and exposure in the frozen north. Their claim to fame was that they had reached the highest latitude ever attained by men up to that time. "I was eight years old and lived in Brooklyn, N.Y., with my parents when my father brought the flag and prayer book home," Mrs. Wynn recalls. "He had gone down to the waterfront to greet a friend who was a member of the rescue party. Whether that friend was Lieutenant Usher I do not remember, but Usher's name is in the prayer book. Father said the two items were given him as souvenirs. In later years we moved from place to place; from Brooklyn to the Middle West, then to Washington; and finally to California. But always, these two relics were carried along. Never have I forgotten my father's plea to continually guard and preserve them. After his death a few years ago I often thought about turning them over to a museum. I hope it isn't too late."

EXCAVATE INDIAN MOUNDS

LOCAL SCIENTIFIC WORK

West Berkeley Man Makes a Valuable Presentation to the University.

An excavation of the shell beds about the bay is about to be commenced by University students under the direction of Professor J. C. Merriam and Vance C. Osmont, a graduate student. Three of these mounds, upon which work will be commenced at once are located at West Berkeley, Shell Mound and Sausalito.

Relics From Drake's Bay Shell Mound Linked to Ill-Fated Spanish Expedition - Oakland Tribune, 10 Dec 1950

Relics From Drake's Bay Shell Mound Linked to Ill-Fated Spanish Expedition

BERKELEY, Dec. 9. - An exciting tale of Spanish exploration lies back of some tiny fragments of porcelain currently on exhibition at the University of California Library.

BERKELEY SCIENTISTS DELVING INTO THE PAST

File Report of Investigation in Earth Mounds at Emeryville

TEN GRAVES FOUND

Light Is Thrown on Life of Indians During the Early Days

BERKELEY, July 6. - The curtain that hides the past of those Indian tribes which once lived on the shores of San Francisco bay is lifted in part by Professor Max Uhle, whose investigations into the mysteries of the earth mounds at Emeryville resulted in the bringing to light of many facts hitherto unknown about these primitive Indians and their ways of living.

SKULL FOUND IN BACKYARD HELD OF INDIAN ORIGIN

RICHMOND, Dec. 5 - A human skull found Thanksgiving Day during the razing of a backyard shed is probably that of an American Indian, Dr. William Thompson, autopsy surgeon, disclosed today.

SKELETONS AND RELICS FOUND

Old Indian Cemetery in West Berkeley is Uncovered.

BERKELEY, June 2. - Professor J. C. Merriam, of the department of Paleontology and Historical Geology at the State University, has made some very interesting discoveries concerning the inhabitants of this coast. With a force of men, Professor Merriam has been excavating in the shell mounds of West Berkeley and has already unearthed nearly twenty skeletons of Indians. Just how long they have been buried cannot be determined, until the professor makes the proper investigation.

Relics of the Ancient Indian Culture - Santa Cruz Sentinel, 12 Jul 1907

Relics of the Ancient Indian Culture

BERKELEY, July 11. - The suburban trains from Berkeley to San Francisco pass several times hourly through a little station called Emeryville; but few passengers as they casually observe through the car windows the pavilion-crowned mound there located, have any conception of the archaeological significance of this relic of ancient Indian culture. Yet this and other similar mounds are almost the only witnesses of a primitive stage of culture which once obtained among the inhabitants of the locality. An interesting one hundred page bulletin by Dr. Max Uhle, just issued by the University of California press, is therefore a timely and welcome publication. The valuable data therein set forth is the result of several years' excavation instituted in 1902 by Professor Merriam and the writer of the bulletin, with funds generously provided by Mrs. Phoebe A. Hearst. The mound, which was probably first observed by the famous traveler, Fages, in 1774, now forms a conspicuous feature of the recreation grounds known as Shellmound park. This location was selected that the inhabitants might avail themselves of the fresh water flowing in the nearby creek known as Temescal. The mound like others, was not, as is often erroneously stated, a burial ground, but rather the site for dwelling places or abodes for the living. There are indeed, indications of some few burials having been made in the vicinity, but these are to be explained by the fact that many tribes of a low grade of civilization follow the custom of burying their dead underneath their feet in the ground upon which they live, in order to protect the graves against disturbance, and also to enjoy the protection of the spirits of the dead against their enemies.

THIS WAS YOUR TOWN

Sausalito was spelled "Saucelito" back in 1874, at least by some of the free-wheeling spellers of the period, but the shell mounds were the shell mounds, even then. Witness this item which appeared in The Tribune 85 years ago: “A communication was received from James Barron calling the attention of the Academy of Sciences to the shell mounds near Saucelito and advising that arrangements be made for opening them.' ... So says the report of a late meeting of the Academy of Sciences. It reminds us of an item in the shell line unearthed lately at Brooklyn by the Contra Costa Water Company while digging a trench for a main on Adams St. The cashier of the company informs us that the shells were those of the oyster. How they got so far up from tidewater, perhaps the men of science can tell."

S. F. GETS LAST LOOK AT LOST-AGE RELICS

Bedrock of This State's Early History to Be Removed From Affiliated Colleges

The "Bed Rock of California History" collection of remains from the Shell Mound builders and other earliest inhabitants of San Francisco and the bay region, which has been on view at the University Museum of Anthropology at the Affiliated Colleges for the past two months as the current display in the Revolving Exhibit Room, will be open to the public for the last time to-day. The following day the collection will be withdrawn and the installation of an entirely new exhibit the opening of whileh is to be announced in about two weeks, will be begun.

Indian Mounds Protected

"Digging" The Past At Coyote Hills

Although chain link fencing has been erected to protect three ancient Indian habitations under exploration at the new Coyote Hills Regional Park, the public will have clear views of just what goes on in an archaeological “dig."

Tribune photo ARCHEOLOGISTS_James Bennyhoff (left) and Albert B. Elsasser, University of California archeologists, excavate at the south eastern edge of the Emeryville Indian shellmound. They hit an underground stream four feet down.

U.C. Pair Probe Indian Shellmound Mystery

University of California archaeologists have dug down into the very bedrock of human existence in the Bay Area in an attempt to fix the precise date of the origin of Emeryville's famed Indian shellmound.

INDIANS ONCE HUNTED SEAL ROCK SEA LIONS - Oakland Tribune, 06 Jul 1913

INDIANS ONCE HUNTED SEAL ROCK SEA LIONS

SAN FRANCISCO, July 5. - "Aboriginal San Francisco” is the display beginning Sunday in the "52 exhibits a year' section at the Affiliated Colleges Museum. This accession was excavated from probably the last Indian shellmound within the city limits of San Francisco. Located in the portion of the Presidio used by the Exposition, it was not discovered until last fall, just before the swamp in which it lay imbedded and nearly submerged was covered by silt pumped up by the Exposition dredgers. Two days' work by these giants forever obliterated the remains which it took a tribo of savages centuries to accumulate.

WHERE PREHISTORIC MAN FILED HIGH ACCUMULATIONS OF SHELLS AND BONĖS

EMERYVILLE SHELLMOUND AS SEEN FROM THE BAY. THE CUT MADE IN THE SIDE OF THE MOUND HAD BEEN FILLED WHEN THE PHOTOGRAPH WAS TAKEN, BUT SITE OF EXCAVATION IS SEEN IN THE LIGHT AREA ON THE WESTERN SLOPE

Emeryville Shellmound Aboriginal Crematory in Stone Age

BERKELEY, July 27. One of the most interesting works among the many publications issued by the University of California dealing with American Archaeology and Ethnology, is the one recently off the University Press, "The Emeryville Shellmound" by Dr. Max Uhle. In this work Dr. Uhle tells of the excavations conducted by Professor John C. Merriam and the writer in the spring of 1902.

PREPARES REPORT OF SHELL MOUNDS - The Berkeley Gazette, 16 Sep 1908

PREPARES REPORT ON SHELLMOUNDS

The survey of the Indian shellmounds about the bay, which has been going on for some time under the supervision of the department of anthropology, has been completed and N. C. Nelson, who was in charge of the work, is preparing his report.

Nearly 300 of these shellmounds about San Francisco bay have been located and mapped. Many of these mounds have been carted away to serve as road material, but traces of them were left. Numbers of them, by their thickness and depth, indicate great antiquity. They also show that many Indians must have been in these regions in an early day. The work has been under the immediate supervision of J. C. Merriam, associate professor of paleontology.

For Dry-Color Manufacture

An aeroplane view of the C. K. Williams and company plant at the old Shellmound Park site. This plant is the western branch of the concern whose main establishment is at Easton, Pennsylvania. Reed and Corlett were the architects and H. A. Christensen, the general contractor for the building.

Dry Color Plant Built On Site of Old Indian Village

ANCIENT RELICS OF STATE SHOWN

Museum Exhibit Earliest Remains of Prehistoric Inhabitants of San Francisco

A new permanent exhibit showing the earliest remains of the prehistoric inhabitants of San Francisco will be opened to-day at the University of California Museum of Anthropology at the Affiliated Colleges. It is the California Shellmound Exhibit. In it there have been brought together implements, bones and relics of the bygone centuries, from so remote a period that even tradition fails to record their origin.

The Ohlone: An Archaeological Park In Bay Area shellmound - Santa Cruz Sentinel, 15 Apr 1973

The Ohlone: An Archaeological Park In Bay Area

JOANN DEAN, Ranger

East Bay Region Parks

On the eastern shore of South San Francisco Bay rised a miniature mountain range aptly named Coyote Hills. Now considered "Land-islands," masses of greenstone and chert rock surrounded by sediment 600 feet deep, the Coyote Hills were surrounded by Bay waters at one point in their geologic history, and as recently as 1917, by a marshy delta fed by Alameda Creek.

Knave - Oakland Tribune, 27 Nov 1960

IT HAS been 50 years since the roar of horse racing fans echoed from Emeryville, but even though the landmarks have been erased the memories linger on. George Edward Wiard, the man who tells this story, was born on Feb. 7, 1871, in a house that straddled one of the smaller Indian shell mounds in Emeryville's old Shellmound Park. He is the son of Edward and Mary Jane Wiard and will celebrate his 90th birthday anniversary next February. His mother died one year before her husband, Edward, passed away in 1885. George was then 14, and went to live with a sister, Mrs. Elizabeth Warren, in East Oakland. For almost two years he had been a student at McClure's Military Academy in Oakland. But he remembers best the hours he spent shelling peas, washing dishes and doing chores for his mother who was in charge of the hotel at the Oakland Trotting Park, built and operated by Edward Wiard. It was in this hotel dining room that former President Ulysses S. Grant dined when he was a track guest on Oct. 25, 1879 - the day the famous racehorse St. Julian broke the world's trotting record to become king of the turf. There was also a long period when Alameda County held its annual fairs at the Oakland Trotting Park. Numerous sheds were built by Edward Wiard for the display of prized cattle, sheep and hogs. Shellmound Park was a big attraction, too. The major Indian shell mound of the area was in Shellmound Park, a property leased by the elder Wiard to Capt. Ludwig Siebe and still later to his son, William Siebe, present city clerk of Emeryville. "I remember," says George Wiard, "sitting on top of that big shell mound and yelling with all the force of my boyish lungs. Back would come the most astounding echo, loud and clear. It was a curious thing. A park pavillion was later built over the mound, with a tier of steps leading up." Wiard also recalls the 7-foot fence that completely surrounded the Oakland Trotting Park, the barges unloading manure from San Francisco on the beach so it could be hauled up and mixed with the turf to make the track soft and spongy. "The bay waters were then clear and blue, and I roamed for hours along the shore picking up bright colored shells. Temescal Creek meandered through both the Oakland Trotting Park and Shellmound Park. At the Trotting Park the racetrack crossed the creek twice. It was bridged between the first quarter-mile pole and half-mile pole, and again between the three-quarter-mile post and the finish wire. My father frequently caught trout in the Temescal, but I never did. I preferred to hunt."

Museum Curator Ilustrate Talk on Shell-Mounds - The Times San Mateo, California, 20 Feb 1936

Museum Curator Illustrate Talk On 'Shell-Mounds'

Stating that the Indians of North America are of the Mongoloid race, coming a million years ago from East Asia over Bering strait, and that the California Indians have been here a long time, Edward W. Gifford, curator of the anthropological museum at the University of California, gave an inspirational lecture on "California Indian Shell-Mounds" before the San Mateo County Historical association. Several junior college instructors, students, and school principals were in attendance last evening.

SHELLMOUNDS SHOW HABITS OF INDIANS

Important discoveries as to the prehistoric inhabitants of the region of San Francisco bay have been made by a party of university students, under the direction of N. C. Nelson of the anthropological museum of the University of California, who has returned from a month's excavations in the shell mounds of Marin county.

Knave - Oakland Tribune, 09 Dec 1928

I've left out the first few paragraphs, which are current events of December, 1928. You can read them in the clipping at the bottom of this page. - MF

Lotta's Fountain

A great stir has been occasioned by the proposal to remove Lotta's Fountain and it remains to be seen what will be done. Those who hold the story of the fountain and its donor dear, and would keep in their city those precious reminders of the past, find it difficult to approach this argument with even temper. On both sides - letters from the public and editorials in our papers - one finds more of sentiment and eloquence than fact. It is true that as art is judged, the fountain is not momentous. Recalling the fact that, it was patched up in an effort at "beautification," it is not as it was when Lotta bestowed it upon the city of her heart. We who are for preserving the reminder, must admit that, and concede, too, that the city has not done its full duty toward making the fountain surroundings presentable. One may find there boxes and papers, the clutter of the street, and every appearance of disorder. If it is an impediment to traffic, it is made more so by the throng of newsboys who use it as a base of operations. There is a call, perhaps, for those who would keep the relic and its memories, to ask that the surrounding base be made smaller, the loafing and gathering area reduced, and the pillar stand as a division marker for traffic. It might be saved and serve a purpose - but a modern world, sooner or later, will tear it down unless its friends use all the arguments at their disposal.

DISCOVER CHILD'S SKELETON IN SHELLMOUND ON CAMPUS - The Berkeley Gazette, 03 Aug 1907

DISCOVER CHILD'S SKELETON IN SHELLMOUND ON CAMPUS

Near the spot where the skeleton of an Indian belonging to a prehistoric tribe was found by workmen digging a trench on the University grounds yesterday, the skeleton of a child was found this morning in a further investigation by Prof. J. C. Merriam of the department of palaeontology at the University. The skeleton was firmly embedded in the shell layer and was situated about 100 feet west of the first discovery.

FINAL REPORT IS WRITTEN ON OLD SHELL-MOUND shellmound - The Times - San Mateo, California 17 Dec 1926

FINAL REPORT IS WRITTEN ON OLD SHELL-MOUND

By United Press

BERKELEY, Cal. Dec. 17. - Probably the last word has been said concerning Indians who inhabited the shores of San Francisco bay, in “Final Report on Emeryville Shellmound," compiled by Egbert Scheney of the University of California.

Old Shellmound Park - Emeryville 'History' Goes Back to 2000 B.C. - Oakland Tribune, 07 Aug 1949

Old Shellmound Park

Emeryville 'History' Goes Back to 2000 B.C.

- By ROBERT STINNETT

Emeryville has a "link" with the past - a past so old that it ventures back before the birth of Christ to probably 2000 B. C.

This "link" has served as a pivot whereby University of California archaeologists, culminating a study begun almost 50 years ago, have been able to determine that human culture was flourishing in the Bay Area hundreds of years before Caesar - even before Salome begged for the head of John the Baptist.

ABOUT SHELL-MOUNDS.

There are a number of shellmounds in the suburbs of Oakland, which will some day attract a great deal of attention. The best known of these are, the one at the head of the San Antonio estuary; the one on Strawberry Creek, near Berkeley; and the one near the race-course, a half-way point on the steam-railroad between Oakland and Berkeley. The latter mound is very perfect in contour, covering probably half an acre, and is between forty and sixty feet in hight. A great many theories have been propounded as to the origin of these mounds, their antiquity, etc.