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."
Built in the 1860s
To the best of his memory, George Wiard says the old Oakland Trotting Park was under construction in the late 1860s. "I was two or three years old when father opened the Trotting Park," he says. "He put a man named Ranlett in charge as manager. Ranlett ran the track only one year, after which he built an inn on the southwest corner of Park Avenue and Hollis Street, practically at the gates of the trotting park. His inn was called the Ranlett Hotel. In later years the Town Hall went up on the southeast corner of Park and Hollis, and on the northeast corner was Dugan's cafe and hotel. George Dugan, proprietor, had been a noted jockey. John S. Emery, after whom Emeryville was named, held eight acres on the northwest corner of Hollis and Park and established what was known as the Oakland Cricket Grounds. My father and Emery contested ownership of those eight acres. Emery must have won. The suit caused hard feelings between the two men during the remainder of their lives. Because of Emery's eight acres father had to put the gates to the Oakland Trotting Park just beyond Emery's land and across what is now Hollis Street. When the track was completed Hollis Street was extended north to the big arched gateway of the Oakland Trotting Park. That was as far as Hollis Street went then. After Ranlett was disposed of as track manager my father made his own son-in-law, George M. Palmer, manager. He was at the helm when father lost the property due to an $81,000 mortgage. Judge John Mee of San Francisco bought it in. Palmer continued to manage the track for Judge Mee, but the loss of the property had a tragic effect on my father. He died in 1885 at the age of 77, a broken and disappointed man. It was much later that Tom Williams and the California Jockey Club took over and rebuilt the grandstand. The old grandstand was torn down, and the hotel that my parents operated at the track, with its verandas on both the first and second stories, was moved down by the Southern Pacific tracks near the iron works. The hotel eventually burned."
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| Sulky silks were favorites when the Oakland Trotting Park opened in the 1870s. Note inside track for running races. |
Shellmound Park
Years later Dugan's cafe was moved across Hollis Street to the northwest corner of Park Avenue and Hollis where Emery had once set up the Oakland Cricket Grounds. The fame of Dugan's continued on into the present century, even up to 1949 when flames lowered it to a heap of ashes. Later members of the Oakland Trotting Park are best recalled by William Siebe who was but four years old when George Edward Wiard left Emeryville in 1885. George never knew the gracious Tom Williams. But Bill Siebe remembers him as one of Emeryville's chief benefactors. "In those days when we had roads and very few sidewalks," remembers Siebe, "it was Tom Williams who kept the streets watered and the dust down. He also kept the same streets in repair, and helped our scattered but scanty population build sidewalks. He was a good-hearted man." Shellmound Park was the birthplace of William Siebe. He was born there on Nov. 10, 1881. His father, Capt. Ludwig Siebe, had become proprietor of Shellmound Park in 1878. He made Shellmound Park and its shooting range one of the outstanding spots in the entire bay region. One of the major events each year was Butcher's Day, held jointly in the California Jockey Club and Shellmound Park. All butcher shops around San Francisco Bay, including San Jose, were closed for that one day. The celebration began with a parade in San Francisco, after which everyone boarded a Southern Pacific ferry to Oakland and took the train to the race track and Shellmound Park. Every year the affair would attract 20,000 or more butchers and their friends. There were other events, too. They were so successful that Bill Siebe was still organizing and managing picnics when World War II ensnared the United States in 1941. The final Shellmound Park event was held on Oct. 5, 1924. It was the gala "Festival Program of the German Days."
The Slim Princess
The Knave: A few weeks ago I crossed the Nevada desert through Tonopah and Montgomery Pass to the old California town of Benton. The trip brought to mind the interesting story of "The Slim Princess." This is the story, not of a beautiful desert maiden, but of a narrow gauge desert railroad that rewarded its builders with exceedingly "slim" returns. That's the only reason for the name that I can think of, or have ever heard. In the days of the fabulous Comstock mines Darius O. Mills, New York financier, employed Henry Yerington to supervise and build a railroad from Carson City's Mound House station south to the Colorado River, with hope of tapping the rich mines in that area. The road was built in 1880-81 and ran down the Carson River to Churchill, then across the desert to Walker Lake, taking the east side of the lake to Hawthorne at the lower end. From there it headed for Tonopah, but took a strange turn southwest to the Candalaria mines and continued in that direction over Montgomery Pass into California. It ran through Benton and down the Owens Valley through Laws to Keeler, on the east shore of Owens Lake, at that time a large body of water. In the mountains above Keeler were the famous Cerro Gordo mines. There the railroad ended. When the road was completed D. O. Mills came West to ride on the first train. It took two days to travel from Mound House at Carson City through that desolate country to Keeler. A group of prominent people were on the train, and at Keeler they asked Mills what he thought of the railroad upon which he had spent vast sums of money. It was said he drew himself up majestically and said: "Gentlemen, we either built this road 300 miles too long or 300 years too soon." The road never paid expenses. In later years a branch line was built to Tonopah, but that was before the rich mines were discovered there. Heirs of D. O. Mills at that unfortunate moment sold the road to the Southern Pacific Co. and the following year news of Tonopah's vast riches broke upon the world, followed soon by the fabulous mines at Goldfield. A part of the old road, the Virginia City and Truckee, tapped something of the spoils in hauling the rich ores north to Reno, but the Southern Pacific spoiled that profit by building a short connection from the Tonopah road on the Carson River north of Hazen on a branch of the S. P. The old Colorado Railroad was indeed a "Slim Princess" for D. O. Mills.
Dimond Jubilee
These are jubilee days in Oakland's Dimond District where residents are celebrating the golden anniversary of the founding of St. Jarlath's parish. Last weekend a three-day festival climaxed festivities that will not conclude until Dec. 11 when a Festival High Mass is held at the church. Dimond residents boasted of their own post office from November 1891, through April 1908, and here too is the geographical center of Oakland. "It was in the early 1820s," reminds Mrs. Bernard Sheridan of Sheffield Ave., "that the King of Spain granted the Peralta family the land on which our community and parish stands. One of the Peralta haciendas stood only a few streets away from where St. Jarlath's now stands. The cowyards of this hacienda are now the playgrounds of Alexander Hamilton Junior High School, and the city blocks that comprise Dimond and Fruitvale were the Peralta pastures and fields. Dimond District was named for the Hugh Dimond family. But it was not always the domestic kind-of-a community, as at present. In the gay '90s it was one of the livelier spots on the Oakland side of the bay. Thousands crossed by the ferries on Sunday and holiday excursions to make merry at the amusement parks, dance halls and beer gardens of the Dimond area. Best remembered is Tepper's Garden, the gate of which stands on MacArthur Blvd. next to a garage at the corner of Dimond Ave. The Hermitage was a mecca for fashionable guests driven up in deluxe carriages. This was operated by Leon Faure, whose exceptional cuisine featuring squab included the choice of birds from the pigeon loft, prepared according to the customers wishes. The original six-storied Altenheim (destroyed by fire in 1907) looked down over the orchards dotted with small lumber mills.
Worth Remembering
"There are many Dimond residents who still remember the lusty poet Joaquin Miller in scarlet shirt and sporting a long white beard. He would stroll down Fruitvale Ave., one of the most beautiful streets in the area. Stately mansions with park-like gardens lined its wooden curbs. At Fruitvale and MacArthur, before the turn of the century, stood a nursery and apple orchard; 100 acres in all. It sold fór $30,000, a tidy sum even for that day. Guy's Drugstore now stands at the corner. The Bank of America corner was the site of a general store, while The Hermitage, mentioned earlier, occupied the corner where the new King's Drugstore now stands. A temperamental trolley known as the 'Dinkey took its time moving from Fruitvale Station up to this intersection. Another streetcar, coming from Oakland proper and terminating at the same place, required the aid of horses to get over the Altenheim hill. Changes came more rapid after the 1906 earthquake. Shops sprung up almost as rapidly as homes. It was in 1910 that St. Jarlaths put in appearance, a small wooden church directed by the Rev. Father Patrick McHugh. Parish borders stretched from the shores of Lake Merritt on up into the hills, a reach sufficiently great that the Irish priest found it necessary to travel via horseback to administer to his flock, regardless of weather. Dimond District's gay spots and picnic areas gradually gave way to homes and shops. Old mansions such as Don Peralta's rambling hacienda were torn down and their lovely gardens subdivided for smaller and more practical dwellings. Gone are the lamplighters, the German bands, the fashionable carriages. Gone, too, is the lusty poet, and the priest on horseback."
A Parish Is Born
Dr. Peter Conmy, Oakland city librarian, is among those to pay tribute to St. Jarlath's Golden Jubilee. "In 1910 the population of Oakland was dense in no district, and sparsely populated indeed was the area northeast of Lake Merritt," he reports. "In earlier times, at the foot of 14th Ave., the village of Clinton had developed. Later, in the area from the lake to 23rd Ave., blossomed the town of Brooklyn which was annexed to Oakland in 1872. That was the year the parish of St. Anthony was founded, a parish that served a vast area extending from the lake to San Leandro. Then Fruitvale developed and annexed itself to Oakland in 1910. In 1892 St. Elizabeth's Church was opened in Fruitvale. For a number of years this church held the status as a German National Church, and although for practical purposes it was attended by Catholics of the area, it was officially a part of St. Anthony's. Later, St. Elizabeth's was made a territorial parish with a far-flung boundary, the balance of the vast northeastern areas remaining under the jurisdiction of St. Anthony's. In 1900 Oakland had 66,960 residents, but by 1910 this had grown to 150,174 - more than doubling. Many who sought asylum at the time of San Francisco's 1906 disaster remained here permanently. New districts were developing, one notably in the territory converging on the intersection of Fruitvale Ave. and Hopkins St., as MacArthur Blvd. was then called. A survey of Catholics in this neighborhood and its tributarý territory convinced authorities that a new parish was in order. On March 10 Archbishop Riordan decreed the establishment of St. Jarlath's parish from areas principally in St. Anthony's and a small portion of St. Elizabeth's. The boundaries of the new parish were extensive, reaching Lake Merritt on the west, 28th St. on the south, 55th Ave. on the east, and the Contra Costa line on the north
The Name
"St. Jarlath,” continues Dr. Conmy, "was an Irish bishop of the fifth century; both a builder and an educator. The college which he founded became noted for its scholarship. The first pastor of St. Jarlath's in Oakland was the Rev. Patrick McHugh, himself an integral part of the Irish foreign missionary movement. Born in Ireland on Dec. 16, 1872, it is significant that he made his studies for the priesthood at All Hollows Seminary where he was ordained on June 5, 1898. Approximately 200 priests who at one time or another have served either the Archdiocese of San Francisco or the Diocese of Sacramento have come from All Hollows. Father McHugh had served as assistant pastor at Star of the Sea Church in San Francisco, St. Francis de Sales in Oakland, and for seven years immediately preceding his appointment to St. Jarlath's as assistant pastor of St. Anthony's, out of which his new parish was carved ... Through the good will of the Oakland city government, Mass was offered temporarily in a hall over a fire house. In May 1910 property at the corner of Fruitvale Avenue and Montana Street was purchased for $7,750, including a small residence. Next to thịs a church was built, with a seating capacity of 300 and a social hall attached. The church faced on Fruitvale Avenue, the hall had its entrance on Montana St. St. Jarlath's was ready for occupancy by December, and on Christmas Day in 1910 the pastor and his people joyfully gathered in the new edifice where Holy Mass was offered for the first time...
Down Memory Lane
Arthur R. McPhail wonders if there are any Knave readers who remember the taffy pulls of the Gay 90s. "A crowd of boys and girls would gather at one home or another and pour a can of molasses in a skillet,” he recalls. "They'd wait until it came to a boil, then set it to one side until it cooled. At the proper moment they would smear their hands with butter and then the couples would get busy and pull the molasses until it was ready to eat. While we were waiting for this we would indulge in songs popular at the time: 'Wait Till the Sun Shines Nellie,' 'Sweet Rosie O'Grady,' etc. A grand time was had by all. I know that everyone in those days played the game of 'Post Office' at one time or another. Remember? You'd get a stamp (a gentle step on your foot) or a letter (a gentle kiss) or, if you were real popular, a postage due (two kisses). The old game of Forfeits' was also a favorite. Here you had to give an article, and if you failed to perform what you were told to do a Judge would be named and the article held over the Judge's head. He would ask, 'Fine or Superfine?' (Fine would mean a boy, Superfine a girl.) You had to do what the Judge said to win the return of the forfeit. Sometimes it was necessary to dance a jig, drink a glass of water while on your back, or kneel to the wittiest, bow to the prettiest, or kiss the one you loved. Another means of livening up the evening was to play Musical Chairs. What hilarious laughing and scrambling to try to get the last chair. Plenty of exercise and fun."
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