Ten Years Ago. - Weekly Trinity Journal Weaverville, California • Sat, Apr 18, 1857 Page 4

Ten Years Ago.

Original article: Daily Alta California, 22 March 1857 — Daily Alta California FRED'K MacCRELLISH & CO. SAN FRANCISCO, SUNDAY, MARCH 22, 1857. [ARTICLE]

Ten years ago, on just such a bright, beautiful Sabbath morning as this is, we took an early breakfast in one of the dilapidated rooms in the old barracks at the Presidio, and started with a dear friend, for a morning walk, to the then little village of Yerba Buena, the now flourishing city of San Francisco. Then the fields along the roadside were green with the springing grass, which the later rains had freshened, and the golden-headed California poppy and the modest little strawberry flower, dotted them with yellow and with white. From out the thickets which skirted the roadside, a scared rabbit now and then ran across the pathway, and timidly hid in the bushes on the other side. For the whole distance from the Presidio to where now is about the corner of Union and Powell streets, there was not a single house, the first one we reached on our journey to the village, being the little adobe establishment of Dona Juana Briones, which still stands as a relic of the early days of Yerba Buena. [map - MF] The laguna lay lonely and still by the pathway, and on its surface ducks were paddling, fearless of gun or pistol. No squatters' had fenced in the hills - no gardens were planted in the valleys, and but few of the signs of 'civilization' greeted our eyes and ears during the delightful, refreshing, invigorating walk of three miles on that beautiful, sunny Sabbath morning.

TELLS ABOUT AUTO RUN OF INTEREST NEAR OAKLAND - William M. Gardner Thinks He has Found Road to Furnish Test for White Automobiles - Oakland Enquirer Oakland, California · Saturday, August 24, 1907

See if you can identify the places this article describes. I'll add a period map below. - MF

 

TELLS ABOUT AUTO RUN OF INTEREST NEAR OAKLAND

William M. Gardner Thinks He has Found Road to Furnish Test for White Automobiles

"Well," said Wm. M. Gardiner of The White Company, the other day subject of hill climbing
when the stunts came up, "I had a little hill climb of my own the other day followed by a hill drop which beat anything I ever tackled before. 

BERKELEY LOSS $9,000,000: 3,000 HOMELESS, 100 INJURED - The San Francisco Examiner, Wednesday, September 19, 1923

100 years ago, almost to the day, a terrible fire wiped out 640 homes in Berkeley:

The 1923 Berkeley, California, fire was a conflagration that consumed some 640 structures, including 584 houses in the densely-built neighborhoods north of the campus of the University of California in Berkeley, California, on September 17, 1923. 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1923_Berkeley,_California,_fire 

Fires were breaking out all over California. Marin and Sonoma counties were hit hard. 

In Marin, a wildfire on September 17 burned from Ignacio through Lucas and Nicasio Valleys, to Woodacre, Lagunitas, and Bolinas Ridge. This happened at the same time as huge fires burned in Sonoma County and in Berkeley, along with 15 other counties in California.

https://www.marinfirehistory.org/1923-wildfires-including-ignacio-to-bolinas-ridge-fairfax.html

Read the front-page news from the September 19, 1923 San Francisco Examiner, below. Some commonalities in this story with what we have today are heat, wind, dry fuel, eucalyptus and other non-native trees and plants, above-ground electrical infrastructure and population density near forested land.

BERKELEY LOSS $9,000,000: 3,000 HOMELESS, 100 INJURED 19 Sep 1923, Wed The San Francisco Examiner (San Francisco, California) Newspapers.com

MRS. J. MILLER WOULD HAVE MEMORIAL - Oakland Tribune, November 09, 1913

MRS. J. MILLER WOULD HAVE MEMORIAL

Wife of Poet Gives Reasons for Wishing Oakland to Have Big Park.

"The Heights," Replete With Interest, Offered as Worthy Memento.

In the following letter, teeming with interesting facts about the personal life of the late Poet of the Sierras, Mrs. Joaquin Miller sets forth her reasons why she believes "The Hights" should be purchased by Oakland as a memorial park:

EDITOR TRIBUNE: I am grateful for your kindly and publicly expressed appreciation of the "Hights" and that you value the place through its association. In 1885 Emerson, Longfellow and Oliver Wendell Holmes urged Mr. Miller to make his home near them and tried to interest him in property in Boston - financially considered most desirable but Mr. Miller was loyal to California and had a view for these hills indelibly impressed upon his mind. In all his travels he had seen nothing to equal it.

Knave - Oakland Tribune - Sunday, February 19, 1961

 

I'm leaving out the first few paragraphs, which deal with current politics, and moving right to the histories and stories. Click the clipping below if you want to read what you missed, here.

Whaling Ships

"The old town has changed," commented Capt. W. T. ("Bill") Murnan this week on his arrival in Oakland to show his "Spain and Portugal" travelogue at the Oakland Auditorium Theater next Friday night, Feb. 24. What Captain Murnan was thinking about was the Oakland of 1911, the year he arrived here as a 15-year-old youth and stowed away on the F. S. Redfield, one of the old whaling ships of the Pacific Steam Whaling Co. The whaling ships in those days anchored well down stream in the Estuary from the Alaska Packers fleet, and Murnan recalls he had been aboard the Redfield pleading for a berth and a chance to sail. "They told me I was too young... go home and tell my mother she wanted me... or something like that," he recounts. While looking wistfully at the ship from ashore he was given more advice by some "old salts" who chanced to be loafing nearby. That night Murnan returned and under the cover of darkness crawled, hand over hand, up the bow line and hid out under the forecastle head on the forward deck. The skipper didn't find him until next day when the ship was out beyond The Heads and it was too late to do anything about it. The skipper, he recalls, was Capt. James McKenna of Berkeley. Murnan thrilled to whaling and trading in Alaska and Siberia. He had never before been at sea, but he was an adventuresome boy. He ran away from his Chicago home in 1909 and made his way to the Alaska-Yukon Exposition at Seattle. Two years later he headed for California and landed in Oakland. The new adventure was to be more exciting than he had bargained for. The Redfield was driven on the point during a storm at Cape Prince of Wales and was pound to pieces. But not before all aboard were rescued by the great old Cutter Bear of Oakland. One of his fondest recollections of his adventure aboard the Redfield was the meeting aboard ship of an equally adventurous young man from Oakland named Bob Dalziel. [Maybe? - MF] Bob came back to Oakland aboard the Bear after the shipwreck, but Murnan returned via Nome and Seattle aboard the coal ship Eureka of Buffalo. "I never saw Bob again," he says.

NEW ROADS OPEN ROUTES FOR AUTOISTS - Oakland Tribune Oakland, California · Sunday, November 20, 1921

The early 20th century meant the development of Oakland for cars and for home building. The bicycle was mostly forgotten, except as a toy or a piece of sports equipment, and neighborhoods were laid out and developed privately, by for-profit corporations rather than a civic body meant to benefit the citizens of Oakland. Public transit was deprecated, except as a vehicle for real estate sales. Auto Row, on Broadway, and the car plants were churning out cars, and debt to the people of Oakland, and the newspaper was a marketing organ for these industries. Mayor Davie was pro-growth, pro-development. Parks were ignored, not built, in favor of private development. Scenic roads like Skyline Boulevard served to open up development, and sell cars. This is all described really well in Mitchell Schwarzer's book Hella Town, which I recommend. I like old maps, knowing how roads came to be, and I've always been curious about the term "Little Skyline," which shows up in articles from this time. This article explains the route, and tells the story...

NEW ROADS OPEN ROUTES TO AUTOISTS

The season of the year having come when short afternoon trips are a popular motoring treas, The TRIBUNE Touring Bureau suggests one within the city limits of Oakland. Berkeley and Piedmont. The one logged by a TRIBUNE-Stephens Salient Six touring car from Brasch & McCorkle's salesroom centers principally in Piedmont and through the Montclair section. In the latter district many new roads have been opened within the past two months about which little is known and they tap new avenues into Piedmont and skirt ridges which give birdseye views of Oakland and the San Francisco Bay that are as beautiful as any obtained from higher summits.

Lake Merritt in the 1880s, looking northeast

Poking around, looking for other stuff, I came across three 1880s? photos of Lake Merritt, and realized that a photographer - William Letts Oliver, or perhaps his son Roland - shot them one at a time, "panning" right, and that they'd make a good panorama. These are in the Oliver Family Photograph Collections.

Title: Lake Merritt from Roland G. Brown house, Oakland. [1 of 3] [negative] Contributing Institution: UC Berkeley, Bancroft Library

ROADS BACK OF LAKE CHABOT SHOWN - Oakland Tribune Oakland, California · Sunday, August 09, 1914

I am fascinated with the history of the roads and trails of my place, especially the old ones. This 1914 automotive touring article describes a trip along some relatively old roads; East 14th & Foothill Boulevards are basically the old Camino Real, or Mission road from the time of the Spanish missions. The road he describes from Hayward is the old Redwood Road, used to bring lumber to the wharves of Castro Valley from the various mills in Redwood Canyon, and the Moraga road descent to Piedmont Avenue return is also a very old redwood logging road. 

From  Redwoods Atop Oakland Hills First Brought Settlers Here - Oakland Tribune - 09 Oct 1966, Sun - Page 137

I'll go into details of the journey at the bottom of this page. These are all roads I like to ride on my bicycle. The new automobile gave people the chance to explore, and this article was a description of a fun, challenging exploration in the hills and canyons "back of Lake Chabot,"

AUTOMOBILE ROAD MAP OF THE HAYWARD-REDWOOD CANYON AUTO TOUR AS COMPILED BY THE AUTOMOBILE DEPARTMENT OF THE TRIBUNE FROM THE DATA SECURED FROM THE SPEEDOMETER OF A BUICK CAR DRIVEN OVER THE ROUTE THIS WEEK BY FRANK SANFORD OF THE HOWARD AUTOMOBILE COMPANY FOR THE PURPOSE OF SUPPLYING THIS DATA FOR THE READERS OF TODAY'S OUTING SECTION. SAVE THIS SECTION, AS THE MAP WILL NOT APPEAR AGAIN.

ROADS BACK OF LAKE CHABOT SHOWN

Trail History: Playground for Motorcyclists, AKA Redwood Motorcycle Hill, AKA Rutwood, AKA Soaring Hawk Trail

History

There are at least two Grass Valleys in California. The one we know in Oakland, in 2023 is near the Oakland Zoo, at the bottom of Golf Links road. In the middle of the 20th century Grass Valley was the name of the valley bordered by Redwood Road on the north, San Leandro reservoir to the east, Lake Chabot on the south and Skyline Boulevard on the west. The Grass Valley trail runs down much of its length. Before the East Bay Regional Park District (EBRPD) was formed, it was one of the areas considered for purchase by the East Bay Regional Park Board, along with Redwood Canyon, Sibley and Wildcat Canyon. In 1951 the sale of Grass Valley by the East Bay Municipal Utility District (EBMUD) to EBRPD was proposed, and in 1952, it was sold. In 1965 Grass Valley Park was renamed Anthony Chabot Regional Park.

Map of GRASS VALLEY PARK AREA 25 Jan 1951, Thu Oakland Tribune (Oakland, California) Newspapers.com

WATER SUPPLY. - How Oakland is Supplied from Extensive Reservoirs. - Oakland Tribune Oakland, California · Thursday, January 20, 1887

WATER SUPPLY.

How Oakland is Supplied from Extensive Reservoirs.

The Contra Costa Water Company, which supplies our city, is well worthy an extended description.

Oakland was but a village when in 1868 Mr. Chabot first introduced water into its streets by a pipe line laid from the bed of Temescal creek, some three miles away, but its promise of growth was such that it seemed to warrant the construction of a reservoir of moderate dimensions for impounding water, and in the spring of the same year the Temescal dam was begun at a point 4.72 miles northeast of the city. A point was selected some 500 feet above the present site of the dam, but after building heavy masonry arches of cut stone for a waste-way, and excavating for a puddle-wall, the bottom proved defective, and the work was abandoned after expending some $15,000. The present site was then selected, and the dam built to a height of 105 feet above the creek bed, or 427 feet above Oakland base, with a top width of 18 feet, and slopes of about 2 1⁄2 to 1 on both sides, which have since been increased from year to year by sluicing in material from the hillsides, by means of ditches that run full for a few days after heavy storms.

TALL TREES GREW HERE AWAY BACK - Redwood Forest Reached for Oakland Sky - Oakland Tribune 01 May 1952

1952 May 1 full clip of Redwood history Thu, May 1, 1952 – Page 118 · Oakland Tribune (Oakland, California) · Newspapers.com

TALL TREES GREW HERE AWAY BACK

Redwood Forest Reached for Oakland Sky 

CUT TO REBUILD S.F.

It's hard to imagine the smoke of lumber mills shrouding the Oakland skyline and sweating oxen hauling gigantic redwood logs down Broadway but that's just what was happening in the year 1849, when most Californians were off to make a fortune in the foothills of the Sierra Nevada.

Oakland Playground for Motorcyclists

Touring over the hills and trails, three Oakland MC members enjoy the natural terrain. From the rear: Bob Vargas, Stan Wilner, Bob Smith and Bud Dutot.

Panoramic view of the park-playground. Trails extend over the top and down the other side of the farthest hill. Plans for extension are in the wind.

 

Oakland Playground FOR MOTORCYCLISTS

MOTORCYCLISTS' PLAYGROUND - Oakland Riders Enjoy Exclusive Use of City Park Trail - Motorcyclist - date?

MOTORCYCLISTS' PLAYGROUND

Oakland Riders Enjoy Exclusive Use of City Park Trail

San Leandro Knights MC members McMeans, Barnes, Marino, Hickman and McKinney at entrance to rugged two-mile trail in Oakland.

By Don R. Hammitt
Photos by Jerry Krieger

WHEN directors of East Bay Regional Park began enforcing an old edict. "No motorcycles allowed on. horse trails," representatives of three of the area's oldest motorcycle clubs stepped forward to voice objections. As a result horsemen are happy, cyclists are happy and the large public park north of Oakland, California, has what park directors believe to be the first public park trail for exclusive use of cyclists. 

Outlawing Off-Road Riding (from 1986 Winning Magazine)

Thanks to Jeff Royal for sharing the original article. - MF

OUTLAWING OFF-ROAD RIDING 

Winning Magazine, May 1986

by R. P. Boye
 

The politics of banning mountain bikes from park trails.
Bob Cooper

On January 21 this year the East Bay Regional Park Board in California discussed the banning of off-road bicycles on many of its park trails. Park administrators felt that the prohibition of bicycles was necessary to ensure the safety of other trail users. The park district, which includes 46 parks in Contra Costa and Alameda counties, had received 30 complaints in two years from hikers and horseback riders who had been forced off trails by mountain bike riders. Consequently, the park board drew up an ordinance that would prohibit bikes from using dirt trails designed primarily for hiking and horseback riding. About one-third of the trails within the parks would be affected. Bikes would be allowed only on fire roads. 

'WORLD'S OLDEST ACTIVE COWBOY' TO MARK 94TH BIRTHDAY - Oakland Tribune - October 20, 1949

'WORLD'S OLDEST ACTIVE COWBOY' TO MARK 94TH BIRTHDAY

Tom Wauhab Shuns His Rocking Chair Despite Great Age

By BILL STROBEL 

SUNOL, Oct, 20. - When most pioneers pass the 75-year mark, society is content to let them retire to a rocking chair and spin tales of the "good old days." 

Gene's Market in Alameda, at the corner of Pacific Avenue and Walnut Street

On the sfba.social mastodon instance, David Gallagher asks:

 

 In case the embed no longer works:

#bikeride through Alameda yesterday. I love this little closed up time capsule store. I’ve seen it before over the years, amazed it hasn’t changed. Anyone know about it?

Oakland's Forgotten Creeks #1 - Oakland Tribune, January 28, 1947

"History is Written by the Victors." This article is from 1947, written by a white man in California, himself an immigrant to this land. You will read dated ideas which are at odds with our current understanding of history. I believe this article is worth transcribing, researching and sharing. I don't condone his views. - MF

Oakland's Forgotten Creeks

By Dave Hope

(First in a series of five articles. Tomorrow - The Creeks in their heyday.)

Steelhead trout and salmon wriggled up Oakland streets to spawn. 

Oakland's Forgotten Creeks #2 - Oakland Tribune, January 29, 1947

"History is Written by the Victors." This article is from 1947, written by a white man in California, himself an immigrant to this land. You will read dated ideas which are at odds with our current understanding of history. I believe this article is worth transcribing, researching and sharing. I don't condone his views. - MF

Oakland's Forgotten Creeks

By Dave Hope

(Second in a series of five articles. Tomorrow - Maybe You Remember.) 

Gold had not yet been discovered, but the hamlet of Yerba Buena was already assuming city-like dignity by repudiating its goat feed and adopting the name San Francisco. 

Oakland's Forgotten Creeks #3 - Oakland Tribune, January 30, 1947

Oakland's Forgotten Creeks

By Dave Hope

(Third in a series of five articles. Tomorrow - The City Grows.)

For two generations of Oakland residents, the forgotten creeks are not yet forgotten.

Oakland's Forgotten Creeks #4 - The City Grows - Oakland Tribune, January 31, 1947

Oakland's Forgotten Creeks

By Dave Hope

(Fourth in a series of five articles. Tomorrow - The Creeks Today.) 

There must be moments when Mother Nature, reviewing her accomplishments, wonders why she created man.

Oakland's Forgotten Creeks #5 - The Creeks Today - Oakland Tribune, February 1, 1947

Oakland's Forgotten Creeks

By Dave Hope

(Last in a series of five articles.)

Never let it be inferred that Oakland's forgotten creeks gave up their identities without a struggle.

Oakland's Forgotten Creeks - Oakland Tribune - Jan - Feb, 1947

A series of five articles by Dave Hope, telling the history of Oakland's 21 creeks, from the beginning of known history until the publication in 1947

1. Oakland's Forgotten Creeks #1 - Oakland Tribune, January 28, 1947
   
2. Oakland's Forgotten Creeks #2 - The Creeks in their heyday - Oakland Tribune, January 29, 1947
   
3. Oakland's Forgotten Creeks #3 - Maybe You Remember - Oakland Tribune, January 30, 1947
   
4. Oakland's Forgotten Creeks #4 - The City Grows - Oakland Tribune, January 31, 1947
   
5. Oakland's Forgotten Creeks #5 - The Creeks Today - Oakland Tribune, February 1, 1947

Tribune's Dave Hope Is Dead - Oakland Tribune, 14 Feb 1969

DAVE HOPE
A natural newsman

Tribune's Dave Hope Is Dead

Tribune political writer Dave Hope died today of an apparent heart attack a short time after he collapsed at his desk in the city room. He was 65.

STEAM SHOVELS BARE ANCIENT COAST FOREST - Oakland Tribune, 14 Jun 1928

[I went looking for this, after reading about it Annalee Allen's Walking tours feature uptown, old Capwell's article, in her Landmarks series, while hunting for them in newspaper archives. - MF]

STEAM SHOVELS BARE ANCIENT COAST FOREST

Trees In First Stages of Petrification Dug Up On Site of New H. C. Capwell Store.

Remains of a forest in the early stages of petrification were uncovered today by workmen excavating foundations for the new H. C. Capwell department store at Broadway and Twentieth streets. Thirty feet below the street level steam shovels began to bring up-pieces of trees that have lain beneath the surface of the earth for years. Petrification was still in the first stages and the stone crumbled easily in one's fingers.