USA > California > History of California, Volume VI > Part 54
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475
OAKLAND.
of the committee in Cal. Jour. Ass., 1852, 500-2; Cal. Statutes, 1852, 128. The archives and state officials having accordingly been ordered baek, the legislature again opened its session at Vallejo on Jan. 3, 1853. The place had not improved meanwhile, and the prospects appearing hopeless, Vallejo petitioned for release from his bond, pleading that the former removal of the government had contributed to defeat his plans for fulfilling it. Id., 1853, 345; Cal. Jour. Sen., 1852, 788, 563; Id., 1853, 661, etc. This was agreed to, and the following month saw the legislature once more on the wing, to alight a while at Benicia, whither it was followed by a large propor- tion of the settlers, including stores, leaving the rest stranded. Vallejo then sold the site for $30,000 to Lt-gov. Purdy and others, but owing to their fail- ure with payments it was reconveyed to Vallejo's associates. The town had still aspirations, as the natural port for the fertile valley of Napa, and as a site for the U. S. navy-yard and naval depôt. The latter project was enter- tained in 1849, Sherman's Mem., i. 68, and in 1852 decided upon. Mare Island, lying in front of Vallejo, and so named after a mnare which there swam ashore from a wrecked ferry, it is said, was accordingly purchased for the government in 1853 for $83,000; the price in 1850 being $7,000. Possession was taken in 1854. Two years later found a floating dock and a basin in operation, with numerous shops and magazines, which, together with the later stone dock, costing over a million dollars, gave employment to a large force of mnen, all depending on Vallejo. The town accordingly began to prosper; wharves were built to accommodate the growing traffic, a newspaper appeared in 1855, and in 1856 the survey was extended to one league; yet the place prudently denied itself the expensive dignity of city until 1866-7, when the inhabitants numbered some 3,000. Cal. Statutes, 1865-6, 147, 431; 1867-8, GI8; 1871-2, 566, 757, 1048; see Solano Advert., Dec. 1868-May 1869; Vallejo Chron., March -June 1871; and the special pamphlets, Resources of Vallejo and Prospects of Vallejo, 1871; also Solano Co. Hist., 88, 184, et seq .; Willey's Pers. Mem., 96 -7; Hittell's Res., 411; Cal. Pioneers, MS., pt. iii .; Alta Cal., Jan. 4, 1853, etc .; Hittell's Code, ii. 1603; Solano, Future of Vallejo.
Martinez, opposite Benicia on the river, is a historic town of growing prosperity.
The beautiful plains and slopes of the contra costa had not failed to strike favorably the many projectors of metropolitan cities, but the extreme shal- lowness of the water interposed a decisive objection. When the prospects of S. F. stood assured, however, the advantages of this tract for suburban sites at once became apparent, and in 1850-3 the greater portion of the Peralta grant, from Point Isabel to San Leandro Bay, was bought by different specu- lators, yet not until the most desirable section of Oakland had been occupied by squatters, who were mainly instrumental in giving a start to the place and procuring town and city charters. With the location here, in the latter part of the sixties, of the overland railroad terminus, which brought superior ferry facilities, a great impulse was given, followed by the acquisition of the county seat, and all the conveniences to be expected of a city ranking next in popula- tion to S. F., although of subordinate importance. The rush of squatters, which in 1850 set in for Oakland, was headed by the lawyers A. J. Moon and
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CITY BUILDING.
Horace W. Carpentier, and E. Adams. Heedless of the remonstrances of the Peralta family, to which the grant belonged, they seized even upon the cattle and timber. Finally, when pressed by the sheriff, Moon arranged for a lease, and on the strength of it was laid out the town of Oakland, so named from the trees growing there. Meanwhile Carpentier used his official position to manœuvre the passage of an act of incorporation May 1852, Cal. Jour. Ass., 1852, 846, Id., Statutes, 303, little suspected by the other squatters, and then to gain from his associates a concession of the water-front, on condition of erect- ing a school-house and three wharves. This deed was subsequently hotly contested, especially when the question came up for means wherewith to gain railroad termini and other progressive adjuncts. In 1867-8.a compromise was effected, under which concessions were made to the city, in the San Antonio water channel, with a frontage between Franklin and Webster sts, and grants to the Western Pacific R. R. Co. of 500 acres, a share going to the S. F. and Oakland R. R. Co., both later merged in the Central Pacific. The rest of the land, aside from two reservations by Carpentier and Merritt, was conveyed to the Oakland Water Front Co., half of whose 50,000 shares of stock belonged to Carpentier, with E. Adams as partner, 20,000 shares to Stanford, and 5,000 to Felton. The title of Peralta in the city lands had been settled by the sale in March 1852 of the squatted part for $10,000 to Clar and others; the Temescal tract was sold in Aug. 1853 for $100,000, with certain reservations to Hammond and others, J. D. Peralta selling another tract on the north for $82,000. The squatter cloud, nevertheless, hung over the city until 1869, when a compromise was effected permitting outstanding claims to be bought at nominal rates. Notwithstanding this drawback great progress was made. Alta Cal., 1852; Oakland Tribune, Oct. 9, 1875; Petaluma Crescent, Nov. 18, 1871; Sta Rosa Democ., March 13, 1869; Sac. Union, Oct. 30, 1856. In early times large numbers of wild cattle roamed here, which led to the establishment of tanneries and regular slaughter-yards for the S. F. market. Matthewson's Stat., MS., 3. An occasional steamboat service was soon replaced by a ferry, the Hector, followed by the E. Corning, of the Contra Costa Ferry Co. Alameda Gaz., May 31, 1873; Herrick's Stat., MS., 3-4. The first public school was organized in 1853, at the corner of Market and Seventh sts, about the same time that H. Durant opened the Oakland College School, preparatory to the College of Cal., which was incorporated in 1855 and organized in 1860, to merge before the end of the decade into the University of Cal. Brayton's Report, in Cal. Jour. Sen., 1865-6, ap. viii. 395- 402. Regular religious services are claimed to have been begun by S. B. Bell, presbyterian, in March 1853, at the corner of Fourth and Clay sts, yet preach- ers had visited the place previously. The first church was erected in the same year by catholics, favored by the large Mexican element. Oakland Tran- script, Jan. 1, 1877. The baptists followed in Dec. 1854, under E. G. Willis. A Sunday-school had been started in Apr. 1853 by the presbyterians. O. Journal, Oct. 13, 1867. In March 1854 the belief in prospective greatness was proclaimed by the incorporation of the place as a city. Cal. Statutes, 1854, 46, 52. Carpentier managed to get himself elected the first mayor. The re- ported votes numbered 368, which seems excessive for the place at that time, as the census of 1860 allows only 1,543 inhabitants. His message, reproduced
477
BROOKLYN AND ALAMEDA.
in O. Transcript, Jan. 23, 1876, refers to efforts for planting here the state capitol. The Alameda Erpress was by this time issued, and in the autumn of 1854 followed the Contra Costa, the issue of Jan. 5, 1855, being no. 17. Oak- land Herald began as a weekly Jan. 4, 1855. In 1867 came gas and water works. C. Costa Water Co. Rules, 1-12; Oakland and Alameda Water Co., 1- 8. With the settlement of land titles and the location of the terminus, dur- ing the following two years, foreshadowed already in the mayor's message of 1854, a decided impetus was given to the place, with a more direct ferry con- nection soon after, over the west front, with bridge and solid bank, instead of following the creek route. By 1870 the population had risen to 10,500, strong enough to begin the struggle in earnest for the county seat, which was won in 1874. The assessed value of property, rated in 1866-7 at $1,434,000, stood a decade later at $24,000,000, and by 1880 the census showed more than 34,500 inhabitants, including Brooklyn, with all the appurtenances of a well-regu- lated city, and with certain harbor advantages, procured by deepening the outlet of San Antonio Creek through the mud flats, and protecting it with rubble walls. Additional details in Terminus of R. R. System, 7-46; Oakland Directories, passim; Hist. Alameda, 1876, 443-57; Id., Atlas, 15-22; Or. Sketches, MS., 3, etc .; Cal. Jour. Sen., 1871-2, 353, etc .; Quigley's Irish Race, 484-9; Oakland Review, Dec. 1873, 9-16, etc .; Hayes' Ang., i. 456; S. J. Pioneer, Aug. 4, 1877, and frequent scattered accounts and items in daily journals, as Alta Cal., Dec. 19, 1854; Feb. 1, 1855; Aug. 9, 1863, etc .; Sac. Union, Sept. 17, 1855, etc .; Oakl. News, Feb. 4, 1874, etc .; S. F. Chron., Nov. 22, 1879; Oakl. Tribune, Oct. 9, 1875; Oakl. Transcript, Jan. 2, 1871; Jan. 13, 1877.
The adjoining trio of towns were properly extensions of one settlement, and Brooklyn, as lying in the rear, sought in time annexation to the leading city, notwithstanding the promising features of a more rolling surface and its esteemed hotels. Alameda gained an additional advantage as a bathing resort, and with the aid of an extra railroad and ferry accommodation is advancing rapidly as a rival of Oakland. Berkeley possesses a yet finer position in some respects, and a large number of homestead builders gathered round the nucleus formed early in the seventies by the transfer hither of the state university, and by the establishment of factories in the western section, on the bay shore.
Brooklyu, which in 1872 was annexed to Oakland, as its east suburb, was a landing in 1849 for lumber cutters in the redwoods five miles inward. The dwelling of the Peralta brothers stood near by, and a Frenchman kept a dairy about Clinton point for a time. Early in 1850 the brothers Patten secured a lease of the site for farming, covering at first 150 acres, and extended shortly after to about treble that number. In 1852 C. B. Strode of the law firm of Jones, Tompkins, and Strode, bought from Peralta the section between Lake Merritt and Sauzal Creek, some 6,000 acres, extending to the hills, and gave the Pattens a share, M. Chase, who had been hunting on the site, joining them to lay out the town of Clinton, round the Patten cabin up Third av. and Ninth st. Washington plaza received a flag-pole in significance of its new importance, and Washington, later East Twelfth st, was graded to the ravine at Commerce st and planted with cottonwood trees. In 1853 D. S. Lacy
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CITY BUILDING.
opened a store at East Twelfth st and Twelfth av., and the following year the town associates erected a $60,000 hotel, which was destroyed by fire within a few weeks. Meanwhile, in 1851, J. B. Larue had squatted across the ravine and started a store at the San Antonio landing, where he subse- quently constructed his wharf, and a settlement gradually rose, which was known as San Antonio, after the channel and rancho. Early house-builders are named in Hist. Alameda, 1876, 462-3. In 1856 the two places were con- solidated and called Brooklyn, at the instance of Eagar, who had arrived with many pioneers in the ship of that name, and thought that the appellation corresponded well to the spot in its relation to the Pacific metropolis, which was similar to that of the Atlantic Brooklyn. In 1860 the population of the district was placed at 1,341; incorporation was put on in 1870, including the cluster of houses north-eastward, known as Lynn, from the shoe factory established there three years before. Cal. Statutes, 1869-70, 680-93. Settle- ment had been favored for several years by the land troubles of Oakland, with which it shared in the picnic excursions from S. F. since Larney's steam ferry began its trips in 1858. Hopes were also raised by the temporary location here of the county seat during the four years' struggle for it, but the more conveniently situated Oakland was advancing with such strides lately as to leave Brooklyn behind, and its people voted in 1872 for annexation. Its vote in 1876 barely exceeded 650. Brooklyn Journal, Sept. 9, 1871, etc .; Hist. Alam., 1876, 461-7; Id., Atlas, 22-3.
Alameda may be regarded as a sister town of Brooklyn in their relation to Oakland, although it gained several advantages. It was known as Bolsa de Encinal, or Encinal de San Antonio, and belonged to A. M. Peralta. It was held under lease by Depachier and Lemarte early in 1850, when the interest taken in Oakland called attention to this adjoining tract. W. W. Chipman and G. Auginbaugh, who had subleased the section fronting on S. Leandro Bay, then stepped forward and bought the peninsula for $14,000, selling half to Minturn, Foley, Hays, Caperton, McMurty, and H. S. Fitch. The latter had lately, after a failure to buy Oakland, made a semi-contract for Alameda, only to be forestalled. As auctioneer, he sold the first lots of the tract laid out in old Alameda under his supervision. The first settlements were made near High st, and ferry-boats began running to Old Alameda Point, the first regular boats being the Bonita and the Ranger. Incorporation was effected in April 1854, when the peninsula contained little more than 100 inhab- itants, and it was expected that the name borrowed from the county would influence settlers. Cal. Statutes, 1854, 76; Id., Jour. Ass., 650; Alta Cal., Dec. 30, 1854; Sac. Union, Nov. 8, 1854; Alam. Encinal, Sept. 8, 1877. Soon after Encinal was laid out in the centre of the peninsula, and Woodstock at the point; yet progress was slow, with few industries. A tannery was established in 1852. Matthewson's Stat., MS., 3. A. A. Cohen bought lots in 1858 and be- gan to foster the place, establishing a superior ferry, which yielded in 1874 to a railroad via Oakland, across San Antonio channel, supplemented soon after by a special ferry and railroad. A wagon road was made over the tongue of land to Brooklyn in 1854, and ferries had run from Hebbard's wharf in the channel, and from West End, after 1856. In 1872 the entire peninsula was united under a town charter. Cal. Statutes, 1871-2, 276-81; 1877-8, 89,
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SOUTH TO SAN DIEGO
etc .; Hist. Alameda, 1876, 469-74; Id., Atlas, 23-4; Oakland and Alameda Water Co. Prospectus, 1-8. The advance of the town was from 1,560 inhabitants in 1870 to 5,700 in 1880. The Alameda Post appeared in 1869, the first news- paper, and was replaced in Nov. 1869 by the Alameda Encinal.
Domingo Peralta was interested in that part of his father's tract lying be- yond the village of Temescal, the term for Indian baths. He sold it in 1853 to Hall McAllister, R. P. Hammond, L. Herrmann, and J. K. Irving. The con- ditions were somewhat ambiguous. and not until more than a score of years later was the cloud lifted from the title. It remained a slighted farming re- gion until the choice of a salubrious and attractive site for the state univer- sity fell in 1868 upon the spot, which was aptly dedicated to the name of the prelate philosopher. The construction of buildings and laying out the 200 acres of ground, as well as work on the adjoining Deaf, Dumb, and Blind Asylum, with its 60 acres, begun in 1868, brought settlers for a town; yet pre- vious to 1874 not a dozen houses were within half a mile of the grounds. Among the first occupants were Shattack, Hillegas, and G. M. Blake. With the opening of the university in the summer of 1873, Univ. Cal., Report 1872-3, the influx of residents increased, and by 1877 the Berkeley Advocate, Oct. 13, 1877, Dec. 11, 1879, etc., claimed nearly 2,000 inhabitants, with over 200 houses round the university in 1879. In April 1878 the town was incorporated, in- cluding the settlement on the bay, a mile and a half away, known as West Berkeley, or Ocean View and Delaware-st station, which had sprung up under railroad influence as a manufacturing site, embracing the California Watch factory, the Standard Soap Co., etc. A ferry ran to this point until increased railroad facilities with both sections absorbed the passengers. The Deaf Asylum, burned in 1875, was rebuilt in 1877-8. Scattered references in the daily S. F., Oakland, and Berkeley journals.
The mania for city building extended from the great bay and its tribu- taries throughout the state, in the north guided by the rise of mining districts and the gradual expansion of lumber and farming, for which places like Red Bluff, Chico, Yreka, and Petaluma sought to become centres, while parts like Crescent City and Eureka aimed to supply a range beyond the county limits. In the south, likewise, several old pueblos roused themselves early from their colonial lethargy to assume civic honors under Anglo-Saxon energy, and to open their ports or establish new landings for the prospective world traffic, but the de- lay of the agricultural era, upon which they depended, caused a relapse. Rail- road enterprise marks the revival under which towns like Modesto, Merced, Visalia, Bakersfield, Hollister, and Salinas sprang into prominence, often at the expense of older places, although several of these not only shared in the advance, but maintained the local supremacy due to a judicious selection of site, as San José, San Luis Obispo, Santa Bárbara, and San Buenaventura. Among the most pretentious of southern towns is Los Angeles, whose history has been fully detailed in previous volumes. San Diego, the oldest of Cali- fornia settlements, languished till the close of the sixties, when transcontinen- tal railroad projects gave it life and hope, based on the possession of an impor- tant terminus, and of the only other fine harbor besides that of San Francisco on the coast, and with a constantly growing reputation as a health and pleas- ure resort.
The eagerness to found commercial centres in 1849-50 roused the ambition
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CITY BUILDING
of Old San Diego, and led it to assume the dignity of an incorporated city in 1850. Cal. Statutes, 1850, 121. To this it was stimulated by rival projects, which in course of time dotted the entire bay shore with prospective towns. Foreseeing the need for a shore settlement, the alcalde had in Sept. 1849 begun to sell lots at La Playa, and here a certain trade sprang up. Hayes' Misc., 44. Federal officers interfered, claiming the place for military purposes. Report in S. Diego, Rept Land, 1-5. Speculators accordingly turned their attention to the south of the pueblo, and obtaining a grant of land in March 1850, on condition of building a wharf, they laid out New San Diego. W. Davis lent his fostering aid in 1851, and three government buildings and a few dwellings rose behind the wharf. Even a journal appeared for a time, the Herald, of Judge Ames; but southern California fell into neglect and the town stood still, unable to count in 1867 more than a dozen inhabitants. Then appeared A. E. Horton, who purchased for $6,700 about five quarter-sections of the present main site of the new city, on the bay shore, Savage's Coll., MS., iv. 285, laid out the addition named after him, built a wharf to deep water, and on the refusal of the coast steamer to call, he in 1869 placed the W. Taber on the route to S. F., in opposition, at low rates. Four miles below on the bay National City was laid out by the Kimball brothers, and competition ran high. Settlers began to come in, lots sold rapidly, and buildings went up in all direc- tions, the proprietors applying their gains to building and other improvements. In 1870 San Diego claimed a population of 2,300, with over 900 houses. The catholics had a church since 1858, tended by Padre J. Moliner. In 1868 the episcopalians organized under S. Wilbur, and in 1869 methodists, baptists with the first temple, and presbyterians followed the example. In 1870 the new city procured a decree transferring the archives from the old town, which was effect- ed in 1871, after a struggle, and the old pueblo, which had so long reigned in mediocre triumph over its rival, fell into decay. The records of its doings since 1848 are given in San Diego Arch .; Hayes' San Diego; Id., Misc., 44 et seq. Its charter was repealed in 1852, and 20 years later the new city assumed in- corporation garbs. Cal. Statutes, 1852, 305; 1871-2, 286-95; 1875-6, 806. The Masonic order, dating here since 1853, moved over in 1871, preceded three years on the new site by the Odd Fellows. In 1873 the place was made a port of entry, and the Panama steamers cheered it with their calls. Prof. Davidson assigned 22 feet to the bar at the mean of the lowest low water. Two journals flourished. The delay of the promised railroad, upon which all hopes rested, interposed a check on progress, but its completion gave fresh impulse to the city, upon which the claims of National City as the real terminus had little effect. In 1882 almost 100 vessels entered from domestic ports and 99 from foreign ports, paying $263,160 in duties on imports. A chamber of commerce was organized in 1870; water and gas were introduced; and between 1878 and 1888 real property advanced in price in some instances from ten to twenty fold. Details of progress in Bancroft's Pers. Observ., MS., 9, etc .; Rusling's Across, 326-8; Hayes' San Diego, i .- iv., passim; San Diego, Arch. H., passim; Id., Index; Savage's Coll., MS., 233 et seq .; South Trans- cont. R. R., Mem .; San Diego News, Id., Union, scattered articles, notably June 26, 1873; July 20, 1876; Feb. 22, 1877; Oct. 17, 1878; also S. F. journals; San Diego City Inform., 1-50; Hist. San Bern. Co., 184-8; Cal. Agric. Soc., Trans., 1878, 272; 1874, 381, etc .; San Diego Com. Lands, 1-5.
CHAPTER XIX. CALIFORNIA IN COUNTIES.
1848-1888.
AFFAIRS UNDER THE HISPANO-CALIFORNIANS-COMING OF THE ANGLO-AMERI- CANS-EL DORADO, PLACER, SACRAMENTO, YUBA, AND OTHER COUNTIES NORTH AND SOUTH-THEIR ORIGIN, INDUSTRIES, WEALTH, AND PROG- RESS.
IN Mexican times settlements were almost wholly restricted to the coast valleys south of San Francisco Bay, with a predilection for the orange-perfumed regions of Santa Bárbara, Los Angeles, and San Diego. The Russians had obtained a footing on the coast above Marin, as a branch station for their Alaska fur trading; and the attempt roused the California au- thorities to place an advance guard in the vicinity, first at San Rafael and its branch mission of Solano, and subsequently at the military post of Sonoma, to affirm their possessory rights. In the forties Anglo-Saxon immigrants, adding their number to the Mexican occu- pants, extended settlement into the valleys north of the bay. With the conquest population began to gravitate round this sheet of water, as the centre for trade, a sprinkling penetrating into San Joaquin Val- ley and up the Sacramento. The effect of Marshall's discovery was to draw the male inhabitants from the coast to the gold region. Many remained in the great California Valley and became traders and town- builders; some continued to roam along the Sierra slope as gold-diggers.
HIST. CAL., VOL. VI. 31
481
482
CALIFORNIA IN COUNTIES.
The American South Fork, as nearest the point of distribution, at Sacra- mento, and carrying with it the prestige of the gold discovery, long attracted the widest current of migration. A just tribute to fame was awarded to the saw-mill site at Coloma, the first spot occupied in the county, in 1847, by making it a main station for travel and the county seat for El Dorado, and so remaining until 1857, after which, the mines failing, it declined into a small yet neat horticultural town. The saw-mill, transferred to other hands by Marshall and Sutter, supplied in 1849 the demand for lumber. The first ferry on the fork was conducted here by J. T. Little, a flourishing trader. Little's Stat., MS., 3. And E. T. Rann constructed here the first bridge in the county early in 1850, for $20,000, yielding a return of $250 a day. Pac. News, May 29, 1850. Population 2,000 in Oct. 1850. S. F. Picayune, Oct. 21, 1850; Barstow's Stat., MS., 1-4; Sherman's Mem., i. 64; Placer Times, July 28, 1849; Apr. 29, 1850; Sac. Transcript, Feb., March 14, 1851. View in Pict. Union, Jan. 1, Apr. 1854; S. F. Bulletin, Sept. 9, 1857; Sac. Union, Oct. 20, 1856; Placer- ville Rep., Feb. 28, 1878. Incorporation act in Cal. Statutes, 1858, 207. Marshall, the gold-finder, gained recognition a while in the adjacent petty Uniontown, first called after him. The early drift of miners tended along Webber Creek toward Placerville, which became the most prominent of El Dorado's towns, its final county seat and centre of traffic. Southward rose Diamond Springs, which strove for the county seat in 1854. It was almost destroyed by fire in Ang. 1856. Loss $500,000, says Alta Cal., Aug. 7, 1856. Lately founded, observes Sac. Transcript, Nov. 29, 1850. Camps, etc., in chapter on mines. Mud Springs, later El Dorado, was incorporated in 1855, Cal. Statues, 1855, 116; 1857, 7; with great flourish, and disincorporated in 1857. Several small towns rose on the divide southward. Above the South Fork sprang up notably Pilot Hill, or Centreville, which claimed the first grange in the state. Then there were Greenwood and Georgetown, both of which aspired at one time to become the county seat. The former was named after the famed mountaineer, though first known as Long Valley, Lewisville, etc. Georgetown, begun by Geo. Ehrenhaft, Ballou's Adven., MS., 22, had in Dec. 1849 a tributary population of 5,000. Alta Cal., Dec. 15, 1849; Cal. Courier, July 12, 1850. It was nearly destroyed by fire in 1856. S. F. Bulletin, July 7, 10, 1856. Latrobe rose on the Placerville R. R. ronte.
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