USA > California > Contra Costa County > History of Contra Costa County, California; with biographical sketches of the leading men and women of the county who have been identified with its growth and development from the early days to the present > Part 39
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The time limit of the Lafayette Tunnel is eighteen months. The con- tractors will work from both ends and from headings from one or more shafts simultaneously. They will employ from 600 to 1000 men and will drive the job through on three eight-hour shifts.
October 10, 1925 .- Construction of the mammoth million-barrel oil storage reservoir at the Shell refinery in Martinez has progressed to a point where the largest and most needed of the reservoirs being constructed will be ready for use within a fortnight. Bent Brothers are building two reservoirs at the Shell, one of a million barrels capacity and the other half that amount. The same contracting firm is building the first of twelve proposed two-million-barrel storage reservoirs for the Standard Oil be- tween Pittsburg and Antioch.
October 7, 1925 .- The harvesting of over eighty tons of cucumber seed in Diablo Valley started Tuesday. Three hundred and fifty acres of cucumbers have been planted in Diablo Valley, being grown exclusively for seed. These are grown as an intercrop in the young orchards and, with 350 acres planted producing better than 500 pounds of seed per acre, will bring in a revenue of crop close to fifty thousand dollars.
This is the first year cucumber seed has been grown in Diablo Valley, and it is expected several times this acreage will be planted in 1926. The principal growers are: George Allan, R. C. Christiansen, and the Kirk- man Nurseries.
In harvesting the seed the cucumbers are picked from the vines and thrown in windrows, after which a separating machine drawn by horses
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pulps the cucumber and separates the seed, which is afterwards washed and dried. Many of the cucumbers grown are weighing in excess of five pounds each.
October 17, 1925 .- With the granting of a contract by the Richmond City Council to the Tibbetts Pacific Company for $64,770 for the con- struction of an open wharf on the inner harbor, a program of harbor im- provement adopted in 1920 was finally put into effect. The contract calls for the construction of an open wharf with creosoted piling on property owned by the City of Richmond on the inner harbor channel. This chan- nel, dredged as a part of the United States government program of de- velopment of Richmond harbor, was recently improved by the City of Richmond, which dredged a turning basin at the site of the wharf. Bonds for the present wharf construction were voted by the city at an election in 1920.
October 17, 1925 .- Firmly convinced that the business interests and citizens are a unit in supporting their compliance with the fire depart- ment's request for additional fire fighting equipment of the most advanced type, the city trustees at a special meeting Monday night unanimously voted the purchase of a $12,500 American-La France fire engine, a 750- gallon pumper fully equipped.
October 23, 1925 .- The steel lift span of the Antioch-Sherman Island Bridge has been completely installed and with a few minor adjustments will be ready for service within a fortnight. O. H. Klatt, general manager of the American Toll Bridge Co., in Martinez Wednesday afternoon en route to the bridge site, stated that the company expects to have the bridge completed and handling traffic early in December.
October 23, 1925 .- The dreaded puncture vine, so deadly to auto- mobile tires and destructive to farm land, which some years ago ravaged one of California's counties and which has been found in three places in the eastern part of this county, was detected this week getting a start beside the Southern Pacific tracks at Pittsburg. Farm Advisor A. M. Burton was immediately notified and a determined war on the pest with the aid of kerosene is being waged.
October 17, 1925 .- P. D. Busch, superintendent of the Concord air- mail base, returned from an extensive tour of inspection, covering the en- tire western division of the federal air-mail service.
"No two air stations are operated the same," declared Busch, "and we are endeavoring to unify the entire western section." Mechanical operations are to be improved here, he said. Additions will be made to the machine shop at the Concord terminal.
Reports have been received from Japan, stating that messages over low-wave radio station in Concord were heard the last week. Dante Cor- dano and T. K. Johnson are in charge of the Concord sending station.
November 7, 1925 .- David Macartney, pioneer of Antioch, who confesses to having weathered seventy-six winters, became a bridegroom Friday in Martinez when Mrs. Rebecca Davis of Los Angeles became his
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wife. For nearly a half century "Uncle" Dave Macartney has resided in Antioch, where he conducts a stationery and notion store and where, being a stanch disciple of Thomas Jefferson, he has served as postmaster for numerous terms. His friends in eastern Contra Costa are numbered by hundreds, and from each and every one congratulations and best wishes will be forthcoming.
November 7, 1925 .- Pinole has had some banner natal days, and discovers claim to distinction in the fact that ten sets of twins have been born in the town from 1914 to 1924, inclusive, as follows :
To Mrs. Antone Light, March 4, 1914; Mrs Manuel Marcos, July 25, 1914; Mrs. John Chattelton, August 17, 1914; Mrs. William Quill, April 14, 1915 ; Mrs. Thomas Atkinson, January 23, 1917; Mrs. C. H. Drysdale, October 29, 1918; Mrs. Frank Maddox, September 7, 1920; Mrs. Burton F. Wills, May 19, 1923; Mrs. M. F. Goularte, December 23, 1923; Mrs. John Catrino, November 29, 1924.
November 7, 1925 .- Breaking all records for the production of fruit, growers of central Contra Costa County sent out upward of 6500 tons of pears, grapes, peaches and apricots during the season just closed, according to a report by L. H. Rodebaugh, traffic manager of the Sacra- mento Short Line, to the directors of the company. Rodebaugh's report showed that in all 500 cars of fruit had been shipped over his line. Of this total 283 cars were pear shipments. There were 197 cars of grapes, twelve cars of apricots and eight cars of peaches. Most of the shipments were from Walnut Creek, Concord, Meinert, Alamo and Moraga. Prac- tically the entire crop went to the east, where Contra Costa fruit is eagerly sought in the better markets, the report stated, though some of the crop was disposed of to the local canneries. The shipment shows a decided in- crease over that of last year.
December 5, 1925 .- For over two years Grant D. Miller, coroner of Alameda County, has been boring hole after hole in hope of striking water on his ranch near Lafayette, but without results until Monday, when at a depth of 308 feet, the borers struck a flow which for three days has shot three feet over the top of the well.
December 5, 1925 .- Workmen engaged in clearing the old McNamara property on Main Street, preparatory to erecting a new building for the J. C. Penney Company, on Monday uncovered one of the town's oldest drinking founts, where the town pump may have stood in the olden days. The old plank sidewalk hid a deep well of clear, cold water. The well is encased with rock and doubtless gave way to the modern water system. It will be filled in and abandoned.
December 19, 1925 .- Crockett, December 14, 1925 .- Free city de- livery of mail, numbering of houses and naming of streets, a new rail- road depot and lower fire insurance rates are the major projects which the Crockett-Valona Business Men's Association has mapped out for con- summation the coming year.
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December 19, 1925 .- Rodeo to vote on $80,000 issue of bonds for new school at the January election. The school conditions in Rodeo are in a deplorable state, owing to the overcrowded condition of the class rooms, and it is hoped that the bond issue will carry.
January 2, 1926 .- Deed of the Lanteri shipyards at Pittsburg from Annie Lanteri to H. F. Lauritzen and H. F. Bundesen was filed in the county recorder's office Thursday, the consideration being $25,000.
January 2, 1926 .- Crockett Signal, January 1-With 119 cabin pas- sengers and a heavy cargo, the Matson liner Matsonia, Capt. John T. Diggs, arrived Tuesday morning from Honolulu. She had 112,926 bags of the 1926 sugar crop for the Crockett refinery.
The Matson freighter Mauna Ala is due to arrive Wednesday with 119,285 bags of raw sugar; the Mahukona with 53,840 bags; and the Enterprise, with 22,983 bags.
The opening days of 1926 have been the coldest in the memory of old- timers, who unhesitatingly state that for sixty years they have not exper- ienced such penetratingly cold weather. For eleven straight days a miser- able cold tule fog sent its chilling mists o'er land and water, day and night. A light fall of rain broke this up, only to let the ocean fog hold sway. And when the ocean fog is not operating, there is an east wind which brings down piercing cold blasts from the mountains.
January 16, 1926 .- John Miller, of Richmond, stated that at the top of Barry Hill, on the Franklin Canyon Highway, ice formed on the telephone wires fully an inch in diameter. He stated that north and east winds were meeting at the top of the hill and the heavy fog was freez- ing to whatever it touched. Icicles several inches long hung on the trees and bushes, where the fog had drifted in.
January 16, 1926 .- Crockett Signal, January 15-Weighted down with ice, which incrusted the poles in some places fully six inches thick, the transcontinental lines of the Pacific Telephone and Telegraph Com- pany, for a distance of two miles across the hills between Crockett and Luzon station in Rodeo Valley, have been wrecked, the weight of the ice bearing down so heavily on the wires that the poles have been snapped off, leaving the ninety individual wires through Contra Costa County a mass of tangled wreckage. Four extra crews are rushing the work of re- pairing the lines. It may be days or even weeks before the circuits are restored and service resumed.
January 23 .- Crockett Signal, January 22 .- The steamer Monoa, of the Matson Line, arrived Wednesday from Honolulu. She brought 65,720 bags of raw sugar for the refinery.
Hawaii's 1926 sugar crop is ripening so fast that every vessel of the Matson Line's fleet, with the exception of the motor ship Annie Johnson, is being placed into service again.
The big 14,000-ton freighter, Manukai, is en route from Hawaiian Island ports to San Francisco with 203,492 bags of raw sugar, which comes to Crockett.
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January 23, 1926 .- Sixty-four industrial plants in Contra Costa County annually produced manufactured or plant products conservatively valued at $404,123,620, two and a half times the production valuation of ten years ago, when the totals were only $161,332,100, figures thought at that time to be stupendous. These sixty-four plants employ 17,428 men and women, and each year pay these workers the sum of $26,424,500 in salaries.
February 13, 1926 .- What engineers say will be the highest electric transmission tower in the world is being erected by the Pacific Gas and Electric Company as a part of the new 220,000-volt line now being built from Vaca-Dixon substation to Antioch. The record-breaker, which will be at the crossing of the Sacramento River, near Rio Vista, will be 459 feet high, rising thirty feet higher than the new telephone headquarters, San Francisco's tallest building.
To get its lines across the Sacramento and San Joaquin Rivers and at the same time comply with the Federal Government's clearance require- ment for navigable streams, the company must put up five steel towers ranging in height from 269 to 459 feet, two at the Sacramento crossing and three at the San Joaquin crossing. The tallest tower of the latter span will be 359 feet.
Without a splice in the wire, six copper-clad steel cables will stretch from anchorage to anchorage, 7029 feet, nearly a mile and a third, across the Sacramento, 8835 feet, more than a mile and two-thirds across the San Joaquin. Supporting towers will be necessary to maintain the pre- scribed clearance height, but there is to be a single unbroken span of 4135 feet over the Sacramento River and one of 3175 feet over the San Joaquin.
The line will end three miles south of Antioch, where the company is building its Contra Costa substation. With the new line operating at world's record voltage it will be possible to carry directly a larger block of power to the industrial district centering around Pittsburg and Antioch.
February 19, 1926 .- Did you know that Martinez was at one time, and for many years, the principal place of business of the Pacific States Telephone Company? It was; and to the central exchange, built over twenty years ago at Ferry and Ward Streets, the directors and stock- holders of the company came once a year to hold their annual meeting. A special train was chartered annually to bring the party to Martinez, where Manager P. B. Borland was always waiting to receive the high officials of the company.
February 19, 1926 .- Pittsburg - A smokestack weighing nearly twelve tons and standing 145 feet high, the largest ever erected in a single unit on the Pacific Coast, was hoisted into position at the blooming mill of the Columbia Steel Works on Monday. Crews are rushing work day and night to complete the mill, which will cost $380,000.
Record-Herald, February 24 .- The new Methodist Episcopal Church at El Cerrito was dedicated Sunday. The handsome new structure at
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Stockton and Everett Streets was officially opened when morning, after- noon and evening services were held.
Walnut Creek, March 4, 1926 .- Walnut Creek's first playground commission was appointed Wednesday by the city trustees. The members are Mrs. Herbert Vaughn Brooke, Mrs. J. McGeehon, S. Quigley, C. P. Howard and William Miles.
Crockett Signal, March 5, 1926 .- The Carquinez Women's Club will be twelve years old Wednesday, it having been organized March 10, 1914. It has prospered under its various presidents, but no set of officers has ever achieved more in the way of beautifying the town than the first of the organization. May continued success attend the workings of the Women's Club.
March 5, 1926 .- For the first time in the history of the municipality, Martinez is about to foreclose and sell a piece of property for taxes. It is Lot 3 in Block 3, Fairview Addition, and is assessed in name of Maria Berterini. The taxes have not been paid on the property for five years, and a deed was recorded to the town "for taxes." The amount of the tax bill is $4.41.
March 5, 1926 .- Concord, March 2-Airplanes constructed at the Douglas airplane plant at Santa Monica, assembled here, and later tried in Chicago, will be used in the air service between San Francisco and Eastern points. The new planes have a capacity of 1000 pounds, as against 350 pounds of the army ships. Service between Los Angeles and Seattle, with Concord as a base, is expected to be in operation by April 1.
March 13, 1926 .- Pinole, March 8-The first building of the civic center planned for Pinole was dedicated Saturday afternoon and evening, when the fire house and library were accepted by Mayor E. M. Downer.
March 10, 1926 .- Crockett Signal-Simultaneously with the floating of Old Glory from the flagpole at the top of the seven-story refinery this morning at 10:25, the machinery of the mill was set in motion as the converting of the first charge of raw sugar into the marketable article was commenced. Passing river crafts, and train and church bells joined in making a din. It is three years since the refinery closed. It is estimated the output of the refinery during the ten months will reach 180,000 tons. Before this the output ranged between 60,000 and 70,000 tons.
March 13, 1926 .- The largest single deal in Martinez business prop- erty in recent years was negotiated Friday afternoon when a number of Oakland men headed by C. L. Philliber, George A. Lewis and A. R. Mitchell acquired title, by purchase, to the entire Fernandez estate hold- ings in the Court Block, bounded by Main, Las Juntas, Escobar and Court Streets, for $32,500, and at the same time obtained agreement for the purchase of the Brown property, southwest corner of Main and Las Juntas Streets, for $17,500.
March 27, 1926 .- Regarding the recent survey of social and indus- trial conditions in the county, we find that of the 65,000 population, 44,000 reside in the cities. There are estimated to be 16,774 foreign-born whites
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and 43,787 native-born, of whom thirty-one per cent are of foreign par- entage. Approximately 15,000 people live on farms, 5000 being distrib- uted on the 2000 individual farms, of which 1561 are owned by the men who are occupying or farming them. There are estimated to be 28,000 head of cattle, worth $7,815,084, in the county, and in 1924 the poultry industry represented an investment of $396,517.
March 27, 1926 .- Crockett, March 23-A total of 394,916 bags of sugar will be received at the California & Hawaiian Sugar Refining Cor- poration this week. On Sunday the Manukai arrived with 188,405 bags of raw sugar; Tuesday the Maui arrived with 103,311 bags; and Friday the Lurline is due with 103,200 bags.
Crockett Signal, April 3, 1926 .- The first truss span of the long ap- proach for the viaduct of the Carquinez bridge was swung into position yesterday, marking the starting of the actual steel erection on the largest highway bridge in the West. In eighteen minutes the giant mass of steel work was swung into place, after being assembled on the ground. The steel and other materials that are arriving daily are taxing the warehouse and storage facilities.
April 8, 1926 .- Sixty-seven years ago today, on April 8, 1859, the first telegraph cable was laid across Suisun Bay between Martinez and Benicia, and California's second capital and Contra Costa's county seat were joined by wire for the first time. Laying down of the submarine telegraph cable at that time was a notable feat.
April 9, 1926 .- Martinez Standard-The fertility of Contra Costa soil was shown when it became known that at the wharf of the Martinez- Benicia Ferry Company, where piling was driven into salt water several months ago, shoots several inches in length are developing on the piling made of eucalyptus trees. D. Joselin of Martinez made the discovery. "Some fertile land, I'll say," Joselin commented. "But what I can't under- stand is that the piles are all driven root end up, and that's no April-fool joke either."
Pinole, May 6, 1926 .- The old Alvarez homestead was destroyed by fire Monday night. This building was one of the old landmarks of Pinole, having been built about seventy years ago.
Brentwood, May 28, 1926 .- Mrs. Elizabeth Shafer celebrated her eighty-third birthday at her home in Brentwood on Wednesday by enter- taining a number of friends who called during the day. Mrs. Shafer crossed the plains in a prairie schooner when about sixteen years old and has resided in Contra Costa county for the past fifty-eight years.
June 5, 1926 .- Twenty Contra Costa pioneers gathered over the holidays at Pacheco's pioneer schoolhouse to glimpse for the last time scenes and associations of childhood days before the structure is torn down to make way for the modern school recently authorized by the school trustees and for which $14,000 bonds have been voted. Mrs. Edna D. Thurber of Concord and Mrs. S. J. de Soto were hostesses at the af-
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fair, which has been an annual event since the organization of the reunion five years ago by Mrs. Robert Wallace of Brentwood.
Those invited to the reunion included: Mrs. Nannie Oliver Thiel, Mrs. Maud O. Wentworth, Miss Ella Ashley, Mrs. Julia V. Thurber, Mrs. Ella Eimonson, all of Berkeley; Mrs. Lottie H. Standish, of Crockett; Mrs. Fannie Dager, Mrs. Carrie Anderson, Mrs. Nellie R. Gorham, Miss Jessie Rowley, Mrs. Belle Loucks Sears of Porterville; Mrs. Alice M. Wallace of Brentwood; Miss Dollie Anderson and Miss Annie Loucks of Pacheco; Miss Ida Hall of Alamo; Mrs. Mary Hen- dricks Alexander of Napa (whose father built the first flour mill in Pa- checo) ; Mrs. Martha S. de Soto, Mrs. Lena McLean, Mrs. Mary Gehr- inger, Mrs. Nellie Dunn Thurber, Mrs. Margaret Anderson Randall, and Mrs. Susan Dunn de Soto, all of Concord.
July 10, 1926 .- Announcement of the purchase of the Lauritzen Ferry Company operating between Contra Costa County and Sherman Island, just east of Antioch, was made by the American Toll Bridge Com- pany. Frank E. Reynolds, engineer for the bridge company, stated that the sale includes all franchises, good will, etc., of the ferry company. The ferry immediately parallels the new Antioch-Sherman Island bridge. Ferry service has been discontinued.
July 10, 1926 .- The opening to travel of the widened and much im- proved tunnel road between Oakland and Walnut Creek and the existence of the new steel bridge at Antioch, which eliminates all ferrying between the bay and Sacramento, stimulated holiday travel between the bay cities and Sacramento. During the three days a mechanical count of machines crossing the bridge showed a total of 6500 cars.
Topping last year's Fourth of July traffic record by 540 automobiles, the Martinez-Benicia Ferry carried more than 5200 cars on Saturday, Sunday and Monday. Manager A. J. Pometta stated that none were forced to wait longer than forty minutes at any time.
July 17, 1926 .- Last Monday, jelly boiled over at Danville, causing a $20,000 fire. The buildings destroyed are: Danville Emporium, owned by the Fosters; residence of N. A. Andreasen, occupied by Ed. Fingersen and family; residence of Mrs. Ella Case; and residence of A. B. Cabral.
July 31, 1926 .- Working three eight-hour shifts a day, contractors are rushing the construction of the $1,375,000 Claremont tunnel, the longest underground link in the Mokelumne water project. Extending for three and one-half miles in a straight line, from Orinda to Rockridge, the bore is being cut through hills which are 1650 feet above sea level at the highest point. Starting at a height of 340 feet above sea level at Orinda, the tunnel will gradually slope to the 328 foot level at Rockridge, giving a daily flow of 200,000,000 gallons.
Workmen will have to remove 100,000 cubic yards of dirt in order to complete the bore. These men will be closely followed by another gang which will construct the concrete pipe line, nine feet in diameter.
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Twenty-two thousand cubic yards of concrete will be required to complete this phase of the work.
The contract for the Claremont tunnel was signed June 15, and work on the project was begun immediately. It is estimated by engineers that it will take 950 days to completely finish the work.
July 31, 1926 .- For the first time since the old Martinez-Clayton horse-drawn stage suspended and abandoned its service, Martinez and Concord are to be linked by direct stage commencing next Sunday, when Robert Miller inaugurates a daily automobile stage service.
August 7, 1926 .- With a vote of seventy-two to fifty-four in favor of the proposition, residents of San Pablo decided to form a fire district to protect their buildings. As the result of the election equipment including hydrants, hose and ladders will be purchased to be used by the volunteer fire department.
August 7, 1926 .- Brentwood, August 4-By an overwhelming vote the residents of Brentwood yesterday established the first Contra Costa County water district to serve the town with a domestic water supply. With 122 registered voters a total of 107 votes were cast, of which 101 were in favor of a $20,000 bond issue to purchase existing equipment, in- stall complete fire protection, and develop new wells for local supply. This is the first district in Contra Costa County under the county water district act.
Martinez Standard, August 9, 1926 .- The Martinez-Benicia Ferry Company transported 438,023 passengers in the fiscal year ending June 30, according to a ferry traffic report just made public by John K. Bulger of San Francisco, United States inspector of steam vessels. Bulger's figures show that more than 58,000,000 persons were transported across San Francisco Bay and its branches during the year, and that 29,310,985 passengers were handled by Southern Pacific lines. The Rodeo-Vallejo Ferry Company handled 1,437,527 passengers and the Richmond-San Rafael Ferry Company 736,644.
August 12, 1926 .- Brentwood, August 12-The election called for the purpose of consolidating the Lone Tree, Knightsen and Brentwood districts cast a heavy vote Tuesday for the consolidation. The new district will be known as the East Contra Costa Irrigation District; and by this election the East Contra Costa Company, which formerly supplied the water for the three districts, will cease to exist, as will the Brentwood, Knightsen and Lone Tree Irrigation Districts. The new district will maintain its headquarters in Brentwood. The consolidation will reduce the operating expense of the district by close to $5000 annually.
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