USA > California > San Mateo County > History of San Mateo County, California, including its geography, topography, geology, climatography, and description, together with an historical sketch of California; a record of the Mexican grants; the early history and settlement, compiled from the most authentic sources; some of the names of Spanish and American pioneers; legislative history; a record of its cities and towns; biographical sketches of representative men; etc., etc > Part 17
Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28 | Part 29 | Part 30 | Part 31 | Part 32 | Part 33 | Part 34 | Part 35 | Part 36
One of the most important suits which occupied the courts in the settlement of property rights in the redwoods was an injunction case, which, on account of some ludicrous incidents in connection with it, is worthy of notice. In 1855, Baker & Burnham, owners of the Bear Gulch mill, were cutting timber on land claimed by Colonel Jack Hayes, the noted Texan ranger. A writ of injunction had been served upon the parties in charge of the mill, and Dr. S. S. Stambaugh was appointed custodian, or sheriff's keeper. The doctor assumed the functions of his appointment, and being acquainted with the men, the afternoon and evening of the first day was pleasantly passed in the games most in vogue in those camps. On the following morning, the legal custodian announced to the men that he was perfectly well satisfied that there was no disposition on the part of any of them to disobey the order of the court, and that as his presence was much needed at the Mountain Home mill, he would leave them on their parol of honor, which he accordingly did. Soon
146
HISTORY OF SAN MATEO COUNTY.
after his departure, Captain John Greer, of whom the timber cut had been leased, came to the mill, and advised the owners to continue sawing, assuring them that he would be responsible for the consequences. The captain's advice was accepted; a good head of steam was raised, and when everything was ready, the engineer turned the throttle valve, but not a rod nor a wheel moved." The steam hissed and roared in the cylinder and through the escapement pipe with such terrific energy that the men, apprehending that some disaster was about to take place, incontinently fled beyond the reach of harm. After wait- ing awhile for the grand catastrophe, the engineer ventured back, and shut off the steam. An investigation disclosed the fact that Dr. Stambaugh had quietly expressed the measure of his faith in human nature, during the night before his departure, by removing the cap, or "bonnet," of the steam chest, and carrying the steam valve away to parts unknown. This little piece of strategy on the part of the doctor gave more force and effect to the injunction than the majesty of the law and the wrath of the courts would have assured, and the mill-men finding the engine more obedient to the injunction than they were inclined to be, agreed that probably after all it would be as well for them to abide by the order of the court-at least so far as running the engine was concerned. Their verdict was that Dr. Stambaugh had made a marvelously correct estimate in fixing the bounds of his confidence in mankind. Shortly afterwards the woods got on fire and made the injunction perpetual, by burn- ing up the mill with all its machinery, except the valve, which the Doctor had carried away.
The following brief summary will show approximately the extent of the mill- ing interests in this part of the redwoods in 1853 and subsequent thereto. In 1853, or about that year, Dennis Martin had two mills; one with two sash saws, and a steam gang mill with a run of twenty-six saws. Then there were Baker & Burnham's gang mills, running twenty-six saws, Oakley's water mill, Whipple's two West Union Mills, Smith's mill, Pinkney's mill, Richardson's, the Mountain Home, Templeton's, Smith & Tuttle's, Mastic's, W. C. R. Smith's, and the Gardner & Spaulding mills. Eight of these were located on the Cañada Ramundo, six on the El Corte de Madera, and the Gardner & Spauld- ing mill on government land; of the foregoing, the Mountain Home Mill was the first erected. Shortly afterward Dennis Martin's water power mill was built.
The fate of some of the old mills, and the starting into existence of new ones after 1853, make a brief record in this connection. In 1854 the Smith mill, situated one mile north of the West Union, was destroyed by fire. In 1855 the boiler of the lower West Union exploded, killing the engineer and badly scald- ing the fireman; then the machinery was taken out, and some years afterwards the frame was used for a shingle mill. In the same year, Horace Templeton's mill, situated on the summit of the mountains, near Searsville, was burned. It was never rebuilt at that place, but the repaired machinery was put into a
147
SKETCHES OF PIONEERS.
new single sash mill in the Harding Gulch. In 1856 the machinery of the Baker & Burnham mill was removed to Squatter Gulch, about one mile from Woodside, and a gang mill, known as Gibbs' mill, was built there. It con- tinued to run until the timber gave out in 1859. In 1855 the West Union was burned. In the following year, however, it was rebuilt by Capt. John Greer, who two years later removed it to a side gulch about one mile from its original location, and there it continued in operation until 1862. In 1856 Messrs. Jones, Mills and Franklin purchased the Dennis Martin gang mill, and removed it to the head waters of the La Honda, on the western slope of the mountains, placing it in the midst of a fine body of timber. It worked here until 1860, when it was replaced by a circular-saw mill. In 1859, French & Carter built a mill having water for the motive power, on San Gregorio creek, just below the junction. It was purchased in 1861 by Johnson & Rounds, who sub- stituted steam for its water power, and afterwards sold it to Horace Temple. The latter owner made extensions and improvements, and eventually disposed of it to A. Hanson & Co., the present owners, who transferred it to a point further up the creek. In 1859, S. B. & F. C. Gilbert and Milton Irish built a shingle mill on the Arroyo Honda. It was driven by water power. About the year 1865 F. C. Gilbert became the sole owner, and converted it into a lumber mill, and it has been an important factor in the lumber interests of this market. In 1860 Wm. P. Morrison built a sawmill in Bear Gulch, about one mile above the crossing of the road from Woodside to Searsville. It was purchased by Hanson & Co., who in 1865 removed it to a point on La Honda creek, near the summit of the coast range, and just above Weeks' ranch, where it remained until 1872. In 1862 and '63, Saunders & Plummer built a sawmill in Deer Gulch, at the head of Arroyo Honda. It was also afterwards purchased by Hanson & Co., who in 1865 built still another mill on the same creek, known as the Mountain Mill.
' In the erection of shingle mills, John G. and George Moore, now residents of San Mateo, were the pioneers. In 1856 they put up a steam mill at Wood- side, near Dr. Tripp's store. In 1857 Daniel Jaggers built the lower West Union mill, which was second in the order of date. In 1861 H. S. Huntington built one on the Arroyo Honda, on the western slope of the mountains, and shortly afterwards, and near the last mentioned, Buckley & Taylor erected another.
While dwelling on the subject of shingle mills, it would be a grave fault to omit the mention of one who is widely known and esteemed. S. P. Pharis, who in some way had got to be almost universally called " Purdy," was one of the most noted shingle-millmen in San Mateo county, or in California. He has built and owned seven shingle mills, and his brands can be found in every market on the coast, and in the islands. Mr. Pharis arrived in California in 1853, and has ever since been engaged in manufacturing shingles.
148
HISTORY OF SAN MATEO COUNTY.
The Borden & Hatch sawmill, on the Purissima creek, was originally a water power mill, built by Doolittle & Crumpecker, in 1854. It subsequently passed into the hands of N. C. Lane, who sold it to the present owners. B. Hey- wood's sawmill, on Pescadero creek, was originally a water power mill, built in 1856 by John Tuffly, who run it until 1859, and then sold it to Jacob N. Varis, who, in turn sold it to Heywood, the present proprietor, in 1868. During the latter proprietorship, it has been remodeled and fitted up with new steam power, giving it a capacity for cutting twelve thousand feet of lumber per day. Heywood's shingle mill is located one mile distant from the sawmill, and can turn out forty thousand shingles per diem. In 1867 Stein & Burch built a steam shingle mill on Gazos creek. It was afterwards purchased by Horace Templeton, from whom it passed into the hands of the Pacific Wood and Lumber Company, who converted it into a sawmill. In the same region of country, but on Butano creek, the James Taylor shingle mill was built in 1873. It is now the property of S. P. Pharis.
In 1863 James Anderson built a shingle mill on Pescadero creek, about eight miles above the town. It was worked by water power, and in 1874 the mill-dam was washed away. It was never rebuilt.
On the same creek, between the mills of Heywood and Anderson, another was erected by John Tuffly. It was afterwards purchased by Henry Wurr and removed to some other locality. In 1875 Mr. Wurr put up a shingle mill on Butano creek.
The Fremont mill, on Tunitas creek, now the property of the San Jose Mill and Lumber Company, was built in 1868.
In 1867, William Page built a steam sawmill on the head waters of Pescadero creek, in which Hanson & Co. bought an interest. Later, the entire mill was sold to Alexander Peers.
In 1875, H. S. Huntington erected a sawmill near the head of Bear Gulch.
The average run of the above mills, upon the same site, has been about five years, and the average amount of lumber cut by them can be safely set down at fifteen millions feet.
Lumber cutting and the manufacture of shingles at and near the place where the pioneer fathers of San Mateo county settled, and where the initial steps in this industry were taken, will soon be a thing of the past. There is a grave significance to the country in the rapid denudation of the mountains of their great forests.
The firm of Hanson & Co. has been frequently mentioned in the foregoing sketches. This firm has been prominently identified with the lumber interests on this coast. The copartnership was formed in 1865, and consisted of Chas. Hanson, J. W. Ackerson, W. P. Wallace, and J. Russ. Mr. Ackerson came to California in 1849, and is especially remembered by old residents for the promi- nent part he took in the troubles growing out of the attempt to organize the
149
SKETCHES OF PIONEERS.
county in 1856, as well as for his faithful services as its first sheriff. The firm name is now A. Hanson & Co., and there have doubtless been some material changes in its constituents since its organization. Albert Hanson looks after the business interests in San Mateo county. Extensive as are their operations in this part of the country, they are but trifling compared with what they are doing at Puget Sound, where their mills turn out thousands of feet of lumber every hour, while their own ships and tugs are constantly carrying cargoes of the products of their mills to San Francisco and other markets. Although their business has far outgrown the resources of San Mateo county, yet here, the field of their first operations, has remained the home of the proprietors, and San Mateo, with a warranted local pride, claims them as her own enterprising citizens.
This concludes the cursory sketch of the lumber interests of the county, and events of another character which marked the early history of the State will be recalled.
Who does not think of '48 with feelings almost akin to inspiration ?
The year 1848 is one wherein was reached the nearest attainment of the dis- covery of the philosopher's stone, which it has been the lot of christendom to witness. On January 19th, gold was discovered at Coloma, on the American river, and the most unbelieving and cold-blooded were, by the middle of spring, irretrievably bound in its fascinating meshes. The wonder is, that the discovery was not made earlier. Emigrants, settlers, hunters, practical miners, scientific exploring parties had camped on, settled in, hunted through, dug in, and ransacked the region, yet never found it; the discovery was entirely acci- dental. Franklin Tuthill, in his History of California, tells the story in these words:
"Captain Sutter had contracted with James W. Marshall, in September, 1847, for the construction of a sawmill in Coloma. In the course of the win- ter a dam and race were made, but, when the water was let on, the tail-race was too narrow. To widen and deepen it, Marshall let in a strong current of water directly to the race, which bore a large body of mud and gravel to the foot.
"On the 19th of January, 1848, Marshall observed some glittering particles in the race, which he was curious enough to examine. He called five carpen- ters on the mill to see them, but though they talked over the possibility of its being gold, the vision did not inflame them. Peter L. Weimar claims that he was with Marshall when the first piece of 'yellow stuff' was picked up. It was a pebble weighing six pennyweights and eleven grains. Marshall gave it to Mrs. Weimar, and asked her to boil it in saleratus water and see what came of it. As she was making soap at the time, she pitched it into the soap kettle. About twenty-four hours afterward it was fished out and found all the brighter for its boiling.
150
HISTORY OF SAN MATEO COUNTY.
"Marshall, two or three weeks later, took the specimens below, and gave them to Sutter to have them tested. Before Sutter had quite satisfied himself as to their nature, he went up to the mill, and, with Marshall, made a treaty with the Indians, buying of them their titles to the region round about, for a certain amount of goods. There was an effort made to keep the secret inside the little circle that knew it, but it soon leaked out. They had many misgiv- ings, and much discussion whether they were not making themselves ridiculous; yet, by common consent, all began to hunt, though with no great spirit, for the ' yellow stuff' that might prove such a prize.
"In February, one of the party went to Yerba Buena, taking some of the dust with him. Fortunately he stumbled upon Isaac Humphrey, an old Georgian gold-miner, who, at the first look at the specimens, said they were gold, and that the diggings must be rich. Humphrey tried to induce some of his friends to go up with him to the mill, but they thought it a crazy expedition, and let him go alone. He reached there on the 7th of March. A few were hunting for gold, but rather lazily, and the work on the mill went on as usual. Next day he began 'prospecting,' and soon satisfied himself that he had struck a rich placer. He made a rocker, and then commenced work in earnest.
" A few days later, a Frenchman, Baptiste, formerly a miner in Mexico, left the lumber he was sawing for Sutter at Weber's, ten miles east of Coloma, and came to the mill. He agreed with Humphrey that the region was rich, and, like him, took to the pan and the rocker. These two men were the competent practical teachers of the crowd that flocked in to see how they did it. The lesson was easy, the process simple. An hour's observation fitted the least experienced for working to advantage."
Slowly and surely, however, did these discoveries creep into the minds of those at home and abroad; the whole civilized world was set agog with the startling news from the shores of the Pacific. Young and old were seized with the California fever; high and low, rich and poor were infected by it; the prospect was altogether too gorgeous to contemplate. Why, they could actu- ally pick up a fortune for the seeking it! Positive affluence was within the grasp of the weakest; the very coast was shining with the bright metal, which could be obtained by picking it out with a knife.
Says Tuthill: "Before such considerations as these, the conservatism of the most stable bent. Men of small means, whose tastes inclined them to keep out of all hazardous schemes and uncertain enterprizes, thought they saw duty beckoning them around the Horn, or across the plains. In many a family circle, where nothing but she strictest economy could make the two ends of the year meet, there were long and anxious consultations, which resulted in selling off a piece of the homestead, or the woodland, or the choicest of the stock, to fit out one sturdy representative to make a fortune for the family. Hundreds of farms were mortgaged to buy tickets for the land of gold. Some insured
B.V. Weeks
151
SKETCHES OF PIONEERS.
their lives, and pledged their policies for an outfit. The wild boy was packed off hopefully. The black sheep of the flock was dismissed with a blessing, and the forlorn hope that, with a change of skies, there might be a change of manners. The stay of the happy household said, ' Good-bye, but only for a year or two,' to his charge. Unhappy husbands availed themselves cheerfully of this cheap and reputable method of divorce, trusting time to mend or mar matters in their absence. Here was a chance to begin life anew. Whoever had begun it badly, or made slow headway on the right course, might start again in a · region where fortune had not learned to coquette with and dupe her wooers.
" The adventurers generally formed companies, expecting to go overland or by sea to the mines, and to dissolve partnership only after a first trial of luck together in the ' diggings.' In the Eastern and Middle States they would buy up an old whaling ship, just ready to be condemned to the wreckers, put in a cargo of such stuff as they must need themselves, and provisions, tools, or goods, that must be sure to bring returns enough to make the venture profitable. Of course, the whole fleet rushing together through the Golden Gate, made most of these ventures profitless, even when the guess was happy as to the kind of supplies needed by the Californians. It can hardly be believed what sieves of ships started, and how many of them actually made the voyage. Little river-steamers, that had scarcely tasted salt water before, were fitted out to thread the Straits of Magellan, and these were welcomed to the bays and rivers of California, whose waters some of them ploughed and vexed busily for years afterwards.
" Then steamers, as well as all manner of sailing vessels, began to be adver- tised to run to the isthmus; and they generally went crowded to excess with passengers, some of whom were fortunate enough, after the toilsome ascent of the Chagres river, and the descent either on mules or on foot to Panama, not to be detained more than a month waiting for the craft that had rounded the Horn, and by which they were ticketed to proceed to San Francisco. But hundreds broke down under the horrors of the voyage in the steerage; con- tracted on the isthmus the low typhoid fevers incident to tropical marshy regions, and died.
" The overland emigrants, unless they came too late in the season to the Sierras, seldom suffered as much, as they had no great variation of climate on their route. They had this advantage, too, that the mines lay at the end of their long road; while the sea-faring, when they landed, had still a weary journey before them. Few tarried longer at San Francisco than was necessary to learn how utterly useless were the curious patent mining contrivances they had brought, and to replace them with the pick and shovel, pan and cradle. If any one found himself destitute of funds to go further, there was work enough to raise them by. Labor was honorable; and the daintiest dandy, if he were
152
HISTORY OF SAN MATEO COUNTY.
honest, could not resist the temptation to work where wages were so high, pay so prompt, and employers so flush.
"There were not lacking in San Francisco grumblers who had tried the mines, and satisfied themselves that it cost a dollars' worth of sweat and time, and living exclusively on bacon, beans, and 'slap-jacks,' to pick a dollars' worth of gold out of rock, or river bed, or dry ground; but they confessed that the good luck which they never enjoyed abode with others. Then the display of dust, slugs, and bars of gold in the public gambling places; the sight of men arriving every day freighted with belts full, which they parted with so freely, as men only can when they have got it easily; the testimony of the miniature rocks: the solid nuggets brought down from above every few days, whose size and value rumor multiplied according to the number of her tongues. The talk, day and night, unceasingly and exclusively of ' gold easy to get and hard to hold,' inflamed all new-comers with the desire to hurry on and share the chances. They chafed at the necessary detentions. They nervously feared that all would be gone before they should arrive.
" The prevalent impression was that the placers would give out in a year or two. Then it behooved him who expected to gain much, to be among the earliest on the ground. When experiment was so fresh in the field, one theory was about as good as another. An hypothesis that lured men perpetually fur- ther up the gorges of the foot-hills, and to explore the cañons of the moun- tains, was this: that the gold which had been found in the beds of the rivers, or in gulches through which streams once ran, must have been washed down from the places of original deposit further up the mountains. The higher up the gold-hunter went, then, the nearer he approached the source of supply.
" To reach the mines from San Francisco, the course lay up San Pablo and Suisun bays, and the Sacramento-not then, as now, a yellow, muddy stream, but a river pellucid and deep-to the landing for Sutter's Fort; and they who made the voyage in sailing vessels, thought Mount Diablo significantly named, so long it kept them company and swung its shadow over their path. From Sutter's, the most common route was across the broad, fertile valley to the foot-hills, and up the American, or some one of its tributaries; on ascending the Sacramento to the Feather and the Yuba, the company staked off a claim, pitched its tent, or constructed a cabin, and set up its rocker, or began to oust a river for a portion of its bed. Good luck might hold the impatient adven- turers for a whole season on one bar; bad luck scattered them always further up. * * *
" Roads sought the mining camps, which did not stop to study roads. Traders came in to supply the camps, and not very fast, but still to some extent; mechanics and farmers to supply both traders and miners. So, as if by magic, within a year or two after the rush began, the map of the country was written thick with the names of settlements.
153
SKETCHES OF PIONEERS.
"Some of these were the nuclei of towns that now flourish and promise to continue as long as the State is peopled. Others, in districts where the placers were soon exhausted, were deserted almost as hastily as they were begun, and now no traces remain of them except the short chimney-stack, the broken sur- face of the ground, heaps of cobble-stones, rotting, half-buried sluice-boxes, empty whisky bottles, scattered playing cards, and rusty cans.
" The 'Fall of '49 and Spring of '50,' is the era of California history which the pioneer always speaks of with warmth. It was the free and easy age when everybody was flush, and fortune, if not in the palm, was only just beyond the grasp of all. Men lived chiefly in tents, or in cabins scarcely more durable, and behaved themselves like a generation of bachelors. The family was beyond the mountains; the restraints of society had not yet arrived. Men threw off the masks they had lived behind, and appeared out in their true character. A few did not discharge the consciences and convictions they had brought with them. More rollicked in a perfect freedom from those bonds which good men cheerfully assume in settled society for the good of the greater number. Some afterwards resumed their temperate and steady habits, but hosts were wrecked before the period of their license expired.
" Very rarely did men, on their arrival in the country, begin to work at their old trade or profession. To the mines first. If fortune favored, they soon quit for more congenial employments. If she frowned, they might depart disgusted, if they were able; but oftener, from sheer inability to leave the business, they kept on, drifting from bar to bar, living fast, reckless, improvi- dent, half-civilized lives; comparatively rich to-day, poor to-morrow; tormented with rheumatisms and agues, remembering dimly the joys of the old homestead; nearly weaned from the friends at home, who, because they were never heard from, soon became like dead men in their memory; seeing little of women and nothing of churches; self-reliant, yet satisfied that there was nowhere any ' show' for them; full of enterprise in the direct line of their business, and utterly lost in the threshold of any other; genial companions, morbidly craving after newspapers; good fellows, but short-lived."
Such was the mælstrom which dragged all into its vortex thirty years ago! Now, almost the entire generation of pioneer miners, who remained in that business, has passed away, and the survivors feel like men who are lost and old before their time, among the new comers, who may be just as old, but lack their long, strange chapter of adventures.
Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.