History of Santa Clara County California with biographical sketches, Part 3

Author: Sawyer, Eugene T
Publication date: 1922
Publisher: Los Angeles : Historic Record Co.
Number of Pages: 1934

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The climate is famed for its evenness and salubrity. The Mt. Hamilton Range on the east and the Santa Cruz Mountains on the west protect the valley from the heat of the San Joaquin plains and direct coast influences. The Bay has a modifying effect, its cool breezes which sweep through the valley, mak- ing the summers cooler and the winters warmer. The mean summer temperature is seventy-five degrees; winter, about sixty de- grees. The average rainfall is sixteen inches for the valley and nearly twice that amount for the mountains. There is an alternation of storm and sunshine between October and May. During this period there are from thirty to forty days in which more or less rain falls; from sixty to seventy that are cloudy ; the rest · are bright and pleasant. These estimates vary with particular seasons, but taking the aver- age of a series of years, it will be found that from October to May one-half the days are cloudless and fully three-fourths such that any outdoor vocation can be carried on with- out discomfort or inconvenience.

Cyclones and terrific windstorms are un- known and thunder is heard only at rare in- tervals. With the month of March the rains are practically over though showers are ex- pected and hoped for in April. Summarizing, it may be said that in any part of the year, days too hot or too cold for the comfort of those engaged in ordinary occupations are rare. It may be added that the fears and fore- bodings with which the seasons are elsewhere greeted, are here unheard of. Coming with no rigors, they bring no terrors and are alike wel- comed as a change. In these conditions health and comfort are largely subserved and also in 3

them the great horticultural possibilities, and these, the elements of present and prospective prosperity, are as constant as the ocean cur- rents in which they have their origin, as permanent as the mountain ranges which bound the field of their exhibition.

Santa Clara County is the banner fruit sec- tion of the state. In 1919 there were 98,152 acres planted in fruit trees and 2,850 acres in vines. The total acreage of cereals, vegetables and berries was 86,695 acres. The livestock numbered 62,248; value $1,288,175. It is the prune center of America. More prunes are raised in the valley than are raised in the whole United States outside. In 1919 the or- chardists of the county received $+5,000,000 from the product of their trees. This was ir- respective of the money received from the packers and canners. In the season ending in the winter of 1919 the Southern Pacific Rail- way handled about 153,000,000 pounds of prunes in the territory between Hollister and San Francisco. The crop was by far the larg- est ever raised in the Santa Clara Valley. In 1921 the canneries of the valley paid out nearly $50,000,000 for orchard products.

Though called the "garden spot of Califor- nia," this phrase should not be interpreted to make gardening more important than fruit raising, for fruit raising is the prime industry. Tiniber, cattle raising, dairying and sundry in- dustries have played and still play an import- ant part in the business life of the population, though the days of wheat raising, grazing and timber culture are passing rapidly. Lands so fertile and so adaptable to fruits and vege- tables cannot, in a section that is being rapidly populated, be given over to any industry other than one that is intensive. Within the limits of the county there is practically no waste land. It is interesting to bear in mind that much of the poorer and rougher land com- pares more than favorably with some of the best acreage in the Eastern states.

A graphic and beautiful picture of the valley appeared in the April (1920) issue of the

HISTORY OF SANTA CLARA COUNTY

by the aged priest in a solemn and impressive manner. On that day he held his confirmation.

Founding of San Jose

Don Felipe de Neve, the third Spanish gov- ernor of California, was in office from Decem- ber, 1774, to September, 1782. On June 3, 1777, he suggested to the central government in Mexico the establishment of three settlements, one of them being on the banks of the Guada- lupe River, seventy-eight miles from Monte- rey, forty-eight from the presidio at San Fran- cisco and two and a quarter miles from the Mission of Santa Clara. At that time, Lieu- tenant Don Jose de Moraga, commanding at San Francisco, was directed to detach nine soldiers of known agricultural skill, two set- tlers and three laborers to form a settlement on the margin of the Guadalupe, which they effected on November 29, 1777. The name they gave it was San Jose de Guadalupe, the approval from Spain being dated March 6, 1789.

On December 24, 1782, Lieutenant Moraga was directed to partition off the land to the settlers, a duty he effected between the thir- teenth and nineteenth of May, 1783, the recip- ients of the land being Ignacio Archeluta, Manuel Gonzales. Jose Tiburcio Vasquez, Manuel Amesquita, Antonio Romero, Ber- nardo Rosales, Francisco Avila, Sebastian Al- vitre and Claudio Alvires.

The first location was made nearly a mile and a quarter from the center of the present city of San Jose, about where a bridge spanned a little stream on the road to Alviso. The ground was too low at this point and the first settlers were the victims of yearly recurring floods and thieving Indians ; therefore, permis- sion was asked to remove to higher land and a more advantageous site. It takes long, how- ever, to move the wheels of official machinery. In the year 1785, the question of the transfer was mooted, but it was not until 1797 that the removal was accomplished-the center of the new site being near the corner of Market and San Fernando streets.

Captain Vancouver, who visited Santa Clara Valley in 1792, thus describes it: "We con- sidered our course from San Francisco parallel to the sea coast, between which and our path the ridge of mountains extended to the south- eastward. As we advanced, their sides and summits exhibited a high degree of fertility, interspersed with copses of various forms and magnitudinous and verdant open spaces en- circled with stately fruit trees of various de- scriptions. About noon we arrived at a very pleasant and enchanting lawn, situated amid a grove of trees at the foot of a small hill, by which flowed a very fine stream of excellent

water. We had not proceeded far from this delightful spot when we entered a country I little expected to find in these regions. For almost twenty miles it could be compared to a park which had originally been planted with true old English oak. The underwood, which had probably attained its early growth, had the appearance of having been cleared away and had left the stately lords of the forest in complete possession of the soil, which was covered with magnificent foliage and beau- tifully diversified with pleasing eminences and valleys, which, with the lofty ranges of moun- tains, that bounded the prospect, required only to be adorned with neat habitations of an in- dustrious people to produce a scene not in- ferior to the most studied effect of taste in the disposal of grounds."

Frederic Hall, a pioneer lawyer of San Jose, says in his history that nearly all the Indians in the region described by Captain Vancouver were in the habit of visiting the hill on which the New Almaden mine was first opened and worked to obtain the red paint to adorn their faces and bodies. The cinna- bar is of a reddish hue, and easily produces a red pigment when moistened and rubbed. While the color of the pigment was pleasing to the eyes of the Indians its effect on their system was by no means agreeable. It sali- vated them-a result as mysterious and unex- plainable to them as the setting of the sun. Although a little painful, they seemed to for- get their illness as they witnessed the lustre of their skins, for they were as resolute in their pride of dress as the proud damsel groan- ing in tight corsets and tight shoes.

The Alameda, that renowned avenue that links San Jose with Santa Clara, is known and admired the world over. The planting of the trees was started in 1799 by Father Maguin de Catala, for the benefit of the way- farer journeying between the two towns. Two hundred Indians were employed to do the work. The eastern limit of the grove was at the Guadalupe River, but in time the march of progress necessitated the removal of many of the trees to make way for houses and streets.

The original Mission of Santa Clara stood near where now are seen the structures of the Southern Pacific Railway station. Its walls were cracked by an earthquake in 1812, but no portion of it fell at that time. In 1822, however, another and more severe shock caused so much injury to the building that it became necessary to take it down rather than attempt to repair it. A site for a new Mission was chosen a short distance to the southwest, and in 1825-26 the new Mission Church was completed. In later years, so great was the

HISTORY OF SANTA CLARA COUNTY

decay that it was found advisable to encase the walls, remodel the facade and erect two towers; each served for the purpose of a lookout. The face of the structure was paint- ed in a rude fashion with biblical scenes in- tended to attract the eye of the aboriginal. while within were tableaux and allegorical pictures. In 1884, as a sanitary measure, the old Mission was torn down under the super- vision of Father Robert E. Kenna, president of Santa Clara College. One adobe wall was. left standing to show the original construc- tion and a number of pictures and relics were allowed to remain.

Secularization of the Missions

In the year 1767 the property possessed by the Jesuits, then known as the Pious Fund. was taken charge of by the Government and used for the benefit of the Missions. At that time the possession yielded an annual revenue of $50,000, $25,000 of which were expended in the stipends of the Franciscan and Dominican missionaries and the balance for the mainten- ance of the missions generally. Father Glee- son says: "The first inroads made upon these pious donations was about the year 1806, when to relieve the national wants caused by the wars of 1801 and 1804 between Portugal on the one hand and Great Britain on the other, His Majesty's fiscal at Mexico scrupled not to confiscate and remit to the authorities in Spain as much as $200,000 of the Pious Fund." By this means the Missions were de- prived of most substantial aid and the Fathers left upon their own resources. Two years after Mexico had been formed into a republic the government authorities began to interfere with the rights of the Fathers and the exist- ing state of affairs. In 1826 instructions were forwarded by the Federal Government to the authorities in California for the liberation of the Indians. This was followed a few years later by another act ordering the whole of the missions to be secularized and the religieux to withdraw. The ostensible object assigned by the authors of the measure was the execu- tion of the original plan formed by the gov- ernment. The Missions, it was alleged, were never intended to be permanent establish- ments; they were to give way in the course of some years to the regular ecclesiastical system when the people would be formed into parishes attended by a secular clergy.

"Beneath these specious pretexts," says Dwinelle in his Colonial History, "was un- doubtedly a perfect understanding between the government at Mexico and the leading men of California, and in such a condition of things the Supreme Government might absorb the Pious Fund under the pretense that it was

no longer necessary for missionary purposes, and thus had reverted to the state as a quasi escheat, while the co-actors in California should appropriate the local wealth of the Missions by the rapid and sure process of ad- ministering their temporalities." And again : "These laws whose ostensible purpose was to convert the missionary establishments into Indian pueblos, their churches into parish churches, and to elevate the Christianized In- dians to the rank of citizens, were, after all, executed in such a manner that the so-called secularization of the missions resulted only in their plunder and complete ruin, and in the demoralization and dispersion of the Chris- tianized Indians."

Immediately upon the receipt of the decree the then-acting Governor of California, Don Jose Figueroa, commenced the carrying out of its provisions to which he added certain rules and in accordance therewith the alteration in the missionary system was begun, to be imme- diately followed by the absolute ruin of both Missions and country. Within a very few years the work of the Fathers was entirely destroyed ; the lands which had hitherto teem- ed with abundance were handed over to the Indians to be by them neglected and permit- ted to return to their primitive wildness, while the thousands of cattle were divided among the people and the administrators.

In 1836 the number of Indians cared for in the missions amounted to over 30,000. They were peaceful, happy and contented, strang- ers to those cares, troubles and anxieties com- mon to higher and more civilized conditions of life. At the same time that their religious condition was one of thankfulness and grate- ful satisfaction to the Fathers, their worldly position was one of abundance and prosper- ity. Divided among the different missions from San Lucas to San Francisco close upon one million head of livestock belonged to the people. The united annual return of the cer- eals, consisting of wheat, maize, beans and the like, was upwards of 120,000 bushels, while at the same time throughout the different mis- sions the preparation and manufacture of soap, leather, wine, brandy, hides. wool, oil, cotton, hemp, linen, tobacco, salt and soda was extensively pursued. And to such perfection were these articles brought that some of them were eagerly sought for and purchased in the principal cities of Europe.

Such was the happy and prosperous condi- tion of the country under missionary rule. What resulted after the transfer of power to the secular authorities was disastrous. In 1834 at the time of the secularization of the missions there were 1,800 Indians belonging

HISTORY OF SANTA CLARA COUNTY

to the Mission of Santa Clara. In 1842 the number had been reduced to four hundred.

Life on the Early Ranchos

Prior to the American occupation of Cali- fornia the natives were a half-caste race, be- tween the half Castilian and the native Indian, very few of the families retaining the pure blood of old Castile. They were of all shades of color and developed into a handsome and vigorous race. Their wants were few and easily supplied; they were contented and happy : the women were virtuous and devoted to their church and religion, while the men. in normal condition, were kind and hospit- able, but when excited became rash, fearless, even cruel, with no dread of knife or pistol. Their generosity was great, everything they had being at the disposal of friend or strang- er. Socially they loved pleasure, spending most of their time in music and dancing : in- deed such was their passion for the latter that their horses were trained to curvet in time to the tunes of the guitar. When not sleeping, eating or dancing the men spent much time in the saddle and naturally became expert eques- trians. Horse racing was with them almost a daily occurrence, not from the gain it might bring but from the amusement to be derived therefrom. To throw a dollar upon the ground, ride by at a full gallop and pick it up was a feat that most of them could perform.

Horses and cattle gave them their chief occupation. They could use the riata or lasso with the utmost dexterity; whenever thrown at a bullock, horseman or bear, it rarely miss- ed its mark. The riata in the hands of a Californian was a more dangerous weapon than gun or pistol, while to catch a wild cow with it, throw and tie her, without dismount- ing, was most common, and to go through the same performance with a bear was not considered extraordinary. Their only articles of export were hides and tallow, the value of the former being a dollar and a half in cash and two dollars in goods and the latter three cents per pound in barter. Young heifers, two years old, for breeding purposes were worth three dollars; a fat steer delivered in the Pueblo San Jose brought fifty cents more, while it was neither trespass nor larceny to kill a beeve, use the flesh and hang the hide with tallow on a tree, secure from coyotes, where it could be found by the owner.

Lands outside of the town were valuable only for grazing purposes. For this use every citizen of good character having cattle, could, for the asking, and by paying a fee to the offi- cials and a tax upon the written paper, get a grant upon a grazing tract of from one to eleven square leagues of land. These domains

were called ranchos, the only improvements on them being a house and a corral. They were never inclosed, they were never survey- ed, but extended from one well defined land- mark to another, and whether they contained two or three leagues more or less, was re- garded as a matter of no consequence, for the land itself was of no value to the government.

It was not necessary for a man to keep cat- tle on his own land. They were ear-marked and these marks established the ownership. The stock roamed at will, the rancher some- times finding his animals fifty or sixty miles away from his grounds. About the middle of March the rodeo season opened, the time was fixed in advance by the ranchero who would send notice to his neighbors for leagues around. All these ranchers with their va- queros, would attend and participate. It was the gathering in one locality of all the cattle on the rancho. When this task was accomplished, the next operation was for each ranchero present to part out from the general herd all animals having his brand and eal- mark and drive them off to his own rancho. In doing this they were allowed to take all calves that followed their mothers. What was left in the rodeo belonged to the owner of the rancho, who then marked them as his property. On some of the ranchos the num- ber of calves branded and marked each year was enormous, Joaquin Bernal, who owned the Santa Teresa Rancho, eight miles south of San Jose, having been in the habit of brand- ing not less than 5,000 head yearly. In this work a great many horses were employed. Fifty head was a small number for a ranchero to own.

By the time the rodeo season was over- about the middle of May-the matanza or killing season commenced. The number of cattle killed each year was commensurate with the number of calves marked and the amount of herbage for the year, for it was the rule that no more should be kept alive than the pasture on the rancho could support. After the butchering the hides were taken off and dried, the fattest portions of the flesh were made into soap, while some of the best portions of the meat were cut, pulled into thin shreds and dried in the sun. The residue was thrown away to be eaten by the buzzards and the dogs. Young dogs were never destroyed and it was no infrequent occurrence to see a ranchero ride into town with a string of dogs at his horse's heels.

The habitations of these people were mark- ed by simplicity. The walls were fashioned of sun dried bricks, made of that black loam known to settlers as adobe soil. The adobe

DON BRUNO BERNAL

HISTORY OF SANTA CLARA COUNTY

was mixed with straw, each brick, about eighteen inches square, three inches thick, be- ing cemented with mud and whitewashed when finished. The rafters and joists were of rough timber, with the bark simply peeled off, and placed in the required position. The thatch was of rushes or chapparal fastened down with thongs of bullocks' hide. When completed these dwellings were capable of standing the brunt and wear and tear of many decades, as can be evidenced by the number now standing in the Valley. The furniture consisted of a few cooking utensils, a rude bench or two, sometimes a table and the never-failing camphor-wood trunk. This trunk, or chest, contained the extra clothes of the women-the men wore theirs on their backs-and if a visit abroad of more than a few days' duration was made the box was taken along. The women were cleanly in their persons and clothing, the common dress being a calico gown of plain colors, blue grounds with small figures being those most fancied. The fashionable ball dress of the young lady was a scarlet flannel petticoat covered with a white lawn skirt. Bonnets there were none, the head-dress consisting of a long, narrow shawl or scarf.

The dress of the men was a cotton shirt, cotton drawers, calzonazos, sash, serape and hat. The calzonazos took the place of panta- loons, but differed from these by being open down the side, or rather the seams on the sides were not sewed up as in pantaloons but were laced together from the waist band to the hips by means of a ribbon run through eyelets and fastened with large silver bell-but- tons. In wearing them they were left open from the knee down. The best of these gar- ments were made of broadcloth, the inside and outside seams being faced with cotton velvet. The serape was a blanket with a hole through its center, through which the head was inserted. These cloaks were invariably of brilliant colors and varied in price from four to one hundred and fifty dollars. The calzonazos were held in place by a pink sash worn around the waist; while the serape served as a coat by day and a covering by night.

The courtship of these people was peculiar. No flirting or love-making was permitted. When a young man of marriageable age saw a girl that suited his eye, he had first to make his wishes known to his own father, in whose house the eligibility of the selected one was gravely discussed .. If the son's wish was re- garded with favor, the father addressed a letter to the father of the girl asking for his daughter in marriage for his son. The matter

was then freely discussed between the parents of the girl and if an adverse decision was ar- rived at, the father of the young man was by letter so informed and the matter was at an end. But if the decision of the parents was favorable to the young man then the girl's in- clinations were consulted and her decision, if favorable, was communicated in the same manner and the affair of the engagement be- came a matter of public notoriety. The girl might then visit the young man to be re- ceived as a member of the family, and when the time for the marriage came there ensued feasting and dancing, the celebration continu- ing for three or four days. When there was a refusal of marriage the girl was said to have given her lover the pumpkin-se dio la cabala.

The principal articles of food were beef and beans, in the cooking and preparing of which they were unsurpassed, though they cultivated to a certain extent maize, melons and pumpkins. The bread used was the tortilla, a wafer in the shape of Jewish un- leavened bread, made generally with wheat, but sometimes with corn. When prepared it was first boiled in a weak lye made of wood ashes and then by hand ground between two stones into a paste. This process completed, a small portion of the dough was taken out and by dexterous throwing from the back of one hand to the back of the other the shape was formed. Then it was placed upon a flat iron and baked over the fire.

The mill in which the grain was ground was made of two stones as nearly round as possible, of about thirty inches in diameter, each being dressed on one side to a smooth surface. One was set upon a frame about two feet high with the smooth face upward; the other was placed on this with the even facet downward while through an inch hole in the center the wheat was fed by hand. Two holes drilled partly through each stone admitted an iron bolt, to which a long pole was attached. To its end was harnessed a horse, mule or donkey and the animal being driven around in a circle caused the stone to revolve. These mills were capable of grinding a bushel of wheat in about twelve hours.

The vehicles and agricultural implements were quite as primitive, the cart in common use being formed in the following manner : the two wheels were sections of a log with a hole drilled or bored in the center, the axle a pole sharpened at each end for spindles, with a pin to prevent the wheels from slipping off. Another pole fastened to the middle of the axle served as a tongue. Upon this frame- work was fastened a kind of wicker-work framed of sticks bound together with strips of

HISTORY OF SANTA CLARA COUNTY

hide. The beasts of burden were oxen. They were yoked with a stick across the forehead. The stick was notched and crooked so as to fit the head closely and the whole was tied with rawhide. The plow was a still more quain't affair. It consisted of a long piece of timber which served the purpose of a beam. To the end was fastened a handle. A mortise was next chiseled in order to admit the plow which was a short stick with a natural crook, with a small piece of iron fastened to the end of it. With this crude implement was the soil upturned, while the branch of a tree served as a harrow. There were no fences to protect the crops. To take their place ditches were dug. the top of the soil being covered with branches of trees to keep away the numerous bands of cattle and horses. When the crops were ripe they were cut with a sickle or any other convenient utensil. Next came the threshing. The floor of the corral in which the cattle and horses were penned had become hardened. Into this enclosure the grain would be piled and upon it the mares would be turned loose to tramp out the seed. The wildest of these animals, many of them colts that had never been branded, would tackle the grain. They were urged to the work by the yelling of vaqueros and the cracking of whips until nothing was left but the grain and the chaff. The difficult part was the separat. ing of the two. Owing to the length of the dry season there was no haste to effect this. Therefore when the wind was high enough the trampled mass would be tossed into the air with large wooden forks. The wind would carry away the chaff, leaving the heavier grain on the ground. With a favorable breeze sev- eral bushels of wheat could be winnowed in a day. Strange as it may appear it is claimed that grain so sifted was much cleaner than is the wheat of today.

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History of Santa Clara County California with biographical sketches, Part 3

Author: Sawyer, Eugene T Publication date: 1922 Publisher: Los Angeles : Historic Record Co. Number of Pages: 1934

Author: Sawyer, Eugene T
Publication date: 1922
Publisher: Los Angeles : Historic Record Co.
Number of Pages: 1934