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Timeline of California (B) 1860-1922
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1860 Jan 9, Milton Latham (1827-1882), the 6th governor of California, gave his inaugural address. Once Latham took office he had the legislature appoint him to Senator Broderick's seat.
1860 Jan 14, John Downey (1827-1894), the 7th governor of California, gave his inaugural address. As Lt. Governor, he succeeded Milton Latham as Governor. Downey's veto of the "bulkhead" bill (which would have allowed ownership of San Francisco's waterfront by a monopoly) made Downey a hero.
1860 Feb 26, White settlers massacred a band of Wiyot Indians at the village of Tuluwat on Indian Island near Eureka, Ca. At least 60 women, children and elders were killed. Bret Harte, newspaper reporter in Arcata, fed the news to newspapers in San Francisco.
(SFC, 2/28/04, p.D1)
1860 Apr 3, The US Pony Express mail system began when one horse and rider carrying a bulging mail pouch began the 10 1/2-day run from San Francisco, Calif., to St. Joseph, Mo. Riders left St. Joseph, Missouri and SF, Ca., at the same time. They averaged 12 mph over 75-100 mile segments between 153 (190) change stations. The SF freight company of Russell, Majors and Waddell began the service. The ride from SF was a publicity stunt and never repeated. Sacramento was made the western terminus. The enterprise failed after only 18 months, however, due to mounting financial losses and competition from the ever-expanding telegraph network. Donald C. Biggs (d.2000 at 72), prof. of history at SF State, later authored �The Pony Express: Creation of the Legend.�
(SFC, 2/15/97, p.D4)(AP, 4/3/97)(HN, 4/3/98)(SFC, 6/12/00, p.A24)(AH, 10/01, p.12)(SSFC, 1/3/10, DB p.46)
1860 Apr 13, 1st Pony Express reached Sacramento, Calif.
1860 Nov, The new schoolhouse in the mining town of Columbia, Ca., opened with 368 students, 2 teachers and a principal. It was abandoned in 1937 and restored in 1960.
(CVG, Vol 16, p.8)
1860 In California a brick mansion was built in the Sierra foothills boomtown of Nevada City. The gothic-revival structure later became the Red Castle Inn.
(SSFC, 11/22/09, p.N6)
1860 St. Teresa of Avila's Catholic Church in Bodega Bay, Ca., was founded.
(SFEM, 6/13/99, p.27)
1860 More laws in California were passed that allowed the enslavement of Indians.
(SFEC, 9/20/98, Z1 p.4)
1860 California began its official mineral collection. It was later house in the California State Mineral and Mining Museum in Mariposa County.
(SSFC, 7/1/07, p.W8)
1860 In California the 25-room Burgess Mansion, later known as the Secret Garden Mansion, was built in The Corners, renamed Walnut Creek in 1862. The Leech House was built in The Corners. In 2006 it stood as a restaurant and offices at 1533 N. Main St.
(SFC, 7/4/98, p.A17)(SFC, 7/17/06, p.B5)
1860 California pioneer John Bidwell founded Chico, Ca. His Rancho Chico became a model for agriculture across the state.
(SFC, 3/9/01, p.WBb 7)(SFC, 4/21/07, p.B5)
1860 Sam Brannan, California�s first millionaire, bought the spring grounds at Indian Springs and built a lavish resort. His name of Calistoga is the combination of California and Saratoga, a famous New York spa.
(Flyer on Indian Springs, 7/95)(SFEC, 2/22/98, p.T5)
1860 Miners numbered some 3,000 in the town of Volcano in California�s Amador county. John Doble, a miner from Indiana, noted this in his diary.
(SSFC, 4/8/01, p.T4)
1860s Lone Pine, Ca., was named after a solitary tree.
(SFEC, 8/17/97, p.T3)
1860s Mines were blasted into the Antioch hills near Mt. Diablo to mine coal. Black Diamond was the largest coal mining operation in California until the turn of the century.
(SFC, 3/4/99, p.A21)
1860s Bernardo Fernandez, a Portuguese immigrant, purchased some 9,000 acres in western Contra Costa, Ca., from the original Spanish land grant holder.
(SFC, 5/1/04, p.B1)
1860-1869 The state capitol was constructed in Sacramento. It was delayed due to the Civil War. [see 1874]
(SFEC,12/28/97, p.A10)(SFEC, 12/20/98, p.T6)
1860-1960 The population of California doubled every 20 years.
(SFEC, 1/25/98, Z1 p.6)
1860-1894 Henry Alexander, California painter. His work includes "Hiding from the Rain." Most of his work was destroyed in the 1906 SF fire.
(SFC, 5/30/01, p.E3)
1860s-1906 The 1996 book by Birgitta Hjalmarson "Artful Players: Artistic Life in Early San Francisco" covered this period.
(SFEC, 2/28/99, BR p.5)
1861 Oct 24, Western Union completed the first transcontinental telegraph line. The first transcontinental telegraph message was sent as Justice Stephen J. Field of California transmitted a telegram to President Lincoln. Telegraph lines linked the West Coast to the rest of the country and made the Pony Express obsolete late in the year.
(SFC, 4/28/97, p.A19)(AP, 10/24/97)(HN, 10/24/98)
1861 Nov 13, California�s 1st printing press, an old wooden Ramage press acquired in 1834, was burned by ruffians in Columbia, Ca.
(CVG, Vol 16, p.10)
1861 Carleton Watkins (1829-1916) photographed the Yosemite Valley, most likely at the behest of his friend John Fremont, whose estate bordered the valley.
(WSJ, 8/20/99, p.A16)
1861 Fire House No. 1 in Nevada City was built. It later became a museum. Two men shot it out with 25-foot hoses releasing 150 pounds of water pressure. It became a tradition for the local 4th of July parade.
(SFEC, 4/12/98, p.T7)
1861 Leland Stanford was elected Governor of California.
(Ind, 6/2/01, 5A)
1861 State officials took control of San Quentin Prison from private contractors following charges of corruption and brutality.
(WSJ, 1/5/00, p.CA1)
1861 Col. Agoston Haraszthy, a Hungarian immigrant to the US who settled in Sonoma, California, was asked by Calif. Governor John Downey to go to Europe and to find sample cuttings of the best European varieties of grapes. Haraszthy�s methodology, personality and perseverance earned him the name of Father of California Wines.
(WCG, p.58)
1861 The Central Pacific Railroad was founded by Sacramento merchants Leland Stanford, Charles Crocker, Mark Hopkins and Collis P. Huntington.
(SFC, 4/18/98, p.A1)
1861 The Fairfax property in Marin was the site of the last legal duel in California.
(SFC, 5/29/98, p.A19)
1861-1865 The mid-downtown park, donated to San Francisco by Mayor John Geary, became the site of rallies on behalf of the Union that gave the park its name. Many of the rallies were led by Unitarian minister Thomas Starr King (1824-1864). The block was renamed Union Square to commemorate the rallies.
(SFEC, 3/15/98, p.W27)(SSFC, 7/21/02, p.F2)
1862 Jan 10, Leland Stanford (1824-1893), the 8th governor of California, gave his inaugural address. As Governor he made major constitutional changes, sponsored legislative reforms, backed the conservation of forests, and cut the state debt in half. One of the constitutional changes enacted during his term lengthened the governor's term in office from two years to four. Consequently, he was the last governor of California to serve a two year term.
1862 Jan, An extensive flood was caused when warm rain melted a heavy snowpack. Marysville, Yuba City, Colusa and Stockton were all flooded with all the other towns of the Central Valley.
(SFC, 5/27/98, p.A13)
1862 May 5, Gov. Leland Stanford signed a bill that appropriated $3,000 to convert the SF normal school into the first state sponsored institution of higher education. The California State Normal School.
(SFEC, 3/21/99, Z1 p.4)
1862 William Brewer, surveyor, authored �Up and Down California,� a journal based on the first survey of California.
(SSFC, 5/14/06, p.G9)
1862 In southern California Isaias Hellman founded the first synagogue in Los Angeles. It became the Wilshire Boulevard Reform Temple.
(SSFC, 11/30/08, Books p.3)
1862 A single-span covered bridge was built over the South Yuba River as part of the Virginia Turnpike connecting Marysville and eastern Sierra mines.
(SSFC, 4/29/01, p.T8)
1962 The Holbrooke Hotel in Grass Valley was built.
(SSFC, 4/29/01, p.T8)
1862 The National Hotel in Jackson was built and the old and burned oak hanging tree, from which ten men were hanged, was cut down.
(SFEC, 4/12/98, p.T6)
1862 In Lone Pine, Ca., settlers shot it out with a local band of Paiute Indians. 11 Paiutes were killed and 2 settlers were wounded.
(SFEC, 8/17/97, p.T9)
1862 The Idaho-Maryland gold mine began operations in Grass Valley. It closed in 1956. In 2003 Emgold Mining of Canada planned to reopen the mine.
(SFC, 6/4/03, p.B1)
1862 In Napa Valley, Ca., Jacob Schram (1826-1905) purchases 200 acres on Diamond Mountain and founded the Schramsberg Winery. He used Chinese laborers to clear the forests, plant the vineyards and dig the caves to store his wine. In 1965 Jack and Jamie Davies purchased the winery.
(SFEM, 10/27/96, p.40)(SFC, 12/22/05, p.F1)(SFC, 1/18/08, p.A12)
1862 The Corners area by Mt. Diablo, Ca., changed its name to Walnut Creek following the arrival of a post office.
(SFCM, 8/24/03, p.7)(SFC, 7/17/06, p.B5)
1862 Warren C. Rickard purchased the Rios property (Mission San Miguel) from the state of California on a possessory claim.
1862 About this time land surveyor William Magee (1806-1892) and Charles Camden discovered an enormous mass of rich ore near Redding, California, and bought the land for an iron mine. Mining at the Iron Mountain Mine commenced in the 1890s.
(SFEC,11/2/97, p.A13)(http://shastacountyhistory.com/law_enforcement_history)
1862 Litigation and land sales had reduced the estate of Gregorio Briones to 2,422 acres.
(SFC, 5/26/97, p.A11)
1862-1884 Robert Mills acquired some 1,100 acres that was donated to the State in 1979 as a living monument to San Mateo County ranch life. It became the Burleigh Murray Ranch State Park, east of Half Moon Bay.
(Ind, 1/19/98, p.14A)
1862-1956 In Grass Valley, California, the Idaho-Maryland gold mine produced about 2.4 million ounces of gold. The nearby Empire Mine produced 5.8 million ounces. In 2007 plans were underway for re-opening the Idaho-Maryland mine.
(WSJ, 11/9/07, p.B2)
1863 Jan 8, Construction on the Central Pacific Railroad from Sacramento heading east was started. With pull from Gov. Leland Stanford, extensive government backing was obtained along with federal land grants in California that totaled 11.6 million acres, 11.4% of the state. $59 mil in 30-year railroad bonds was backed by the government and not paid back until 1909. The Northern Pacific Railroad was built by Nelson Bennett
(SFC, 7/8/96, p.D2)(SFC, 2/24/98, p.A22)
1863 Feb, The Plumas County sheriff surrounded Fort Defiance and forced the surrender of some 30 independence-seeking Nataquans. [see Apr 26, 1856]
(SFC, 2/27/04, p.D4)
1863 Apr 24, California�s �Act to Provide for Improvement and Protection of Wharves, Docks, and Waterfront in the City and Harbor of San Francisco� was signed by Gov. Leland Stanford. It established the Board of State Harbor Commissioners, an agency with the sole purpose of running the port of San Francisco.
(SSFC, 4/28/13, p.A2)(http://sfheritage.org/03StateHarbor.pdf)
1863 Apr 29, Randolph Hearst was born in SF.
(SFEM, 10/24/99, p.20)
1863 Dec 10, Frederick Low (1828-1894), the 9th governor of California, gave his inaugural address. Low encouraged a state university, and some consider him the founder of the University of California. Looking back on his term of office, Low once said, "There's not much chance to display one's ability in the governor's office of this state, even if you be brilliant."
1863 In northern California the 331-foot Knight�s Ferry Bridge was erected over the Stanislaus River.
(KCSM TV, Calif. Gold, 10/10/11)
1863 Walker Rankin Sr. founded the 31,000 acre Quarter Circle U Rankin Ranch in the Tehachapi Mountains of Kern County.
(SFEC, 7/5/98, p.T6)
1863 The state�s "black laws" were repealed.
(SFC, 7/18/98, p.A15)
1863 The California Teachers Association was formed.
(SSFC, 1/23/05, p.C1)
1863 A locomotive named the Gov. Stanford was built by Richard Norris & Son in Philadelphia and shipped around Cape Horn to California by schooner. It hauled the Central Pacific�s 1st freight and passenger trains and later was made a centerpiece at the California State Railroad Museum in Sacramento.
(SSFC, 8/8/04, p.D5)(SSFC, 2/9/14, p.P2)
1863 Gregorio Briones died and Pablo de la Guerra (d.1897) became head of the family.
(SFC, 5/26/97, p.A11)
1863-1869 The Big Four Sacramento merchants, Charles Crocker, Mark Hopkins, Collis P. Huntington, and Leland Stanford put up the initial money for the Central Pacific Railroad. Congress thought that silver from the Comstock mines would help finance the Civil War and contracted the Central Pacific and Union Pacific to build a trans-continental railroad.
(SFC, 5/19/96, City Guide, p.17)
1864 Mar 4, Thomas Starr King (b.1824), Unitarian minister, died in SF. During the Civil War, he spoke zealously in favor of the Union and is credited (by Abraham Lincoln) with saving California from becoming a separate republic. In addition, he organized the Pacific Branch of the United States Sanitary Commission, which cared for wounded soldiers. He led many rallies on behalf of the Union in SF, and the site of the rallies was later renamed Union Square.
(SSFC, 7/21/02, p.F2)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Starr_King)
1864 Apr 1, Lassen County, Ca., was created with Susanville as the county seat.
(SFC, 2/27/04, p.D4)
1864 Jun 30, Pres. Lincoln signed legislation creating America�s first national park. Congress gave to California the lands known as Yosemite with the understanding that the state would preserve them for public enjoyment.
(SFEC, 10/18/98, p.T4)(SSFC, 6/22/14, p.P6)
1864 Sep 5, In California boilers on the steamer Washoe exploded on its voyage from San Francisco to Sacramento. An estimated 175 people were onboard. Reporter Mark Twain estimated as many as 100 people were killed and 75 wounded or missing.
1864 John Currey was elected to the California Supreme Court.
(SFC, 12/16/03, p.A26)
1864 The Earp family moved to California.
1864 Giovanni Foppiano arrived in California from Genoa. In 1896 he purchased the Riverside Farm in Healdsburg and founded Foppiano Vineyards.
(SFC, 12/19/02, p.D4)
1865 Jan 17, The 170-foot sailing ship Sir John Franklin, a clipper out of Baltimore with 16 people aboard, wrecked near Pescadero, Ca. Capt. Desperaux and 11 crew members were lost.
(SFC, 8/10/02, p.A13)(Ind, 8/10/02, 5A)
1865 Jul 30, The worst US steamship disaster occurred. The Brother Jonathon, a paddle wheel steamer, sank off the coast of Northern California near Crescent City. 225 people died after the ship hit a rock near Crescent City. There were 19 survivors. The 220-foot, side-wheeled steamer was on route to Puget Sound and reportedly carried as much as $2 million in gold. In the 1990s Deep Sea Research found and salvaged 1,207 gold coins from the ship. California received 20% of the treasure and the rest was put up for auction in 1999.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brother_Jonathan_%28steamer%29)(SFC, 7/18/96, p.A18)(SFC, 6/10/97, p.A4)(SFC, 4/23/98, p.A6)(SFC, 5/28/99, p.D7)(SSFC, 4/21/02, p.A27)
1865 Oct 5, George Calvert Yount (b.1794), founder of Yountville, died in Napa Valley, Ca.
1865 Bret Harte edited the 1st collection of California poetry from newspaper clippings of poems compiled by Mary Tingley of San Francisco.
(SSFC, 1/4/04, p.M1)
1865 A hotel was built in Wilbur Hot Springs as a stage coach stop.
(SSFC, 4/29/01, p.T8)
1865 The Marin French Cheese Company opened in Marin County. It originally supplied hard cheeses to SF but shifted to soft cheeses in 1900.
(SSFC, 12/3/00, p.T4)
1865 In northern California a surprise attack by settlers wiped out nearly all the Indians of the Yahi tribe, south of Mt. Lassen. Rancher Norman Kingsley and three others shot 30 Yahi, including babies and young children, on Mill Creek. Remnants hid in the mountains for 40 years until there was but one survivor, Ishi, who emerged in 1911.
(SFC, 2/19/99, p.A1)(SFC, 9/6/14, p.C1)
1865-1867 Thomas Bard and Josiah Stanford found oil in California�s Ojai Valley. Drilling produced the first gusher.
(SSFC, 10/29/06, p.F6)
1865-1890 Wars against the native American Indians were fought during this period in the Pacific Northwest. In 2003 Peter Cozzens edited: �Eyewitnesses to the Indian Wars, 1865-1890: The Wars for the Pacific Northwest.�
(AH, 6/03, p.62)
1866 Nov 19, The sailing ship Coya, a Welsh coal ship out of Sidney with passengers bound for SF, wrecked near Pigeon Point, Ca. 26 people perished and 3 survived.
(SFC, 8/10/02, p.A13)
1866 The Chico Courant newspaper called for the extermination of Indians.
(SFEC, 9/20/98, Z1 p.4)
1866 The Feather River Bulletin newspaper in Quincy was founded.
(SFC, 5/24/01, p.C6)
1866 Charles Moss, a sea captain from Texas, built a wharf on Monterey Bay, northwest of Salinas, Ca., and the adjoining settlement took his name becoming Moss Landing.
1866 State supreme court Judge John Currey became California's 8th Chief Justice.
(SFC, 12/16/03, p.A26)
1866 Millerton became the county seat of Fresno. Its Courthouse (1866-1874) was moved when the town was flooded in the 1940s to create Millerton Reservoir behind the Friant Dam.
(SSFC, 11/28/04, p.F8)
1866 The Moretti and Respini families settled coastal property north of Santa Cruz, Ca., and developed their Coast Dairies.
(SFC, 7/28/06, p.A1)
1866 Pacific Rolling Mills opened the first big iron and steel mill in the West at what became known as Pier 70 in SF.
(SSFC, 9/14/08, p.A11)
1866 Reuben Clark, designer of the state capitol, died in the Stockton Insane Asylum.
(SSFC, 10/27/02, p.A16)
1866 Don Rafael Garcia, Californio rancher, died.
(SFC, 5/26/97, p.A11)
1867 Jun 27, The Bank of California opened its doors.
1867 Jun, 2,000 Chinese workers on the western railroad struck because they had not been paid in weeks. They also demanded that whippings stop and that hours spent in hot tunnels be limited to 8 hours per day. Central Pacific Railroad co-founder, Charles Crocker, who was in charge of construction, cut off the striker�s food supply and threatened to fire the workers. The strike collapsed after a week.
(SFC, 7/8/96, p.D2)
1867 Dec 5, Henry Haight (1825-1878), the 10th governor of California (1867-1871), gave his inaugural address.
1867 In Deep Creek, Modoc Ct., (later Cedarville) William Cressler and James Bonner built a log structure for a trading post, the first building in the town.
(SFEC, 5/10/98, p.T9)
1867 The John Dougherty House was built in Mendocino. It was later converted to a bed and breakfast.
(SSFC, 8/12/01, p.T5)
1867 In Nicasio Valley, Marin County, St. Mary�s Church was built.
(SSFC, 6/3/01, Par p.24)
1867 The St. Stephen�s Episcopal Church was built in San Luis Obispo.
(SFEC, 10/11/98, p.T6)
1867 Diekmann's General Store of Tomales, Ca., dated to this time.
(SSFC, 11/16/03, p.C7)
1867 Henry Haight was elected Governor. He served to 1871.
(SFC, 3/8/00, p.C8)
1867 Healdsburg in northern California was incorporated.
(SFEC, 8/28/98, p.T10)
1867 The trustees of the College of California in Oakland offered the state their physical plant in exchange for a university that taught humanities as well as the practical arts of land grant colleges.
(SFEM, 1/30/00, p.8)
1867 The sailing ship Hellespont, a Welsh coal ship with passengers, wrecked near Pescadero, Ca.
(SFC, 8/10/02, p.A13)
1868 Mar 23, Gov. Henry Haight signed an act that created the Univ. of California and wed the insolvent College of California to the state with the promised backing of 150,000 acres of federal land. The line "Westward the course of empire takes its way" from a 1752 poem by Irish Bishop Berkeley had earlier inspired the founders of Berkeley, Ca., to name their city and university after Berkeley.
(SFEC, 4/18/99, Z1 p.2)
1868 Mar 23, University of California was founded in Oakland, CA. Legislator John W. Dwinelle helped establish the Univ. of California and Dwinelle Hall was named for him. The first chancellor was Clark Kerr, for whom the Clark Kerr campus was named. Its first president was Henry Durant for whom Durant Hall was named. Its 8th president was Benjamin Ide Wheeler and the 17th president was Robert Gordon Sproul, for whom Sproul Plaza was named. Later the Haas family of SF contributed $23.75 million on behalf of Walter A. Haas Sr., who ran Levi Strauss & Co. for several decades. The Doreen B. Townsend Center for the Humanities was started with a $5 million pledge from Ms. Townsend, a UC alumna.
(SFC, 12/30/96, p.A15)(SS, 3/23/02)
1868 Mar 27, John Muir (30) arrived by steamer in San Francisco and almost immediately set off on a 300-mile journey to Yosemite Valley along with Englishman Joseph Chilwell.
(SSFC, 4/2/06, p.B1)(SSFC, 5/14/06, p.B3)
1868 Nov 9, The Colorado, a Pacific Mail side-wheeler steamer, was snagged off the San Mateo coast at Montara. The shoal was later named Colorado Reef.
(SFEC, 5/25/97, p.T3)(Ind, 3/31/01, 5A)
1868 Enoch Pardee (1826-1896), an eye doctor from San Francisco, built an Italianate mansion on 11th Street in Oakland. It was later turned into the Pardee Home Museum. In 1876 Pardee was elected to a single term as Mayor of Oakland. His only child, George C. Pardee, also became a respected medical doctor and politician and was elected as Oakland Mayor between 1893 to 1895. George C. Pardee later served a single term as Governor of California from 1903 to 1907.
(SFC, 1/8/09, p.B1)
1868 The Calistoga train depot was built by Sam Brannan. In 2002 it was the 2nd oldest in the state after the depot in Menlo Park.
(SFCM, 2/3/02, p.32)
1868 The Virginia and Truckee railroad line was built to serve Virginia City, Nv., site of the richest silver strike in history. Ted Wurm (d.2004) later co-authored with Harre W. Demoro "Silver Short Line," a history of the line.
(SSFC, 2/29/04, p.A25)
1868 In Nevada the Central Pacific Railroad came through Reno. The town had been founded on the banks of the Truckee River by Myron Lake and was named after a Civil War general. Lake's land was bought up by Charles Crocker, who had surveyors lay out streets and a town for which he sold lots. The Crocker land eventually came under the control of the Pacific Improvement Co., controlled by Crocker, Huntington, Hopkins and Stanford.
(SFC, 2/16/00, p.A12)
1868 The SF-San Jose railroad line joined the Southern Pacific Railroad and became a part of the statewide system.
(GTP, 1973, p.73)
1868 A wooden bell tower was constructed at Mission San Juan Bautista.
1868 Balboa Park in San Diego was established as a 1,200-acre recreational area.
(BS, 5/3/98, p.5R)
1868 Gen. John Bidwell built Bidwell mansion on his 26,000-acre ranch in Chico, Ca. Bidwell was the founder of Chico and had made his fortune working for John Sutter. He had been a New York farmer and crossed the continent penniless in 1841.
(SFC, 3/9/01, p.WBb 7)(SFC, 4/21/07, p.B5)
1868 Hamilton W. Crabb, pioneering viticulturist, purchased 240 acres in Oakville and began growing grapes.
(SFEM, 10/25/98, p.44)
1868 Fort Bidwell in Modoc Ct. was established as a cavalry outpost to protect settlers from Indians.
(SFEC, 5/10/98, p.T9)
1868 The Lawley Toll Road was completed. It was used to deliver payroll to miners and send shipments of gold, silver and quicksilver to the railroad yards from the Silverado mining camp.
(SFC,11/25/97, p.A12)
1868 The area around Mount Diablo, land grant of Don Salvio Pacheco, was named the town of Todos Santo (All Saints). It was later renamed Concord.
(SFC, 12/31/99, p.A22)(SFC, 5/26/01, p.A13)
1868 California decided to sell state-owned tidelands. In 1879 the state constitution was amended to prevent the sale of tidelands to private parties within 2 miles of a city.
(SFC, 6/15/06, p.B4)
1868 A state grant allowed SF to raise hogs in the city.
(SFC, 10/12/01, WB p.5)
1868 Charlotte "Charley" Parkhurst was the first woman to vote for US president in California. The Santa Cruz female stagecoach driver impersonated a man. In 1998 Pam Munoz Ryan wrote her biography: "Riding Freedom."
(SFEC, 7/26/98, BR p.8)
1868 George Butchart opened the Rios property (Mission San Miguel) as an inn, hotel, stagecoach stop and tavern. He named it the Caledonia Inn (a Scottish word for Scotland).
1868 There was a magnitude 7 earthquake on the Hayward fault.
(SFC, 5/21/01, p.A4)
1868-1948 Mary DeNeale Morgan, artist, was a representative of the California Plein Air movement. Much of her work was done in Carmel and around the Monterey Peninsula.
(SFEC, 8/9/98, p.B6)
1869 May 10, In the desert near Promontory, Utah, railway official Leland Stanford, drove down a golden spike to unite the tracks from the east and the west. The first transcontinental railroad was completed when the Union Pacific Railroad--building west from Omaha, Nebraska--and the Central Pacific--building east from Sacramento, California--met at Promontory Point, Utah. Recognizing that transportation was essential to the economic development of the nation, the U.S. Congress passed legislation in 1862 that provided for the construction of a railroad linking the east and west coasts. A depression followed the completion of the railroad and the Chinese became a target of ill-will as unemployment soared. Engine 350 was the first one down the Union Pacific line and commemorative platters were made for the occasion. In 1999 David Howard Bain published "Empire Express: Building the First Transcontinental Railroad." In 2000 Stephen E. Ambrose authored "Nothing Like It in the World, The Men Who Built the Transcontinental Railroad 1863-1869." In 2007 Richard Rayner authored �The Associates: Four Capitalists Who Created California.
(SFC, 7/8/96, p.D2)(SFC,1/22/97, Z1 p.7)(HN, 5/11/99)(WSJ, 11/4/99, p.A28)(WSJ, 8/25/00, p.W10)(SSFC, 12/17/00, BR p.10)(SSFC, 1/20/08, p.M1)
1869 The state capitol in Sacramento was finished. Begun in 1860 it was delayed due to the Civil War. It cost $13,200. [see 1874]
(SFEC,12/28/97, p.A10)(SFEC, 12/20/98, p.T7)
1869 US Congress appropriated $140,000 for navigational aids including a lighthouse at Pigeon Point, Ca.
(Ind, 8/10/02, 5A)
1869 Wells Fargo allowed Leland Stanford, Charles Crocker, Henry Huntington and Mark Hopkins (the Big Four) to gain controlling interest in exchange for the exclusive rights to carry express over the Transcontinental Railroad.
(SFC, 6/9/98, p.A10)
1869 The transcontinental railway arrived in Oakland.
(SFEC, 3/8/98, p.W27)
1870 Mar 18, The 1st US National Wildlife Preserve was Lake Meritt in Oakland, Calif. (Lake Merritt was named after Samuel Merritt, a physician and one of the 1st mayors of Oakland).
(SFC, 1/1/98, p.A22)(SFEC, 3/8/98, p.W31)(SFC, 1/5/01, WBb p.8)(MC, 3/18/02)
1870 Jul 2, The California and Oregon Railroad reached Chico, Ca.
1870 Dec 1, The Point Reyes Lighthouse began sending its signal to sailors every 30 seconds. It was built on the foggiest point of the entire Pacific coast and continued working to 1975.
(SFEC, 8/22/98, p.T7)(SFC, 12/1/00, p.A29)
c1870 Leon Trusset painted "Father Serra Celebrates Mass at Monterey."
(SFEC, 7/11/99, DB p.26)
1870 The Mendocino County Point Arena brick lighthouse tower was built. It was destroyed in the 1906 earthquake and rebuilt in 1908.
(SSFC, 7/8/01, p.T5)
1870 Gridley, Ca., was founded when the California and Oregon Railroad was constructed north of Marysville. It was named after George W. Gridley, wool grower and grain farmer.
1870 The California town of Summerland was established in Santa Barbara County.
(SSFC, 12/4/05, p.F10)
1870 Harold Robinson, an ex-slave from Missouri, founded the Hotel Robinson in Julian, Ca., a former gold-mining town near Anza Borrego Desert State Park. It was later renamed the Julian Hotel.
(SSFC, 11/17/02, p.C5)
1870 Albert Kent arrived from Chicago and bought 13 acres near Mount Tamalpais for $1,851. 2 years later he bought another 395 acres.
(SFCM, 1/20/02, p.22)
1870 Merchant Albert Dibblee purchased the Ross family estate in Marin County, Ca. The property later constituted much of the town of Ross.
(SFC, 11/23/06, p.B6)
1870 The Gottlieb Groezinger winery in Napa was begun. The vineyard later became the site of the Vintage 1870 shopping complex on Washington St. in Napa.
(SFEC, 2/22/98, p.T4)
1870 Rancho Refugio, between Ano Nuevo and Santa Cruz, was sold to D.D. Wilder and I.K. Baldwin. Wilder took over full operation in 1885. The ranch was sold to the state in 1975.
(Ind, 7/11/00,10A)
1870 There was an earthquake in Lone Pine, Ca., and some people died.
(SFEC, 8/17/97, p.T3)
1870 The well at Mission San Juan Bautista went dry and mission inhabitants began to use is as a subterranean dumpster. [was it due to the earthquake]
(SFC, 9/3/97, p.A17)
1870 The Chinese population in California grew to 50,000.
(SFEC, 9/20/98, Z1 p.4)
1870s Briton Greenwood, one of the rescuers of the Donner Party (1847), settled along the North Coast of California and gave his name to a small lumber town near Mendocino. He later moved to the Sierra foothills and named another town after himself. The former Greenwood was renamed Elk.
(SSFC, 8/17/03, p.C5)
1870s Gen. John Franklin Miller built a mansion on his Napa estate called "La Vergne." The Silverado Land Company bought the property in the 1950s and created the Silverado Resort and Country Club.
(SSFC, 3/24/02, p.C5)
1870s Edgar Wakefield McLellan began growing flowers as a boy on the family dairy farm on land that later became the Bay Meadows Race Track near San Mateo. He delivered flowers to customers who promptly paid their milk bills.
(PI, 1/24/98, p.5)
1870s Milton Latham acquired a controlling interest in the North pacific Coast Railroad running from Sausalito to Cazadero. He invested $3.5 million into the project and lost it all.
(Ind, 1/9/98, p.5A)
1870s Tiburcio Vasquez robbed and murdered his way through central California. He often hid out in the rugged crags of the Pinnacles at Bear Gulch Cave.
(SSFC, 4/15/01, p.T4)
1870-1970 The Selby smelter near San Pablo Bay released large amounts of lead into the Bay.
(SFC, 3/17/99, p.A19)
1871 May 9, In southern California debt-ridden Rancho Cucamonga was foreclosed on by Isaias Hellman.
1871 Jun, The California Historical Society was founded with 25 members. Many of its records were destroyed in the 1906 SF earthquake and fire.
(SFEC,10/26/97, DB p.55)
1871 Oct 24, Anti Chinese rioting took place in Los Angeles. A mob in Los Angeles hanged 16 Chinese men and one woman.
(SFEC, 2/6/00, Rp.10)(SSFC, 6/3/07, p.M5)
1871 Dec 8, Newton Booth (1825-1892), the 11th governor of California, gave his inaugural address. In 1875 he was elected to the US Senate.
c1871 Albert Bierstadt painted "Kern's River Valley."
(SFC, 4/21/99, p.E1)
1871 The College of California was acquired by the state and became the Univ. of California.
(SFEC, 2/9/97, p.W4)
1871 Phineas Banning, shipping magnate and former state senator, visited Washington to seek rail and harbor funds for Wilmington Harbor and San Pedro, 20 miles south of Los Angeles.
(WSJ, 1/5/00, p.CA1)
1871 George King discovered gold at Chariot Canyon.
(SFC, 2/15/02, p.H4)
1872 Mar 26, A 7.8 earthquake shook the Owens Valley, California.
1872 Jul 19, The Glen Ellen post office opened.
(SFEM, 7/27/97, p.26)
1872 Oct 17, The Aculeo, a British square-rigged sailing ship, struck rocks near Montara. All 21 crew survived. The ship broke up in a week with her cargo of sheet iron, steel wire and coal from Liverpool.
(SFEC, 5/25/97, p.T3)(Ind, 3/31/01, 5A)
1872 Nov 15, In California the 115 foot Pigeon Point Light Station near Pescadero started operation. It was built due to a series of shipwrecks in the area. Service ended in the 1980s and in 2004 it was transferred to the Peninsula Open Space Trust and the Calif. Dept. of Parks. On May 25, 2005 ownership was transferred from the US Coast Guard to the California State Parks. A 5-year, $5 million restoration campaign was begun.
(SFEC, 5/25/97, p.T3)(SFEC,11/16/97, p.A2)(SFC, 3/23/04, p.B4)(SFC, 5/26/05, p.B1)
1872 Nov 28, The Modoc War of 1872-73 began in Siskiyou County, northern California when fighting broke out between Modoc Chief Captain Jack and a cavalry detail led by Captain James Jackson. At Lava Beds National Monument in northern California 52 [60] Modoc warriors held off over 1,000 US Army troops for five months. The 4 year conflict was described in the 1997 book "Hell with the Fire Out" by Arthur Quinn, a re-creation of the war from eye-witness accounts.
(SFC,10/16/96,zz1p.1)(SFEC, 4/6/97, BR p.5)(SFEC, 10/25/98, p.T9)(HN, 11/28/98)
1872 Albert Bierstadt painted "Seal Rocks, San Francisco."
(SFC, 4/21/99, p.E1)
1872 Charles Nahl completed his painting "Sunday Morning in the Mines." It is on display at the Oakland Museum.
(SFEC, 1/11/98, DB p.40)
1872 In Santa Barbara the Stearns Wharf was built. It served gamblers on floating casinos in the 1930s and was hit by a major fire in 1998.
(SFC, 11/19/98, p.C8)
1872 The Ventura Pier was built. It was renovated in 1933.
(SSFC, 10/14/01, p.T9)
1872 Cristobal Aguilar, mayor of Los Angeles, left office. He was the last Latino mayor of LA until Antonio Villaraigosa in 2005.
(Econ, 5/14/05, p.29)
1872 A California law against double indemnity was enacted that prevents local prosecutors from trying cases in state courts after a federal conviction.
(SFC, 1/14/98, p.A4)
1872 Vagrancy was made a crime in California. The law was repealed in 1961.
(SFC, 3/8/00, p.C8)
1872 California banned boxing but fights continued to take place on boats and open fields and anywhere that police could be avoided.
(SFC, 5/3/14, p.C2)
1872 The San Francisco Bohemian Club was founded by 5 newspapermen, a Shakespearean actor, a vintner and a local merchant. The Bohemian grove, a 2,700 acre redwood grove on the Russian River, became their summer encampment. In 1974 John van der Zee authored �The Greatest Men�s Party on Earth.�
(SFC, 1/24/02, p.A18)(WSJ, 7/15/04, p.A1)(SSFC, 7/18/04, p.A18)
1872 Leland Stanford, railroad baron, founded the city of Fresno as a railroad station. Fresno means ash tree in Spanish.
(SFC, 9/1/99, p.A9)
1872 UC Berkeley received its first endowment.
(SFC, 12/30/96, p.A15)
1872-1873 Albert Bierstadt painted his work "The Sacramento Valley."
(SFEC, 4/18/99, DB p.23)
1873 Fall, Leaders of the 1872 Modoc War were executed and survivors were exiled to Oklahoma.
(SFEC, 6/18/00, p.T7)
1873 The original Harford pier was built at Port San Luis Harbor, Ca. It was rebuilt in 1915 following a tidal wave and became known as the Avila Beach Pier.
(SSFC, 9/17/06, p.G8)
1873 The Univ. at Berkeley became part of the Univ. of California and was required by law to admit women. The first roofed halls opened at Berkeley and Daniel Coit Gilman from Yale served as the first president of the new state university until 1875.
(PacDis, Winter �97, p.24)(SFEM, 1/30/00, p.8)
1873 The medical department of the Univ. of California opened.
(SFC, 2/15/02, p.H4)
1873 In Yosemite Valley the Cosmopolitan, a bath house and saloon, began its �Grand Register of Yo-Semite Valley� and continued with entries until 1884. In 2007 Bill Lane, former publisher of Sunset Magazine, purchased the book from the family of the owners of the Cosmopolitan for $130,000 and donated to Yosemite National Park.
(SFC, 12/15/07, p.A1)
1873 Levi Strauss and Jacob Davis patented the rivets that adorned their miners' work pants.
1874 Apr 24-26, The 2-story mansion leased by Thomas Clarke on the southwest corner of 16th and Castro in Oakland was reported to be haunted. Dr. Joseph LeConte Sr., co-founder of the Univ. of California and the Sierra Club, was called in to evaluate the situation. A 360 page report was compiled but not released. In 1877 Clarke published a 23-page pamphlet called "The Oakland Ghost," in which he argued that the house was haunted.
(SFC,10/31/97, p.A4)
1874 May 20, Levi Strauss began marketing blue jeans with copper rivets at $13.50 per doz. [see 1872]
(HN, 5/20/98)(SFC, 8/28/98, p.B4)(MC, 5/20/02)
1874 July 3, In southern California Isaias Hellman forms the Cucamonga Homestead Association to sell land north of Base Line Road and west of Hermosa in Alta Loma.
1874 Edwin Deakin painted "Farming in the Livermore Valley."
(SFC, 4/21/99, p.E1)
1874 William Hahn painted "Sacramento Railway Station."
(SFEC, 6/7/98, Z1 p.2)
1874 In San Juan Bautista, Ca., the Plaza Hall was built.
(SSFC, 2/22/04, p.C5)
1874 The Elms House in Calistoga, Ca., was built.
(SSFC, 11/15/09, p.M4)
1874 Construction on California�s Folsom Prison began.
(SFEC, 1/26/97, p.B4)
1874 The California state capitol in Sacramento, built in the Renaissance Revival style, was completed. It was designed by Reuben Clark (d.1866). [see 1869]
(SFEC, 12/20/98, p.T6)(SSFC, 10/27/02, p.A16)
1874 In San Luis Obispo, Ca., the Ah Louis Store was built to serve the 2000 Chinese coolies who worked on nearby railroad tunnels.
(SFEC, 10/11/98, p.T6)
1874 Capt. James Cass of Bristol, England, built a wharf and pier named Cass Landing on the north end of Morro Bay, Ca., to facilitate the loading of ships carrying lumber, staples and dairy products between the Central Coast and San Francisco. It became the town of Cayucos, carved from the Morro y Cayucos Rancho. The name was after a unique plank canoe (cayuco) invented by the local Chumash Indians.
(SSFC, 1/4/09, p.E6)
1874 Jean Laurent founded a vineyard in St. Helena that he named the Laurent Winery. After a series of owners it was purchased in 1977 by Bruce Markham and renamed Markham Vineyards. Mercian Corp. took over in 1988.
(SFC, 10/9/02, p.E7)
1874 The California Legislature passed compulsory school attendance laws.
(SFC, 2/15/02, p.H4)
1874 The California state Supreme Court in Ward vs. Flood upheld a law authorizing racial segregation in public schools.
(SSFC, 5/16/04, p.E5)
1874 In California the Pinnacles rock spires were first seen by non-natives.
(CAS, 1996, p.16)
1875 Mar 1, A fog station was established at Montara in San Mateo Ct. following 2 major shipwrecks. The 12-inch steam-driven fog whistle began operating.
(SFEC, 5/25/97, p.T3)(Ind, 3/31/01, 5A)
1875 Mar 19, Tiburcio Vasquez (b.1835), a cultured robber, was hanged in San Jose, Ca., after being found guilty of robbery and murder In 2010 John Boessenecker authored �Bandido,� an account of Vasquez� life.
(SSFC, 11/21/10, p.A2)
1875 Jul 26, Charles E. Boles (b.1829), aka Black Bart, robbed his first stage coach in the Stanislaus River Canyon, California. He robbed at least 28 of Wells Fargo coaches before he was caught by a Wells Fargo agent in SF in 1883. He served four years of a six year sentence in San Quentin and then was never heard from again. In 1995 Charles Hoeper authored �Black Bart: Boulevardier Bandit.�
(HN, 8/27/01)(SFC, 3/29/14, p.D1)
1875 Oct, George G. Anderson, A Scottish carpenter and trail builder, engineered his way to the top of Half Dome in Yosemite. He used wooden pins and iron eyebolts drilled into the granite to pull himself up.
(WSJ, 7/23/96, p.A20)(SSFC, 7/15/01, p.T1)
1875 Dec 9, William Irwin (1827-1886), the 13th governor of California, gave his inaugural address. During Irwin's term as Governor, paper money was widely introduced. Irwin fought to keep California a "hard money" state, preferring gold and silver instead. He also believed that the power to issue pardons should be taken away from the governor.
1875 Romualdo Pacheco (1831-1899) became the 12th governor of California after Gov. Newton Booth won a US Senate seat. Pacheco, the 1st California born governor, served for 9 months and was elected to Congress.
1875 The town of Pacific Grove on the Monterey peninsula was established as a retreat for Methodists.
(SFEC,12/21/97, p.T6)
1875 Lucy Field Wanzer became the 1st woman to graduate from UC Medical College.
(SFC, 2/15/02, p.H4)
1876 Oct 17, Rydal Hull, a 3-masted, iron-hulled, square-rigged ship carrying coal from Cardiff, Wales, hit Frenchman�s Reef north of Princeton, Ca. 9 of the 30-man crew drowned.
(Ind, 3/31/01, 5A)
1876 The St. Vibiana Cathedral was built in LA. It seated about 1,100. The population of the city was less than 10,000.
(SFC, 2/18/96, p.A11)
1876 California lawmakers established a 7-member board to license doctors.
(WSJ, 1/5/00, p.CA1)
1876 Jacob Beringer, a German immigrant, began planting vines and constructing a stone winery connected to caves burrowed into a St. Helena hillside.
(SSFC, 4/29/01, p.E7)
1876 Oil was struck in a well near what later became Santa Clarita, California. It was sold to the Pacific Coast Oil Co. of San Francisco in 1879, which eventually became Chevron.
(SSFC, 10/29/06, p.F6)
1876 The Black Diamond Mine exploded.
(SFC, 2/15/02, p.H4)
1876 The Chinatown of Chico, Ca., was destroyed by a fire. About this time arson, murder and terrorism forced the Chinese out of Truckee.
(SSFC, 6/3/07, p.M5)
1877 Jul 11, Los Angeles recorded a temperature of 112 degrees, but it was not recorded as an all-time-high because official recording only began 20 days later.
(SFC, 6/11/09, p.D8)
1877 Nov 5, The Homestake Mining Company was incorporated in California based on the gold discovered in Deadwood in the Dakota territory by Quebec brothers Fred and Moses Manuel in 1876. A consortium of SF investors, led by George Hearst, purchased Homestake.
(WSJ, 1/5/00, p.CA1)(SFC, 6/26/01, p.B1)
1877 cDec 27, Sgt. Frank Lewis, a cavalry officer at Fort Bidwell, shot himself to death in front of his men.
(SFEC, 5/10/98, p.T9)
1877 The 30-room Victorian Governor's Mansion, at 16th and H streets in Sacramento, was completed by Albert Gallatin. It became the governor�s mansion in 1903 and was last used by Gov. Reagan in 1967.
(SFEC, 12/20/98, p.T7)(SFC, 11/22/01, p.A29)
1877 The original home of Albion�s Heritage House Inn on the Mendocino coast was built. It was later rumored to have served as a hideaway for "Baby Face" Nelson.
(SSFC, 11/26/00, p.T5)
1877 The Wildrose Charcoal Kilns were built in Death Valley to fuel the area�s silver smelters.
(SSFC, 1/19/03, p.C5)
1877 Timber began to be hauled by rail from Duncan Mills on the Russian River to Sausalito.
(SFEC, 10/24/99, p.T6)
1877 Almost one-fourth of the California labor force was unemployed. Anti-Chinese feelings in SF resulted in several killings.
(SFEC, 9/20/98, Z1 p.4)
1877 Eli Sheldon Glover made an aerial view of Santa Barbara.
(Via, 3-4/99, p.41)
1878 Mar 26, Hastings College of Law was founded in SF. It was named after Serranus Clinton Hastings, the 1st chief justice of the California Supreme Court.
(SS, 3/26/02)(SFCM, 10/26/03, p.8)
1878 Apr 10, The California St. Cable Car RR Co. started service.
1878 The town of Byron was founded in the Sacramento delta.
(WSJ, 2/24/99, p.CA1)
1878 In Mendocino the Mendocino Hotel Restaurant and Garden Room was built.
(SFEM, 10/25/98, p.36)
1878 Rev. Philip Farrely took up residence as the 1st pastor of Mission San Miguel following 38 years without a resident padre.
1878 The clipper ship Western Shore, built in 1874 at Coos Bay for the Simpson Brothers Lumber Co. of San Francisco, ran aground on Duxbury Reef and sank near Bolinas, Ca.
(SFC, 10/22/05, p.B2)
1878 Mark Hopkins, railroad builder, died. Mary Frances Sherwood Hopkins set up her adopted son Timothy as treasurer of the Southern Pacific RR.
(Ind, 8/25/01, 5A)
1879 Jan 5, The shares of Homestake Mining Co. began trading on the NY Stock Exchange.
(WSJ, 1/5/00, p.CA1)
1879 Feb 10, The 1st electric arc light was used in a California Theater. The first electric arc lights were installed in Cleveland in this year. Some women complained that the white light blanched their complexions in a most ghastly manner.
(MC, 2/10/02)(SFC, 11/30/96, p.B5)
1879 Sep 10, Pacific Coast Oil Co. was founded in San Francisco by Lloyd Tevis, George Loomis and Charles Felton. In 1906 it became Standard Oil Co. (California). In 1926 it became Standard Oil Co. of California (Socal). In 1984 it became Chevron Corp. In 2001 it became ChevronTexaco. In 2005 it was renamed Chevron Corp.
(SFC, 10/20/04, p.C6)(SFC, 5/10/05, p.D1)
1879 The Women�s Christian Temperance Union founded their 1st Northern California chapter in Petaluma.
(SFC, 8/27/04, p.F2)
1879 The Italianate Crowley Opera House in Napa, Ca, was built. It went dark in 1914 and in 1973 local citizens lobbied to have it designated as a national landmark. It re-opened in 2003.
(SFEC, 2/15/98, DB p.31)(SFC, 6/19/02, p.D1)(SFC, 8/4/03, p.A1)
1879 Chinese settlers built a temple dedicated to the river god, Bok Kai, at Marysville, Ca., at the junction of the Yuba and Feather Rivers.
(HT, 3/97, p.10)
1879 A new California state constitution was adopted.
(SFC, 10/14/99, p.A27)
1879 The California constitutional convention called for a state Board of Equalization to standardize the appraisal methods used by independent county assessors in property tax assessment.
(SFC, 9/13/00, p.A15)(SFC, 6/21/11, p.D5)
1879 In southern California 3 community leaders, Ozro W. Childs, a Protestant horticulturist; former California Governor John G. Downey, an Irish-Catholic businessman; and Isaias W. Hellman, a German-Jewish banker and philanthropist, deeded to the Board of Trustees of the nascent University of Southern California 308 lots, which were located in an area designated "West Los Angeles," near the intersection of Vermont Avenue and Exposition Boulevard.
1879 Milton Latham went broke and his SF home was auctioned off.
(Ind, 1/9/98, p.5A)
1879 Gustave Niebaum, a Finnish sea captain, founded the Inglenook Winery near Rutherford in the Napa Valley of California. Niebaum had made a fortune in the Alaskan fur trade. His Inglenook Chateau, designed by Hamden McIntyre, opened in 1887. The winery was later sold in pieces to movie director, Francis Ford Coppola, who bought a large part in 1975 and the rest of it in 1994-95. In 1994 Constellation Brands acquired Inglenook Vineyards in the Central Valley and in 2008 sold the winery to the Wine Group of San Francisco along with Almaden Vineyards in a deal valued at $134 million.
(WSJ, 11/7/95, p.A-20)(SFC, 1/24/08, p.C3)(SSFC, 4/26/09, p.E6)
1879 The Hercules Powder Works began manufacturing explosives north of Richmond, Ca. Production later shifted to fertilizer and continued until 1964. As the company moved out residential developers moved in and the town of Hercules took the company name.
(SFC, 5/30/06, p.D1)
1879 California�s population was about 865,000.
(Econ, 3/19/11, SR p.7)
1880 Jan 8, George Perkins (1839-1923), the 14th governor of California, gave his inaugural address. While in office, he personally interviewed each of the many prisoners he pardoned, showing particular leniency toward juveniles. A new state constitution was developed during this time, shortening his term of office to allow future gubernatorial elections to be held in even-numbered years. The open support that Perkins showed for business monopolies prompted modern-day historians to joke that if Perkins ever got into deep water a Standard Oil tanker would have been sent to rescue him.
1880 Mar, The Bok Kai Temple was dedicated beside the Yuba River in Marysville by Chinese immigrants to honor the god of water. In 2001 it was listed as among America�s 11 most endangered historic places.
(SFC, 6/26/01, p.A2)(SFC, 7/9/01, p.A3)(SFC, 2/20/04, p.A21)
1880 May 28, Ada May, a schooner with 120,000 feet of lumber, hit the Colorado Reef at Montara and was destroyed by the surf.
(Ind, 3/31/01, 5A)
1880 Summer, Robert Louis Stevenson and his new wife, Fanny Osbourne, honeymooned at Mount St. Helena. He moved to an abandoned mining camp in the Palisades cliffs above Napa Valley and worked on his novel "Treasure Island." He made notes for his book "Silverado Squatters."
(SFEC, 10/6/96, T3)(SFC,11/25/97, p.A15)
1880 Joaquin Miller (1837-1913), "poet of the Sierras," published "Utopia."
(SFEM, 4/2/00, p.48)(Internet)
1880 California politicians integrated the state�s public schools.
(SSFC, 5/16/04, p.E5)
1880 Folsom Prison began operations.
(WSJ, 11/26/97, p.CA4)
1880 Charles Crocker, California railroad pioneer, built the Hotel Del Monte on the Monterey Peninsula as a wooden Gothic structure. It was destroyed by fire in 1887, rebuilt and burned again in 1924. It was later purchased by Samuel F.B. Morse with the backing of SF banker Herbert Fleishhacker. Morse sold the hotel and over 600 surrounding acres to the US Navy in the late 1940s. In 1952 the Naval Postgraduate School moved onto the site.
(SSFC, 5/18/08, p.A15)
1880 Milton Latham was forced to auction off his property in Menlo Park.
(Ind, 1/9/98, p.5A)
1880 John Ballard, a blacksmith and former slave, bought land on a mountain in the Santa Monica range of southern California. In 2010 the 2,031 peak, previously known as Negrohead Mountain, was renamed to Ballard Mountain.
(SFC, 2/22/10, p.A6)
1880 Oilmen in southern California formed a company that grew to become Unocal.
(SFC, 4/5/05, p.C1)
c1880 The Napa Valley had some 65 wineries.
(SFEM, 10/31/99, p.28)
1880 Geyser Peak Winery was established.
(SFEM, 10/31/99, p.37)
1880 Frank Miller (22) bought his parents 5-year-old boarding house called Glenwood Cottage in Riverside, Ca., and began to turn it into his world famous Mission Inn.
(SSFC, 1/16/05, p.F1)
1880s The Rockland Lime and Lumber Company burned local redwood off the Big Sur coastline to produce lime from the naturally occurring limestone. It was then packed into barrels and shipped to Monterey and SF where it was used to make cement. The site later became Limekiln State Park.
(SFEC, 3/30/97, p.T3)
1880s Eight acres of picholine olive trees, a French variety, were planted on Highway 12 at the site of the first Wells Fargo stagecoach stop in glen Ellen.
(SFEM, 7/27/97, p.29)
1880s There was a petition to Congress by 52 Indians of Yosemite requesting $1 million to relinquish rights to the valley. There is no record of any response.
(SFEC, 5/18/97, Z1 p.4)
1880s The Del Monte name appeared on coffee sold at the Del Monte Hotel in Monterey.
(SSFC, 10/3/04, p.J1)
1880-1916 Stinson Beach in west Marin County was known as Willow Camp.
(SFC, 6/30/99, p.C2)
1880-1930 A 2nd major wave of Italians immigrated to California. The 1st wave was in 1850-1870.
(SSFC, 7/10/05, p.D5)
1881 Sep 26, The Alice Buck, a ship from New York loaded with railroad iron for Portland, hit rocks north of Point Montara. 13 were rescued and 6 people died.
(Ind, 3/31/01, 5A)
1881 The LA Times began operation under Gen. Harrison Gray Otis and Harry Chandler. After 119 years of ownership by the Otis and Chandler families, the paper was sold in 2000 to the Tribune Co.
(SFC, 3/14/00, p.A1)(WSJ, 6/14/01, p.A18)
1881 The Madrona Manor in Healdsburg was built as a country retreat. it was later turned into a bed and breakfast.
(SFEC, 8/28/98, p.T10)
1881 Baughman�s Western Outfitters opened in Livermore, Ca.
(SFC, 10/5/06, 96HR p.37)
1881 The Bok Kai Festival at Marysville, Ca., was first celebrated.
(HT, 3/97, p.10)
1881 Leland Stanford purchased the 3,800 Vina Ranch on the Feather River and built the world�s largest winery building there. His wine was unsuccessful so he turned to making brandy. A Cistercian-Trappist order purchased 595 acres of the ranch in 1954.
(SFC, 8/22/00, p.A6)
1881 George Washington Gridley, sheep rancher and founder of Gridley in Butte County, died. His great grandson Arnold (d.2004) invented the motorized cable car after buying and converting some old SF California Street cable cars in 1958.
(SFC, 5/15/04, p.B6)
1881-1906 The town of Calico in San Bernadino County, Ca., grew during the gold rush. 50 mines produced some $21 million in silver over this period.
(SFC, 6/24/02, p.A13)
1881-1919 Some 59 laborers, mostly Chinese immigrants, were killed during this period in explosions at the California Powder Works in Hercules. They were paid 12.5 cents per hour.
(SFEC, 9/20/98, Z1 p.4)
1882 Highway 120, the Tioga Pass, began as a mining road across the Sierras above Yosemite Valley.
(SFEC, 7/16/00, p.T6)
1882 The Pacific Stock Exchange was founded in SF.
(SFC, 7/14/98, p.B1)
1882 The SF military base was re-named Fort mason after former Gov. Richard Barnes Mason.
(SFC, 10/4/02, p.E1)
1882 A Seth Thomas clock from Connecticut, shipped around the Horn, arrived in Petaluma and was placed atop the new Masonic Lodge.
(SFEC, 1/9/00, p.T6)
1882 The Pacific Grove Museum of Natural History began operation.
(SFEC,12/21/97, p.T6)
1882 Farmer John Frazier discovered an aquifer of mineral water in Frazier Station, Ca., and renamed the town to Carlsbad after the resort in Karlsbad, Bohemia.
(SSFC, 11/9/03, p.C5)
1802-1889 Juana Briones Y Tapia de Miranda was born in Santa Cruz, Ca. She was a battered wife and became the first California woman to get a divorce. Her family moved to the Presidio in 1812. She was the first to settle on San Francisco�s Powell St. in what is now North Beach and worked as a homeopathic doctor. In 1989 the Women�s Heritage Museum persuaded the state to authorize a plaque in her honor to be set in Washington Square.
(SFEC, 5/26/97, p.A11)(SFC,11/17/97, p.A1,21)(SFC, 8/24/13, p.C1)
1882-1943 In the US the Chinese Exclusion Act was in force. [see May 6, 1882] The Chinese Exclusion Act, prohibiting the immigration of Chinese laborers into the United States, was first passed in 1882 and then repealed by Congress in 1943. Strong anti-Chinese feeling in the West led to the 1882 act, which was extended for 10 years in 1894 and indefinitely in 1902. The laws were finally repealed in 1943 but only after the Chinese population in the U.S. had declined dramatically. In 2007 Jean Pfaelzer authored �Driven Out: The Forgotten War Against Chinese Americans.�
(SFEC, 8/18/96, DB p.27)(HNQ, 9/9/98)(SSFC, 6/3/07, p.M1)
1883 Jan 10, George Stoneman (1822-1894), the 15th governor of California, gave his inaugural address. He supported prison reform and staunchly believed in rehabilitating prisoners through parole. In the last few weeks of his term, Stoneman granted 260 pardons and commuted 146 prison sentences.
1883 Aug 28, John Montgomery (b.1858) made the first manned, controlled flight in the US in his "Gull" glider, whose design was inspired by watching birds. The craft weight 38 pounds and flew to 15 feet for at least 300 feet at Otay Mesa near San Diego, Ca. In 1911 Montgomery died in a glider crash.
(SFC, 6/5/98, p.A23)(SFCM, 2/6/05, p.3)(GenIV, Winter 04/05)
1883 Frederick Spencer Oliver in Yreka, Ca., authored "Dweller on Two Planets," an occult classic that told the story of the Lemurians, an ancient race who abandoned their Atlantis-like continent, when it sank beneath the Pacific Ocean, and formed a mystical brotherhood inside Mount Shasta.
(SSFC, 10/12/02, p.C5)
1883 Robert Lewis Stevenson authored �Silverado Squatters.� It covered 2 months of his journey to Mount St. Helena, Ca., with his wife Fanny Van de Grift Osbourne.
(SSFC, 11/15/09, p.M4)
1883 The Elk Cove Inn in Elk, California, was built.
1883 In Hanford the Wing family began their Imperial Dynasty restaurant in China Alley.
(SFEC, 1/4/98, p.T9)
1883 In Oakland, Ca. the city engineer, Anthony Chabot, donated the Chabot Observatory and Science Center to the school district. In 1996 it began a $51 million, 3-year expansion and move to the Oakland Hills in Joaquin Miller Park at 10902 Skyline Blvd.
(SFC, 10/19/96, A15)(SFC, 5/19/98, p.A20)
1883 Wente Winery was founded in California. Carl Wente bought 49 acres in Livermore and started a winery.
(SFC, 9/27/96, p.E3)(SFC, 12/19/02, p.D4)
1883 A newly elected Democratic governor withdrew Leland Stanford's nomination to the board of regents of the Univ. of California.
(SFEM, 1/30/00, p.8)
1883 Charles E. Boles, known as Black Bart, was caught in SF by a Wells Fargo detective James B. Hume, who tracked him down using a laundry ticket. Bart spent 50 months in San Quentin for his eight-year string of stagecoach robberies.
(HN, 8/27/01)(CVG, Vol 16, p.23)
1883 California railroad tycoon Charles Crocker used Chinese laborers to complete a 23-mile pipeline to deliver Carmel River water to his new Hotel del Monte in Monterrey. Another Chinese crew built the river�s first dam. In 2012 Ray A. March authored �River in Ruin: The Story of the Carmel River.�
(SSFC, 4/15/12, p.F7)
1883 The Hitchcocks of SF purchased a 1000 acres in the upper Napa Valley between St. Helena and Calistoga. Martha Hitchcock set up her homesite named "Lonely." Nearby Lillie Hitchcock Coit set up her homesite named "Larkmead.� In 2000 Drew Sparks and Sally Kellman authored "A Salon at Larkmead: A Charmed Life in the Napa Valley."
(SFEM, 4/2/00, p.47,48)
1883 Katherine Layne Curran was offered the curatorship of Botany at the Univ. of California.
(PacDis, Winter �97, p.24)
1883 Grape vines in Anaheim began to wilt. The disease responsible was named Pierce's disease in 1891 by Newton B. Pierce in his publication "California Vine Disease."
(SFC, 9/1/99, Z1 p.4)
1884 Jan 6, A federal judge in SF ordered that miners stop dumping debris into the waterways.
(WSJ, 1/5/00, p.CA1)
1884 Mar 17, John Joseph Montgomery made the first glider flight in Otay, Calif.
1884 Nov, The novel "Ramona" by Helen Hunt Jackson (1830-1885) was published. It was about a love affair between a half-Indian girl and a Luisea Indian in southern California. It also served a covert tract on Indian oppression in America. In 1990 Valerie Sherer Mathes published "Helen Hunt Jackson and Her Indian Reform Legacy." In 1998 Mathes edited: "The Indian Reform Letters of Helen Hunt Jackson."
(SFEC, 12/20/98, BR p.5)
1884 Elisha Babcock and Hampton L. Story decided to build a resort hotel on a flat peninsula in San Diego Bay. They built the Hotel del Coronado in 11 months and the town of Coronado grew up around it. [see 1885]
(SFEC, 1/10/99, p.T6)
1884 The first Veteran�s Home in California was built in Yountville (Napa Ct.).
(SFC, 5/20/96, p.A-15)
1884 A large part of the Cesnola collection of Cypriot antiquities of the NYC Metropolitan Museum was sold to Gov. Leland Stanford of California.
(AM, 7/97, p.68)
1884 A federal judge ruled that hydraulic mining must stop destroying the land.
(SFEC, 1/11/98, DB p.41)
1884 The Union Lumber Company was founded in Fort Bragg. It ran the California Western Rail and Navigation line, which was nicknamed the Skunk Train from the smell of its fuel. Charles Johnson started the mill in 1885.
(SFC, 3/5/96, p.A16)(SSFC, 11/26/00, p.T4)
1884 Charles Fletcher Lummis proposed to Gen. Otis of the LA Times to walk 3,000 miles to LA an file news dispatches. In 2001 Mark Thompson authored "American Character: the Curious Life of Fletcher Lummis and the Rediscovery of the Southwest."
(SSFC, 6/24/01, DB p.66)
1884 Leland Stanford Jr. (15) died of typhus. His death moved the Stanfords to found Stanford Univ.
(SFC, 6/20/98, p.A15)
1884-1915 Harry Granice edited and published the Sonoma Index-Tribune.
(SFC, 9/25/03, p.A23)
1885 Mar 3, California became the 1st US state to establish a permanent forest commission.
1885 Aug, James Marshall, the man who discovered gold in Ca., died broke.
(SFEC, 1/4/98, Z1p.4)
1885 Leland and Jane Stanford founded Stanford Univ. The cornerstone was laid in 1887. The 1st class began in 1891 with David Starr Jordan (d.1931) as the first president.
(SFEM, 1/30/00, p.8)(Ind, 4/12/03, 5A)(Ind, 4/19/03, 5A)
1885 California in response to the �yellow menace� passed legislation that allowed districts to create separate schools for Asian Americans.
(SSFC, 5/16/04, p.E5)
1885 Elisha Babcock and Hampton L. Story bought the uninhabited Coronado peninsula for $110,000. They divided the land, sold most of the lots and built a resort on the leftover oceanfront acreage. [see 1884]
(SSFC, 3/3/02, p.C5)
1885 A Cal Western railroad line was built in northern California to haul lumber along the Noyo River canyon. A connection to Willits was completed in 1911. It became known as the Skunk Train when Cal Western began using single-car rail buses with bad gas fumes in 1925.
(SSFC, 8/31/03, p.A27)(SFC, 6/8/13, p.A7)
1885 In California the Far Niente winery was built in Napa Valley. In 2008 it was among the a maverick group of local wineries to embrace solar power.
(SFC, 5/29/08, p.A1)
1885 Union Iron Works launched its first ship, the coal carrier Arago, from Pier 70 in SF.
(SSFC, 9/14/08, p.A11)
1885 Helen Hunt Jackson (b.1830), author and social reformer, died. Her books included "Ramona" (1984). In 2003 Kate Phillips authored Helen Hunt Jackson: A Literary Life."
(SFEC, 12/20/98, BR p.5)(SFC, 4/19/03, p.D4)
1886 Feb 14, California orange growers ship their first trainload of fruit from Los Angeles.
(HCB, 2003, p.92)
1886 May 10, The US Supreme Court ruling in Santa Clara County v Southern Pacific Railroad dealt with taxation of railroad properties. A unanimous decision, written by Justice Harlan, ruled on the matter of fences, holding that the state of California illegally included the fences running beside the tracks in its assessment of the total value of the railroad's property. As a result, the county could not collect taxes from Southern Pacific that it was not allowed to collect in the first place.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Santa_Clara_County_v._Southern_Pacific_Railroad)(Econ, 3/26/11, p.78)(Econ, 4/16/11, p.18)
1886 Newly-elected Gov. James H. Budd attempted to oust Moses A. Gunst from his position as SF police commissioner.
(Ind, 3/2/02, 5A)
1886 George Hearst was elected US Senator for California.
(SFEM, 10/24/99, p.20)
1886 The Southern Pacific RR arrived in San Miguel. The Rios-Caledonia Adobe changed to a dress shop, post office and school house.
1887 Apr 29, William Randolph Hearst received the SF Examiner newspaper on his 24th birthday. He proceeded to found the Hearst Corporation with help from his father, Senator George Hearst. The elder Hearst had amassed wealth from the Comstock mines of Nevada.
(SFC, 4/14/99, p.A19)(CHA, 1/2001)
1887 The H.H. Harris Winery was built in Rutherford. It was purchased in the 1940s by Katherine Cebrian and her 2nd husband Douglas Pringle, who remodeled it into a medieval chateau (Puerto Dorada). It burned down on July 4, 1970, and was rebuilt over the next 10 years.
(SFC, 10/4/02, p.A26)
1887 Lawyer Niles Searls of New York, became chief justice of the California Supreme Court. He had practiced law in Missouri and came to Cal. during the gold rush.
(SFC, 1/29/98, p.B2)
1887 Winfield Scott Matthew, a minister in the Methodist Episcopal Church, became the dean and acting president of the Univ. of Southern California.
(SFC, 6/8/99, p.A22)
1887 The Stony Ridge winery was founded in Pleasanton, Ca. In 1975 the operation moved to Livermore.
(SSFC, 7/1/12, p.N3)
1887 California Savings was founded. In 2003 the Symon family put it up for sale.
(SFC, 8/15/03, p.B1)
1887 Horace Gasquet completed a 23-mile toll road from Crescent City to Waldo, Ore. Hogs and sheep cost 6 cents each. A man and horse cost $1.
(SFEC, 12/5/99, p.T5)
1887 In Pope Valley, Ca. water from a hot spring flooded a quicksilver mine shaft and a dozen Chinese miners were killed. Mercury mining soon ended and the Aetna Springs and Mineral Waters Co. began to flourish in its place.
(SFC, 1/3/00, p.A15)
1888 Jun 1, California got its first seismographs as three of the devices were installed at the Lick Observatory at Mount Hamilton, Ca. The Lick Observatory, built atop Mt. Hamilton near San Jose, contained a 36-inch telescope, the largest in the world.
(DTnet, 6/1/97)(SFC, 3/5/96, p.C1)
1888 The Agnews State Hospital was opened in San Jose on farmland purchased from Abraham Agnews. It was once called the Agnews Insane Asylum and was closed in 1995. Sun Microsystems acquired an 82.5 acre portion of the property and planned to build an R&D campus in 1997.
(SFC, 9/29/97, p.A21)
1888 A manor house was built in Napa Valley that later became part of Stags� Leap Winery.
(SFC, 10/28/04, p.F6)
1888 The Winship Building opened in Napa.
(SSFC, 11/11/01, p.C5)
1888 Wells Fargo introduced Ocean-to-Ocean express services, the first transcontinental express that shipped all kinds of valuables.
(SFC, 6/9/98, p.A10)
1888 Black Bart, aka Charles Earl Bowles, was released after serving five years in San Quentin. He had held up 28 stages in Northern California from 1875 to 1883.
(SFC, 3/1/14, p.A8)
1888 Charles Crocker died and San Bruno Mountain became an asset of the Crocker Land Co.
(Ind, 4/27/99, p.11A)
1889 May 6, A special Southern Pacific train left Sacramento bound for Utah to drive the final spike connecting the SP to the Union Pacific on May 8. The UP train did not arrive until May 10.
(WSJ, 8/25/00, p.W10)
1889 Aug 14, David S. Terry, former Chief Justice of the California Supreme Court (1857-1859), was shot by a bodyguard of Stephen Field, an associate justice of the US Supreme Court, after Terry slapped Field in the face at a railroad restaurant in Lathrop, Ca.
(SFC, 9/7/09, p.C6)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_S._Terry)
1889 William Heath Davis authored� Sixty Years in California.� It included a description of life in Yerba Buena (San Francisco).
(SFC, 7/6/13, p.C2)
1889 The 3-story Churchill Manor was built in Napa. It later became a bed-and-breakfast.
(SSFC, 11/11/01, p.c5)
1889 The Greystone winery in Napa Valley was constructed of locally quarried tuffa stone.
(SSFC, 1/21/01, p.T8)
1889 The town of Pacific Grove incorporated and the Centrella Inn opened as a boarding house.
(SFEC,12/21/97, p.T6)
1889 SF attorney and real estate developer James McMillan Shafter subdivided a portion of his vast holdings on Point Reyes peninsula. The cluster of summer residences grew to become the town of Inverness.
(SFEC,10/19/97, p.T3)
1889 Katherine Layne Curran (1844-1920) married Townshend S. Brandegee. For their honeymoon they walked from San Diego to San Francisco botanizing and collecting plants all the way.
(PacDis, Winter �97, p.22)
1889 David S. Terry, former California Supreme Court chief, was killed by a federal marshal following a fracas in a San Joaquin Valley railroad depot,.
(Ind, 5/12/01, 5A)
1890 Jan 1, In Pasadena a parade of flower-decorated horse and buggies was staged. It was followed by an afternoon of public games on the "town lot" east of Los Robles between Colorado and Santa Fe. The parade was intended to resemble a version of the festival of roses in Nice, France.
1890 Jul 13, John C. "Pathfinder" Fremont (76), US explorer, governor (Arizona, California), died. He was buried in obscurity in Sparkill, NY. Fremont (b.1830) was the 1st Republican presidential candidate in 1856. In 1999 David Roberts authored "A Newer World: Kit Carson, John C. Freemont and the Claiming of the American West." In 2002 Tom Chaffin authored �Pathfinder: John Charles Fremont and the Course of American Empire.� In 2007 Sally Denton authored �Passion and Principle: John and Jessie Fremont, the Couple Whose Power, Politics and Love Shaped Nineteenth-Century America.�
(WUD, 1994, p.567)(SFEC, 2/13/00, BR p.5)(SSFC, 12/22/02, p.M1)(SSFC, 7/1/07, p.M1)
1890 Sep 25, Congress established California�s Yosemite National Park.
1890 Oct 1, Yosemite National Park, created by Congress, was dedicated in California.
(SFEC, 5/18/97, Z1 p.4)(HN, 10/1/98)
1890 The Century Magazine published "Ranch and Mission Days in Alta California" by Guadalupe Vallejo, niece of Gen. Mariano Vallejo.
(SFC, 11/21/03, p.I14)
1890 The Thatcher Hotel, later the Hopland Inn, was built in Hopland, Ca.
(SSFC, 8/18/02, p.C1)
1890 Katherine Layne Curran and Townshend S. Brandegee founded the botanical journal, Zoe.
(PacDis, Winter �97, p.26)
1890 The Native Sons of the Golden West dedicated the John [James Wilson] Marshall (d.1885) Monument on a hill overlooking Coloma, for the man who discovered gold in California.
(SFEC, 7/6/97, p.T3)
1890 The Dominican College of San Rafael was founded. It was associated with women�s education until 1971, when a transition to accept males was completed under Sister M. Samuel Conlan (d.2004).
(SFEC, 3/15/98, p.W21)(SFC, 7/14/04, p.B7)
1890 Lincoln, a railhead in the Sierra foothills, was incorporated.
1890 The town of Rodeo, just south of the Carquinez Strait, was named.
(SFC, 10/22/03, p.A23)
1890 The Sunset oil field in Kern County, California, and the Coalinga field in Fresno County were discovered.
(SSFC, 10/29/06, p.F6)
1890 In California the first opossums were released by humans in Los Angeles County about this time. Tow more releases were documented in 1910 and 1924.
(SFC, 11/26/08, p.G3)
1890s McCloud in Siskiyou County was established by the McCloud River Lumber Co.
(SSFC, 6/17/01, p.T5)
1890s William and Godfrey Notley established Notley�s Landing on the Big Sur coast. It was used to ship out local redwood and tan oak to SF and other ports. In 2001 the Big Sur Land Trust acquired the 6-acre stretch.
(SFC, 5/18/01, p.A24)
1890s Charles Rovengo, an Italian stonemason, came to Napa and built the Burgundy House.
(SFEC, 2/22/98, p.T4)
1890s Warren Bechtel founded the Bechtel construction company.
(SFC, 6/22/01, p.D5)
1890s Pierce's disease, spread by the glassy-winged sharpshooter, destroyed the Southern California grape industry.
(SFC, 9/1/99, Z1 p.4)(SFC, 5/20/00, p.A3)
1890-1916 The US Army ran Yosemite and Sequoia National Parks.
(SFC, 6/5/97, p.A19)
1890-1930 The California Plein Air movement in art was based in outdoor scenes that captured the state�s colors and light. Later Ruth Lilly Westphall edited "Plein Air Painters of California."
(SFEC, 8/9/98, p.B6)
1890-1964 Idwal Jones, California writer. His work included the classic novel "The Vineyard," set in Napa Valley with a foreword by Robert Mondavi, and the non-fiction work "Vines in the Sun."
(SFEM,10/26/97, p.36)
1891 Feb 6, The Dalton Gang committed its first crime, a train robbery in Alila, Calif. on Southern Pacific #17. In 1979 Ron Hansen authored "Desperadoes," a fictional account of the Dalton gang.
(HN, 2/6/99)(WSJ, 8/1/00, p.A20)(MC, 2/6/02)
1891 Feb 28, US Senator George Hearst (b.1820) of California died. He was the father of William Randolph Hearst and left his entire $18 million estate to his wife, Phoebe.
(Ind, 10/17/98, p.5A)(SFEM, 10/24/99, p.20)
1891 Mar 19, Earl Warren, later attorney general and governor of California, was born. He was appointed 14th Supreme Court Chief Justice (1954) and led the commission investigating the assassination of President John F. Kennedy.
(HN, 3/19/99)(SFEC, 12/19/99, Z1 p.5)
1891 Mar, Congressman millionaire Charles N. Felton of Menlo Park, California, was appointed to succeed Sen. Hearst.
(Ind, 10/17/98, p.5A)
1891 Oct 1, The Leland Stanford Junior Memorial Univ. in Palo Alto was dedicated. Stanford Univ. opened its Mission Romanesque Quadrangle in Palo Alto. It was established by Leland and Jane Stanford in honor of their late son. Gov. Leland Stanford had purchased the campus property from Peter Coutts.
(SFEC, 2/9/97, p.W4,5)(SFC, 7/8/96, p.D1)(SFC, 12/30/96, p.A15)(SFC, 6/20/98, p.A15)(Ind, 10/17/98, p.5A)(Ind, 10/17/98, p.5A)(SFC, 7/17/99, p.A21)
1891 The Aetna Springs golf course was built in Pope Valley.
(SFC, 1/3/00, p.A15)
1891 In Monterey the Hopkins Marine Station began operating.
(SFC, 6/8/98, p.A8)
1891 A statewide bond measure raised almost $1 million for the construction of the SF Ferry Building which was designed by Arthur Page Brown and finished in 1898. Brown died before the building was completed.
(SFEC, 7/12/98, p.B1)
1891 California set the duck hunting season to run from Oct to Feb.
(Ind, 2/23/02, 5A)
1891 The San Manuel Band of Mission Indians had their homeland established in the foothills of the California San Bernardino Mountains by presidential executive order.
(SFEC, 2/13/00, p.D12)
1891 In California the Southern Pacific Railroad established its San Ramon branch.
(SSFC, 5/19/13, p.P7)
1892 May 5, US Congress passed the Geary Chinese Exclusion Act, which required Chinese in the United States to be registered and carry an identity card or face deportation. The Six Companies of San Francisco ordered all 110,000 immigrants to refuse compliance.
(AP, 5/5/97)(SSFC, 6/3/07, p.M5)
1892 The 150-foot St. George Reef Lighthouse was built off the shore of Crescent City for $704,000.
(SSFC, 4/21/02, p.A27)
1892 Bernard Maybeck, architect, designed the dining hall at Aetna Hot Springs in Pope Valley, north of St. Helena.
(SFEC, 2/21/99, p.D3)
1892 The 60-foot-high Searsville Lake dam was constructed of interlocking concrete boulders on the San Francisquito Creek near Stanford Univ.
(SFC, 6/21/00, p.A17)
1892 Alice Eastwood moved to SF and became co-curator at the Academy of Sciences.
(PacDis, Winter �97, p.26)
1892 Harriett Pullman, daughter of the Chicago railcar magnate George Mortimer Pullman, married Francis J. Carolan, a debonair Sacramento playboy. They moved to Burlingame and later built the Chateau Carolands in Hillsborough.
(Ind, 2/26/00, p.5A)
1892 Heavy rains flooded the entire Central Valley and produced a lake that was some 250-300 miles long and 20-30 miles wide. Sacramento was under water for 3 months and in LA it rained for 28 straight days. Sonora had 102 inches by the end of Jan. Prof. William Brewer, the principal ass�t. to state geologist Josiah Whitney, supposed that one-fourth of the taxable state property was under water. [some confusion here with the deluge of 1862]
(SFC, 5/27/98, p.A1)
1892 There was an earthquake on the Winters-Vacaville fault greater than magnitude 6.
(SFC, 5/21/01, p.A4)
1893 Dec 25, Robert Leroy Ripley, artist, author and radio broadcaster (Believe It or Not), was born in Santa Rosa, Calif.
1893 California�s 1st subdivision law was passed.
(SFC, 6/21/04, p.B5)
1893 San Ysidro Ranch, a citrus farm in Santa Barbara, added 8 rustic cabins and opened as a stylish retreat. In 1935 it was purchased by Ronald Colman, a Hollywood actor, in partnership with Alvin Weingand.
(SFCM, 1/20/02, p.22)
1893 Samuele Sebastiani arrived in California from Tuscany. By 1904 he saved up enough money to buy a winery in Sonoma.
(SFC, 12/19/02, p.D4)
1893 An oil field was discovered in Los Angeles, California.
(SSFC, 10/29/06, p.F6)
1893 The San Andreas Fault in California was detected.
(SFC, 5/19/96,City Guide, p.17)
1893 Senator Leland Stanford died.
(SFEC, 12/19/99, Z1 p.5)
1894 The city of Palo Alto was founded.
(SFC, 11/26/96, p.D5)(SFC, 6/15/99, p.A20)
1894 The UC Boalt School of Law in Berkeley opened. It was one of the few law schools to admit women right from its inception.
(SFC, 2/27/98, p.21,25)
1894 The Mountain Copper Co. of Great Britain bought the Iron Mountain Mine north of Redding, California, and developed it into the only big copper producer on the Pacific Coast. The exposure of a large concentration of pyrite to oxygen water and bacteria created a poisonous runoff that ran into the Sacramento River. The mind was abandoned in 1966 but by the 1980s tons of acidic water still flowed into the river. The site became known as one of the most polluted places on Earth. In 2004 the EPA built the Slip Rock Creek Retention Dam to capture most of the toxic sludge. EPA management costs in 2010 were estimated at $200 million over the next 30 years.
(http://ice.ucdavis.edu/education/esp179/?q=node/164)(SFEC,11/2/97, p.A13)(SSFC, 8/29/10, p.A15)
1894-1895 Theodore Seixas Solomons made trips through the Sierras to the headwaters of the San Joaquin River. He was later credited with creating the idea for the Muir Trail.
(SFC, 5/28/01, p.A5)
1895 Mar 19, Los Angeles Railway was established to provide streetcar service.
1895 Apr 11, Anaheim, Ca., completed it's new electric light system.
1895 Gov. H.H. Markham appointed Moses A. Gunst, millionaire cigar retailer, as a SF police commissioner.
(Ind, 3/2/02, 5A)
1895 The schooner C.A. Thayer was built and hauled lumber as part of the Pacific Coast fleet. It was later converted to a cod-fishing vessel. In 2004 a 2-year $9.6 million restoration program ran into budget problems.
(SFC, 8/22/01, p.A16)(SFC, 11/5/04, p.B1)
1895 Edoardo Seghesio planted his 1st vineyard in the Alexander Valley of northern California.
(SFC, 12/19/02, p.D4)
1895-1937 Ninety-three men were hanged at Folsom Prison.
(SFEC, 1/26/97, p.B4)
1896 Jul 14, The Pacific Mail $680,000 Steamship Colombia was destroyed on rocks near Pescadero, Ca.
(Ind, 7/20/02, 5A)(Ind, 8/10/02, 5A)
1896 Nov 16, Lawrence Tibbett, baritone (Metropolitan Opera 1923-50), was born in Bakersfield Calif.
1896 Newly-elected Gov. James H. Budd attempted to oust Moses A. Gunst from his position as SF police commissioner.
(Ind, 3/2/02, 5A)
1896 Giovanni Foppiano founded Foppiano Vineyards in Sonoma, Ca.
(SFC, 12/19/02, p.D4)(SSFC, 5/23/10, p.L3)
1896 Col. Griffith J. Griffith donated over 3,000 acres to California. In 2008 efforts began to formally preserve the 4,218-acre Griffith Park as a Los Angeles historic cultural monument.
(SFC, 7/23/08, p.B12)
1896 Floodwaters swept coffins from the Folsom Prison cemetery into the American River.
(SFEC, 1/26/97, p.B4)
1896-1936 The SS Tahoe, a 169-foot steamer, carried passengers and cargo to the towns around Lake Tahoe. The ship was scuttled in Glenbrook Cove in 1940.
(SFEC, 4/2/00, p.B1)
1897 The yellow brick King�s County Courthouse in Hanford was built in neo-classical revival style.
(SFEC, 1/4/98, p.T3)
1897 McCloud, Ca., was founded near Mt. Shasta as a company town for the McCloud River Lumber Co.
(WSJ, 6/9/05, p.B1)
1897 In California a Polish prince opened the Sierra Railroad. For years it was run by descendants of Charles Crocker. The Sierra RR in Jamestown, Tuolumne County, was built to carry lumber and ore to other parts of California.
(SFC, 12/19/03, p.A25)(SSFC, 3/23/14, p.P2)
1897 The Lime Point Military Reservation at the entrance to SF Bay was renamed Fort Baker after Col. Edward Dickinson Baker, a former US Senator from Oregon active in California politics in the 1850s.
(SFEC, 8/1/99, p.B4)
1897 Gov. James H. Budd appointed Ms. Hearst as the 1st woman regent of the Univ. of California.
(SFEM, 1/30/00, p.10)
1897 Natural hot springs were discovered by men drilling for oil south of San Luis Obispo. The San Luis Hot Sulfur Springs became a tourist attraction and later became the Sycamore Mineral Springs.
(SFEC, 3/12/00, p.T6)
1897 The world�s first offshore oil well was drilled just east of Santa Barbara, Ca.
(SSFC, 10/29/06, p.F6)
1898 The domed Placer County Courthouse was built.
(SFC, 4/13/02, p.A17)
1898 Frederick Hess, publisher of the German-language California Democrat, built a stone winery on Howell Mountain in Napa Valley. He named it La Jota Vineyard after Rancho la Jota, the Spanish land grant on which it was situated.
(SFC, 11/10/05, p.F3)
1898 Sunset Magazine began as a publication by the Southern Pacific Co. to promote rail travel and to sell real estate.
(SFEC, 4/5/98, Z1 p.1)
1898 Willis Jepson received the 1st Ph.D. in botany granted by UC Berkeley.
(SFEM, 8/15/99, p.4)
1898-1971 In Sutter Creek the J. Monteverde family operated a general store during this period. It was turned into the J. Monteverde Merchant Museum.
(SFEC, 1/3/99, p.T6)
1899 Mar 22, SF State Univ. was founded. The state Senate passed an appropriation bill for $20,000 to establish the SF State Normal School. Gov. Henry Gage later signed it. Frederik Burk was the first president.
(SFEC, 3/15/98, p.W21)(SFEC, 3/21/99, Z1 p.4)
1899 Jun 1, David Curry and his mother Jennie, schoolteachers from Redwood City, founded Camp Curry in Yosemite. They wanted an affordable alternative to the $4-a-day Sentinel Hotel.
(SFC, 4/20/99, p.B10)(SFEC, 6/6/99, p.A14)
1899 California started allowing athletic clubs to stage boxing exhibitions.
(SFC, 5/3/14, p.C2)
1899 Buffalo Soldiers from the SF Presidio were assigned patrol duty at Yosemite National Park. The assignment was repeated in 1903 and 1904.
(SFC, 2/1/03, p.A21)
1899 The Los Angeles Oil Exchange was established to handle the securities of oil companies in southern California.
(SSFC, 1/25/04, p.I3)
1899 In California wildcatters discovered oil along the Kern River in Bakersfield.
(SSFC, 4/13/08, p.C1)
1899 Oakland Preserving Co. and 17 other firms combined to form the California Fruit Canners Association. They adopted the Del Monte brand name. In 1916-17 the canner�s association called itself Calpak and started advertising the Del Monte brand.
(SFC, 3/1/97, p.B1)(SSFC, 10/3/04, p.J1)
1899 A huge forest fire burned in the Santa Cruz Mountains and locals were said to use wine to douse the fire after running out of water.
(SFC, 5/20/00, p.A13)
1899 Rep. Timothy Phelps was killed by a tandem bicycle while crossing a street in San Carlos, Ca.
(SFEC, 3/22/98, p.A1)
1900 Apr 4, California pioneer John Bidwell (b.1819), founder of Chico, Ca. died. In 2003 Michael Jerome Gillis and Michael Magliari authored �John Bidwell and California: The Life and Writings of a Pioneer, (1841-1900).�
(SFC, 4/21/07, p.B5)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Bidwell)
1900 May 1, Andrew Putnam Hill, artist and photographer, and Stanford Pres. David Starr Jordan convened a meeting of citizens and academics at Stanford Univ. with the intent of saving redwood forests. Hill had attempted to photograph the burned redwoods of the 1899 Santa Cruz fire, but was barred unless he paid a local landowner for the privilege.
(Ind, 4/24/99, p.5A)(SFC, 5/20/00, p.A13)
1900 May 18, Andrew Putnam Hill, encamped at Slippery Rock with a Subcommittee in the Big Basin of the Santa Cruz Mountains, proposed the formation of an organization to save the Big Basin redwoods. The next day he passed a hat and collected $32. This was the birth of the Sempervirens Club of California. "Save the Redwoods" became its official slogan.
(Ind, 4/24/99, p.5A)(SSFC, 10/19/03, p.C1)
1900 Nov 26, A new kerosene-powered lantern was first used at Point Montara.
(Ind, 3/31/01, 5A)
1900 Mary Austin (d.1934) wrote her classic "The Land of Little Rain" in the town of Independence in Inyo County. Her work included 30 published books
(SFEC, 5/7/00, p.T6)
c1900 San Clemente was built and the 1st mayor, Ole Hanson, planned to make it look like a Greek fishing village.
(SFEC, 8/1/99, p.T6)
1900 Frenchman Georges de Latour founded Beaulieu Vineyard near Rutherford in Napa Valley Ca.
(SFC, 10/10/08, p.F3)
c1900 Abbot Kinney bought some marshland outside of Los Angeles and created a Venice of the West with dredged canals, boardwalks and piers.
(SFEM, 6/18/00, p.8)
1900 The Auto Club of California was spawned by a meeting of 11 "automobilists" at the SF Cliff House.
(SFC, 3/21/00, p.A17,20)
1900 About 16,000 Indians remained in all of California.
(SFEC, 9/20/98, Z1 p.4)
1900 Around this time San Francisco Bay Area oil companies began using the copper ore and later pyrite from Iron Mountain to produce sulfuric acid for use in the oil refining process.
(SFEC,11/2/97, p.A13)
1901 Feb 21, Stephen M. White (b.1853), former US Senator from California (1893-1899), died. He is remembered as the �Father of Los Angeles Harbor.�
(GenIV, Winter 04/05)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephen_M._White)
1901 Feb 22, The steamer Rio de Janeiro piled up on rocks at Fort Point at the bay entrance of San Francisco and some 130 people died. 80 people were rescued, mostly by Italian fishing boats and many of the dead were Chinese immigrants. The ship was being guided by bar pilot Frederick W. Jordan when it hit submerged rock near Lime Point and 128 of 210 passengers drowned in 300 feet of water.
(PacDis, Fall/�96, p.14)(SFEC, 2/23/96, z-1 p.5)(SFEC, 12/26/99, p.W2)(SFC, 2/21/01, p.A17)
1901 Mar 16, Gov. Henry T. Cage signed the California Redwood Park Bill.
(Ind, 4/24/99, p.5A)
1901 Jul 25, A fire destroyed the Byron Hot Springs Hotel in Byron, Ca. A new hotel, designed by James and Merritt Reid, was built to replace it. It burned down in 1912 and was replaced in 1914 with a new design by James Reid.
(SSFC, 11/9/08, p.A7)(www.byronhotsprings.com/TimeTable.html)
1901 Harry Partch (d.1974), later composer, instrument builder, philosopher and multiculturalist, was born. He held allegiance to just intonation and the 43 tone scale.
(SFEM, 9/5/99, p.11)
1901 Frank Norris wrote "The Octopus," a depiction of the clash between wheat ranchers and Southern Pacific railroad in California.
(WSJ, 10/7/97, p.A20)
1901 A California state Pauper Act was approved.
(SFC, 12/27/99, p.A10)
1901 Battista Bianco, the mother Giuseppe and Mike Gallo�s father, founded the Bianco Winery Company in California.
(SFC, 12/19/02, p.D1)
1901 California set a duck hunting bag limit of 50 birds per day.
(Ind, 2/23/02, 5A)
1901 SF Mayor James D. Phelan, as a private citizen, filed for water rights in Yosemite�s Hetch Hetchy Valley and at nearby Lake Eleanor.
(SFC, 9/15/02, p.A20)
1901 In Los Angeles the short Angels Flight railway opened to commuters to negotiate a steep hillside. It was rebuilt in 1966 and closed in 2001 after a raid car crashed into another car killing an man (83). The downtown landmark reopened in 2010.
(SFC, 3/15/10, p.A7)
1901 Arizona ranchers Walter L. Vail (d.1906) and J.V. Vickers bought the 84-square-mile Santa Rosa Island, one of the Channel Islands 26 miles off Santa Barbara, Ca. The Vail & Vickers group sold the island to the US government for $30 million in 1986 and it became part of Channel Islands National Park.
(SFC, 12/2/11, p.C10)
1901 The Southern Pacific Railroad imported lettuce seeds from France and introduced them to coastal valley farmers.
(SFEC, 7/2/00, Z1 p.2)
1901 The Livermore Power and Water Company produced a carbide filament incandescent light bulb that proceeded to give light to the Livermore Fire Station # 6 for at least 100 years.
(SSFC, 1/21/01, p.A19)
1901 Colorado River water first flowed to California's arid southeast on the Alamo Canal, which dipped into Mexico. California farmers soon decided they needed a canal completely within the United States, leading to completion of the All-American Canal in 1942.
(AP, 3/18/06)(Econ, 8/1/09, p.71)
1901 A fire burned down downtown Calistoga, Ca.
(SFCM, 2/3/02, p.32)
1902 Jan 1, In Pasadena the 1st Rose Bowl football game was held and the Univ. of Michigan beat Stanford 49 to 0 before a crowd of 7,000. The next Rose Bowl game was held 11 years later.
(SFC, 9/25/99, p.A20)(SFEC, 12/26/99, p.W2)
1902 cJan 2, It was reported that the steamer Walla Walla had collided with the French bark Max of Havre off Cape Mendocino. The Walla Walla sank immediately with 141 passengers and crew as the Max limped away.
(SFEC, 12/26/99, p.W2)
1901 Jan, 163 men convened at Pioneer Hall in SF and launched what would become the California Labor Federation.
(SFC, 1/26/01, p.A7)
1902 Feb 27, John Steinbeck, American novelist, was born in Salinas, Ca. He authored "The Grapes of Wrath," "Of Mice and Men" and "The Log from the Sea of Cortez." "A man, after he has brushed off the dust and chips of his life, will have left only the hard, clean question: Was it good or was it evil? Have I done well�or ill?"
(AP, 6/27/97) (SFEC, 6/21/98, DB p.67)(HN, 2/27/99)(SFC, 2/22/02, p.A21)
1902 Apr 2, Thomas L. Talley set up the first moving picture theater as part of a carnival in Los Angeles.
(SFEC, 5/23/99, Z1 p.10)(MC, 4/2/02)
1902 Sep, Big Basin State Park, north of Santa Cruz and the first in the state, was founded by redwood enthusiasts led by Andrew Putnam Hill. California purchased 3,800 acres from the Big Basin Lumber Co., which included 2,500 acres of redwoods and 800 acres of chaparral.
(Via, 3-4/99, p.48)(Ind, 4/24/99, p.5A)
1902 Oct, James A. Folger II, son the gold rush coffee pioneer, acquired 2,000 acres of the original Coppinger land grant in San Mateo Ct. He renamed the area Hazelwood Hills.
(Ind, 5/26/01, 5A)
1902 Former SF Mayor James Phelan filed a federal claim "for the water from the Tuolemne River, to be gathered by damming the mouth of the Hetch Hetchy Valley."
(ON, 7/03, p1)
1902 Walter and Ella Scott arrived in Barstow, Ca., using funds from Julian Gerard, a Manhattan banker and mining promoter. Scott had faked a gold mine in Death Valley. In 1904 Scott faked a theft and managed to get more funds from Albert Mussey Johnson, treasurer of the national Life Insurance Company in Chicago. Scott admitted his fraud in 1912.
(ON, 3/04, p.7)
1902 Two Swiss immigrant families purchased the 7,000 acre coastal property north of Santa Cruz around Davenport that became the Coast Dairies & Land Co. It became permanently protected from development in 1998.
(SFC, 10/27/98, p.A12)
1902 As Southern California faced a severe drought Charley Mallory Hatfield (1876-1958), inventor, demonstrated his "moisture accelerator" at Oceanside, Ca. An inch of rain fell within 5 days. [see 1916]
(SFC, 3/19/04, p.E13)
1903 Jan 6, George Pardee (1857-1941), former mayor of Oakland (1893-1895), was inaugurated as governor of California. Pardee served a single term to 1907.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Governors_of_California)(SFC, 1/8/09, p.B1)
1903 May 31, It was reported that the Coast Limited train out of SF plunged down a 50-foot embankment near Santa Barbara and injured over 40 people with an untold number killed.
(SFEC, 12/26/99, p.W2)
1903 The Saeltzer Dam across Deer Creek in Shasta County was erected. In 2000 it was demolished to encourage salmon reproduction.
(SFC, 10/7/00, p.A3)
1903 John Randolph Haynes, a California doctor, brought city-wide direct democracy to Los Angeles and then moved to extend the system to the whole state.
(Econ, 4/23/11, SR p.7)
1903 James D. Phelan, former mayor of SF, signed his water rights in Yosemite�s Hetch Hetchy Valley and nearby Lake Eleanor to SF.
(SFC, 9/15/02, p.A20)
1903 Pearley Monroe, grandson of Nancy Gooch, began Gen�l. Blacksmithing and Horseshoeing in Coloma, Ca.
(SFEC, 7/6/97, p.T3)
1903 The Scripps Institute of Oceanography was founded in the boathouse of the Hotel Del Coronado.
(SFEC,10/19/97, p.A17)
1903 The Rios-Caledonia Adobe property was sold to Mr. Alfred Nygren and family.
1903 The Boole Redwood tree on Rob Roy Mountain near Fresno measured 109 feet in circumference. It was the largest known Redwood. A photo was made of the tree surrounded by loggers by Maxwell.
(Kodak shop, Fresno, 11/17/99)
1903-1905 Chris Jorgensen painted the California missions over this period.
(SFC, 7/14/00, WBb, p.8)
1904 The Riverside County Courthouse was built. It was designed by Franklin Pierce Burnham and inspired by the beaux arts movement.
(SFC, 4/13/02, p.A17)
1904 A power plant was built on Eureka�s Humboldt Bay shore.
(SFEC, 7/30/00, p.C10)
1904 In Marin the West Point Inn on Mount Tamalpais was built as a stopover for passengers on the old Bolinas stagecoach.
(SFEC, 6/28/98, p.T4)(SFC, 6/25/04, p.F8)
1904 Pope Pius X gave papal permission for Los Angeles to construct a Cathedral. The permit was not made use of until 1997 with the planned construction of Our Lady of the Angels.
(SFC, 2/18/96, p.A11)
1904 California�s Wells Fargo merged with the Nevada Bank, owned by Isaias Hellman, making it one of the West�s largest financial institutions.
(SSFC, 11/30/08, Books p.3)
1904 Radio PH of the De Forest Wireless Telegraph Company began broadcasting from the Old Palace Hotel in SF.
(SFC, 7/1/97, p.A14)
1904 Big Basin State Park was opened to campers.
(Ind, 4/24/99, p.5A)
1904 Julia Morgan (1872-1957) became the first woman to receive a California architectural license.In 2014 she became the first woman to receive the annual Gold Medal awarded by the American Institute of Architects.
(SFC, 6/27/14, p.A1)
1904 Samuel Sebastiani purchased a winery in Sonoma.
(WSJ, 4/16/97, p.CA1)
1904 California�s population was around 1.4 million.
(SFC, 6/25/04, p.F8)
1904 Mary Ellen Pleasant ("Mammy") died after years of work on the Underground Railroad and in civil rights.
(SFC, 7/18/98, p.A15,18)
1905 Apr 21, Edmund G "Pat" Brown, (Gov-D-Calif), was born.
1905 The federal government built the Klamath Project, a series of reservoirs and lakes on the California-Oregon border.
(SFC, 11/12/96, p.A8)
1905 California ceded Yosemite Valley to the federal government.
(SFC, 12/27/99, p.A10)
1905 California banned the collection of condor eggs. By 1982 only 22 condors were left in the state. In 1987 government biologists caught the last of 5 wild condors. Between 1992 and 2004 161 condors were released of which about half survived.
(CW, Winter 04, p.26)
1905 In southern California the town of Vernon was founded at a rail crossing along the Los Angeles River as an industrial city in LA County. In 2011 it had about 1,800 businesses employing some 50,000 workers, but only 96 actual residents.
(Econ, 5/7/11, p.34)
1905 The National Steel and Shipbuilding Company (NASSCO) in San Diego was founded as a small machine shop. In 1997 the employee-owned company encompassed 147 acres with a work force of 5,000 for ship design, construction and repair.
1905 PG&E was created with the merger of California Electric Light and the San Francisco Gas Co.
(SFC, 4/7/01, p.A5)
1905 Wells Fargo fell under the control of Edward Harriman, a railroad entrepreneur, who moves its headquarters to NYC and merged with Nevada National Bank.
(SFC, 6/9/98, p.A10)
1905 UC Berkeley regents purchased the Bancroft Library.
(SFEM, 1/30/00, p.14)
1905 Jack London bought his 1,400-acre Beauty Ranch in Glen Ellen.
(SFEC, 5/21/00, p.T10)
1905 Charles M. Schwab of Bethlehem Steel bought Union Iron Works, located at Pier 70 in SF, for $1 million. He used the facility to build 66 destroyers and 18 submarines for WWI.
(SSFC, 7/3/05, p.F2)(SSFC, 9/14/08, p.A11)
1905 The Salton Sea in southern California was formed by a broken Colorado River diversion dyke. Prior to this time it had been called the Salton Sink. It flowed unimpeded for the next 15 months.
(AAM, 3/96, p.87)(SFC, 7/7/96, zone 1 p.5)(SSFC, 12/9/01, p.A22)
1905 Pete Aguereberry discovered gold in Death Valley and worked his Eureka Mine for 40 years.
(SSFC, 1/19/03, p.C5)
1905 Jane Lathrop Stanford (b.1828), widow of Leland Stanford, died in Honolulu. She subsidized Stanford Univ. to keep it open.
(SFEC, 12/19/99, Z1 p.5)
1905-1916 Jack London, writer, lived in Glen Ellen.
(SFEM, 7/27/97, p.26)
1906 cFeb, The San Mateo Courthouse was constructed just months before the earthquake, which forced it to be rebuilt.
1906 Apr 18, 5:12 AM The San Francisco 8.2 earthquake occurred. 28,000 buildings were destroyed and 498 blocks leveled. One quarter of the city burned.
(SFC, 4/4/96, p.A-106)(SFC, 4/8/96, p.A-1) (SFC, 4/14/96, p.Z1, p.3)
1906 Apr 18, The earthquake killed 119 people at Agnews State Hospital in San Jose.
(SFC, 9/29/97, p.A21)
1906 Apr, William J. Seymour, a black preacher, (b.1870) began evangelizing for his apostolic Faith Mission from 312 Azusa Street in Los Angeles. The Azusa Street revival contributed to a new diaspora of missionaries who anticipated that global evangelization would be achieved by gospel preaching accompanied by miraculous signs and wonders.
1906 May, In California a suspicious fire destroyed the Chinese fishing village of Point Alones on the Monterey Bay. The Chinese were not allowed to rebuild.
(SFC, 11/5/10, p.A1)
1906 Jul 18, S.I. Hayakawa, (Sen-R-CA), educator (Language in Action), was born.
1906 Aug 20, It was reported that in Yreka 3 boys were blown to bits when they shot at a gunpowder storage house. 16 tons of TNT went up and left a crater 15 feet deep with damage to every house in town.
(SFEC, 12/26/99, p.W3)
1906 Nov 28, Philadelphia Jack O'Brien and Tommy Burns fought to no decision in a 20-round draw in a world heavyweight title bout in Los Angeles.
(DTnet, 11/28/97)
1906 Dec 24, Hermosa Beach voted 24-23 to incorporate.
(SSFC, 12/14/03, p.C8)
1906 The Daguerra Dam in Yuba county was constructed. It was demolished in a 1963 flood and reconstructed. It severely impeded salmon spawning and was considered for demolition in 2000.
(SFC, 11/24/00, p.A1)
1906 A revival meeting at a small church in downtown Los Angeles was the beginning of the Pentecostal movement in California. It started as a multiracial movement but soon split along racial lines.
(SFC, 7/22/98, p.A21)
1906 John McLaren agreed to let the Academy of Sciences build in Golden Gate Park after the earthquake.
(PacDis, Winter �97, p.26)
1906 The California Federation of Women�s clubs began a campaign to mark the missionary route of El Camino Real with cast-iron bells. They were installed along El Camino Real from San Diego to Sonoma and included a route along the east side of the SF Bay. The first bell was erected in San Diego. SF got the 13th bell. By 1913 at least 450 bells had been installed. The project was rejuvenated in 1963 and again in 2004.
(SFC, 4/10/99, p.A15)(SFC, 11/11/04, p.B1)(SSFC, 12/20/09, p.C1)
1906 Cemex opened a cement factory near Davenport, Ca., under a lease to mine limestone until 2067.
(SFC, 7/28/06, p.A14)
1906 Giuseppe and Mike Gallo founded the Gallo Wine Company in California.
(SFC, 12/19/02, p.D1)
1906 The Pagani Brothers established a winery in Sonoma, Ca. In 1970 the Lee family opened Kenwood Vineyards on the site. Some of the Kenwood grapes came from vineyards on Jack London�s original ranch in Glen Ellen.
(SFC, 11/2/07, p.F3)
1906 Baldassare Forestiere (1879-1946), Sicilian immigrant, began creating his 10-acre Forestiere Underground Gardens in Fresno, Ca.
(WSJ, 8/28/08, p.D11)(www.forestiere-historicalcenter.com/Forestierebio.html)
1906 Fort Ross became one of California�s 1st state parks.
(SFC, 6/15/01, WBb p.7)
1906 The SF earthquake created a boom for wood and the town of Freestone in Sonoma, Ca., quickly grew to 10,000 people as a lumber and railroad town.
(SFEC, 7/13/97, p.T5)
1907 Mar 6, In California Gov. James Gillett signed amendments to the Pharmacy and Poison Act making it a crime to sell opiates of cocaine in the state without a prescription.
(SSFC, 3/4/07, p.E1)
1907 Mar 11, President Roosevelt induced California to revoke its anti-Japanese legislation.
1907 The Continental Inn of Tomales, Ca., dated to this time.
(SSFC, 11/16/03, p.C7)
1907 Carlotta Monterey, later the 3rd wife of Eugene O�Neill, playwright, was Miss California.
(SFEC, 2/1/98, Z1p.1)
1907 Fred Swanton, a local entrepreneur in Santa Cruz, opened the Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk.
(SFEC, 5/11/97, DB p.64)
1907 The Auto Club of California changed its name to the California State Automobile Association and affiliated itself with the American Automobile Association. The club, which formed had formed in SF in 1900, began providing insurance in 1914.
(SFC, 3/21/00, p.A17,20)(SSFC, 6/25/06, p.F3)
1907 California permitted high schools to offer college-level courses. This was the beginning of the community college program.
(SFC, 12/27/99, p.A10)
1907 The Berkeley Development Co. offered 40 acres and a bay view for a new state capitol in an attempt to lure the legislature out of Sacramento.
(SFCM, 9/9/01, p.24)
1907 William Kent donated 298 acres for the Muir Woods National Monument.
(SFCM, 1/20/02, p.22)
1907 Floods were recorded on the Sacramento River system and inspired a 1,100 mile system of levees and dams for flood control.
(SFEC, 3/3/97, p.A9)
1907 The leak from the diverted water of the Colorado River that formed the Salton Sea was finally plugged.
(SFC, 11/30/98, p.A22)
1908 Jan, Pres. Theodore Roosevelt created Pinnacles National Monument in California. The area was expanded in 2000 for the 7th time and covered 24,000 acres in San Benito and Monterey counties.
(SFEC, 1/23/00, p.C1)
1908 Apr, Hootch Simpson, a saloon keeper in Skidoo, Ca. (Death Valley), shot and killed Joe Arnold, the town banker. Simpson was hung and buried the next morning, but was dug up and re-hung for a newspaper reporter.
(SSFC, 1/19/03, p.C5)
1908 Aug 3, Col. Allan Allensworth (1842-1914) filed the site plan for the first African-American town, Allensworth, California. Allensworth had purchased 800 acres in Tulare County along the Sante Fe rail line and planned a settlement to be governed, financed and operated by black people. The town flourished for a decade and then began to crumble. In 1976 it was transformed into a 240-acre state park.
(HN, 8/3/98)(SFC, 1/8/07, p.A1)
1908 Aug 31, William Saroyan (d.1981), American writer, was born. "He was a prolific and bombastic writer who never threw anything away." He was a native of Fresno, Ca. and his unpublished materials, held by the Saroyan Foundation, were turned over to Stanford Univ. in 1996. His work included "The Human Comedy."
(HFA, �96, p.36)(SFC, 5/23/96, p.A1)(WUD, 1994, p.1269)(HN, 8/31/00)
1908 Dec 9, It was reported that over 1,500 people, including the governor and his wife, were poisoned by contaminated meat at a Mare Island luncheon. At least 2 people died and scores were hospitalized.
(SFEC, 12/26/99, p.W3)
1908 The Point Arena lighthouse tower was rebuilt. The original 1870 brick structure was destroyed in the 1906 earthquake.
(SSFC, 7/8/01, p.T5)
1908 Charles and Henry Greene designed a Pasadena, Ca., home for David and Mary Gamble (of Proctor and Gamble fame) in the Craftsman style. The Gamble House was later named a National Historic Landmark.
(SSFC, 4/1/01, p.T4)(http://gamblehouse.org/)
1908 John Spreckles, owner of the San Diego Union and San Diego Tribune newspapers, built a 12,751-square foot home in Coronado, Ca.
(SFC, 7/19/11, p.A6)
1908 The postmaster of Penn�s Grove, NE of Petaluma, Ca., changed the community�s name to Penngrove.
(SFCM, 5/15/05, p.5)
1908 Pres. Theodore Roosevelt established the Lower Klamath Refuge in northern California and southern Oregon as the nation�s first preserve set aside for waterfowl.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lower_Klamath_National_Wildlife_Refuge)(SFC, 4/21/12, p.A10)
1908 The Potter Valley System in Northern California began diverting the Eel River at Potter Valley near Ukiah to the Russian River.
(SFC, 1/15/99, p.E2)
1908 The French dip sandwich got its start at Phillipe�s Original Sandwich Shop in Los Angeles.
(SFEC,12/797, p.T3)
1908 Beaulieu Vineyard in Napa Valley inked a long term contract to provide altar wine to the Catholic archdiocese of San Francisco.
(SFC, 10/10/08, p.F3)
1908 The California Historical Society fell apart. It had earlier merged with the California Genealogical Society and prospective members had to produce a genealogical chart to qualify for membership.
(SFEC,10/26/97, DB p.55)
1908 In Sacramento modernization of the Capitol and Capitol Park was completed.
(SFEC,12/28/97, p.A10)
1908 Argentine ants were 1st noticed in California. They had reached New Orleans by 1891 and became successful because their colonies did not fight each other and their nests contained multiple queens and males.
(SFC, 4/25/01, p.A1)
1908-1910 Thousands of East Indians came to Northern California to work on the Western Pacific Railroad.
(SFEC, 9/20/98, Z1 p.5)
1909 Feb 27, Pres. Theodore Roosevelt established the Farallon Islands, 28 miles off the coast of San Francisco, as a wildlife refuge.
(SFC, 2/17/05, p.A1)(www.theodoreroosevelt.org/life/conFedBird.htm)
1909 The Point Cabrillo lighthouse was built north of Mendocino in northern California. The Coast Guard retired the fog signal 1972.
(SSFC, 2/11/07, p.G10)
1909 California became its own Jesuit province becoming fully independent from Turin. The Province boundaries expanded to encompass all of the Pacific Northwest and Alaska.
(GenIV, Winter 04/05)(www.jesuitscalifornia.org/Page.aspx?pid=272)
1909 California made betting on horses illegal.
(Ind, 8/17/02, 5A)
1909 California became the 3rd state to enact eugenics-related laws.
(SSFC, 11/9/03, p.D1)
1909 California legalized the sterilization of convicted sodomites.
(SSFC, 5/11/08, Books p.4)
1909 The California State Automobile Association produced its first road map. In 2008 it planned to stop production of paper maps and shift to digital technology.
(SFC, 5/27/08, p.D1)
1909 Huntington Beach was incorporated.
(SFEC, 12/12/99, p.T6)
1909 Highway 99 was designated a state highway.
(SFC, 11/4/96, p.A4)
1909 The Central Pacific Railroad finally paid off its 30-year bonds issued in 1863.
(SFC, 7/8/96, p.D2)
1909 Floods were again recorded on the Sacramento River system
(SFEC, 3/3/97, p.A9)
1910 Mar 23, 1st race at Los Angeles Motordrome (1st US auto speedway).
1910 Jul 4, The Roman Renaissance-style San Mateo Courthouse was dedicated. It had been rebuilt after the 1906 earthquake.
(SFC, 1/4/97, p.A17)
1910 Sep 2, Alice Stebbins Wells was admitted to the Los Angeles Police Force as the first woman police officer to receive an appointment based on a civil service exam.
1910 Sep 11, The 1st commercially successful electric bus line opened in Hollywood.
1910 Oct 1, Trade unionists, aggrieved by the anti-union stance of the Los Angeles Times, bombed the Times building at 1st and Broadway killing 21 nonunion pressman and linotype operators. A new Los Angeles Times building was completed in 1935. In 2008 Howard Blum authored �American Lightning: Terror, Mystery, The Birth of Hollywood, and the Crime of the Century.�
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Los_Angeles_Times_bombing)(WSJ, 9/16/08, p.A23)(Econ, 3/23/13, p.35)
1910 Nov, SF city voters approved a $5 million bond for the 1915 Panama-Pacific Int�l. Exposition. Voters also approved a $45 million bond to fund the Hetch Hetchy project for water from the Tuolumne River originating on Mount Lyell.
(SFEC, 12/26/99, p.W4)(SFC, 9/15/02, p.A20)
1910 Allensworth, an all-black community in Tulare County, was founded by Allen Allensworth, a former Louisiana slave.
(SFEC, 9/20/98, Z1 p.5)
1910 Angel Island, Ca., opened as an immigration processing and detention center and became known as the Ellis Island of the West. It processed some 1 million people until 1940. 50,000 Chinese entered the US through Angel Island.
(SFEC, 3/1/98, p.W37)(SFEC, 2/6/00, Rp.10)
1910 The US Grant Hotel was built in San Diego by the son of Civil War Gen. Ulysses S. Grant.
(SSFC, 4/8/07, p.G1)
1910 The Hotel Stockton was built in Stockton, Ca. in the Mission Revival style.
(SFC, 4/28/05, p.A14)
1910 The Thorsen House in Berkeley, California, was designed by Charles Sumner Greene and Henry Mather Greene. In 1943 it became the home of the Sigma Phi fraternity.
(SFC, 6/27/96, p.D1)
1910 In Scotia, Ca., the Pacific Lumber Co. built Mill B to process old growth redwood. The mill was closed in 2001.
(SSFC, 5/13/01, p.A4)
1910 Henry Murphy purchased 375 acres of Big Sur, Ca., from Tom Slate. The area was known as Slate�s Hot Springs. The Esselen Indian tribe had used the area as their burial ground and provided the Esalen name for the institute that was later established there after work crews provided highway access in the 1930s.
(SSFC, 6/16/02, p.A17)(Econ, 12/22/07, p.74)
1910 The first California community college opened in Fresno.
(SFC, 12/27/99, p.A10)
1910 The Suisun City Railroad Station was built about this time in Suisun City, Ca.
(Hem., Nov.�95, p.91)
1911 Jan 26, Glenn Curtiss piloted the 1st successful hydroplane in San Diego.
1911 Jan, A Western Pacific train stalled in the Sierra Nevada and left 100 passengers trapped in the snow for 5 days.
(SFEC, 12/26/99, p.W4)
1911 Feb 17, The 1st hydroplane flight to & from a ship was made by Glenn Curtiss in San Diego.
1911 May 11, Doodles Weaver, comedian (Spike Jones and City Slickers), was born in LA, Calif.
1911 Jun 13, Luis W. Alvarez (d.1988), physicist (Nobel-1968), was born in SF, Ca.
(MC, 6/13/02)(www.britannica.com)
1911 Aug 28, Ishi (d.1916), a native Yahi Indian, walked out of the forest near Oroville, Ca. He underwent examination at UC medical center in San Francisco and liked to practice "drawing bow" on Parnassus Heights.
(SFC, 7/14/96, Z1 p.2)(SFEC, 12/26/99, p.W4)(SSFC, 2/8/04, p.M1)(SFC, 9/6/14, p.C1)
1911 Oct 10, California voters approved amendments by Republican Gov. Hiram Johnson that included the recall, initiative and referendum process as part of his progressive reform package. Almost 2/3 of 178,115 voters affirmed the amendments. Voters granted women the right to vote in state and local elections. It was the 6th state of the union to pass suffrage. The initiative process was set up so that once passed, initiatives could not be undone except by another vote of the people.
(SFC, 5/18/98, p.A7)(SFC, 12/27/99, p.A10)(SSFC, 8/3/03, p.D1)(SSFC, 10/5/03, p.E3)(SSFC, 10/10/04, p.E1)(SSFC, 6/16/13, p.E5)
1911 Oct 31, Prof. John J. Montgomery (b.1858) died when his glider crashed on his 56th flight at the Evergreen College campus south of San Jose.
(GenIV, Winter 04/05)
1911 Nov 5, Calbraith P. Rodgers ended the first transcontinental flight; 49 days from New York to Pasadena, Calif.
1911 In Sacramento the I Street Bridge was built. It moved on a pedestal to open for paddle wheelers on the Sacramento River.
(SFEC,12/21/97, p.B3)
1911 Dinuba, Ca., began hosting a raisin festival.
(SFC, 9/18/03, p.A10)
1911 Fernbridge was built over the Eel River in Ferndale, Ca.
(SSFC, 6/10/07, p.G8)
1911 Solvang in the Santa Ynez Valley was founded by Danish immigrants.
(SFEC, 1/24/99, p.T6)
1911 Hiram Johnson began serving as governor of California and continued to 1917.
(SSFC, 6/16/13, p.E5)
1911 A state law declared that private sea walls were the equivalent of private sidewalks and must be maintained at homeowner�s expense. A 1997 bill sought to change this.
(WSJ, 1/8/97, p.CA2)
1911 The power of the state Railroad Commission was expanded to cover all utilities.
(SFC, 12/27/99, p.A10)
1911 UC Berkeley received $779,000 from businessman Charles Franklin Doe for whom the Doe Library was named.
(SFC, 12/30/96, p.A15)
c1911 Henry Morgan Tilford was one of the founders of Standard Oil of California.
(SFC, 8/16/99, p.A21)
1911 Joseph Smeaton Chase traveled the coast from Mexico to Oregon via horse and wrote a journal titled "California Coast Trails."
(SFEC, 5/25/97, p.T3)
1911 In Santa Cruz a new carousel by Charles Looff was installed on the boardwalk. The seaside boardwalk saw its first visitors.
(CG, #205, 1991)(SFC, 8/14/99, p.A15)
1911 Lee DeForest invented the vacuum tube in Palo Alto, Ca.
(SFC, 2/7/98, p.D1)
1911-1930 James "Sunny Jim" Rolph served as mayor of SF. He went on to become the governor of the state.
(SFC, 3/16/98, p.A14)
1912 Jan 10, The World's first flying-boat airplane, designed by Glenn Curtiss (1878-1930), made its maiden flight at San Diego, Ca. The Curtiss Model D featured an electric starter. Curtiss had become the first licensed pilot in 1911.
(www.aerofiles.com/chrono.html)(SFC, 8/5/00, p.B4)
1912 May 12, The Beverly Hills Hotel opened. In 1987 it was acquired by the Sultan of Brunei. He closed it down for a $100 million remodel in 1992 and it reopened in 1995.
(WSJ, 5/11/01, p.W6)(SSFC, 5/27/12, p.H5)
1912 Aug 15, Julia Child (d.2004), American chef and television personality, was born as Julia Carolyn McWilliams in Pasadena, Calif. Her 90th B-day party was held in SF on Aug 1, 2002.
(SFEC, 9/28/97, BR p.5)(SFC, 10/20/99, Z1p.4)(HN, 8/15/00)(SFCM, 9/1/02, p.33)
1912 Maritime Radio PH had its transmitter relocated from SF to Bolinas and its receiver to Tomales Bay under the Marconi Co.
(SFC, 7/1/97, p.A14)
1912 The Sunol Water Temple in Alameda County was designed by Willis Polk as a tribute to the Temple of Vesta outside of Rome.
(SFC, 9/27/97, p.A24)
1912 California farmers in Butte County began raising rice in the wet lowlands of the Sacramento Valley, a Japanese variety imported from Texas.
(SFC, 5/22/96, zz-1)(SSFC, 11/25/12, p.C10)
1912 The cooperative California Associated Raison Co. was formed in the Central Valley to produce, process and market raisins. The Sun-Maid brand name was launched in 1915. In 1916 a portrait of Lorraine Collett of Fresno became the company�s trademark.
(SSFC, 4/23/06, p.F1)(www.sunmaid.com/about/our_history.html)
1912 About this time Fred H. Bixby purchased the 8,580-acre Cojo Ranch in California�s Santa Barbara County. In 1939 he acquired the adjacent 15,814-acre Jalama Ranch. The properties included 9 miles of coastline and in 2007 sold for about $155 million.
(WSJ, 1/12/07, p.W10)
1913 Jan 9, Richard M. Nixon, 37th president of the United States and first President to resign from office, was born in Yorba Linda, Calif.
1913 Jan 15, Lloyd Bridges, actor (Sea Hunt, Roots, Airplane), was born in San Leandro, Calif.
1913 Apr 19, California passed the Webb Bill, excluding Japanese from owning land. It was signed into law on May 19, 1913.
1913 May 8, California lawmakers passed Assembly bill 2039, an anti-tipping measure with penalties for both giving and receiving tips.
(SSFC, 5/5/13, p.46)
1913 May 19, The Webb Alien Land-Holding Bill was signed in California, excluding Japanese from owning land.
(DTnet, 5/19/97)
1913 May 29, Iris Adrian, actress (Blue Hawaii, Bluebeard), was born in Los Angeles, CA.
1913 May, A state board recommended building a train bridge across SF Bay.
(SFEC, 12/26/99, p.W4)
1913 Jul 10, A temperature of 134 degrees was recorded in Death Valley. It was the highest ever recorded in the US.
(SFEC, 11/14/99, p.T6)(AP, 7/23/03)
1913 Aug, The famous Wolf House of Jack London in glen Ellen burned down its stone foundation.
(SFEM, 7/27/97, p.26)
1913 Sep 3, In northern California the Sacramento Northern began operating a new electric train from Oakland to Sacramento. Its morning Comet and afternoon Meteor made the run in 2 hrs and 41 minutes. The railroad never made money and passenger service stopped in 1941.
(SFC, 9/3/13, p.A1)
1913 Dec 2, The US Senate passed the Raker Act which authorized SF rights to dam the Tuolumne River in Yosemite National Park for water-collection and power-generation facilities.
1913 Dec 6, President Woodrow Wilson signed the Raker Act into law. It authorized SF rights to dam the Tuolumne River in Yosemite National Park for water-collection and power-generation facilities.
1913 Dec, Ella Llewellyn, the daughter of a San Joaquin county farmer, arrived at the Oakland train station wearing corduroy trousers, a cowboy hat and a man�s overcoat. She was arrested for transvestitism.
(SFEC, 12/26/99, p.W4)
1913 Edgar Holmes Adams authored �Private Gold Coinage of California 1849-1855.�
(Economist, 9/8/12, p.18)
1913 The Los Angeles aqueduct, built under the direction of city engineer William Mulholland, began carrying water into LA.
(SFEC, 4/25/99, Z1 p.5)
1913 In Pasadena the Colorado Street Bridge was built.
(SSFC, 4/1/01, p.T4)
1913 California reduced the duck hunting bag limit to 25 birds per day.
(Ind, 2/23/02, 5A)
1913 In LA the first Henry Ford California auto plant was built. The plant later became the site of the Imperial Toy Corp.
(SFC,11/6/97, p.A3)
1913 Theodore Hoover, brother of Herbert, bought most of the 3,000-acre valley of Rancho del Oso near Ano Nuevo. He used it as a retreat from his job as the first dean of Stanford's engineering school.
(Via, 3-4/99, p.46)
1913 In southern California mass excavations began at the asphalt pools at Rancho La Brea. The oldest fossils found there dated back 38,000 years.
(Econ, 11/9/13, p.85)
1913 The steamer Pomo sank off the coast of northern California in a gale.
(SFC, 9/26/97, p.A23)
1913-1928 Julia Morgan, architect, designed 16 buildings for the YWCA conference center in Monterey, Ca., known as Asilomar.
(SSFC, 1/18/04, p.C5)
1914 Jan 28, Beverly Hills, Ca, was incorporated.
1914 Apr 4, "Perils of Pauline" was shown for 1st time in LA.
1914 May 8, William Wadsworth Hodkinson (1881-1971) merged 11 film rental bureaus to create the first US-wide distributor of feature films, Paramount Pictures.
1914 Jun 1, Three big movie companies in Los Angeles and San Francisco merged to form the Paramount Picture Corp. They included the Famous Players Co., the Master Film Co. and the Bosworth Co.
(SSFC, 6/1/14, DB p.46)
1914 Jun 19, Alan Cranston (d.2000), later California Senator (1968-1993), was born in Palo Alto.
(SFC, 1/1/01, p.A5)
1914 Jun, Mt. Lassen in northern California began erupting and continued to spew volcanic debris through 1921.
(SFEC, 8/3/97, p.T5)(SSFC, 6/15/14, DB p.46)
1914 Dec 24, John Muir (76), naturalist, died in Martinez, Ca. He was born in Dunbar, Scotland, in 1838.
(SFEC, 1/2/00, DB p.23)(SFC, 2/2/00, p.A21)(ON, 7/03, p.3)
1914 Miner "Al" Gardisky, a Russian immigrant, built a lodge at Tioga Pass on the east side of Yosemite to provide him income as he searched for silver.
(SFEC, 1/25/98, p.T1,3,4)
1914 The steam tug Eppleton Hall was built.
(SFC, 8/22/01, p.A16)
1914 The 315-mile Northwestern Pacific Railroad reached Eureka.
(SFEC, 9/7/97, Z1 p.1)
1914 Mother�s Cake & Cookie Co. was founded in Oakland.
(SFC, 2/28/98, p.D1)
1914 The town of Walnut Creek, Ca., population 500, incorporated.
(SFC, 7/17/06, p.B5)
1914 In California Ishi, the "Stone Age" Indian, led scientists back to the his native canyons and demonstrated his old ways of life.
(CAS, 1996, p.7)
1915 Mar 15, Thomas Robert Bard (b.1841), US Republican Senator from Ventura, California (1900-1905), died. In 1871 he laid out the town of Hueneme and built a wharf there. Bard was born in Chambersburg, Pa., and came to California in 1864.
1915 May 19, A mammoth mud flow at Mt. Lassen filled the valleys of Hat and Lost Creeks.
(SFEC, 8/13/00, p.T8)
1915 May 22, At Mt. Lassen a searing cloud of hot gas and vaporized lava created the Devastated Area, a mile wide and 5 miles long.
(SFEC, 8/13/00, p.T8)
1915 William Wendt painted his impressionist work "Summer Sea."
(SFC, 3/18/99, p.C1)
1915 Ina Coolbrith (1841-1928), born as Josephine Donna Smith, became California�s first poet laureate.
1915 In Fort Bragg, Ca., a 14-room, 3-story hospital was built. It later became the Grey Whale Inn.
(SSFC, 6/24/01, p.T10)
1915 The McCloud Hotel in McCloud, Siskiyou County, was built.
(SSFC, 6/17/01, p.T5)
1915 In northern California the Feather River Inn opened just outside Graegle for rail passengers on the new Western Pacific Feather River line.
(SSFC, 7/7/02, p.C10)
1915 The California legislature outlawed boxing.
(Ind, 3/22/03, 5A)
1915 California expanded the definition of sodomy to include fellatio and cunnilingus.
(SSFC, 5/11/08, Books p.4)
1915 Alcatraz island in the SF Bay was converted into a military prison.
(SFEC, 3/8/98, p.W38)
1915 Los Angeles, Ca., annexed the San Fernando Valley, and thus more than doubled its own size.
(Econ, 11/9/13, p.35)
1915 The California Dept. of Motor Vehicles was created.
(SFC, 12/27/99, p.A10)
1915 Lockeport, Ca., was founded by Chung Shan Chinese merchants who left Walnut Grove when the town�s Chinatown burned down. The Sacramento delta town was later renamed Locke. In 2001 the Sacramento Ct. Housing and Redevelopment Agency planned to buy the 10-acre town for $250,000 and then arrange for its sale to the townspeople.
(SFC, 10/11/00, p.A15)(SFC, 5/23/01, p.A2)
1915 In California the old stagecoach road in San Luis Obispo County was paved and used as Highway 101 until 1931.
1915-1949 The Sonoma Index-Tribune was co-published by Celeste Granice Murphy.
(SFEC,12/14/97, BR p.7)
1916 Mar, Ishi, the last Yahi Indian in California, died of tuberculosis. His body was cremated but his brain was removed and shipped to the Smithsonian Institute in Washington, DC. The documentary film "Ishi, the Last Yahi" was made by John Harrison Quinn (d.2000 at 59). In 2004 Orin Starn authored "Ishi's Brain: In search of the Last "Wild" Indian."
(SFC, 2/19/99, p.A1)(SFC, 1/26/00, p.A24)(SSFC, 2/8/04, p.M1)
1916 Apr 3, Herb Caen (d.1997), columnist (SF Chronicle), was born in Sacramento, Calif.
1916 Jun 23, Carleton Watkins (b.1829), California photographer, died in obscurity at Napa State Hospital. He was later considered the greatest documentarian of Western landscape ever to heft a camera.
(SFC, 5/4/09, p.E3)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carleton_Watkins)
1916 Oct 4, The California State Federation of Labor maintained its policy of banning Japanese workers from joining labor unions.
(SFEC, 12/26/99, p.W5)
1916 Nov 22, Jack London, American writer, died in Glen Ellen, Ca., of a kidney disease, gastrointestinal uremic poisoning. An overdose of morphine was also suspected. He had written 50 books. London produced 200 short stories, 400 nonfiction articles and 20 novels. A 1998 biography by Alex Kershaw was titled: "Jack London: A Life." In 2010 James L. Haley authored �wolf: The Lives of jack London.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_London)(SFC, 11/20/96, p.A17)(SFEC, 1/25/98, BR p.3)(Econ, 8/14/10, p.69)
1916 Edgar Payne painted his impressionist work: "Sycamore in Autumn, Orange County Park."
(SFC, 3/18/99, p.C9)
1916 Sarah Williamson authored �A California Cook Book.� It was reprinted in 2009.
(SSFC, 1/17/10, p.K2)
1916 The Goodyear Redwood Lumber Co. constructed Harbor House in Elk, Ca., (once Greenwood Landing). It served as an executive residence and quarters for Goodyear guests.
(SFEC, 4/13/97, p.T9)
1916 In San Diego Ellen Browning Scripps, newspaper heiress, built a home that later became the La Jolla Museum of Contemporary Art.
(SFEC, 8/20/00, p.T6)
1916 Oakland Preserving Co. became the California Packing Co.
(SFC, 3/1/97, p.B1)
1916 The Pacific Coast Company was an established network of railroads and ships. Its history is described in the 1997 book: "The Pacific Coast Company" by Gerald M. Best.
(SFEC,12/14/97, BR p.5)
1916 Mt. Lassen was made a National Park.
(SFEC, 8/13/00, p.T8)
1916 Tom Mooney was framed for a terrorist bombing and sent to San Quentin. He was later pardoned.
(SFEC, 12/19/99, Z1 p.5)
1916 San Diego agreed to pay rainmaker Charley Mallory Hatfield (1876-1958) $10,000 if he could fill the local reservoirs. Hatfield set up his "moisture accelerator" and heavy rains soon began, which flooded the city. The city council refused to pay him because the flooding exceeded his contract. [see 1902]
(SFC, 3/19/04, p.E13)
1916-1932 Ernest Batchelder founded a decorative tile business in Pasadena that was sold to Bauer Pottery.
(SFC, 9/9/98, Z1 p.3)
1917 Mar 15, William D. Stephens (1859-1944) began serving as the 24th governor of California and continued to Jan 8, 1923.
1917 May 18, California approved an Industrial Loan Act. State chartered industrial loan banks approved loans to industrial workers shunned by traditional banks.
(www.leginfo.ca.gov/.const/.article_15)(Econ, 4/22/06, p.71)
1917 May 25, Steve Cochran, actor (Mozambique, Gay Senotiys, Dallas), was born in Eureka, CA.
1917 Nov 23, The California Fruit Growers� Convention in Sacramento passed a resolution asking that Chinese farm laborers be imported to fill the void left by men leaving for the war in Europe.
(SFEC, 12/26/99, p.W5)
1917 Dec 11, Aviator Katherine Stinson landed at the SF Presidio and established a new endurance record by flying from San Diego.
(SFEC, 12/26/99, p.W5)
1917 In California Fort Ord was established as a military base just north of Monterey. It spread over some 28,000 acres east of Monterey Bay. The base was closed in 1994 and in 2012 some 14,000 acres were turned into the Fort Ord National Monument.
(SFC, 5/12/96, p.C-11)(SFC, 4/21/12, p.C4)d
1917 The Grand Central Market in downtown Los Angeles was established.
1917 Ansel Mills Easton settled land southeast of Mount Diablo that he named Black Hawk after his family's Irish race horse. The property was later sold to Raymond Force, owner of the Caterpillar Tractor Company. The property was then sold to Howard Peterson, the owner of Peterson Tractor.
(SFC, 5/14/99, p.A21)
1917 Harry Chandler, the son-in-law of Gen. H.G. Otis, took over as publisher of the LA Times.
(WSJ, 6/14/01, p.A18)
1917 L.L. Nunn, self-made American millionaire in mining and hydro-power, founded Deep Springs College in eastern California. It is a very small liberal arts institution with only a couple dozen students (all male). There is no tuition, but the students are required to work at least 20 hours per week. It is on 3,500 acres and the academic year consists of six seven-week terms.
(Smith., 4/1995, p.115-117)(Econ, 1/19/13, p.31)
1918 Jul 25, Annette Adams of Calif. was sworn in as the 1st US woman district attorney.
c1918 E. Charlton Fortune painted his impressionist work: "Study of Monterey Bay."
(SFC, 3/18/99, p.C9)
c1918 Guy Rose painted his impressionist work: "Point Lobos."
(SFC, 3/18/99, p.C9)
1918 Edgar Payne, muralist, started the Laguna Beach Art Association and opened a gallery.
(SSFC, 2/15/04, p.C12)
1918 Amy McPherson, preacher, arrived in Los Angeles with 2 children. Within 5 years she established the Angelus Temple, the largest church in the US. Her members would be taken with the spirit and roll in the aisles and became known as the Holy Rollers.
(SFEC, 4/25/99, Z1 p.4)
1918 The Livermore Pro Rodeo was begun to raise money for the American Red Cross. It became an annual event.
(SFC, 6/15/98, p.A17)
1918 The US government nationalized the Wells Fargo franchise into a government agency known as the American Railway Express Agency. The government took control of everything except the bank, which began rebuilding with a focus on commercial markets.
(SFC, 6/9/98, p.A10)
1918 A state law was enacted that granted women and children time-and-a-half for working over 8 hours and double time for work over 12 hours.
(SFC, 1/7/98, p.A19)
1918 Frederick Madison Roberts was elected as the state's first African American legislator. He represented the 74th District in LA as a Republican and was the great grandson of Sally Hemmings. In 1934 he was defeated by Gus Hawkins.
(SFEC, 1/16/00, p.C6)
1918 The Calaveras Dam, 10 miles NE of San Jose, failed during construction.
(SFC, 9/15/02, p.A20)
1918 The Copco 1 Dam was constructed on the Klamath River in northern California. It permanently blocked access to more than 75 miles of salmon and steelhead habitat in the main stem of the upper Klamath and its tributaries. [see 1925]
1918 The California-based Save the Redwoods League began collecting donations for the purchase of redwood land. In 1960 the 33-mile Avenue of the Giants, a 52,000-acre area of river and redwoods, was dedicated following efforts by the Save the Redwoods League.
(www.savetheredwoods.org/league/anniversary.shtml)(SFCM, 7/18/04, p.29)
1918 Clair L. Peck founded the C.L. Peck Contractor company.
(SFC, 12/26/98, p.A23)
1918 The Warner brothers built a film studio on Sunset Blvd. in LA, Ca.
(WSJ, 6/2/06, p.A1)
1919 Jan 13, California voted to ratify the Prohibition amendment.
1919 Feb 14, The United Parcel Service was incorporated in Oakland, CA.
1919 Sep 2, Marge Champion, dancer (Marge & Gower Champion Show), was born in LA, California.
c1919 Childe Hassam, American impressionist, painted "California."
(WSJ, 6/2/00, p.W4)
1919 In southern California the Sunkist packing warehouse was built in Anaheim. In 2014 the Mission Revival building was transformed into a food hall with more than 20 food purveyors.
(SSFC, 5/25/14, p.P6)
1919 William Randolph Hearst began the construction of his 150-room Castle at the 245,000 acre ranch at San Simeon.
(SFC, 8/7/99, p.A9)
1919 William Wrigley Jr. began to transform Catalina Island as a favorite destination for Southern Californians
(SFEC, 9/24/00, p.T11)
1919 Pebble Beach Golf Links opened in Monterey. The course was designed by Jack Neville.
(SFEC, 9/26/99, p.T6)
1919 William Riker (d.1969), white supremacist and charlatan, founded the Holy City commune in California�s Santa Cruz Mountains. In 1942 he was arrested, but not convicted, for writing letters to Adolf Hitler supporting his policies. In 1968 three contractors bought the 142 acre property for $350,000. In 2006 the property was up for sale for $11 million.
(SFC, 12/25/06, p.B1)
1919 State work legislation restricted those under 18 from working over 48 hours a week. Work with dangerous machinery was prohibited to those under 16.
(SFC, 12/27/99, p.A10)
1919 Henry Allen Rispin, a SF oil executive, purchased the town of Capitola.
(SFC, 5/17/99, p.A15)
1919 Karl A. Hess opened Hess Station beside the old Lincoln Highway, Hwy 40 (later Hwy 80). The station was sold in 1938 to Mr. and Mrs. Homer R. Henderson who renamed it the Milk Farm. In 1963 a Milk Farm neon sign was erected for $78,000. In 1997 the 60-acre property was sold to inventor Paul Moller and a group of investors. Moller hoped to fly his experimental Skycar there over a new artificial lake.
(SSFC, 3/21/04, p.B5)
1919 Phoebe Apperson Hearst (77), wife of Senator George Hearst and mother of William Randolph Hearst, died in the influenza epidemic. She had donated an estimated $25 million to UC Berkeley, hospitals, schools, senior centers, art galleries and other institutions. She was buried at Cypress Lawn in Colma.
(SFEM, 10/24/99, p.20)(CHA, 1/2001)
1920 Feb 22, The 1st artificial rabbit was used at a dog race track in Emeryville, Calif.
1920 Apr 2, Jack Webb, actor (Joe Friday-Dragnet), was born in Santa Monica, Calif.
1920 Apr 9, Isaias Hellman (b.1842), Jewish immigrant and California entrepreneur, died. In 2008 Frances Dinkelspiel authored �Towers of Gold: How One Jewish Immigrant Named Isaias Hellman Created California.�
(SSFC, 11/30/08, Books p.1)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isaias_W._Hellman)
1920 Nov, California voters passed an anti-Japanese Alien Land law that barred Japanese immigrants from purchasing land in the name of their American-born children. A federal court deemed it constitutional in 1921.
(SFEC, 12/26/99, p.W7)
1920 The town of Manzanar in Owens Valley had 57 houses and a population of 203. Water diverted from the valley to LA caused the complete abandonment of Manzanar by 11941.
(SFEC, 4/13/97, Z1 p.6)
1920 A building was completed in Sonoma on the State Farm for Delinquent Women. It was later converted to a hospital annex and after that became part of Bartholomew Park Winery.
(SFC, 10/28/04, p.F1)
1920 Walter Knott (d.1981) first rented a berry patch in Buena Park, Ca., that he turned into a family attraction called Knott's Berry Place. The farm later made famous the "Boysen berry," named after Rudolph Boysen, a parks superintendent who had crossed blackberry, red raspberry and loganberry plants.
(SFC, 6/14/03, p.A20)
1920 Los Angeles surpassed SF in population 576,673 to 506,676.
(SFEC, 4/25/99, Z1 p.4)
1920s Fatty Arbuckle arrived in Lone Pine, Ca., to star in the film "The Roundup."
(SFEC, 8/17/97, p.T3)
1920s In Santa Barbara El Pasea, which claims to be The Oldest Shopping Arcade in the West, was built around Casa de la Guerra.
(Via, 3-4/99, p.40)
1920s In Santa Barbara George Fox Steedman, industrialist, commissioned a grand interpretation of an Andalusian farmhouse and surrounded it with 11 acres of gardens.
(Via, 3-4/99, p.43)
1921 Feb 24, A giant plane was completed at 421 Colyton Street, Los Angeles. The "leviathan of the Skies" or "The Cloudster," was designed by Donald Douglas and was the first to carry a load greater than it own weight.
1921 Sabato "Simon" Rodia, Italian immigrant and cement finisher, began a project in Los Angeles that later became known as the Watts Towers. He worked on the towers for 33 and then deeded the property to a neighbor.
(WSJ, 10/16/01, p.A24)
1921 Nelbert Murphy Chouinard founded the Chouinard Art Institute in Los Angeles and operated it until 1972. In 1961 Walt and Roy Disney guided the merger of the Chouinard Art Institute and the Los Angeles Conservatory of Music to establish California Institute of the Arts. In 1985 Robert Perine (d.2004) authored �Chouinard: An Art Vision Betrayed.�
(SFC, 11/13/04, p.B7)(www.calarts.edu/alumni/chouinard/)
1921 Henry Allen Rispin, a SF oil executive, built his Rispin Mansion in the town of Capitola-by-the-Sea, which he owned. Rispin went broke in 1929 and the mansion was sold to a Burlingame businessman, who never live there. In 1940 the mansion was sold to the Oblates of St. Joseph, who converted it into a convent and moved out in 1956. The city of Capitola bought the home in 1986 and in 1999 planned to approve renovation by Ron Beardslee and Dan Floyd.
(SFC, 5/17/99, p.A15)
1921 See�s Candies opened in Los Angeles.
(SFC, 10/8/97, Z1 p.8)
1921 The Power family in Vacaville, Ca. opened a roadside produce stand on I-80 that grew into the Nut Tree Restaurant. A family feud put the restaurant and adjoining 160 acre site up for sale in 1996. In 2006 it re-opened as Nut Tree Family Park.
(SFC, 6/4/96, p.C3)(SSFC, 10/29/06, p.G8)
1921 Col. J.G. Boswell, a cotton farmer from Georgia whose business was ruined by the boll weevil, arrived in California and began to acquire land in the central valley. The Boswell family took advantage of federal programs to stop droughts and floods and helped get the Army Corps of Engineers to build Pine Flat Dam, which drained Lake Tulare. In 1952 his nephew J.G. Boswell II (1923-2009) took control of the company. In 2003 Mark Arax and Rick Wartzman authored "The King of California: J.G. Boswell and the Making of a Secret American Empire."
(Econ, 10/18/03, p.82)(SFC, 11/11/03, p.D1)(SFC, 4/8/09, p.B6)
1922 Feb 1, William Desmond Taylor, president of the Motion Picture Director�s Guild, was discovered murdered in his Hollywood bungalow. Taylor was discovered to actually be William Deane-Tanner, an Irishman who had abandoned his family and reinvented himself in the film industry.
(AH, 2/05, p.47)
1922 Aug, Templeton Crocker led a movement to "organize anew" the California Historical Society. The society began publishing a magazine that has continued ever since.
(SFEC, 8/31/97, DB p.9)(SFEC,10/26/97, DB p.55)
1922 The Egyptian Theater was built over a lemon orchard in Hollywood by developer Charles Toberman and impresario Sid Grauman. The theater at 6712 Hollywood Blvd was restored in 1999 and reopened by American Cinematheque.
(SFC, 11/5/98, p.E6)(SFC, 1/29/99, p.D10)
1922 The 1st arc-welded structure in the US was a 245-step, freestanding, steel staircase into the Moaning Caverns of Calaveras, Ca.
(SSFC, 12/16/01, p.C5)
1922 In the Rose Bowl California played to a 0-0 tie with Washington & Jefferson.
(SFC, 10/15/99, p.C12)
1922 The Colorado River Compact allocated 7.5 million acre-feet of water from the upper basin states (Wyoming, Colorado, Utah and New Mexico) to be delivered to the lower basin sates (California, Arizona and Nevada) plus the rights to divert another 1 million acre-feet from the river�s lower tributaries.
(SFEC, 8/24/97, p.A10)(SFCM, 7/17/05, p.6)
1922 Venice, an independent municipality since 1915, was annexed to Los Angeles after city treasurer, James Peasgood, absconded with the city�s funds.
(SFEM, 6/18/00, p.8)
1922 William Randolph Hearst acquired land in San Antonio Valley for his cattle empire. In 1940 the US War Dept. purchased the ranch for troop training.
(SSFC, 8/5/01, p.T5)
1922 Frank McArthur bought the land around Burney Falls in Northern California and gave it to the state in memory of his parents. The park was named McArthur-Burney Falls Memorial State Park.
(SSFC, 3/18/01, p.T4)
1922 Earle C. Anthony, a Los Angeles Packard dealer, commissioned from France the 1st neon signs in the US for his dealership.
(SFEC, 8/13/00, p.T6)
1922 Louis M. Martini founded the L. M. Martini Grape Products Co. in Kingsburg, Fresno Ct., California, to sell grape juice, concentrates, sacramental and medicinal wines.
(SFC, 12/19/02, p.D1)
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