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Historic Spots in California
By Mildred Brooke Hoover STANFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS
Copyright © 2002 Board of Trustees of the Leland Stanford Junior University
All rights reserved.
ISBN: 978-0-8047-4483-6
CHAPTER 1
Alameda County
Alameda County was created in 1853 from portions of Contra Costa and Santa Clara Counties. The county seat was originally at Alvarado. It was moved to San Leandro in 1856, and from there in 1873 to Oakland, where it has remained.
The poplar or cottonwood tree (alamo in Spanish) is the basis for the word alameda, which means "a place where poplar trees grow"; it was also used to describe a tree-lined road. The county's name came from El Arroyo de la Alameda (Alameda Creek), lined with willow and silver-barked sycamore trees, giving it the appearance of a tree-lined roadway.
THE EMERYVILLE SHELL MOUND
From the 1850s the shell mounds found along the shores of San Francisco Bay excited the curiosity of the incoming new settlers. In 1902 these mounds were studied by Professors John C. Merriam and Max Uhle of the University of California. They made careful excavations on the site of the prominent Emeryville mound and published the results of their work. In 1908, N. C. Nelson completed a survey of the entire San Francisco Bay region, where he located, numbered, and mapped nearly 425 shell heaps, analyzing them in detail and publishing a summary of his observations and conclusions.
The Emeryville Mound, designated number 329 in the Nelson survey, was situated on the eastern shore of San Francisco Bay almost due east of the Golden Gate. It lay on the western side of the Peralta grant, or that part of Rancho San Antonio apportioned to Vicente Peralta by his father, Luis Maria Peralta. This section later became known as Emeryville, an incorporated city lying between Oakland and Berkeley. The shell mound (SRL 335) was located between the bay and the railroad tracks. Shellmound Street identifies the site; no official marker has been placed there. As W. Egbert Schenck explained:
The first people who came to this area camped just above the shoreline, possibly on little hummocks at the edge of the marsh. As shellfish were obtained, the shells were thrown aside, and these with the by-products of daily life increased the campground and gradually crept out into the marsh. ... As the shell area increased, subsequent people utilized it because it was drier, placing camps, perhaps over what had previously been marsh. ... This shell area grew until it covered some hundreds of thousands of square feet.
The Emeryville mound was located at a point that was favorable for use as a camping ground by native peoples. Lying on the narrow alluvial plain that stretches along the Contra Costa ("opposite coast") between the foothills and the bay, it was bordered on the north by open, almost treeless plains, and on the south by a willow thicket some twenty acres in extent. Further south the thicket merged into a marsh extending about one and one-half miles along the shore and gradually increasing in width until at its southern end it was three-quarters of a mile wide. Beyond the marshes stretched a mile of rolling, oak-studded fields, the Encinal de Temescal.
In prehistoric times, Temescal Creek supplied fresh water to the nomadic people who visited its banks, and the abundant shellfish beds at its mouth supplied food. The quiet reaches of the bay were full of sea otter, perhaps hunted from tule rafts. Waterfowl filled the marshes, and deer were plentiful in the willow thicket and the oak grove to the south; acorns, seeds, and other vegetable foods were abundant, as the numerous mortars found in the vicinity indicate. The willow thicket also supplied ample firewood.
To this choice spot groups of Indians came yearly from the surrounding country, perhaps from long distances. They may have spent six months out of each year at this site, fishing and hunting, drying and pounding the shellfish for future food supplies, and taking the otter skins for clothing.
The Emeryville shell mound may be as old as 1,000 years, but it is impossible to determine this accurately. There is no certain evidence on when the place was last used as a rendezvous for nomadic tribes. Schenck says that it was apparently unoccupied when Fages passed that way in 1772, for no mention of it is made in the chronicles of that expedition. Anza, in 1776, and Gabriel Moraga, in the early 1800s, also failed to mention having seen Indians in the Oakland-Berkeley neighborhood, although they did note their presence both to the south and to the north. Yet even if these early explorers did not see Indians there, and even though there were no fogs concealing their whereabouts, the oak groves of which Father Crespi wrote, together with the willow thicket near the mouth of Temescal Creek, may well have formed an effectual screen behind which the Indians at the Emeryville mound were encamped — or perhaps took refuge — when the first white travelers passed that way.
Around the year 1836, Vicente Peralta built his adobe house not far from Temescal Creek and about one and a half miles east of the Emeryville mound. At the mouth of the creek was the Temescal embarcadero ("pier"), and the ancient mound was a landmark known to travelers along the old creek road during those days.
In 1857 the Peralta grant was surveyed and mapped by Julius Kellersberger, and in 1859 Edward Wiard purchased that portion of it on which the mound lay. Contemporary maps show buildings on both the eastern and western parts; in 1871 Wiard leveled a section of the eastern side and laid out the mile racetrack that became known as the Oakland Trotting Park. On the western side in 1876 he opened Shellmound Park, a popular holiday resort and picnic grounds; the Emeryville shell mound in those days was a picturesque landmark. On its low, truncated summit were a circle of trees, some windmills, and the round dance pavilion surrounded by a high cypress hedge. An atlas of 1878 shows this mound with the residence of J. S. Emery in the foreground.
The shores of San Francisco Bay were too valuable to be left undeveloped, and over the years virtually all the shell mounds were leveled and their contents dispersed. In 1924 the Emervyille mound was leveled in order to convert the area into a factory site. John Hubert Mee, president of the Mee Estate, which owned the property, made known his intentions and permitted the University of California to explore the site, with much assistance from Captain Ludwig Siebe, proprietor of Shellmound Park. The mound was razed by steam shovel; careful observations were made and collections were taken during the process. After the leveling operations were completed, controlled excavations of its lower levels were made by hand. Many skeletal and artifact materials were collected. The pile was found to be composed principally of shells — mostly clams, mussels, and oysters, with a plentiful mixture of cockleshells. Certain other kinds, found only in small quantities, had been treated in the manner of possessions. Besides human burials, the accumulation disclosed the skeletal remains of birds, quadrupeds, sea mammals, and fish. Many of these bone remains were placed in the Museum of Vertebrate Zoology at the University of California at Berkeley. One shell mound in Alameda County remains pretty much undisturbed, in Coyote Hills Regional Park in Fremont.
But the Emeryville shell mounds were not totally gone. In 1999 and 2000 renovations along the shoreline revealed substantial remains from these old sites, discovered as old buildings and lots were pulled down. Here, and across the bay in South San Francisco, efforts are being made to keep intact some traces of these long-dispersed sites, something very difficult to achieve in areas of high population and commercial density.
THE LINCOLN PARK SHELL MOUND
One shell mound of the 425 mapped by Nelson in 1906–8 has been memorialized. The site of this mound, located in the city of Alameda and now covered by streets and residences, extended over three acres of ground bounded roughly by what are now Central, Johnson, and Santa Clara Avenues and Court Street. The mound was removed by the city authorities in the summer of 1908, and the earth, combined with tons of shells, was used for the making of roads on Bay Farm Island.
The lower levels of this ground were examined by Captain W. A. Clark, who, working the ground carefully with a hand trowel, was able to save a number of fine relics. They were placed in the Alameda Public Library, where they are still on display.
Near the site of the old Indian mound in Lincoln Park is a stone monument with a bronze tablet inscribed: "One thousand feet due west was a prehistoric mound, 400 feet long, 150 feet wide, 14 feet high. The remains of 450 Indians, with stone implements and shell ornaments, were found when the mound was opened in 1908. Erected by Copa de Oro Chapter, D.A.R., 1914."
OTHER INDIAN SITES
From Albany in the north to Mowry's Landing in the south, there were at least twenty shell mounds scattered along the shore of the bay in Alameda County when they were cataloged and mapped by Nelson in 1906–8. Nelson in his report states that the 425 mounds found in the greater Bay Area probably did not include all of them, and that some doubtless had been obliterated in past years.
At the curve of Indian Rock Avenue where it meets the south end of San Diego Road in north Berkeley, a huge, irregular rock mass looms above the roadway. From its level summit there is a commanding view of the city and of the bay beyond. At the base of the main boulders are a number of smaller rocks with deeply worn holes or mortars where the Indians once ground acorns for meal. Nearby, the city of Berkeley has planted a garden in Mortar Rock Park. A few hundred feet lower down on Indian Rock Avenue at the head of San Mateo Road is Indian Rock Park, another prehistoric landmark set among small live oak and tall eucalyptus trees.
In the Trestle Glen neighborhood of Oakland there is a level spot where an Indian village once stood. It was originally called Indian Gulch because Indians still lived there when the first Americans came to that region. Nothing remains today as a reminder of the Indians, and Trestle Glen Road winds through a narrow canyon still shaded by immense live oaks and other trees.
TEMESCAL
Temescal, a name of Aztec origin meaning "sweat house," was brought to California by the Franciscan Fathers. A. L. Kroeber describes the temescal thus:
From the outside its appearance is that of a small mound. The ground has been excavated to the depth of a foot or a foot and a half, over a space of about twelve by seven or eight feet. In the center of this area two heavy posts are set up three or four feet apart. These are connected at the top by a log laid in their forks. Upon this log, and in the two forks, are laid some fifty or more logs and sticks of various dimensions, their ends sloping down to the edge of the excavation. It is probable that brush covers these timbers. The whole is thoroughly covered with earth. There is no smoke hole. The entrance is on one of the long sides, directly facing the space between the two center posts, and only a few feet from them. The fireplace is between the entrance and the posts. It is just possible to stand upright in the center of the house. In Northern California, the sweat house is of larger dimensions, and was preeminently a ceremonial or assembly chamber.
Dr. L. H. Bunnell, in his history published in 1880 of his discoveries in the Yosemite Valley, noted some interesting details about the use of the sweat house:
It ... was used as a curative for disease, and as a convenience for cleansing the skin, when necessity demanded it. ... I have seen a half-dozen or more enter one of these rudely constructed sweathouses through the small aperture left for the purpose. Hot stones are taken in, the aperture is closed until suffocation would seem impending, when they would crawl out, reeking with perspiration, and with a shout, spring like acrobats into the cold waters of the stream. As a remedial agent for disease, the same course is pursued.
Through what is now a busy part of Oakland, Temescal Creek wandered down from the Piedmont hills to San Francisco Bay. When Americans first came to this section of the country, it is said that they found an old Indian sweat house in the arroyo and that because of this circumstance they named it Temescal Creek. W. E. Schenck, however, believes that the name may have arisen not from the presence of a native Indian village and sweat house but because the Indian retainers on the Peralta rancho doubtless set up a temescal on the bank of the creek near their cabins. The Vicente Peralta adobe was built about two blocks north of where Telegraph Avenue crosses the creek, near 51st Street. Around this nucleus the settlement of Temescal grew up. The name first appears on the Kellersberger survey map of 1857 as "Temesconta," which, Schenck says, "may or may not be Temescal."
Temescal Creek flowed about 450 feet southeast of the center of the Emeryville shell mound and discharged into the bay some 800 feet southwest of the center of the mound. The creek seems to have been the determining physiographical feature of the region in prehistoric as well as in pioneer times, tending to focus population by its supply of fresh water and food; until about the 1880s, for instance, it had salmon runs. With the coming of the Spaniards to the eastern side of the bay, Mission San José was settled, and later the great ranchos of San Antonio, San Leandro, San Lorenzo, San Pablo, and others were granted. Gradually embarcaderos sprang up along the eastern shore of the bay. Among others, the Temescal landing at the mouth of Temescal Creek near the old Emeryville shell mound became a landing place for occasional parties from San Francisco. The old Temescal Creek Road probably followed the creek as far east as Telegraph Avenue, and perhaps beyond.
During this period, visitors landing in boats at the mouth of Temescal Creek continued to the ranchos or to the mission by way of the Vicente Peralta Adobe one and a half miles inland. It was said that all visitors were hospitably greeted. From there they would proceed close to the foothills to Antonio Peralta's adobe near what is now Fruitvale Avenue, and thence to Ignacio Peralta's on the bank of San Leandro Creek. The next stop was the Estudillo rancho on the south side of the creek, and from there they went to Guillermo Castro's adobe at the site of the present city of Hayward. Here roads led east to Amador's and Livermore's ranchos and south to Mission San José.
The old Temescal Creek Road no longer exists (though a portion of SR 24 follows the creek bed in some places), and the free flow of the stream was stopped in 1866 when it was dammed up in the hills to form the reservoir still known as Lake Temescal. At that time it furnished the principal water supply for several thousand inhabitants. The course of the arroyo itself is still plainly indicated in some places by a winding lane of native oak, willow, bay, alder, buckeye, and cottonwood trees. The creek itself runs through culverts underground and in places runs freely; it forms part of the boundary between Emeryville and Oakland.
ORTEGA'S DISCOVERY OF THE "CONTRA COSTA"
In the fall of 1769, while he was encamped on San Francisquito Creek (on the San Mateo-Santa Clara county line), after his discovery of the great Bay of San Francisco, Gaspar de Portolá sent out a reconnoitering party. Commanded by José Francisco de Ortega, the expedition's purpose was to find a land route up the eastern shore of the newly discovered bay to Point Reyes in Marin County and Cermeno's harbor. It seems to have been anticipated that a settlement to be named San Francisco would be established on that harbor and there would be founded the mission dedicated to St. Francis.
Passing around the southern end of San Francisco Bay, Ortega and his men forded the Guadalupe River (in Santa Clara County). From there, wrote Father Juan Crespi, chronicler and chaplain to Portolá, "they went forward on the other side of the estuary eight or ten leagues, but there was still a long distance for them to go. [A league would be 2.633 miles today.] At this distance of ten leagues, they came upon another very large stream with a very strong current, and its bed was also wooded and its course was through a great plain which was also quite well wooded." Professor Herbert E. Bolton wrote that they must have gone as far north as Niles or farther, and the second "very large stream" with wooded arroyo was doubtless Alameda Creek, from which the county takes its name.
(Continues...)
Excerpted from Historic Spots in California by Mildred Brooke Hoover. Copyright © 2002 Board of Trustees of the Leland Stanford Junior University. Excerpted by permission of STANFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS.
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