Population killed California.
I'm a fifth generation Californian born in Redwood City in 1948 the great great grandson of a man who jumped a Russian whaling ship docked in San Francisco bay in 1846 two years before the gold rush. As far as we can tell my great great grandfather came out of Yekaterinburg via Odessa but it really gets sketchy.
When I was born the entire family lived in California with the exception of an uncle who lived in Reno, Nevada. Growing up I lived in San Carlos, Palo Alto, Mountain View, Menlo Park and Santa Clara.
When I was born we were living at 1047 McCue Avenue in San Carlos a house that was built by my grandfather who was a pretty big developer in the area.
Here is what the house looks like today on Google Street View and here is what it looked like right after my grandfather finished building it.
My first memories are of that house and I do remember my bedroom was in the front corner and you can see the two windows on the right side which were my bedroom windows.
My grandfather built most of the homes in the San Carlos area... back in that time he was the largest developer of the area and he lived in a house with five acres on McCormick Lane in Atherton. The money is all gone today but he was well off back then.
I remember both sides of the El Camino had acres and acres of orchards, mostly pears and prunes but some cherries, between the small towns of Mountain View, Sunnyvale and Santa Clara. Growing up as a young kid we would spend all our time in these orchards exploring.... they were huge with their own dirt roads and a 10 year old sure could explore!
The El Camino was a two lane road back then once you got out of the cities. Oh yes it was!
In my early teen years we lived on Dundee Drive in Santa Clara and in 1965 Monroe Street dead ended at Quinn Avenue to the San Jose Airport it was all, and I do mean all, orchards. It was a two mile walk, or bike ride on the private dirt roads which were many, to get to the airport.
To make money in the summer I would head over to the airport where they had hundreds, if not thousands, of acres of string beans which I would pick for two cents a pound. If I worked all afternoon I could make $2 which wasn't bad for a 12 year old seeing how it was equivalent to $17 today for maybe four hours of carefree work. Back then it seems parents didn't give kids anything.. if we wanted money we had to work for it and picking was one of the ways to get it.
I remember when they were building Wilcox High School.
I also remember the building of the Hetch Hetchy (sp?) tunnel to bring water to Crystal Lake from the Sierra Nevada mountains. The tunnel was HUGE and we boys, being boys, would play and explore while under construction. Can't remember exactly where it was but it wasn't far from our house in Santa Clara... I remember it being an easy bike ride.
Behind a set of stores at the southeast corner of the El Camino and Kiely Blvd it was all orchards except for The Moonlight Drive In Theater. The stores used to be called The Moonlight shopping center or something like that.
In 1960 San Jose had a population of 204,196 and I remember everyone was excited when they changed the population sign with the new figure.... we had lots of beautiful places and it was the best place for a young man to grow up in back then. I loved being a kid there.
We would ride bikes like you wouldn't believe. It was common for a group of us to leave the Bonnie Brae neighborhood, that was what the development area around Dundee Drive was officially called, and bike to Stevens Creek where we would explore and get poison oak. How poison oak didn't kill me I will never know.
Today the family is mostly gone... over 100 people that I can remember in the family and today there's maybe 20 with nobody left in the bay area where we all came from. Who is left is in Sacramento, Fresno or the Los Angeles area. I go back to visit today and I don't recognize it at all.
Oh, and if you are wondering my parents bought the house on Dundee Drive new paying $29,900 in 1960. It was either 1960 or 1961.
California changed.. imagine Ronald Reagan being elected governor twice today.
Hope you all enjoyed this little trip down memory lane.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
