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Alameda, California
Alameda is a city in Alameda County, California, United States. It is located
on a small island of the same name next to Oakland, California in the San Francisco
Bay. An additional part of the city is Bay Farm Island, which is adjacent to
the Oakland International Airport. The city has a small-town feel with its Victorian
homes and tree-lined neighborhoods. As of the 2000 census, the city had a total
population of 72,259. Alameda is a charter city, rather than a general law city,
meaning that the city can provide for any form of government. Alameda became
a charter city in 1916, and adopted a council-manager government then, which
it retains to the present.
History
The island that Alameda occupies was originally a peninsula connected to Oakland. Much of the peninsula was low-lying and marshy, but on higher ground the peninsula and adjacent parts of what is now downtown Oakland were home to one of the largest coastal oak forests in the world. The area was therefore called Encinal, Spanish for oak grove. Alameda is Spanish for grove of poplar trees or tree-lined avenue, and was chosen in 1853 by popular vote.
The inhabitants at the time of the arrival of the Spanish in the late 18th Century were a local band of the Ohlone tribe. The peninsula became part of the vast Rancho San Antonio granted to Luis Peralta by the Spanish king who claimed California. The grant was later confirmed by the new Republic of Mexico upon its independence from Spain.
The city was founded on June 6, 1853. Originally three small settlements grew in town. Old Alameda referred to the village at Encinal and High, Hibbardsville was at the North Shore ferry and shipping terminal, and Woodstock was on the west near the ferry piers of the South Pacific Coast Railroad and the Central Pacific. Eventually, the Central Pacific's ferry pier became the Alameda Mole while the Central Pacific itself became the Southern Pacific. The Alameda pier was the site of the first train across the Transcontinental Railroad into the San Francisco Bay Area on September 6, 1869. The transcontinental terminus was switched to the Oakland Long Wharf two months later on November 8, 1869.
In 1917, an attraction called Neptune Beach was built in the area now known as Crab Cove. Often compared to Coney Island, the park was a major attraction in the 1920s and 1930s. The original owners of the facility, the Strehlow family, partnered with a local confectioner to create tastes unique to Neptune Beach. It is not widely known that both the American snow cone and the popsicle were first sold at Neptune Beach. The Kewpie doll, handpainted and dressed in unique hand-sewn dresses, became the original prize for winning games at the beach - another Neptune Beach invention. The Strehlows owned and operated the beach on their own, even filling in a section of the bay to add an additional olympic-size swimming pool and an exceptional roller coaster which must have given riders a tremendous view of the bay.
Neptune Beach's two huge outdoor pools hosted swimming races and exhibitions by famous swimmers like Olympian Johnny Weismuller, who later starred as the original Tarzan, and Jack LaLanne, who started a chain of health clubs. Unfortunately, the park closed down in 1939 because of the Great Depression, the completion of the Bay Bridge, people circumventing paying the admission price and in general, the rise of car culture. Once the Bay Bridge was complete, the rail lines, which ran right past the entrance to Neptune Beach on the way to the Alameda Mole and the Ferry, lost riders in droves. People began using their cars to escape the city and the immediate suburbs like Alameda and travelling further afield in California. Alameda lost its resort status as more distant locations became more attractive to cash-rich San Francisco tourists. Youngsters in town became aware of ways to avoid paying the dime for admission to the park. Strong swimmers or even waders could sneak in on the bay side, just by swimming around the fence.
Some of the resort homes and buildings from the Neptune beach era still exist in present-day Alameda. The Croll Building, on the corner of Webster St. and Central Ave., was the site of Croll's Gardens and Hotel, famous as training quarters for the some of the greatest fighters in boxing history from 1883 to 1914. James J. Corbett, Bob Fitzsimmons, Jim Jefferies, Jack Johnson, and many other champions all stayed and trained here. Today this beautiful preserved building is home to Croll's Pizza and the New Zealander Restaurant. Neptune Court, just a block away on the corner of Central Ave. and McKay Ave., provides another glimpse of what resort life was like in Alameda in the 1920s. A short walk near Crab Cove will reveal many more historic gems.
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Roger M. Bondy 405-447-6743
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