Berkeley

Historically Important Album with 227 Gelatin Silver Photos of California Showing the Former Lumber Hub of Fort Bragg the Newton J. Tharp Commercial School 1908–1952 in San Francisco the Tanforan Racetrack in San Bruno the Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk the Second Grammar School in Dixon Panama Pacific International Exhibition etc.; also with Rare Photos of the Standard Oil Co. Explosion in Riverside and Pioneering Automobile Race & Airplane Flight in San Bruno. Ca. 1908-1915.

réf. PB14 — Oblong Quarto album 132x209 cm. 50 paper album leaves two blank. With ca. 227 mounted original gelatin silver photographs from ca. 84x84 cm 3 ¼ x 3 ¼ in to 25x36 cm 1 x 1 ½ in. No captions. Period brown cloth album fastened with a string; gilt-tooled generic title “Photographs” on the front cover. Edges worn mild silvering of the photos but overall a very good album with strong interesting photos. Interesting collection of 227 lively original photos of California likely taken by a local male resident during leisure outings with family and friends including early views of San Francisco San Bruno Santa Cruz and Dixon. About forty identified photographs show California landmarks with ca. ten rare images of Fort Bragg a former lumber hub in Mendocino County. Fort Bragg established in 1857 as a military garrison was soon transformed into a logging town with the support of the Union Lumber Company est. in 1891. In its prime Fort Bragg was a business center and the primary supplier of lumber for San Francisco’s post-1906 earthquake reconstruction. By the 1960s as accessible timber dwindled the town gradually shifted toward tourism. The early well-executed views of Fort Bragg show the Union Lumber Company’s lumber mill logging operations water tower log ponds and a nearby lake. The other photos from the “landmark” series document the now-demolished Newton J. Tharp Commercial School 1908–1952 in San Francisco the Tanforan Racetrack 1899–1964 in San Bruno the Sather Tower built in 1914 at the University of California Berkeley the Second Grammar School in Dixon built in 1911 demolished in 1958 and California’s oldest surviving amusement park the Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk established in 1907. There are also about ten photographs of the 1915 Panama-Pacific International Exposition featuring the now-lost Service Building Tower of Jewels Court of the Universe and Court of Abundance. The album also contains lively images of significant historical moments in California including the 1908 explosion at the Standard Oil Company in Riverside one of the first airplane flights in Northern California and one of the state’s earliest automobile races at Tanforan Park in 1910. The other interesting photos include private photographs of the travelers posing by cars picnicking fishing horseback riding images of Silver Lake with cottages and camps topographers at work with alidade and plane tables steam trains railway tracks tunnels rugby matches at Stanford and a graduation ceremony at Stockton High School. Overall historically interesting extensive album with rare early views of California. hardcover