Mission Statement:
East Bay Hills Project is a self-supporting, non-profit, non-commercial effort whose purpose is to document and preserve the region’s history. It was conceived as an act of historical preservation and is not associated with any single organization or group. It is made possible by the generosity, thoughtfulness and vision of those individuals and institutions that provided the photographs with the understanding that they would serve as an educational resource to the public.
Home Page Photo Credits:
Home Page, Top: SN 1014, Shepherd Canyon from Melin Cut to Havens, circa 1940, from Charles Savage, Courtesy Tom Gray.
Home Page, Middle: Rockridge, the Broadway Lower Tunnel Project, and East to Contra Costa County, 1935, HJW Geospatial Inc./Pacific Aerial Surveys, Oakland CA, Courtesy East Bay Regional Park District, USNPS-7-B.
Home Page, Bottom: SN 1008, St. Mary’s Station, North View, circa 1940, Charles Savage Photo, Courtesy Tom Gray.
Photo Ownership and Rights:
The East Bay Hills Project owns none of the historic images on this WEB site. Each photo title provides all that is known about the origins of the photo and from whom the photo was obtained. In some cases, the title lines were too long to fit on one line and had to be divided between the first line and the end of the caption. Assigning the correct attribution to each image is an on-going effort. Reproduction or use of any of the photos is prohibited without the expressed written consent of the owner (copyright holder, owner of negative, in possession of print).
Photo Dates:
An exact date assigned to an individual photo indicates written verification or documentation, whereas other images are dated based on the photographer’s records, or landmarks present that provide a window of time. These landmarks include identification of auto license plates, building construction or removal, and clues from the local railroads themselves, including excursion rides with known dates.
Nomenclature of Names, Places and Railroad:
The names of many of the towns and locales described in this WEB site are referred to as they are known today on the main WEB pages, but the captions do refer to places as they had been called in the early and mid-20th century. In the area of coverage in Contra Costa County prior to 1968, only Walnut was incorporated, and the size of that city is much larger today than it was in the 1950s. The name Sacramento Northern Railway is used generically since the majority of the material presented in this WEB site are dated after 1928. From 1920 until 1928, the Oakland to Walnut Creek section was part of the San Francisco-Sacramento Railroad, and before that the Oakland, Antioch and Eastern Railway, or its original name, the Oakland and Antioch Railway. In contrast, the railway north of Sacramento had many names depending on the time period or the specific branch incorporated into the system. These names will be explained within the presentations dealing with these subjects.
Updates:
Updates may be significantly revised at a later date, and in those instances, the information will appear in the Bulletin Board as the Latest Expanded Update under the listing for the Latest Update.
Specific Locations Requiring Additional Images:
Three particular areas in need of photographic documentation are:
1- the housing on the west side of Glenwood Glade and Fernwood Drive abutting the SN prior to housing demolition in the early 1940s,
2- 1946-1960s Lafayette “Loop”, particularly the two Glenside Drive and Broadmoor Court grade crossings, the section along Old Hawthorn Drive and Beechwood Drive, and
3- Any images along the Sacramento Northern Railway right-of-way north of Sacramento between the major cities (i.e., Marysville, Yuba City, Chico, and Oroville.)
Important Sources of Information:
The alignment and road overlay functions of http://www.historicaerials.com/ were extremely useful to assess before-and-after scenes from the WEB site’s collection of USDA aerials. Thanks to John Stashik for this tip.
USDA vertical aerials from 1939 and 1950, and a 1957 set from HJW Geospatial were very useful to recheck positions of railroad bridges and trestles.
Articles from the Oakland Tribune to verify historical dates and other historical content were obtained from http://www.newspaperarchive.com/. Thanks to Gail Lombardi for this tip.
The books and articles of the Sacramento Northern Railway were very useful resources; a fairly comprehensive list can be found at the Sacramento Northern On-Line WEB site, http://www.wplives.org/sn/
Bulletin Board:
All material proposed for the bulletin board will be reviewed, administered, and posted by the WEB site caretaker. Material appropriate for the board may consist of meeting announcements, new publications, events that would be of local interest, or other requests from viewers to the general public. Submit material to be posted to eastbayhillsproject@gmail.com.
Contact:
Stuart J. Swiedler is the caretaker for the WEB site. Contact him at eastbayhillsproject@gmail.com to request material to be placed on the bulletin board, to discuss an ownership issue regarding any photo, to suggest corrections or modifications, for help with difficulties contacting the owner of any image, or for any other questions, comments or ideas you might have.