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"slug": "why-theres-a-cross-on-san-franciscos-highest-peak",
"title": "Why There's a Cross on San Francisco's Highest Peak",
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"headTitle": "Why There’s a Cross on San Francisco’s Highest Peak | KQED",
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"content": "\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"#Viewthefullepisodetranscript\">View\u003c/a>\u003cem>\u003ca href=\"#Viewthefullepisodetranscript\"> the full episode transcript.\u003c/a>\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>This article first published April 1, 2021.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Tucked away on a wooded hillside in the middle of San Francisco sits a big concrete cross. When it was built, it could be seen from miles around. Now, a thick grove of trees partially shields it from view.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[baycuriousbug]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Over the years, Bay Curious has gotten several questions about the cross. Even lifelong San Franciscans, like Julia Thollaug and Phil Montalvo, have wondered about it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I grew up in and around S.F. I’ve always noticed the cross and just wondered why it was there and where it came from?” says Thollaug.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Growing up in the Outer Mission/Crocker Amazon, the cross was always in view. I never understood when it was constructed, or even as of today, why it’s still up on Mount Davidson,” adds Montalvo.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Neither of them has ever visited Mount Davidson Park, where the cross is located. And after living here for decades, I hadn’t either.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Mount Davidson Park rises above a quiet residential neighborhood just west of Twin Peaks. It’s not well known or well marked. But once you start walking the park’s trails, you’re surrounded by eucalyptus trees and it’s easy to forget you’re in the middle of a major city.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11867150\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-11867150 size-full\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/03/RS48183_IMG_6367-qut.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1440\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/03/RS48183_IMG_6367-qut.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/03/RS48183_IMG_6367-qut-800x600.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/03/RS48183_IMG_6367-qut-1020x765.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/03/RS48183_IMG_6367-qut-160x120.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/03/RS48183_IMG_6367-qut-1536x1152.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Looking to the east from the top of Mt. Davidson (Suzie Racho/KQED) \u003ccite>(Suzie Racho)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">When you get to the top, you see two things: a view that stretches all the way to the East Bay and one very big cross. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u003ca href=\"https://www.arcadiapublishing.com/Products/9780738546605\">Author\u003c/a> and Mount Davidson \u003ca href=\"https://mtdavidson.org/jacqueline-proctor/\">historian\u003c/a> Jacquie Proctor says the cross’s origin story goes back to 1923. To a time when the area was a forest. \u003c/span>\u003cb> \u003c/b>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“A guy named James Decatur, who is an employee of the Western Union Telegraph Company and involved with the YMCA, hikes through that forest and comes to the top, ” Proctor says. “And he sees this incredible view of downtown. And he is just overwhelmed. He is inspired then to build a cross to crown the highest point of the city.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">An imposing sight, the concrete cross stands 103 feet tall and measures 10 feet wide at the base. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Decatur thought it would be a perfect place to hold an Easter sunrise service. Holding religious ceremonies in natural settings was a trend at the time. Proctor says people were pushing back against the materialism of the Roaring ’20s by reconnecting to the natural and to the spiritual. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">So it wasn’t hard for Decatur to find support for his idea. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11867161\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 281px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-11867161\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/03/RS48208_1923-SF-Examiner-qut-800x1209.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"281\" height=\"425\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/03/RS48208_1923-SF-Examiner-qut-800x1209.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/03/RS48208_1923-SF-Examiner-qut-160x242.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/03/RS48208_1923-SF-Examiner-qut.jpg 940w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 281px) 100vw, 281px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">An article from the San Francisco Examiner, January 1923.\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Several of Mount Davidson’s trails had already been established by its landowner, a developer named A.S. Baldwin. Baldwin was already starting to build houses in the surrounding area. These would become neighborhoods like Westwood Highlands, Forest Hill and St. Francis Wood. Baldwin saw the service as a way to introduce more people to new neighborhoods west of Twin Peaks. So he not only gives Decatur permission to hold the event, but donates $2,000 to get a 40-foot tall wooden cross constructed for the service. That’s nearly $31,000 in today’s dollars.\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u003cb>\u003ci>\u003c/i>\u003c/b>The event also received enthusiastic backing from city officials, religious leaders and community groups. Boy Scout troops camped out the night before and acted as ushers for attendees. The dean of Grace Cathedral led the service. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">That Easter morning was a rainy one, but Proctor says that didn’t stop 5,000 worshipers from showing up. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u003cb> \u003c/b>\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">“James Decatur thinks, ‘This is great. Had no idea 5,000 people would come, so let’s do it again!’ ” Proctor says.\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Decatur raises money for a bigger wooden cross for the service the following year. But it wouldn’t be the last service or the last cross. There were five in all. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Each temporary cross was replaced as t\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">he now annual service got more and more popular, drawing tens of thousands of people, Proctor says. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11867160\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 358px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-11867160\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/03/RS48209_AAB-9499-qut.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"358\" height=\"459\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/03/RS48209_AAB-9499-qut.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/03/RS48209_AAB-9499-qut-160x205.jpg 160w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 358px) 100vw, 358px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">(Photo Courtesy: San Francisco History Center, San Francisco Public Library)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“People are dressed up,” Proctor says. “They’re wearing fancy shoes and their fur coats. It was this incredible civic event. ”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">But it was still being held on \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">private\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> land, land that was beginning to fill with new houses. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The encroaching development alarmed nature lover \u003ca href=\"https://sfpucnewsroom.com/spotlight/a-look-back-in-history-a-courageous-woman-organized-to-preserve-mt-davidson-as-a-public-park/\">Madie Brown\u003c/a>. In 1926, she led a campaign to urge the city to buy 25 acres on Mount Davidson to create a public park. Bolstered by women’s groups across the city, the three-year campaign was a success. She even won the support of Baldwin’s widow, Emma, who donated the six acres at the peak. T\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">he cross would now be sitting on public land. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11867378\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11867378\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/03/RS48271_AAA-9478-2-qut.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"671\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/03/RS48271_AAA-9478-2-qut.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/03/RS48271_AAA-9478-2-qut-160x134.jpg 160w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Thousands of worshippers climbed to the top of Mount Davidson for the sunrise service in 1930. (Photo Courtesy: San Francisco History Center, San Francisco Public Library) \u003ccite>(San Francisco History Center, San Francisco Public Library)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">After years of temporary crosses, construction began on the monument in 1932. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It took two years and $20,000 to build the enormous concrete cross — almost $400,000 in today’s dollars. By the time it was completed, the country was in The Great Depression. But the people still wanted a grand celebration.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">As part of the ceremony, a dozen 1,000-watt flood lights were installed on poles surrounding the cross. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Madie Brown envisioned a dramatic moment when the lights would be switched on for the first time. She wrote to an envoy of President Franklin Delano Roosevelt asking him to do the honors.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cblockquote>\u003cp>“It seems most appropriate that the President, who has brought light into many a darkened American home and who through his New Deal has instilled the principles of the Golden Rule into American business, should take part in this cross lighting ceremony,” she wrote.\u003c/p>\u003c/blockquote>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Western Union donates their time and their telegraph lines to set up a coast-to-coast hookup between Washington, D.C., and San Francisco. And on the evening of March 24, 1934, President Roosevelt pressed a gold \u003ca href=\"https://www.electronics-notes.com/articles/history/morse-code-telegraph/morse-key-development.php\">telegraph key\u003c/a> that sent electricity across the country to light the Mount Davidson cross. Once lit, the cross was visible from 50 miles away. That Easter, 50,000 people journeyed to the monument. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11867162\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 280px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\" wp-image-11867162\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/03/RS48210_AAA-9440-sfi.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"280\" height=\"352\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/03/RS48210_AAA-9440-sfi.jpg 286w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/03/RS48210_AAA-9440-sfi-160x201.jpg 160w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 280px) 100vw, 280px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The Mount Davidson cross nears completion in 1934. (Photo Courtesy: San Francisco History Center, San Francisco Public Library) \u003ccite>(Photo Courtesy: San Francisco History Center, San FrancicoPublic Library)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The cross became a San Francisco landmark. But other than an appearance in the Clint Eastwood movie, \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">“Dirty Harry”\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> in 1971, it had largely stayed out of the news until the early 1990s, when the issue of a cross on public land ends up in \u003ca href=\"https://law.justia.com/cases/federal/district-courts/FSupp/803/337/2132956/\">court.\u003c/a>\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">After several years of litigation, the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals rules that\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> city ownership of the cross violates the California Constitution’s separation of church and state laws. San Francisco has to find someone to buy the cross or tear it down. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The city decides they’re going to sell the land around the cross and the cross and they have to sell it with no conditions,” says Proctor.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postID=news_12077572 hero='https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/10/251027-ALMADENQUICKSILVER00034_TV-KQED.jpg']\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">In 1997, San Francisco settles on a plan to auction off the cross and the little over a third of an acre it sits on. The sale requires any bidder to keep the site open to the public and places restrictions on how many days it can be illuminated.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Three groups come forward in hopes of preserving the cross as a landmark: The Friends of Mount Davidson Conservancy (of which Jacquie Proctor was a member), the \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Museum of the City of San Francisco\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> and the \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Council of \u003ca href=\"https://www.mountdavidsoncross.org/council\">Armenian American Organizations of Northern California\u003c/a>. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Armenian group thought that the cross could become a memorial.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Most Armenian Americans, including those in the San Francisco Bay Area, are descendants of the few survivors of the Armenian genocide, which was carried out by the Turkish leaders of the Ottoman Empire in 1915,” says \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Roxanne Makasdjian, a member of Council of Armenian American Organizations of Northern California.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Makasdjian says that descendants often built two things in the places where they settled: churches and genocide memorials. The Armenian Council thought a visible symbol like the cross on Mount Davidson could educate the public about this history. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">With the support of the neighborhood group, who share the goals of preserving the cross and the park, Makasdjian’s group wins the rights to buy the site and the cross for $26,000. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11867479\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-11867479\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/03/RS48320_Armenian-Genocide-Plaque-Closeup-qut-800x600.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"600\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/03/RS48320_Armenian-Genocide-Plaque-Closeup-qut-800x600.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/03/RS48320_Armenian-Genocide-Plaque-Closeup-qut-1020x765.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/03/RS48320_Armenian-Genocide-Plaque-Closeup-qut-160x120.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/03/RS48320_Armenian-Genocide-Plaque-Closeup-qut-1536x1152.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/03/RS48320_Armenian-Genocide-Plaque-Closeup-qut.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">A plaque at the base of the Mount Davidson Cross marks Armenian Genocide Commemoration Day. (Photo Courtesy: Council of Armenian Americans of Northern California) \u003ccite>(Courtesy of Council of Armenian Americans of Northern California)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Now, the cross is lit two nights a year, April 24 to commemorate the Armenian genocide and the night before Easter.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The annual \u003ca href=\"https://mtdavidson.org/easter-sunrise-service/\">sunrise service\u003c/a> still exists. Now it’s non-denominational, and a few hundred people usually show up. Not quite the same scene as the thousands who appeared in their finery in the 1920s and 1930s.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">But Proctor is thankful for the sunrise service. Without it, she says, Mount Davidson would look very different today. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“If we didn’t have the sunrise service, we wouldn’t have a park there now. And it would have been covered with houses and buildings, like most of the other hills of San Francisco.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">In 2020, the coronavirus pandemic canceled the Easter service for the first time since 1923.\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[baycuriousquestion]\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>\u003ca id=\"Viewthefullepisodetranscript\">\u003c/a>Episode transcript\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">San Francisco may not be thought of as one of America’s most religious cities these days, but the place is named for St. Francis of Assisi. He’s the patron saint of animals, the environment and the country of Italy, which if you think about the city’s history has turned out to be a pretty apt name. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">San Francisco has a long tradition of diverse religious practice. One place that hints at this history is on San Francisco’s highest peak, Mount Davidson. Look up and you’ll find a massive concrete cross at the top, one that some of you have been wondering about.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Julia Thollaug: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Hi, Bay Curious. I’m Julia Thollaug. I grew up in and around San Francisco.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Phil Montalvo: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">My name is Phil Montalvo. I’m a native San Franciscan.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Julia Thollaug: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I’ve always noticed the cross and just wondered why it was there, where it came from.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Phil Montalvo: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Growing up in the Outer Mission, Crocker Amazon, the cross was always in view. I never understood when it was constructed or even why it’s still up on Mount Davidson.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Julia Thollaug and Phil Montalvo together: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">What’s the deal with the giant cross on the top of Mount Davidson?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Today on Bay Curious, we tell the story of how San Francisco ended up with a cross at its highest point. This story first aired in 2021, and we’re sharing it again because, well, there’s an event coming up that makes it sort of noteworthy at this point in time. You’ll see. You’ll see.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I’m Olivia Allen-Price, you’re listening to Be Curious. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Sponsor message\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">What is the deal with that Mount Davidson cross? We sent KQED producer Suzie Racho to find out.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Suzie Racho: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Just west of Twin Peaks, rising above a quiet residential neighborhood is Mount Davidson Park. It’s not well-known or well-marked, but once you start walking one of the park’s trails, you’re surrounded by eucalyptus trees, and you start to forget that you’re in the middle of a major city. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Suzie Racho in scene:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> I’m coming up the trail. I’m a little out of breath, but wow, what an amazing view. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Suzie Racho: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">When you get to the top, you see two things: a view that stretches all the way to the East Bay and one very big cross. The cross is an imposing sight. It stands at 103 feet tall and 10 feet wide at the base. Made of concrete, it stands in stark contrast to blue sky and the eucalyptus grove that surrounds it. To learn more about how it got here, I went to Mount Davidson’s resident historian.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u003c/span>\u003cb>Jackie Proctor: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Hi, I’m Jackie Proctor.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Suzie Racho: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Jackie says the cross’s origin story goes back almost 100 years to 1923, to a time when the area was a forest.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Jackie Proctor: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">A guy named James Decatur, who is an employee of the Western Union Telegraph Company, and followed with the YMCA, hikes through that forest and comes to the top and he sees this incredible view of downtown. And he is just overwhelmed and inspired and he writes this long essay about the experience.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Voice over for James Decatur: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Peace and quiet were so profound that it seemed almost unbelievable that the noise and roar of a great city was only a few minutes behind them. The solitude of the forest conveyed a sense of vastness quite as real as one would experience among the age-old monarchs of the High Sierras.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Jackie Proctor: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">He is inspired then to build a cross to crown the highest point of the city.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Suzie Racho: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Decatur thought it would be a perfect place to hold an Easter sunrise service. Holding religious ceremonies in natural settings was a trend at the time. Jackie says that people were pushing back against the materialism of the Roaring Twenties, reconnecting with the natural and spiritual worlds. So it wasn’t hard to find support for his idea. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Several of Mount Davidson’s trails had already been established by its landowner, a local developer named A.S. Baldwin. Baldwin was already starting to build houses in the surrounding area. He saw the Easter service as a way to introduce more people to the new neighborhoods west of Twin Peaks. So Baldwin not only gives Decatur permission to hold the event, but donates $2,000 to get a 40-foot-tall wooden cross constructed. That’s nearly $31,000 today — a hefty contribution.\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Jackie Proctor: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">5,000 people hike up that hill in 1923.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Suzie Racho: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The service received enthusiastic backing from city officials, religious leaders and community groups. Boy Scouts camped out the night before and acted as ushers for attendees. The Dean of Grace Cathedral led the service.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Jackie Proctor: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">James Decatur thinks, great, this is great. I had no idea 5,000 people would come, so let’s do it again.\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Suzie Racho: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Decatur raises money for a bigger wooden cross for the service the following year, but it wouldn’t be the last service or the last cross.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Jackie Proctor: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The first one was just torn down and replaced, and then the second one was burned down, and then, the third one was burnt down.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Suzie Racho: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Local newspapers report the fires as accidental or vandalism by bored teenagers. Each temporary cross was replaced as the now annual service got more and more popular, drawing tens of thousands of people.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Jackie Proctor: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">People are dressed up. They’re wearing their fancy shoes and their fur coats and everything. It was like, you know, this incredible civic event.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Suzie Racho: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">But it was still being held on private land, land that was beginning to fill with newly constructed houses. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The encroaching development alarmed nature lover Maddie Brown. In 1926, she led a campaign to urge the city to buy 25 acres on Mount Davidson to create a public park. Bolstered by women’s groups across the city, the three-year campaign was a success. She even won the support of Baldwin’s widow, Emma. Who donated the six acres at the peak. In 1929, Mount Davidson became a city park. That put the cross on public land. Supporters eagerly began planning for a more permanent cross, one that couldn’t be blown or burned down.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Jackie Proctor reading: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">And before 32,000 people at the 1932 Sunrise event, Governor Roth dedicated the cornerstone of the new 103-foot-high concrete cross.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Suzie Racho: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It took two years and $20,000 to build the enormous concrete cross. That’s almost $400,000 today. And by the time it was done, the country was in the Great Depression. But the people still wanted a grand celebration. 12 huge floodlights were installed on poles surrounding the cross. Maddy Brown envisioned a dramatic moment when the lights would be switched on for the first time. She wrote to President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, asking him to do the honors.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Voice Over: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It seems most appropriate that the President, who has brought light into many a darkened American home, and who through his new deal has instilled the principles of the Golden Rule into American business, should take part in this cross-lighting ceremony.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Suzie Racho: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Western Union donates their time and their telegraph lines, providing a coast-to-coast hookup between Washington, D.C. And San Francisco. And on the evening of March 24, 1934, President Roosevelt pressed the button that sent electricity across the country to light the Mount Davidson Cross. That Easter, 50,000 people journeyed to the monument. The cross became a San Francisco landmark. It made an appearance in the Clint Eastwood movie Dirty Harry in 1971. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Dirty Harry clip:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> Now turn, face the cross. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Suzie Racho: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">But had largely stayed out of the news until the early 90s. That’s when the issue of a cross on public land becomes a lawsuit. Groups concerned about the separation of church and state, including the ACLU, sue the city. After several years, the courts rule that city ownership of the cross violates the California Constitution’s separation of church and state. San Francisco has to find someone to buy the cross or tear it down.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Jackie Proctor: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">So then the city decides they’re going to sell the land around the cross, and the cross. And they have to sell it with no conditions. So whoever buys it can tear the cross down, or they can…\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Suzie Racho: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Our historian Jackie, a longtime Mount Davidson resident, remembers the controversy vividly.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Jackie Proctor: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Concerned about that. I’m not a religious person. I sort of just saw the cross as like a relic of the depression, another public works project.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Suzie Racho: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">In 1997, San Francisco settles on a plan to auction off the cross and the little over a third of an acre that it sits on. They require any bidder to keep the site open to the public. The city sets the opening bid at $20,000. Three groups are interested in buying and preserving the cross, the Friends of Mount Davidson Conservancy, of which Jackie was a member, the Museum of the City of San Francisco, and the Council of Armenian American Organizations of Northern California.\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Roxanne Makassian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Most Armenian Americans, including those in the San Francisco Bay Area, are descendants of the few survivors of the Armenian Genocide, which was carried out by the Turkish leaders of the Ottoman Empire in 1915.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Suzie Racho: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Roxanne Makassian is a member of the Armenian Council. She says that descendants often build two things in the places where they settled, churches and a genocide memorial.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Roxanne Makassian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The Armenians said, you know, this would make a great monument for us to remember the Armenian genocide and maybe to educate locals about it.\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Suzie Racho: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">At the auction, the museum doesn’t go past their opening bid of $20,000. The neighborhood group bids $25,000, but supports the Armenian group after agreeing they both want the same things for the park.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Jackie Proctor: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">We thought, well, they seem like they really care about maintaining the area for public access. That was our goal.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Suzie Racho: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Today the cross is lit two nights a year, April 24th to commemorate the Armenian Genocide, and the night before Easter. The annual sunrise service still exists, today it’s non-denominational, and a few hundred people usually show up. Not quite the same scene as the thousands who appeared in their finery in the 1920s and 30s. But Jackie says, without the sunrise service Mount Davidson would look very different today.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Jackie Proctor: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">You know, if we didn’t have the sunrise service, we wouldn’t have a park there now. And it would have been covered with houses and buildings or everything like most of the other hills of San Francisco.\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">This year’s sunrise service takes place at 6.30 a.m on April 5th. Find details at mtdavidson.org. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Have you signed up for the Bay Curious newsletter yet? It’s full of Bay Area trivia, more answers to your questions, and usually some cool photos. Sign up at baycurious.org slash newsletter. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">This episode was produced by Suzie Racho, Katie McMurran, Katrina Schwartz, Christopher Beale, and me, Olivia Allen-Price. Bay Curious is a production of member-supported KQED in San Francisco. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It is pledge season, and that means we need your support. Give any amount that works for your budget at kqed.org slash donate. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Some members of the KQED podcast team are represented by the Screen Actors Guild, American Federation of Television and Radio Artists, San Francisco, Northern California Local.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I’m Olivia Allen-Brice, have a great day.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"#Viewthefullepisodetranscript\">View\u003c/a>\u003cem>\u003ca href=\"#Viewthefullepisodetranscript\"> the full episode transcript.\u003c/a>\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>This article first published April 1, 2021.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Tucked away on a wooded hillside in the middle of San Francisco sits a big concrete cross. When it was built, it could be seen from miles around. Now, a thick grove of trees partially shields it from view.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003caside class=\"alignleft utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__bayCuriousPodcastShortcode__bayCurious\">\u003cimg src=https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/02/bayCuriousLogo.png alt=\"Bay Curious Podcast\" loading=\"lazy\" />\n What do you wonder about the Bay Area, its culture or people that you want KQED to investigate?\n \u003ca href=\"/news/series/baycurious\">Ask Bay Curious.\u003c/a>\u003c/aside>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Over the years, Bay Curious has gotten several questions about the cross. Even lifelong San Franciscans, like Julia Thollaug and Phil Montalvo, have wondered about it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I grew up in and around S.F. I’ve always noticed the cross and just wondered why it was there and where it came from?” says Thollaug.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Growing up in the Outer Mission/Crocker Amazon, the cross was always in view. I never understood when it was constructed, or even as of today, why it’s still up on Mount Davidson,” adds Montalvo.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Neither of them has ever visited Mount Davidson Park, where the cross is located. And after living here for decades, I hadn’t either.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Mount Davidson Park rises above a quiet residential neighborhood just west of Twin Peaks. It’s not well known or well marked. But once you start walking the park’s trails, you’re surrounded by eucalyptus trees and it’s easy to forget you’re in the middle of a major city.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11867150\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-11867150 size-full\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/03/RS48183_IMG_6367-qut.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1440\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/03/RS48183_IMG_6367-qut.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/03/RS48183_IMG_6367-qut-800x600.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/03/RS48183_IMG_6367-qut-1020x765.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/03/RS48183_IMG_6367-qut-160x120.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/03/RS48183_IMG_6367-qut-1536x1152.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Looking to the east from the top of Mt. Davidson (Suzie Racho/KQED) \u003ccite>(Suzie Racho)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">When you get to the top, you see two things: a view that stretches all the way to the East Bay and one very big cross. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u003ca href=\"https://www.arcadiapublishing.com/Products/9780738546605\">Author\u003c/a> and Mount Davidson \u003ca href=\"https://mtdavidson.org/jacqueline-proctor/\">historian\u003c/a> Jacquie Proctor says the cross’s origin story goes back to 1923. To a time when the area was a forest. \u003c/span>\u003cb> \u003c/b>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“A guy named James Decatur, who is an employee of the Western Union Telegraph Company and involved with the YMCA, hikes through that forest and comes to the top, ” Proctor says. “And he sees this incredible view of downtown. And he is just overwhelmed. He is inspired then to build a cross to crown the highest point of the city.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">An imposing sight, the concrete cross stands 103 feet tall and measures 10 feet wide at the base. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Decatur thought it would be a perfect place to hold an Easter sunrise service. Holding religious ceremonies in natural settings was a trend at the time. Proctor says people were pushing back against the materialism of the Roaring ’20s by reconnecting to the natural and to the spiritual. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">So it wasn’t hard for Decatur to find support for his idea. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11867161\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 281px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-11867161\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/03/RS48208_1923-SF-Examiner-qut-800x1209.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"281\" height=\"425\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/03/RS48208_1923-SF-Examiner-qut-800x1209.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/03/RS48208_1923-SF-Examiner-qut-160x242.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/03/RS48208_1923-SF-Examiner-qut.jpg 940w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 281px) 100vw, 281px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">An article from the San Francisco Examiner, January 1923.\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Several of Mount Davidson’s trails had already been established by its landowner, a developer named A.S. Baldwin. Baldwin was already starting to build houses in the surrounding area. These would become neighborhoods like Westwood Highlands, Forest Hill and St. Francis Wood. Baldwin saw the service as a way to introduce more people to new neighborhoods west of Twin Peaks. So he not only gives Decatur permission to hold the event, but donates $2,000 to get a 40-foot tall wooden cross constructed for the service. That’s nearly $31,000 in today’s dollars.\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u003cb>\u003ci>\u003c/i>\u003c/b>The event also received enthusiastic backing from city officials, religious leaders and community groups. Boy Scout troops camped out the night before and acted as ushers for attendees. The dean of Grace Cathedral led the service. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">That Easter morning was a rainy one, but Proctor says that didn’t stop 5,000 worshipers from showing up. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u003cb> \u003c/b>\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">“James Decatur thinks, ‘This is great. Had no idea 5,000 people would come, so let’s do it again!’ ” Proctor says.\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Decatur raises money for a bigger wooden cross for the service the following year. But it wouldn’t be the last service or the last cross. There were five in all. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Each temporary cross was replaced as t\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">he now annual service got more and more popular, drawing tens of thousands of people, Proctor says. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11867160\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 358px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-11867160\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/03/RS48209_AAB-9499-qut.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"358\" height=\"459\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/03/RS48209_AAB-9499-qut.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/03/RS48209_AAB-9499-qut-160x205.jpg 160w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 358px) 100vw, 358px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">(Photo Courtesy: San Francisco History Center, San Francisco Public Library)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“People are dressed up,” Proctor says. “They’re wearing fancy shoes and their fur coats. It was this incredible civic event. ”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">But it was still being held on \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">private\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> land, land that was beginning to fill with new houses. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The encroaching development alarmed nature lover \u003ca href=\"https://sfpucnewsroom.com/spotlight/a-look-back-in-history-a-courageous-woman-organized-to-preserve-mt-davidson-as-a-public-park/\">Madie Brown\u003c/a>. In 1926, she led a campaign to urge the city to buy 25 acres on Mount Davidson to create a public park. Bolstered by women’s groups across the city, the three-year campaign was a success. She even won the support of Baldwin’s widow, Emma, who donated the six acres at the peak. T\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">he cross would now be sitting on public land. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11867378\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11867378\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/03/RS48271_AAA-9478-2-qut.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"671\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/03/RS48271_AAA-9478-2-qut.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/03/RS48271_AAA-9478-2-qut-160x134.jpg 160w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Thousands of worshippers climbed to the top of Mount Davidson for the sunrise service in 1930. (Photo Courtesy: San Francisco History Center, San Francisco Public Library) \u003ccite>(San Francisco History Center, San Francisco Public Library)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">After years of temporary crosses, construction began on the monument in 1932. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It took two years and $20,000 to build the enormous concrete cross — almost $400,000 in today’s dollars. By the time it was completed, the country was in The Great Depression. But the people still wanted a grand celebration.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">As part of the ceremony, a dozen 1,000-watt flood lights were installed on poles surrounding the cross. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Madie Brown envisioned a dramatic moment when the lights would be switched on for the first time. She wrote to an envoy of President Franklin Delano Roosevelt asking him to do the honors.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cblockquote>\u003cp>“It seems most appropriate that the President, who has brought light into many a darkened American home and who through his New Deal has instilled the principles of the Golden Rule into American business, should take part in this cross lighting ceremony,” she wrote.\u003c/p>\u003c/blockquote>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Western Union donates their time and their telegraph lines to set up a coast-to-coast hookup between Washington, D.C., and San Francisco. And on the evening of March 24, 1934, President Roosevelt pressed a gold \u003ca href=\"https://www.electronics-notes.com/articles/history/morse-code-telegraph/morse-key-development.php\">telegraph key\u003c/a> that sent electricity across the country to light the Mount Davidson cross. Once lit, the cross was visible from 50 miles away. That Easter, 50,000 people journeyed to the monument. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11867162\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 280px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\" wp-image-11867162\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/03/RS48210_AAA-9440-sfi.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"280\" height=\"352\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/03/RS48210_AAA-9440-sfi.jpg 286w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/03/RS48210_AAA-9440-sfi-160x201.jpg 160w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 280px) 100vw, 280px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The Mount Davidson cross nears completion in 1934. (Photo Courtesy: San Francisco History Center, San Francisco Public Library) \u003ccite>(Photo Courtesy: San Francisco History Center, San FrancicoPublic Library)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The cross became a San Francisco landmark. But other than an appearance in the Clint Eastwood movie, \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">“Dirty Harry”\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> in 1971, it had largely stayed out of the news until the early 1990s, when the issue of a cross on public land ends up in \u003ca href=\"https://law.justia.com/cases/federal/district-courts/FSupp/803/337/2132956/\">court.\u003c/a>\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">After several years of litigation, the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals rules that\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> city ownership of the cross violates the California Constitution’s separation of church and state laws. San Francisco has to find someone to buy the cross or tear it down. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The city decides they’re going to sell the land around the cross and the cross and they have to sell it with no conditions,” says Proctor.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">In 1997, San Francisco settles on a plan to auction off the cross and the little over a third of an acre it sits on. The sale requires any bidder to keep the site open to the public and places restrictions on how many days it can be illuminated.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Three groups come forward in hopes of preserving the cross as a landmark: The Friends of Mount Davidson Conservancy (of which Jacquie Proctor was a member), the \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Museum of the City of San Francisco\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> and the \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Council of \u003ca href=\"https://www.mountdavidsoncross.org/council\">Armenian American Organizations of Northern California\u003c/a>. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Armenian group thought that the cross could become a memorial.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Most Armenian Americans, including those in the San Francisco Bay Area, are descendants of the few survivors of the Armenian genocide, which was carried out by the Turkish leaders of the Ottoman Empire in 1915,” says \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Roxanne Makasdjian, a member of Council of Armenian American Organizations of Northern California.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Makasdjian says that descendants often built two things in the places where they settled: churches and genocide memorials. The Armenian Council thought a visible symbol like the cross on Mount Davidson could educate the public about this history. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">With the support of the neighborhood group, who share the goals of preserving the cross and the park, Makasdjian’s group wins the rights to buy the site and the cross for $26,000. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11867479\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-11867479\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/03/RS48320_Armenian-Genocide-Plaque-Closeup-qut-800x600.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"600\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/03/RS48320_Armenian-Genocide-Plaque-Closeup-qut-800x600.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/03/RS48320_Armenian-Genocide-Plaque-Closeup-qut-1020x765.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/03/RS48320_Armenian-Genocide-Plaque-Closeup-qut-160x120.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/03/RS48320_Armenian-Genocide-Plaque-Closeup-qut-1536x1152.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/03/RS48320_Armenian-Genocide-Plaque-Closeup-qut.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">A plaque at the base of the Mount Davidson Cross marks Armenian Genocide Commemoration Day. (Photo Courtesy: Council of Armenian Americans of Northern California) \u003ccite>(Courtesy of Council of Armenian Americans of Northern California)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Now, the cross is lit two nights a year, April 24 to commemorate the Armenian genocide and the night before Easter.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The annual \u003ca href=\"https://mtdavidson.org/easter-sunrise-service/\">sunrise service\u003c/a> still exists. Now it’s non-denominational, and a few hundred people usually show up. Not quite the same scene as the thousands who appeared in their finery in the 1920s and 1930s.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">But Proctor is thankful for the sunrise service. Without it, she says, Mount Davidson would look very different today. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“If we didn’t have the sunrise service, we wouldn’t have a park there now. And it would have been covered with houses and buildings, like most of the other hills of San Francisco.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">In 2020, the coronavirus pandemic canceled the Easter service for the first time since 1923.\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>\u003ca id=\"Viewthefullepisodetranscript\">\u003c/a>Episode transcript\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">San Francisco may not be thought of as one of America’s most religious cities these days, but the place is named for St. Francis of Assisi. He’s the patron saint of animals, the environment and the country of Italy, which if you think about the city’s history has turned out to be a pretty apt name. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">San Francisco has a long tradition of diverse religious practice. One place that hints at this history is on San Francisco’s highest peak, Mount Davidson. Look up and you’ll find a massive concrete cross at the top, one that some of you have been wondering about.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Julia Thollaug: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Hi, Bay Curious. I’m Julia Thollaug. I grew up in and around San Francisco.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Phil Montalvo: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">My name is Phil Montalvo. I’m a native San Franciscan.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Julia Thollaug: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I’ve always noticed the cross and just wondered why it was there, where it came from.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Phil Montalvo: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Growing up in the Outer Mission, Crocker Amazon, the cross was always in view. I never understood when it was constructed or even why it’s still up on Mount Davidson.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Julia Thollaug and Phil Montalvo together: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">What’s the deal with the giant cross on the top of Mount Davidson?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Today on Bay Curious, we tell the story of how San Francisco ended up with a cross at its highest point. This story first aired in 2021, and we’re sharing it again because, well, there’s an event coming up that makes it sort of noteworthy at this point in time. You’ll see. You’ll see.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I’m Olivia Allen-Price, you’re listening to Be Curious. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Sponsor message\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">What is the deal with that Mount Davidson cross? We sent KQED producer Suzie Racho to find out.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Suzie Racho: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Just west of Twin Peaks, rising above a quiet residential neighborhood is Mount Davidson Park. It’s not well-known or well-marked, but once you start walking one of the park’s trails, you’re surrounded by eucalyptus trees, and you start to forget that you’re in the middle of a major city. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Suzie Racho in scene:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> I’m coming up the trail. I’m a little out of breath, but wow, what an amazing view. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Suzie Racho: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">When you get to the top, you see two things: a view that stretches all the way to the East Bay and one very big cross. The cross is an imposing sight. It stands at 103 feet tall and 10 feet wide at the base. Made of concrete, it stands in stark contrast to blue sky and the eucalyptus grove that surrounds it. To learn more about how it got here, I went to Mount Davidson’s resident historian.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u003c/span>\u003cb>Jackie Proctor: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Hi, I’m Jackie Proctor.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Suzie Racho: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Jackie says the cross’s origin story goes back almost 100 years to 1923, to a time when the area was a forest.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Jackie Proctor: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">A guy named James Decatur, who is an employee of the Western Union Telegraph Company, and followed with the YMCA, hikes through that forest and comes to the top and he sees this incredible view of downtown. And he is just overwhelmed and inspired and he writes this long essay about the experience.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Voice over for James Decatur: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Peace and quiet were so profound that it seemed almost unbelievable that the noise and roar of a great city was only a few minutes behind them. The solitude of the forest conveyed a sense of vastness quite as real as one would experience among the age-old monarchs of the High Sierras.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Jackie Proctor: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">He is inspired then to build a cross to crown the highest point of the city.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Suzie Racho: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Decatur thought it would be a perfect place to hold an Easter sunrise service. Holding religious ceremonies in natural settings was a trend at the time. Jackie says that people were pushing back against the materialism of the Roaring Twenties, reconnecting with the natural and spiritual worlds. So it wasn’t hard to find support for his idea. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Several of Mount Davidson’s trails had already been established by its landowner, a local developer named A.S. Baldwin. Baldwin was already starting to build houses in the surrounding area. He saw the Easter service as a way to introduce more people to the new neighborhoods west of Twin Peaks. So Baldwin not only gives Decatur permission to hold the event, but donates $2,000 to get a 40-foot-tall wooden cross constructed. That’s nearly $31,000 today — a hefty contribution.\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Jackie Proctor: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">5,000 people hike up that hill in 1923.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Suzie Racho: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The service received enthusiastic backing from city officials, religious leaders and community groups. Boy Scouts camped out the night before and acted as ushers for attendees. The Dean of Grace Cathedral led the service.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Jackie Proctor: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">James Decatur thinks, great, this is great. I had no idea 5,000 people would come, so let’s do it again.\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Suzie Racho: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Decatur raises money for a bigger wooden cross for the service the following year, but it wouldn’t be the last service or the last cross.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Jackie Proctor: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The first one was just torn down and replaced, and then the second one was burned down, and then, the third one was burnt down.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Suzie Racho: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Local newspapers report the fires as accidental or vandalism by bored teenagers. Each temporary cross was replaced as the now annual service got more and more popular, drawing tens of thousands of people.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Jackie Proctor: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">People are dressed up. They’re wearing their fancy shoes and their fur coats and everything. It was like, you know, this incredible civic event.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Suzie Racho: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">But it was still being held on private land, land that was beginning to fill with newly constructed houses. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The encroaching development alarmed nature lover Maddie Brown. In 1926, she led a campaign to urge the city to buy 25 acres on Mount Davidson to create a public park. Bolstered by women’s groups across the city, the three-year campaign was a success. She even won the support of Baldwin’s widow, Emma. Who donated the six acres at the peak. In 1929, Mount Davidson became a city park. That put the cross on public land. Supporters eagerly began planning for a more permanent cross, one that couldn’t be blown or burned down.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Jackie Proctor reading: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">And before 32,000 people at the 1932 Sunrise event, Governor Roth dedicated the cornerstone of the new 103-foot-high concrete cross.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Suzie Racho: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It took two years and $20,000 to build the enormous concrete cross. That’s almost $400,000 today. And by the time it was done, the country was in the Great Depression. But the people still wanted a grand celebration. 12 huge floodlights were installed on poles surrounding the cross. Maddy Brown envisioned a dramatic moment when the lights would be switched on for the first time. She wrote to President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, asking him to do the honors.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Voice Over: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It seems most appropriate that the President, who has brought light into many a darkened American home, and who through his new deal has instilled the principles of the Golden Rule into American business, should take part in this cross-lighting ceremony.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Suzie Racho: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Western Union donates their time and their telegraph lines, providing a coast-to-coast hookup between Washington, D.C. And San Francisco. And on the evening of March 24, 1934, President Roosevelt pressed the button that sent electricity across the country to light the Mount Davidson Cross. That Easter, 50,000 people journeyed to the monument. The cross became a San Francisco landmark. It made an appearance in the Clint Eastwood movie Dirty Harry in 1971. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Dirty Harry clip:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> Now turn, face the cross. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Suzie Racho: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">But had largely stayed out of the news until the early 90s. That’s when the issue of a cross on public land becomes a lawsuit. Groups concerned about the separation of church and state, including the ACLU, sue the city. After several years, the courts rule that city ownership of the cross violates the California Constitution’s separation of church and state. San Francisco has to find someone to buy the cross or tear it down.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Jackie Proctor: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">So then the city decides they’re going to sell the land around the cross, and the cross. And they have to sell it with no conditions. So whoever buys it can tear the cross down, or they can…\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Suzie Racho: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Our historian Jackie, a longtime Mount Davidson resident, remembers the controversy vividly.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Jackie Proctor: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Concerned about that. I’m not a religious person. I sort of just saw the cross as like a relic of the depression, another public works project.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Suzie Racho: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">In 1997, San Francisco settles on a plan to auction off the cross and the little over a third of an acre that it sits on. They require any bidder to keep the site open to the public. The city sets the opening bid at $20,000. Three groups are interested in buying and preserving the cross, the Friends of Mount Davidson Conservancy, of which Jackie was a member, the Museum of the City of San Francisco, and the Council of Armenian American Organizations of Northern California.\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Roxanne Makassian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Most Armenian Americans, including those in the San Francisco Bay Area, are descendants of the few survivors of the Armenian Genocide, which was carried out by the Turkish leaders of the Ottoman Empire in 1915.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Suzie Racho: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Roxanne Makassian is a member of the Armenian Council. She says that descendants often build two things in the places where they settled, churches and a genocide memorial.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Roxanne Makassian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The Armenians said, you know, this would make a great monument for us to remember the Armenian genocide and maybe to educate locals about it.\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Suzie Racho: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">At the auction, the museum doesn’t go past their opening bid of $20,000. The neighborhood group bids $25,000, but supports the Armenian group after agreeing they both want the same things for the park.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Jackie Proctor: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">We thought, well, they seem like they really care about maintaining the area for public access. That was our goal.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Suzie Racho: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Today the cross is lit two nights a year, April 24th to commemorate the Armenian Genocide, and the night before Easter. The annual sunrise service still exists, today it’s non-denominational, and a few hundred people usually show up. Not quite the same scene as the thousands who appeared in their finery in the 1920s and 30s. But Jackie says, without the sunrise service Mount Davidson would look very different today.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Jackie Proctor: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">You know, if we didn’t have the sunrise service, we wouldn’t have a park there now. And it would have been covered with houses and buildings or everything like most of the other hills of San Francisco.\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">This year’s sunrise service takes place at 6.30 a.m on April 5th. Find details at mtdavidson.org. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Have you signed up for the Bay Curious newsletter yet? It’s full of Bay Area trivia, more answers to your questions, and usually some cool photos. Sign up at baycurious.org slash newsletter. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">This episode was produced by Suzie Racho, Katie McMurran, Katrina Schwartz, Christopher Beale, and me, Olivia Allen-Price. Bay Curious is a production of member-supported KQED in San Francisco. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It is pledge season, and that means we need your support. Give any amount that works for your budget at kqed.org slash donate. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Some members of the KQED podcast team are represented by the Screen Actors Guild, American Federation of Television and Radio Artists, San Francisco, Northern California Local.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"slug": "new-almaden-the-mercury-mine-that-built-a-boomtown-south-of-san-jose",
"title": "New Almaden: The Mercury Mine That Built a Boomtown South of San José",
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"headTitle": "New Almaden: The Mercury Mine That Built a Boomtown South of San José | KQED",
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"content": "\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"#Viewthefullepisodetranscript\">View\u003c/a>\u003cem>\u003ca href=\"#Viewthefullepisodetranscript\"> the full episode transcript.\u003c/a>\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Visitors to the Almaden Quicksilver County Park may well wonder what the heck accounts for the name.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Who or what was Almaden? What is quicksilver? Why is there a 27-room Classical Revival mansion nestled in more than 4,000 acres in the hills south of San José? So many questions!\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It beggars belief today, given how bucolic the park is, but New Almaden once hummed with a busy mining operation in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In its heyday, 1,800 miners and their families lived here, primarily in a couple of self-contained villages. Imagine churches, saloons, a school, a post office, and more. Now there are just a few moldering cemeteries and the old mine supervisor’s mansion, which has been turned into a \u003ca href=\"https://parks.santaclaracounty.gov/learn/visit-historic-sites/almaden-quicksilver-mining-museum\">museum\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>\u003cstrong>How quicksilver is used to extract gold\u003c/strong>\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Before we get to our audience questions sent in about Almaden Quicksilver Park, let’s get a handle on why this place was once so valuable.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The South Bay is full of cinnabar, a bright red rock the color of a stop sign. It formed 10 million to 12 million years ago during a time of intense volcanic and hydrothermal activity. Chemically speaking, cinnabar is mercury bonded to sulfur, and mercury is the more proper name for the silver-colored quicksilver. To get mercury out of cinnabar, you heat the rocks up and the mercury essentially sweats out.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12062447\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/10/251027-ALMADENQUICKSILVER00307_TV-KQED.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12062447\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/10/251027-ALMADENQUICKSILVER00307_TV-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/10/251027-ALMADENQUICKSILVER00307_TV-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/10/251027-ALMADENQUICKSILVER00307_TV-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/10/251027-ALMADENQUICKSILVER00307_TV-KQED-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Exhibits at The New Almaden Quicksilver Mining Museum, south of San José, on Oct. 27, 2025, paint a picture of the dangerous but lucrative craft of mining quicksilver from cinnabar. \u003ccite>(Tâm Vũ/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Mercury was super important during the Gold Rush, because in its liquid form, gold and silver miners used the quicksilver to extract precious metals from the crushed rocks they were trapped in.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The mercury kind of grabs on to any precious metal,” said Lynda Will, parks program coordinator at Santa Clara County Parks and Recreation. “All the sand and other waste rock is left alone and left behind. And then you have a kinda of silver putty.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Miners call that an amalgam. You heat that amalgam to 1,076 degrees Fahrenheit, the mercury vapor goes off into the air, leaving you with your precious metal.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It usually looks like spun sugar,” Will said. “It has all these holes where the mercury had been. So then you can take that spun gold, as we call it, and so you can make nuggets or even bars.”\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>\u003cstrong>How a Mexican cavalry officer discovered the cinnabar deposit in 1845\u003c/strong>\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Just a few years prior to the discovery of gold at Sutter’s Mill near Sacramento in 1848, California was a Mexican territory. The Mexican government sent a cavalry officer named Andrés Castillero to catalogue strategic assets, and as was the practice at that time, officers and citizens could claim mines they discovered for themselves.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Castillero was traveling in the South Bay when he noticed a fiery red-orange paint local Indigenous people were using on the walls of nearby missions. Castillero knew exactly what he was looking at. He knew that red paint had to have come from cinnabar.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12062440\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/10/251027-ALMADENQUICKSILVER00156_TV-KQED.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12062440\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/10/251027-ALMADENQUICKSILVER00156_TV-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/10/251027-ALMADENQUICKSILVER00156_TV-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/10/251027-ALMADENQUICKSILVER00156_TV-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/10/251027-ALMADENQUICKSILVER00156_TV-KQED-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The New Almaden Quicksilver Mining Museum features different kinds of ore in a display on Oct. 27, 2025. \u003ccite>(Tâm Vũ/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>At the time, the world’s main source of mercury was in Almadén, Spain. Spain controlled the supply, which meant they could charge what they wanted. Castillero, just from reading the newspapers, would have understood he was looking at a potential fortune in the hills south of San José.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As you can imagine, it wasn’t long after Castillero discovered the cinnabar that other people wanted to take the mine from him, especially after the Gold Rush kicked off in 1848 and sent demand for quicksilver soaring. Multiple parties, including private investors and mining companies, tried to claim the land, and the case went all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court. In 1859, the Supreme Court recognized Castillero’s claim, but the mine’s ownership remained split among several parties.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And then in 1861, the U.S. Civil War started. During the Civil War, the federal government briefly attempted to seize the New Almaden mine because mercury was essential for extracting gold used to finance the Union war effort.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And this is where we get to Bay Curious listener Kiera O’Hara’s question:\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>\u003cstrong>What was the Civil War history behind the Almaden mercury mine in San José? I remember hearing Abraham Lincoln was involved?! \u003c/strong>\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>At the museum, parks program coordinator Will told of an aide to President Lincoln who thought, “There’s enough questionability about who owns this land, so maybe it’s owned by the U.S. government.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Again, the quicksilver mine is an obvious money maker, and war is expensive. California gold was vital to the Union’s war effort, providing more than $170 million (roughly $7 billion today), in gold mostly, that stabilized the federal currency and paid for roughly 10% of things like weapons and supplies.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12062439\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/10/251027-ALMADENQUICKSILVER00110_TV-KQED.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12062439\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/10/251027-ALMADENQUICKSILVER00110_TV-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/10/251027-ALMADENQUICKSILVER00110_TV-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/10/251027-ALMADENQUICKSILVER00110_TV-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/10/251027-ALMADENQUICKSILVER00110_TV-KQED-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The New Almaden Quicksilver Mining Museum features photos of village life for quicksilver miners and their families during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. \u003ccite>(Tâm Vũ/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>This aide was thinking something along the lines of, “Why not claim the New Almaden mine and its profits for the Union side of the Civil War?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“And so he came down with a marshal and even a cavalry behind him to say, ‘Lincoln’s going to take over this mine. And, you know, you’re supposed to just surrender it to me.’” Will said. The mine manager at the time, John Young, rallied the miners working for him by saying something akin to “If they take over the mines, you’re going to be out of a job. So come down with, you know, your best rifles and your guns and, you know, help me defend this,” Will said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Young also fired off urgent telegraphs, not only to other mine operators across California, but to a former New Almaden manager who happened to be working inside Lincoln’s administration.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Young warned the well-placed friend that the federal government was about to set off a destructive chain reaction across the West, at a moment when the Union depended on the support of California’s gold miners. There were people in the state who sympathized with the South during the Civil War. So it would be really, really dumb to piss off Union supporters and drive them into the waiting arms of the Confederacy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Will thinks it’s possible Lincoln didn’t even know this whole fight was going on, given how distracted he was with the Civil War. Whatever the case, John Young’s quick thinking stopped a bright idea from a government man that could have thrown California and the rest of the Western U.S. to the Confederate side.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Has the mercury in San José caused environmental problems?\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>You don’t have to be a geologist to know mercury is a neurotoxin and an environmental hazard.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Some of the mercury dug up at New Almaden \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/quest/17411/mercury-in-the-bay-part-1\">made its way downstream\u003c/a>, into the San Francisco Bay. Mining continued into the 1970s, and in 2002, scientists identified this mine as the \u003ca href=\"https://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/tracking-a-toxic-trail-long-closed-mine-2709557.php\">single largest source\u003c/a> of mercury in the Bay, making the fish unsafe to eat for humans and birds alike.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12062445\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/10/251027-ALMADENQUICKSILVER00255_TV-KQED.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12062445\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/10/251027-ALMADENQUICKSILVER00255_TV-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1334\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/10/251027-ALMADENQUICKSILVER00255_TV-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/10/251027-ALMADENQUICKSILVER00255_TV-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/10/251027-ALMADENQUICKSILVER00255_TV-KQED-1536x1025.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">A statue of a miner is featured at The New Almaden Quicksilver Mining Museum south of San Joséon Oct. 27, 2025. \u003ccite>(Tâm Vũ/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“When we acquired the land in the mid-1970s, there was quite a bit of mercury contamination of the land,” Will said. “Under the furnace yards were pools of mercury. They had paved roads with cinnabar waste rock, which we call calcines. They had just dumped it over the sides of the hills. They had dumped it into the creeks. And so we have been remediating it ever since.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Local governments, including Santa Clara County, purchased part of the mine property for parkland, found themselves partially on the hook for a multimillion-dollar \u003ca href=\"https://dtsc.ca.gov/dtsc-oversees-environmental-cleanup-of-mercury-contaminated-park/\">cleanup effort\u003c/a> to comply with the federal Clean Water Act. They did get help from the state and federal agencies. Additional work and monitoring continue, but authorities say it’s safe to picnic, hike, ride horses and otherwise recreate.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>\u003cstrong>Is it safe to eat fish from the San Francisco Bay?\u003c/strong>\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>As recently as 10 years ago, two years into the big effort to clean up the Bay, \u003ca href=\"https://youtu.be/cpwQ5OFIZRQ?si=SP5B4deyax67I7iR&t=356\">KQED explored this question\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://youtu.be/cpwQ5OFIZRQ?si=SP5B4deyax67I7iR&t=356 \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Because mercury converts into methylmercury, which bioaccumulates up the food chain, fish, especially large fish, can carry high levels.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The Bay is slowly cleaning itself, washing 3,100 pounds a year out to sea, but because so much has built up over time, it needs a helping hand,” the story said. “At a minimum, three generations will be impacted by the potent and long-lasting poison still lingering in the Bay mud. It may take more than 100 years for the Bay to recover.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In 2023, California’s Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment recommended that children and women of childbearing age steer clear of fish like \u003ca href=\"https://oehha.ca.gov/sites/default/files/media/downloads/advisories/fishadvisorysfbayreport2023.pdf\">sharks and striped bass\u003c/a>. Ocean-going fish like Chinook salmon would be the safer bet.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>\u003cstrong>Has Cornish culture survived in the region?\u003c/strong>\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Our final listener question comes from Andrew Long, who lives all the way over in Cornwall, on the far southwest tip of England. He came to the Bay Area some time ago to visit a relative and had some questions.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I’m Cornish from the U.K. I know of the Cornish Camp at the Alamaden Quicksilver Mine. It would be great to know if Cornish culture survived, and is growing, like it is here with our language,” Long said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12062446\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/10/251027-ALMADENQUICKSILVER00296_TV-KQED.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12062446\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/10/251027-ALMADENQUICKSILVER00296_TV-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/10/251027-ALMADENQUICKSILVER00296_TV-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/10/251027-ALMADENQUICKSILVER00296_TV-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/10/251027-ALMADENQUICKSILVER00296_TV-KQED-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The New Almaden Quicksilver Mining Museum features a Cinnabar display south of San Joséon Oct. 27, 2025. \u003ccite>(Tâm Vũ/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Long filled me in on the long, rich history of mining tin and copper in Cornwall, which extends all the way back to the early Bronze Age, circa 2200 B.C.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Some of you may be thinking about the British TV series “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7A0U6kQNCN0\">Poldark,\u003c/a>” and you’d be in the right territory. There were more than 300 active mines in Cornwall in the 1860s. But by the late 19th century, the industry had largely collapsed, and Cornish miners left in droves, traveling across the world to places like New Almaden in search of work.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“There is a saying, ‘If you go to the bottom of a mine, a hole in the ground, at the bottom of it you’ll find a Cornishman,’” Long said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>They took a bit of Cornwall with them and left cultural evidence everywhere they went. In central Mexico, they introduced the Cornish pasty, which became, in Spanish, the paste. Over in \u003ca href=\"https://califcornishcousins.org/\">Grass Valley\u003c/a>, home to a lot of gold mining back in the day, there’s an annual Cornish Christmas Celebration. But in the South Bay, the history’s more subtle, almost hiding in plain sight. Like cinnabar.[aside postID=news_12076973 hero='https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/03/260317-MONARCH-THE-BEAR-07-KQED.jpg']“I just did a very cursory search of your phone book in San José, and I saw a scattering of Cornish surnames,” Long said. Also on his trip to San José not too long ago, he spotted the \u003ca href=\"https://www.vta.org/go/stations/ohlone-chynoweth\">Ohlone-Chynoweth\u003c/a> station sign for the Santa Clara Valley Transportation Authority.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Chynoweth in Cornish means ‘new house.’ So that got me thinking, well, there’s got to be a reason you have a Cornish name for a Cornish railway station in South San José,” Long said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The two most prominent settlements at New Almaden were Spanish Town and English Camp, but that was really Cornish Camp, if you ask him.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A 1960 documentary collaboration entitled \u003ca href=\"https://archive.org/details/casjhsj_000081\">Quicksilver!\u003c/a> noted that, even then, in the mid-20th century, the mine was fading into the mists of time.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The international flavor of the old mining camp is shown by the names that survive. Manyales. Danielson. Castro. At one time, 26 nationalities were represented in New Almaden, and they helped fill two other cemeteries up on Mine Hill, which have long since been swept bare by souvenir hunters and the ravages of time.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Cornish culture has largely faded into the rearview mirror in the South Bay, but Long has an idea related to his membership in a Cornish chorus. The Cornish are big singers. Here’s Barrett’s Privateers singing \u003ca href=\"https://open.spotify.com/track/60i1cJcq1fCNgolbUc67Xn\">The Miners’ Anthem\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Long wants to take the band on tour to the South Bay, to reintroduce locals to our Cornish connections and light a fire under our interest in the history.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Maybe to link up with a museum and do some promotional singing in shopping malls and that sort of stuff, to give people an idea that where they’re living has a history that is maybe something they never knew about,” Long said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[baycuriousquestion]\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>\u003ca id=\"Viewthefullepisodetranscript\">\u003c/a>Episode transcript\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>This story starts with three things that don’t seem like they belong together: Cornish miners, mercury poisoning, and Abraham Lincoln. They are, however, all connected to a mine in the foothills south of San José. We’re talking about the Almaden Quicksilver mine. Its glory days are long gone, and so Bay Curious gets a lot of questions about it. KQED’s Rachael Myrow knows all sorts of things South Bay, so we called her up to answer some of your questions. Hey, Rachael!\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>Hey, Olivia!\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>So the Almaden Quicksilver mine sits in what is today Almaden Quicksilver County Park. I visited some years ago, and I remember a sprawling park with rolling hills. I think I went in the summertime, so it was very, very, very hot and quite dry. But I can’t say I remember the mine.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow:\u003c/strong> That could be because there’s not a lot of the mining apparatus left. But in its heyday, in the 19th century, 1,800 miners and their families populated these hills, primarily in a couple of self-contained villages. Imagine churches, saloons, a school, and much, much more. Now there’s just a few moldering cemeteries …and the old mine supervisor’s mansion, which has been turned into a museum, with really restricted hours. I’m going to guess it was closed when you hiked or drove past.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>Hmmm, yeah. Must have been. Now, over the years on Bay Curious, we have done quite a few stories that touch on the California Gold Rush, less about the Silver Rushes that followed, but really nothing about quicksilver. To be honest, I don’t even really know what quicksilver is …\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>To be honest, Olivia, neither did I before reporting this story out. But mining it was a lucrative hustle during the Gold Rush.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>OK, well, before we dive in, then, could we do a little quicksilver 101?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>Of course! The South Bay is full of \u003cem>cinnabar\u003c/em>, a bright red rock the color of a stop sign. It formed 10-12 million years ago during a time of intense volcanic and hydrothermal activity. Chemically speaking, cinnabar is mercury bonded to sulfur. Mercury being a more proper name for quicksilver, by the way …\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>This is really taking me back to high school chemistry class.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow:\u003c/strong> As it should! And what do you remember about mercury, Olivia?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price:\u003c/strong> OK, well, it’s a liquid at room temperature, and that’s unusual for a metal. And it’s a silvery color…\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow:\u003c/strong> You’ve got it! To get mercury out of cinnabar, you heat the rocks up and the mercury essentially sweats out. Now, mercury was super important during the Gold Rush because it was used by gold and silver miners to extract the precious metals from the crushed rocks they were trapped in. Here’s Lynda Will, parks program coordinator at Santa Clara County Parks and Recreation, to explain further.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Lynda Will: \u003c/strong>So you pour your mercury over that sand. The mercury kind of grabs onto any precious metal. All the sand and other waste rock is left alone and left behind. And then you have — uh — looks kinda of like a silver putty. So it’s called an amalgam, and then you heat that amalgam to 1,076 degrees, the mercury vapor goes off into the air, and then you are left with your precious metal, which could be gold or silver. It usually looks like spun sugar, almost. It has all these holes where the mercury had been. So then you can take that spun gold, as we call it, and so you can make nuggets or even bars.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price:\u003c/strong> All right, I get it. And this stuff must have been in high demand after the Gold Rush kicked off in 1848. I imagine?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow:\u003c/strong> Exactly. In 1845, California is still a Mexican territory. A Mexican cavalry officer named Andrés Castillero was riding through these foothills when he noticed something unusual — a fiery red-orange paint that local Indigenous people were using on the walls of nearby missions. Castillero knew exactly what he was looking at. He knew that red paint had to have come from cinnabar.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price:\u003c/strong> But how did he know?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow:\u003c/strong> At the time Castillero made his discovery, the world’s main source of mercury was in Almadén, Spain. So Spain controlled the supply. Which meant they could charge what they wanted. Castillero, just from reading the newspapers, would have understood mercury’s importance in economic terms. So when Castillero saw that cinnabar in 1845, he understood he was looking at a potential fortune.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price:\u003c/strong> What was Castillero doing in San José anyway?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>He was sent by the Mexican government to catalogue strategic assets. Now, under Mexican law, officers and citizens could claim mines they discovered for themselves. So when Castillero saw the cinnabar, his life changed forever.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price:\u003c/strong> And this brings us to one of our Almaden Quicksilver listener questions! It comes from Kiera O’Hara of Santa Clara, who joined you, Rachael, on her \u003cem>second\u003c/em> tour of the Almaden Quicksilver Museum. Second, because she first visited when she was seven or eight years old. The museum is a regular pit stop for South Bay school children.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Kiera O’Hara:\u003c/strong> What was the Civil War history behind the Almaden mercury mine in San José? I remember hearing Abraham Lincoln was involved?!\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>The museum sits in the Casa Grande, or big house, a 27-room Classical Revival mansion the mine’s superintendents used to live in. As you can imagine, it wasn’t long after Castillero discovered the cinnabar that other people wanted to take the mine from him, especially after the Gold Rush sent demand for quicksilver soaring.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>So multiple parties, including private investors and mining companies, tried to claim the land, and the case went all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court. In 1859, SCOTUS recognized Castillero’s claim, but the mine’s ownership remained split among several parties. And then in 1861, the U.S. Civil War started. And this is where we get to Kiera’s question, about whether Abraham Lincoln was involved.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Lynda Will: \u003c/strong>There was an aide to President Lincoln who went, “Oh, there’s enough questionability about who owns this land, so maybe it’s owned by the U.S. government.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow:\u003c/strong> Again, the quicksilver mine is an obvious money maker, and war is expensive. California gold was vital to the Union’s war effort, providing more than $170 million dollars in gold mostly that stabilized the federal currency and paid for roughly 10% of things like weapons and supplies. For those of you wondering, $170 million dollars in the 1860s would be worth roughly $7 billion dollars today.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>So this aide is thinking, ‘Why not claim the New Almaden mine and its profits for the Union side of the U.S. civil war?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Lynda Will: \u003c/strong>And so he came down with a marshal and even a cavalry behind him to say, “Lincoln’s going to take over this mine. And, you know, you’re supposed to just surrender it to me, the aide.” Then, mine manager, John Young, said ‘no!’\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>So, just put yourself in John Young’s shoes. Who the heck is this aide showing up all of a sudden with troops behind him and a half-baked plan to take over the mine, because says who?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Lynda Will: \u003c/strong>He got the miners and said, “If they take over the mines, you’re going to be out of a job. So come down with, you know, your best rifles and your guns and, you know, help me defend this.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>First, Young rallies his workers. And he fires off urgent telegraphs, not only to other mine operators across California, but to a former Almaden manager who now sits inside Lincoln’s administration.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Lynda Will: \u003c/strong>And said, “This is what’s happening out here. If he takes this mine, there’s the potential that he could take over every mine in California and the western United States.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow:\u003c/strong> Young was essentially saying, if the federal government seizes this mine, it could set off a chain reaction across the West, and at a moment when the Union depends on the support of California’s gold miners. There \u003cem>were\u003c/em> people in the state who sympathized with the South during the Civil War. So it would be really, really dumb to piss off Union supporters and drive them into the waiting arms of the Confederacy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Kiera, our question asker, asked if Abraham Lincoln was involved. Lynda told us it’s possible Lincoln didn’t even know this whole fight was going on, given how distracted he was with the Civil War. Whatever the case, John Young’s quick thinking — his calculated warning framed as patriotism — stopped a bright idea from a government man that could have thrown California and the rest of the Western U.S. to the Confederate side.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>When we return, we dig in on the environmental impacts of this mine. Plus a listener question about the miners who once worked there. Stay with us.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>\u003cstrong>Sponsor Message\u003c/strong>\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>So we’ve learned that mercury comes from cinnabar. It was super valuable during the Gold Rush because it helps separate gold from ore. And there was a big kerfuffle over the ownership of the Almaden mine that could have changed California’s posture during the Civil War.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Next, I want to touch on the environment … because you don’t have to be a geologist to know mercury is a neurotoxin, and a huge environmental hazard.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>Yes. Unfortunately, some of that mercury made its way downstream, into the San Francisco Bay. In 2002 — not that long ago — scientists identified \u003cem>this\u003c/em> mine as the single largest source of mercury in the Bay, making the fish unsafe to eat for humans and birds alike. I asked Lynda Will, parks program coordinator at Santa Clara County Parks and Recreation, about this very question …\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Lynda Will: \u003c/strong>I can tell you a little bit about it. Yeah. When we acquired the land in the mid-70s, 1970s, there was quite a bit of mercury contamination of the land. Under the furnace yards was, you know, pools of mercury. They had paved roads with cinnabar waste rock, which we call calcines. They had just dumped it over the sides of the hills. They had dumped it into the creeks. And so we have been remediating it ever since.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>Local governments, including Santa Clara County, which purchased part of the mine property for parkland, found themselves partially on the hook for a multimillion-dollar cleanup effort to comply with the federal Clean Water Act. They did, I should mention, get help from the state and the feds.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>Is it safe for us to be in this park?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow:\u003c/strong> Additional work and monitoring continues, but authorities say it’s safe to picnic, hike, ride horses, et cetera.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>And what about the fish in the Bay, can we eat them?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow:\u003c/strong> Errr, that’s a different story, more complicated. As recently as 10 years ago, 2 years then into the big effort to clean up the Bay, KQED explored this very question. Let’s just say, they were still describing it as problematic, not just because of the direct legacy from mining days, but from stormwater runoff and air pollution. Because mercury converts into methylmercury, which bioaccumulates up the food chain, fish … especially large fish … can carry high levels.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Clip from documentary: \u003c/strong>The Bay is slowly cleaning itself, washing 3,100 pounds a year out to sea, but because so much has built up over time, it needs a helping hand. … At a minimum, three generations will be impacted by the potent and long-lasting poison still lingering in the Bay mud.\u003cstrong> \u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price:\u003c/strong> So that old adage, “Don’t fish off the pier,” sounds like it remains true today.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow:\u003c/strong> Well, the longer-lived, big fish, especially. In 2023, California’s Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment, or OEHHA, recommended children and women of childbearing age steer clear of fish like sharks and striped bass. Ocean-going fish like Chinook salmon would be the safer bet.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>Alright, so that’s two questions dispatched. Let’s move on to question number three. It comes from Andrew Long, who lives all the way over in Cornwall — the county at the far south west tip of England. He came to the Bay Area some time ago to visit a relative and had some questions.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Andrew Long: \u003c/strong>I’m Cornish from the U.K. I know of the Cornish Camp at the Alamaden Quicksilver Mine. It would be great to know if Cornish culture survived, and is growing, like it is here with our language.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>Andrew filled me in on the long, rich history of mining tin and copper in Cornwall, which extends all the way back to the early Bronze Age, circa 2200 BC.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Some of you may be thinking about the British TV series “Poldark,” and you’d be in the right territory. There were more than 300 active mines in Cornwall in the 1860s.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But by the late 19th century, the industry had largely collapsed … and Cornish miners left in droves, traveling across the world to places like New Almaden in search of work.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Andrew Long: \u003c/strong>So there is a saying, if you go to the bottom of a mine, a hole in the ground, at the bottom of it you’ll find a Cornishman.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>They took a bit of Cornwall with them and left cultural evidence everywhere they went. In central Mexico, they introduced the Cornish \u003cem>pasty\u003c/em>, which became, in Spanish, the \u003cem>paste. \u003c/em>Over in Grass Valley, home to a lot of gold mining back in the day, there’s an annual Cornish Christmas Celebration. But in the South Bay, the history’s more subtle, almost hiding in plain sight. Like cinnabar.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Andrew Long: \u003c/strong>I just did a very cursory search of your — the phone book in San José — and I saw a scattering of Cornish surnames.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>Cornish surnames like “Hicks” and even “Cornish.” Also, on his trip to San José, not too long ago, and he spotted a curious station sign for the Santa Clara Valley Transportation Authority.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Andrew Long: \u003c/strong>There’s a station called Ohlone-Chy-NO-weth. Or CHIN-oh-weth, as you call it. Well, Chynoweth in Cornish means “new house.” So that got me thinking, well, there’s got to be a reason you have a Cornish name for a Cornish railway station in South San José.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>The two most prominent settlements at New Almaden were Spanish Town and English Camp, but that was really Cornish Camp, if you ask Andrew. Today, little remains of the area’s once-bustling village life. Aside from the large mansion that now houses the museum, the only hints are the nonnative cypress and poplar trees, and the spreading vinca ground cover … green survivors of gardens long since forgotten.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Here’s a bit from a 1960 documentary collaboration I dug up between the Museum and Channel 11 News.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Clip from documentary: \u003c/strong>The international flavor of the old mining camp is shown by the names that survive. Manyales. Danielson. Castro. At one time, 26 nationalities were represented in New Almaden, and they helped fill two other cemeteries up on Mine Hill, that have long since been swept bare by souvenir hunters and the ravages of time.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>Cornish culture has largely faded into the rearview mirror in the South Bay, but Andrew has an idea, related to his membership in a Cornish chorus called Barrett’s Privateers. The Cornish are big singers. Here’s Barrett’s Privateers singing The Miners’ Anthem.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Clip of The Miners Anthem\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>Andrew wants to take the band on tour to the South Bay, to reintroduce locals to our Cornish connections and light a fire under our interest in the history.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Andrew Long: \u003c/strong>Maybe to link up with the museum and do some promotional singing in shopping malls and that sort of stuff, to give people an idea that where they’re living has a history that is maybe something they never knew about.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price:\u003c/strong> Thanks to Andrew, Kiera and to you, Rachael.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow:\u003c/strong> My pleasure, as always!\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>It’s the start of a month, and that means a new voting round is up at \u003ca href=\"http://baycurious.org\">BayCurious.org\u003c/a>. Let’s hear your choices …\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Voice 1: Why is there a taco truck on every corner in San Francisco and San Mateo? They seem to have sprung up in the last year or two.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Voice 2: Why are there huge fans over the tunnels near the Golden Gate Bridge?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Voice 3: What’s the story with the abandoned cop car in front of the airport off 101? Everyone knows no actual cop is in it, so what’s the scoop with leaving it there?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>Tally a vote for your favorite of those questions at \u003ca href=\"http://baycurious.org\">BayCurious.org\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>We’ve still got space in our upcoming Bay Curious Trivia game. Snag some tickets for you and your friends at KQED.org/live.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Bay Curious is made in San Francisco at member-supported KQED.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Our show is made by Katrina Schwartz, Christopher Beale and me, Olivia Allen-Price. With extra support from Maha Sanad, Jen Chien, Katie Sprenger, Ethan Toven-Lindsey and everyone on Team KQED.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Some members of the KQED podcast team are represented by the Screen Actors Guild, American Federation of Television and Radio Artists, San Francisco Northern California Local.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>I’m Olivia Allen-Price. Thanks for listening!\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n",
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"title": "New Almaden: The Mercury Mine That Built a Boomtown South of San José | KQED",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"#Viewthefullepisodetranscript\">View\u003c/a>\u003cem>\u003ca href=\"#Viewthefullepisodetranscript\"> the full episode transcript.\u003c/a>\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Visitors to the Almaden Quicksilver County Park may well wonder what the heck accounts for the name.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Who or what was Almaden? What is quicksilver? Why is there a 27-room Classical Revival mansion nestled in more than 4,000 acres in the hills south of San José? So many questions!\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It beggars belief today, given how bucolic the park is, but New Almaden once hummed with a busy mining operation in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In its heyday, 1,800 miners and their families lived here, primarily in a couple of self-contained villages. Imagine churches, saloons, a school, a post office, and more. Now there are just a few moldering cemeteries and the old mine supervisor’s mansion, which has been turned into a \u003ca href=\"https://parks.santaclaracounty.gov/learn/visit-historic-sites/almaden-quicksilver-mining-museum\">museum\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>\u003cstrong>How quicksilver is used to extract gold\u003c/strong>\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Before we get to our audience questions sent in about Almaden Quicksilver Park, let’s get a handle on why this place was once so valuable.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The South Bay is full of cinnabar, a bright red rock the color of a stop sign. It formed 10 million to 12 million years ago during a time of intense volcanic and hydrothermal activity. Chemically speaking, cinnabar is mercury bonded to sulfur, and mercury is the more proper name for the silver-colored quicksilver. To get mercury out of cinnabar, you heat the rocks up and the mercury essentially sweats out.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12062447\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/10/251027-ALMADENQUICKSILVER00307_TV-KQED.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12062447\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/10/251027-ALMADENQUICKSILVER00307_TV-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/10/251027-ALMADENQUICKSILVER00307_TV-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/10/251027-ALMADENQUICKSILVER00307_TV-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/10/251027-ALMADENQUICKSILVER00307_TV-KQED-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Exhibits at The New Almaden Quicksilver Mining Museum, south of San José, on Oct. 27, 2025, paint a picture of the dangerous but lucrative craft of mining quicksilver from cinnabar. \u003ccite>(Tâm Vũ/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Mercury was super important during the Gold Rush, because in its liquid form, gold and silver miners used the quicksilver to extract precious metals from the crushed rocks they were trapped in.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The mercury kind of grabs on to any precious metal,” said Lynda Will, parks program coordinator at Santa Clara County Parks and Recreation. “All the sand and other waste rock is left alone and left behind. And then you have a kinda of silver putty.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Miners call that an amalgam. You heat that amalgam to 1,076 degrees Fahrenheit, the mercury vapor goes off into the air, leaving you with your precious metal.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It usually looks like spun sugar,” Will said. “It has all these holes where the mercury had been. So then you can take that spun gold, as we call it, and so you can make nuggets or even bars.”\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>\u003cstrong>How a Mexican cavalry officer discovered the cinnabar deposit in 1845\u003c/strong>\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Just a few years prior to the discovery of gold at Sutter’s Mill near Sacramento in 1848, California was a Mexican territory. The Mexican government sent a cavalry officer named Andrés Castillero to catalogue strategic assets, and as was the practice at that time, officers and citizens could claim mines they discovered for themselves.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Castillero was traveling in the South Bay when he noticed a fiery red-orange paint local Indigenous people were using on the walls of nearby missions. Castillero knew exactly what he was looking at. He knew that red paint had to have come from cinnabar.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12062440\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/10/251027-ALMADENQUICKSILVER00156_TV-KQED.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12062440\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/10/251027-ALMADENQUICKSILVER00156_TV-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/10/251027-ALMADENQUICKSILVER00156_TV-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/10/251027-ALMADENQUICKSILVER00156_TV-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/10/251027-ALMADENQUICKSILVER00156_TV-KQED-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The New Almaden Quicksilver Mining Museum features different kinds of ore in a display on Oct. 27, 2025. \u003ccite>(Tâm Vũ/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>At the time, the world’s main source of mercury was in Almadén, Spain. Spain controlled the supply, which meant they could charge what they wanted. Castillero, just from reading the newspapers, would have understood he was looking at a potential fortune in the hills south of San José.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As you can imagine, it wasn’t long after Castillero discovered the cinnabar that other people wanted to take the mine from him, especially after the Gold Rush kicked off in 1848 and sent demand for quicksilver soaring. Multiple parties, including private investors and mining companies, tried to claim the land, and the case went all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court. In 1859, the Supreme Court recognized Castillero’s claim, but the mine’s ownership remained split among several parties.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And then in 1861, the U.S. Civil War started. During the Civil War, the federal government briefly attempted to seize the New Almaden mine because mercury was essential for extracting gold used to finance the Union war effort.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And this is where we get to Bay Curious listener Kiera O’Hara’s question:\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>\u003cstrong>What was the Civil War history behind the Almaden mercury mine in San José? I remember hearing Abraham Lincoln was involved?! \u003c/strong>\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>At the museum, parks program coordinator Will told of an aide to President Lincoln who thought, “There’s enough questionability about who owns this land, so maybe it’s owned by the U.S. government.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Again, the quicksilver mine is an obvious money maker, and war is expensive. California gold was vital to the Union’s war effort, providing more than $170 million (roughly $7 billion today), in gold mostly, that stabilized the federal currency and paid for roughly 10% of things like weapons and supplies.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12062439\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/10/251027-ALMADENQUICKSILVER00110_TV-KQED.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12062439\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/10/251027-ALMADENQUICKSILVER00110_TV-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/10/251027-ALMADENQUICKSILVER00110_TV-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/10/251027-ALMADENQUICKSILVER00110_TV-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/10/251027-ALMADENQUICKSILVER00110_TV-KQED-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The New Almaden Quicksilver Mining Museum features photos of village life for quicksilver miners and their families during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. \u003ccite>(Tâm Vũ/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>This aide was thinking something along the lines of, “Why not claim the New Almaden mine and its profits for the Union side of the Civil War?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“And so he came down with a marshal and even a cavalry behind him to say, ‘Lincoln’s going to take over this mine. And, you know, you’re supposed to just surrender it to me.’” Will said. The mine manager at the time, John Young, rallied the miners working for him by saying something akin to “If they take over the mines, you’re going to be out of a job. So come down with, you know, your best rifles and your guns and, you know, help me defend this,” Will said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Young also fired off urgent telegraphs, not only to other mine operators across California, but to a former New Almaden manager who happened to be working inside Lincoln’s administration.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Young warned the well-placed friend that the federal government was about to set off a destructive chain reaction across the West, at a moment when the Union depended on the support of California’s gold miners. There were people in the state who sympathized with the South during the Civil War. So it would be really, really dumb to piss off Union supporters and drive them into the waiting arms of the Confederacy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Will thinks it’s possible Lincoln didn’t even know this whole fight was going on, given how distracted he was with the Civil War. Whatever the case, John Young’s quick thinking stopped a bright idea from a government man that could have thrown California and the rest of the Western U.S. to the Confederate side.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Has the mercury in San José caused environmental problems?\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>You don’t have to be a geologist to know mercury is a neurotoxin and an environmental hazard.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Some of the mercury dug up at New Almaden \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/quest/17411/mercury-in-the-bay-part-1\">made its way downstream\u003c/a>, into the San Francisco Bay. Mining continued into the 1970s, and in 2002, scientists identified this mine as the \u003ca href=\"https://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/tracking-a-toxic-trail-long-closed-mine-2709557.php\">single largest source\u003c/a> of mercury in the Bay, making the fish unsafe to eat for humans and birds alike.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12062445\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/10/251027-ALMADENQUICKSILVER00255_TV-KQED.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12062445\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/10/251027-ALMADENQUICKSILVER00255_TV-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1334\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/10/251027-ALMADENQUICKSILVER00255_TV-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/10/251027-ALMADENQUICKSILVER00255_TV-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/10/251027-ALMADENQUICKSILVER00255_TV-KQED-1536x1025.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">A statue of a miner is featured at The New Almaden Quicksilver Mining Museum south of San Joséon Oct. 27, 2025. \u003ccite>(Tâm Vũ/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“When we acquired the land in the mid-1970s, there was quite a bit of mercury contamination of the land,” Will said. “Under the furnace yards were pools of mercury. They had paved roads with cinnabar waste rock, which we call calcines. They had just dumped it over the sides of the hills. They had dumped it into the creeks. And so we have been remediating it ever since.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Local governments, including Santa Clara County, purchased part of the mine property for parkland, found themselves partially on the hook for a multimillion-dollar \u003ca href=\"https://dtsc.ca.gov/dtsc-oversees-environmental-cleanup-of-mercury-contaminated-park/\">cleanup effort\u003c/a> to comply with the federal Clean Water Act. They did get help from the state and federal agencies. Additional work and monitoring continue, but authorities say it’s safe to picnic, hike, ride horses and otherwise recreate.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>\u003cstrong>Is it safe to eat fish from the San Francisco Bay?\u003c/strong>\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>As recently as 10 years ago, two years into the big effort to clean up the Bay, \u003ca href=\"https://youtu.be/cpwQ5OFIZRQ?si=SP5B4deyax67I7iR&t=356\">KQED explored this question\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/cpwQ5OFIZRQ'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/cpwQ5OFIZRQ'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>Because mercury converts into methylmercury, which bioaccumulates up the food chain, fish, especially large fish, can carry high levels.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The Bay is slowly cleaning itself, washing 3,100 pounds a year out to sea, but because so much has built up over time, it needs a helping hand,” the story said. “At a minimum, three generations will be impacted by the potent and long-lasting poison still lingering in the Bay mud. It may take more than 100 years for the Bay to recover.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In 2023, California’s Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment recommended that children and women of childbearing age steer clear of fish like \u003ca href=\"https://oehha.ca.gov/sites/default/files/media/downloads/advisories/fishadvisorysfbayreport2023.pdf\">sharks and striped bass\u003c/a>. Ocean-going fish like Chinook salmon would be the safer bet.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>\u003cstrong>Has Cornish culture survived in the region?\u003c/strong>\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Our final listener question comes from Andrew Long, who lives all the way over in Cornwall, on the far southwest tip of England. He came to the Bay Area some time ago to visit a relative and had some questions.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I’m Cornish from the U.K. I know of the Cornish Camp at the Alamaden Quicksilver Mine. It would be great to know if Cornish culture survived, and is growing, like it is here with our language,” Long said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12062446\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/10/251027-ALMADENQUICKSILVER00296_TV-KQED.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12062446\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/10/251027-ALMADENQUICKSILVER00296_TV-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/10/251027-ALMADENQUICKSILVER00296_TV-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/10/251027-ALMADENQUICKSILVER00296_TV-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/10/251027-ALMADENQUICKSILVER00296_TV-KQED-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The New Almaden Quicksilver Mining Museum features a Cinnabar display south of San Joséon Oct. 27, 2025. \u003ccite>(Tâm Vũ/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Long filled me in on the long, rich history of mining tin and copper in Cornwall, which extends all the way back to the early Bronze Age, circa 2200 B.C.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Some of you may be thinking about the British TV series “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7A0U6kQNCN0\">Poldark,\u003c/a>” and you’d be in the right territory. There were more than 300 active mines in Cornwall in the 1860s. But by the late 19th century, the industry had largely collapsed, and Cornish miners left in droves, traveling across the world to places like New Almaden in search of work.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“There is a saying, ‘If you go to the bottom of a mine, a hole in the ground, at the bottom of it you’ll find a Cornishman,’” Long said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>They took a bit of Cornwall with them and left cultural evidence everywhere they went. In central Mexico, they introduced the Cornish pasty, which became, in Spanish, the paste. Over in \u003ca href=\"https://califcornishcousins.org/\">Grass Valley\u003c/a>, home to a lot of gold mining back in the day, there’s an annual Cornish Christmas Celebration. But in the South Bay, the history’s more subtle, almost hiding in plain sight. Like cinnabar.\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>“I just did a very cursory search of your phone book in San José, and I saw a scattering of Cornish surnames,” Long said. Also on his trip to San José not too long ago, he spotted the \u003ca href=\"https://www.vta.org/go/stations/ohlone-chynoweth\">Ohlone-Chynoweth\u003c/a> station sign for the Santa Clara Valley Transportation Authority.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Chynoweth in Cornish means ‘new house.’ So that got me thinking, well, there’s got to be a reason you have a Cornish name for a Cornish railway station in South San José,” Long said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The two most prominent settlements at New Almaden were Spanish Town and English Camp, but that was really Cornish Camp, if you ask him.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A 1960 documentary collaboration entitled \u003ca href=\"https://archive.org/details/casjhsj_000081\">Quicksilver!\u003c/a> noted that, even then, in the mid-20th century, the mine was fading into the mists of time.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The international flavor of the old mining camp is shown by the names that survive. Manyales. Danielson. Castro. At one time, 26 nationalities were represented in New Almaden, and they helped fill two other cemeteries up on Mine Hill, which have long since been swept bare by souvenir hunters and the ravages of time.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Cornish culture has largely faded into the rearview mirror in the South Bay, but Long has an idea related to his membership in a Cornish chorus. The Cornish are big singers. Here’s Barrett’s Privateers singing \u003ca href=\"https://open.spotify.com/track/60i1cJcq1fCNgolbUc67Xn\">The Miners’ Anthem\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Long wants to take the band on tour to the South Bay, to reintroduce locals to our Cornish connections and light a fire under our interest in the history.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Maybe to link up with a museum and do some promotional singing in shopping malls and that sort of stuff, to give people an idea that where they’re living has a history that is maybe something they never knew about,” Long said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>\u003ca id=\"Viewthefullepisodetranscript\">\u003c/a>Episode transcript\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>This story starts with three things that don’t seem like they belong together: Cornish miners, mercury poisoning, and Abraham Lincoln. They are, however, all connected to a mine in the foothills south of San José. We’re talking about the Almaden Quicksilver mine. Its glory days are long gone, and so Bay Curious gets a lot of questions about it. KQED’s Rachael Myrow knows all sorts of things South Bay, so we called her up to answer some of your questions. Hey, Rachael!\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>Hey, Olivia!\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>So the Almaden Quicksilver mine sits in what is today Almaden Quicksilver County Park. I visited some years ago, and I remember a sprawling park with rolling hills. I think I went in the summertime, so it was very, very, very hot and quite dry. But I can’t say I remember the mine.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow:\u003c/strong> That could be because there’s not a lot of the mining apparatus left. But in its heyday, in the 19th century, 1,800 miners and their families populated these hills, primarily in a couple of self-contained villages. Imagine churches, saloons, a school, and much, much more. Now there’s just a few moldering cemeteries …and the old mine supervisor’s mansion, which has been turned into a museum, with really restricted hours. I’m going to guess it was closed when you hiked or drove past.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>Hmmm, yeah. Must have been. Now, over the years on Bay Curious, we have done quite a few stories that touch on the California Gold Rush, less about the Silver Rushes that followed, but really nothing about quicksilver. To be honest, I don’t even really know what quicksilver is …\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>To be honest, Olivia, neither did I before reporting this story out. But mining it was a lucrative hustle during the Gold Rush.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>OK, well, before we dive in, then, could we do a little quicksilver 101?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>Of course! The South Bay is full of \u003cem>cinnabar\u003c/em>, a bright red rock the color of a stop sign. It formed 10-12 million years ago during a time of intense volcanic and hydrothermal activity. Chemically speaking, cinnabar is mercury bonded to sulfur. Mercury being a more proper name for quicksilver, by the way …\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>This is really taking me back to high school chemistry class.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow:\u003c/strong> As it should! And what do you remember about mercury, Olivia?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price:\u003c/strong> OK, well, it’s a liquid at room temperature, and that’s unusual for a metal. And it’s a silvery color…\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow:\u003c/strong> You’ve got it! To get mercury out of cinnabar, you heat the rocks up and the mercury essentially sweats out. Now, mercury was super important during the Gold Rush because it was used by gold and silver miners to extract the precious metals from the crushed rocks they were trapped in. Here’s Lynda Will, parks program coordinator at Santa Clara County Parks and Recreation, to explain further.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Lynda Will: \u003c/strong>So you pour your mercury over that sand. The mercury kind of grabs onto any precious metal. All the sand and other waste rock is left alone and left behind. And then you have — uh — looks kinda of like a silver putty. So it’s called an amalgam, and then you heat that amalgam to 1,076 degrees, the mercury vapor goes off into the air, and then you are left with your precious metal, which could be gold or silver. It usually looks like spun sugar, almost. It has all these holes where the mercury had been. So then you can take that spun gold, as we call it, and so you can make nuggets or even bars.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price:\u003c/strong> All right, I get it. And this stuff must have been in high demand after the Gold Rush kicked off in 1848. I imagine?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow:\u003c/strong> Exactly. In 1845, California is still a Mexican territory. A Mexican cavalry officer named Andrés Castillero was riding through these foothills when he noticed something unusual — a fiery red-orange paint that local Indigenous people were using on the walls of nearby missions. Castillero knew exactly what he was looking at. He knew that red paint had to have come from cinnabar.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price:\u003c/strong> But how did he know?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow:\u003c/strong> At the time Castillero made his discovery, the world’s main source of mercury was in Almadén, Spain. So Spain controlled the supply. Which meant they could charge what they wanted. Castillero, just from reading the newspapers, would have understood mercury’s importance in economic terms. So when Castillero saw that cinnabar in 1845, he understood he was looking at a potential fortune.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price:\u003c/strong> What was Castillero doing in San José anyway?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>He was sent by the Mexican government to catalogue strategic assets. Now, under Mexican law, officers and citizens could claim mines they discovered for themselves. So when Castillero saw the cinnabar, his life changed forever.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price:\u003c/strong> And this brings us to one of our Almaden Quicksilver listener questions! It comes from Kiera O’Hara of Santa Clara, who joined you, Rachael, on her \u003cem>second\u003c/em> tour of the Almaden Quicksilver Museum. Second, because she first visited when she was seven or eight years old. The museum is a regular pit stop for South Bay school children.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Kiera O’Hara:\u003c/strong> What was the Civil War history behind the Almaden mercury mine in San José? I remember hearing Abraham Lincoln was involved?!\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>The museum sits in the Casa Grande, or big house, a 27-room Classical Revival mansion the mine’s superintendents used to live in. As you can imagine, it wasn’t long after Castillero discovered the cinnabar that other people wanted to take the mine from him, especially after the Gold Rush sent demand for quicksilver soaring.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>So multiple parties, including private investors and mining companies, tried to claim the land, and the case went all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court. In 1859, SCOTUS recognized Castillero’s claim, but the mine’s ownership remained split among several parties. And then in 1861, the U.S. Civil War started. And this is where we get to Kiera’s question, about whether Abraham Lincoln was involved.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Lynda Will: \u003c/strong>There was an aide to President Lincoln who went, “Oh, there’s enough questionability about who owns this land, so maybe it’s owned by the U.S. government.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow:\u003c/strong> Again, the quicksilver mine is an obvious money maker, and war is expensive. California gold was vital to the Union’s war effort, providing more than $170 million dollars in gold mostly that stabilized the federal currency and paid for roughly 10% of things like weapons and supplies. For those of you wondering, $170 million dollars in the 1860s would be worth roughly $7 billion dollars today.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>So this aide is thinking, ‘Why not claim the New Almaden mine and its profits for the Union side of the U.S. civil war?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Lynda Will: \u003c/strong>And so he came down with a marshal and even a cavalry behind him to say, “Lincoln’s going to take over this mine. And, you know, you’re supposed to just surrender it to me, the aide.” Then, mine manager, John Young, said ‘no!’\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>So, just put yourself in John Young’s shoes. Who the heck is this aide showing up all of a sudden with troops behind him and a half-baked plan to take over the mine, because says who?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Lynda Will: \u003c/strong>He got the miners and said, “If they take over the mines, you’re going to be out of a job. So come down with, you know, your best rifles and your guns and, you know, help me defend this.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>First, Young rallies his workers. And he fires off urgent telegraphs, not only to other mine operators across California, but to a former Almaden manager who now sits inside Lincoln’s administration.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Lynda Will: \u003c/strong>And said, “This is what’s happening out here. If he takes this mine, there’s the potential that he could take over every mine in California and the western United States.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow:\u003c/strong> Young was essentially saying, if the federal government seizes this mine, it could set off a chain reaction across the West, and at a moment when the Union depends on the support of California’s gold miners. There \u003cem>were\u003c/em> people in the state who sympathized with the South during the Civil War. So it would be really, really dumb to piss off Union supporters and drive them into the waiting arms of the Confederacy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Kiera, our question asker, asked if Abraham Lincoln was involved. Lynda told us it’s possible Lincoln didn’t even know this whole fight was going on, given how distracted he was with the Civil War. Whatever the case, John Young’s quick thinking — his calculated warning framed as patriotism — stopped a bright idea from a government man that could have thrown California and the rest of the Western U.S. to the Confederate side.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>When we return, we dig in on the environmental impacts of this mine. Plus a listener question about the miners who once worked there. Stay with us.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>\u003cstrong>Sponsor Message\u003c/strong>\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>So we’ve learned that mercury comes from cinnabar. It was super valuable during the Gold Rush because it helps separate gold from ore. And there was a big kerfuffle over the ownership of the Almaden mine that could have changed California’s posture during the Civil War.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Next, I want to touch on the environment … because you don’t have to be a geologist to know mercury is a neurotoxin, and a huge environmental hazard.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>Yes. Unfortunately, some of that mercury made its way downstream, into the San Francisco Bay. In 2002 — not that long ago — scientists identified \u003cem>this\u003c/em> mine as the single largest source of mercury in the Bay, making the fish unsafe to eat for humans and birds alike. I asked Lynda Will, parks program coordinator at Santa Clara County Parks and Recreation, about this very question …\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Lynda Will: \u003c/strong>I can tell you a little bit about it. Yeah. When we acquired the land in the mid-70s, 1970s, there was quite a bit of mercury contamination of the land. Under the furnace yards was, you know, pools of mercury. They had paved roads with cinnabar waste rock, which we call calcines. They had just dumped it over the sides of the hills. They had dumped it into the creeks. And so we have been remediating it ever since.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>Local governments, including Santa Clara County, which purchased part of the mine property for parkland, found themselves partially on the hook for a multimillion-dollar cleanup effort to comply with the federal Clean Water Act. They did, I should mention, get help from the state and the feds.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>Is it safe for us to be in this park?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow:\u003c/strong> Additional work and monitoring continues, but authorities say it’s safe to picnic, hike, ride horses, et cetera.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>And what about the fish in the Bay, can we eat them?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow:\u003c/strong> Errr, that’s a different story, more complicated. As recently as 10 years ago, 2 years then into the big effort to clean up the Bay, KQED explored this very question. Let’s just say, they were still describing it as problematic, not just because of the direct legacy from mining days, but from stormwater runoff and air pollution. Because mercury converts into methylmercury, which bioaccumulates up the food chain, fish … especially large fish … can carry high levels.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Clip from documentary: \u003c/strong>The Bay is slowly cleaning itself, washing 3,100 pounds a year out to sea, but because so much has built up over time, it needs a helping hand. … At a minimum, three generations will be impacted by the potent and long-lasting poison still lingering in the Bay mud.\u003cstrong> \u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price:\u003c/strong> So that old adage, “Don’t fish off the pier,” sounds like it remains true today.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow:\u003c/strong> Well, the longer-lived, big fish, especially. In 2023, California’s Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment, or OEHHA, recommended children and women of childbearing age steer clear of fish like sharks and striped bass. Ocean-going fish like Chinook salmon would be the safer bet.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>Alright, so that’s two questions dispatched. Let’s move on to question number three. It comes from Andrew Long, who lives all the way over in Cornwall — the county at the far south west tip of England. He came to the Bay Area some time ago to visit a relative and had some questions.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Andrew Long: \u003c/strong>I’m Cornish from the U.K. I know of the Cornish Camp at the Alamaden Quicksilver Mine. It would be great to know if Cornish culture survived, and is growing, like it is here with our language.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>Andrew filled me in on the long, rich history of mining tin and copper in Cornwall, which extends all the way back to the early Bronze Age, circa 2200 BC.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Some of you may be thinking about the British TV series “Poldark,” and you’d be in the right territory. There were more than 300 active mines in Cornwall in the 1860s.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But by the late 19th century, the industry had largely collapsed … and Cornish miners left in droves, traveling across the world to places like New Almaden in search of work.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Andrew Long: \u003c/strong>So there is a saying, if you go to the bottom of a mine, a hole in the ground, at the bottom of it you’ll find a Cornishman.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>They took a bit of Cornwall with them and left cultural evidence everywhere they went. In central Mexico, they introduced the Cornish \u003cem>pasty\u003c/em>, which became, in Spanish, the \u003cem>paste. \u003c/em>Over in Grass Valley, home to a lot of gold mining back in the day, there’s an annual Cornish Christmas Celebration. But in the South Bay, the history’s more subtle, almost hiding in plain sight. Like cinnabar.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Andrew Long: \u003c/strong>I just did a very cursory search of your — the phone book in San José — and I saw a scattering of Cornish surnames.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>Cornish surnames like “Hicks” and even “Cornish.” Also, on his trip to San José, not too long ago, and he spotted a curious station sign for the Santa Clara Valley Transportation Authority.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Andrew Long: \u003c/strong>There’s a station called Ohlone-Chy-NO-weth. Or CHIN-oh-weth, as you call it. Well, Chynoweth in Cornish means “new house.” So that got me thinking, well, there’s got to be a reason you have a Cornish name for a Cornish railway station in South San José.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>The two most prominent settlements at New Almaden were Spanish Town and English Camp, but that was really Cornish Camp, if you ask Andrew. Today, little remains of the area’s once-bustling village life. Aside from the large mansion that now houses the museum, the only hints are the nonnative cypress and poplar trees, and the spreading vinca ground cover … green survivors of gardens long since forgotten.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Here’s a bit from a 1960 documentary collaboration I dug up between the Museum and Channel 11 News.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Clip from documentary: \u003c/strong>The international flavor of the old mining camp is shown by the names that survive. Manyales. Danielson. Castro. At one time, 26 nationalities were represented in New Almaden, and they helped fill two other cemeteries up on Mine Hill, that have long since been swept bare by souvenir hunters and the ravages of time.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>Cornish culture has largely faded into the rearview mirror in the South Bay, but Andrew has an idea, related to his membership in a Cornish chorus called Barrett’s Privateers. The Cornish are big singers. Here’s Barrett’s Privateers singing The Miners’ Anthem.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Clip of The Miners Anthem\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>Andrew wants to take the band on tour to the South Bay, to reintroduce locals to our Cornish connections and light a fire under our interest in the history.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Andrew Long: \u003c/strong>Maybe to link up with the museum and do some promotional singing in shopping malls and that sort of stuff, to give people an idea that where they’re living has a history that is maybe something they never knew about.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price:\u003c/strong> Thanks to Andrew, Kiera and to you, Rachael.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow:\u003c/strong> My pleasure, as always!\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>It’s the start of a month, and that means a new voting round is up at \u003ca href=\"http://baycurious.org\">BayCurious.org\u003c/a>. Let’s hear your choices …\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Voice 1: Why is there a taco truck on every corner in San Francisco and San Mateo? They seem to have sprung up in the last year or two.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Voice 2: Why are there huge fans over the tunnels near the Golden Gate Bridge?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Voice 3: What’s the story with the abandoned cop car in front of the airport off 101? Everyone knows no actual cop is in it, so what’s the scoop with leaving it there?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>Tally a vote for your favorite of those questions at \u003ca href=\"http://baycurious.org\">BayCurious.org\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>We’ve still got space in our upcoming Bay Curious Trivia game. Snag some tickets for you and your friends at KQED.org/live.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Bay Curious is made in San Francisco at member-supported KQED.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Our show is made by Katrina Schwartz, Christopher Beale and me, Olivia Allen-Price. With extra support from Maha Sanad, Jen Chien, Katie Sprenger, Ethan Toven-Lindsey and everyone on Team KQED.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Some members of the KQED podcast team are represented by the Screen Actors Guild, American Federation of Television and Radio Artists, San Francisco Northern California Local.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>I’m Olivia Allen-Price. Thanks for listening!\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cp>Women have dramatically influenced San Francisco Bay Area history since before the Gold Rush, but their stories are often far less well known. Rae Alexandra’s new book, \u003ca href=\"https://citylights.com/city-lights-published/unsung-heroines35-women-who-changed/\">\u003cem>Unsung Heroines: 35 Women Who Changed the Bay Area\u003c/em> \u003c/a>shines a light on these untold stories, highlight these women’s impact on the social, cultural and political life of the Bay Area.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c!-- iframe plugin v.4.3 wordpress.org/plugins/iframe/ -->\u003cbr>\n\u003ciframe loading=\"lazy\" frameborder=\"0\" height=\"200\" scrolling=\"no\" src=\"https://playlist.megaphone.fm?e=KQINC8955735736&light=true\" width=\"100%\" class=\"iframe-class\">\u003c/iframe>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Rae Alexandra, an arts and culture reporter here at KQED was frustrated.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Rae Alexandra: \u003c/b>I think I learned there were no statues of women. \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Or, there were very few.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It was 2018 and she had just found out that just 12 percent of San Francisco’s street names, statues, parks and public art honored women.\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Rae Alexandra: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">And that made me angry.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Meanwhile, the names of important men were everywhere. Anza, Coit, Sutro, Sutter, Polk, Taylor, Fillmore. I could go on. So for Women’s History Month, she made a pledge to find and honor five women from local history to write about for KQED.\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Rae Alexandra: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">So that just in case somebody wants to add a statue later, they might have an easy list to look at.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It seemed like a simple idea, but once she started looking, she found troves of stories to tell. Countless women whose impact on local life, culture, and politics was profound yet overlooked.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Rae Alexandra: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Then I kept dipping back in because I kept finding more women. Couple. I’ll just do another couple.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">What started as a month-long project grew into an ongoing series, and now a book. It’s out this month. It’s called Unsung Heroines, 35 Women Who Changed the Bay Area. Rae Alexandra is here to talk with us about it. Welcome, Rae. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u003cb>Rae Alexandra: \u003c/b>Hello. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>I think for a long time, people would look back on history and see a lack of women and think, well, women weren’t able to participate. They often didn’t have as much education as their male counterparts. It’s no wonder they couldn’t contribute as much. But that isn’t really true, is it? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[baycuriouspodcastinfo]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Rae Alexandra: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">People kept saying to me, well, San Francisco is a gold rush town, and maybe there just weren’t many women here, and maybe the women here weren’t in a position to do anything, and I just, it didn’t ring true to me. Because where there is life, there are women, and where there are woman, there are useful things being done. So I just didn’t believe it. And, of course, now that I’ve done the digging, that’s absolutely not true. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">So many of the people who you profiled in this book are names that are new to me. And I work on a podcast that does a fair amount of history stories. How did you find these women and their stories? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Rae Alexandra: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I was literally at one point g\u003c/span>\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">oing through the indexes at the back of books and finding a woman who’d been mentioned twice and then trying to do some research on newspapers.com in newspaper archives to see, did they do anything else? And sometimes they did and sometimes they didn’t. The oral histories that libraries have online and archives have online were very useful. I was constantly looking, I got obsessive about looking for. Teeny-tiny plaques on the side of buildings. Is there a woman on that? Is there a woman that? So there were an awful lot of dead ends but when you find a good one it’s a real joy.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Do you feel like this book, do you hope that it will create sort of a more complete history of the Bay Area? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Rae Alexandra: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Absolutely. \u003c/span>\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The thing that I found in the course of writing this is that now that the book has put the women in chronological order, you kind of do get an overview of the Bay Area from the very beginning up to the present day, and it does reflect the social and cultural events of our entire history. But once I started looking at even major events that we think we all know, like the 1906 earthquake, when you start looking at it from an individual working class woman’s perspective, it gave me a completely different idea of what that whole crisis was at the time. Breaking history down to small individual people is very different to hearing it from fancy historians perspective.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I love that. And that’s part of what makes your book, I think, so compelling is really, you know, looking at everything through that individual female lens. Yeah. I’d love to get into one of these stories now. Can you tell us about Tianfu Wu, whose contributions in Chinatown have led San Francisco city leaders to rename a street in her honor just this month? So this is very topical.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u003c/span>\u003cb>Rae Alexandra: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">She was trafficked from China in the early 1890s. She was sold by her father to pay off gambling debts. She wasn’t told anything that was happening. She was just, she was told that she was gonna be going to visit her grandmother. She was dropped off, put in a boat. She was left with her supper and a toothbrush and her father just said, you know, stay here, be quiet, didn’t say goodbye. And that was it and she never saw her family again. And it wasn’t for lack of trying years later, she did try and track them down and was unable to. And she found herself in San Francisco. She was under the age of 10 at the time. She was basically a domestic slave and the second place that she found herself was a gambling den and the owner of that gambling den was very physically abusive to her. So she wound up getting rescued in 1894 by a group of Presbyterian missionaries who operated out of the Occidental Mission House. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I found a newspaper report about it, and the reporters said that she was in such a bad way that the police officers who were escorting the missionaries had tears in their eyes when they found her. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">And what was the Occidental Mission home? What was their larger purpose at the time?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postID=news_11700225 hero='https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/10/10062018_AW_GhostStory_103-e1540151366310.jpg']\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Rae Alexandra: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I mean, it was literally taking in children and young women, because what happened to the trafficked children is that once they reached a certain age, once they got to be adolescents, then they’re sold into the brothel system. And the girls working in the brothels had very short life expectancies because of what they were coping with physically. So the missionaries would take the girls. They were giving them Christian educations. There was an element here of trying to rescue these people from a life of sin, as they saw it. But they were educated, they were housed, they had playtime. So Tien ended up going there. She was raised in the mission house. Within about 15 months of her being there, there was a new superintendent who came in named Donaldina Cameron. And she became a mentor and a teacher to Tien. When Tien was little and she first got there and Donaldina was quite a strict teacher and Tien was quite strong-willed, they would butt heads a lot. And they somehow met in the middle. And it became a very mother-daughter relationship. And the two of them wound up, as Tien reached her teens, they wound up working together. She started off as Donaldina’s aide, just because Donaldina needed a translator. She didn’t speak Chinese. And when they were on rescue missions, it was really important that someone be able to communicate clearly with the poor girls in these situations. The two started working more and more closely together. She was going on rescue mission. She was a travel guardian for any girls trying to get out of the country. She went to court against brothel owners, which was extremely dangerous. She got death threats all the time. And she even, as the girls got older and were trying to leave the home, she would even vet fiancees. She’d bring in the grooms and interview them about whether or not they were appropriate and financially stable enough for her young ones. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>Truly an auntie in that way. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u003cb>Rae Alexandra: \u003c/b>They called her Auntie Wu. Donaldina retired at a certain point and Tien basically took over the whole running of the Mission House. She was working as a fundraiser as well by that point. She didn’t retire until 1951 and at the time that she did retire from the Mission House, Donaldina was living down in Palo Alto and offered Tien the cottage next door to hers that she also owned and they lived side by side for the rest of their and they’re even buried next to each other. In Los Angeles, which I think is quite remarkable. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u003c/span>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Yeah, quite a partner o\u003c/span>\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">ver many, many years, and get us to modern times. I mean, Tien was an unsung heroine, perhaps getting a little bit of flowers now. What’s happening with her naming in the city? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u003c/span>\u003cb>Rae Alexandra: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">So, t\u003c/span>\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">he old Mission House is still at 920 Sacramento Street, they still work with women dealing with domestic violence every day. I mean, if you go in there in the afternoon, it’s full of kids having the time of their lives. They’re still doing great work. And last year, at the end of last summer, the manager of special projects at Cameron House, her name’s Leanne Mar came up with the idea of trying to get a street named after Tien And then they roped in District 3 Supervisor Daniel Sauter. And they now, the street behind the mission house where all of the children used to play is now named for Tien. It’s part of Joy Street. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">When we come back, we meet another unsung heroine from Bay Area history. Stick around. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Sponsor message\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>Rae, last night I attended one of your book launch events, a night of bingo here at KQED, where you told stories of the unsung heroines between each round. It was super fun, even though I didn’t win a single game, and I’m a little salty about it. But of the women you spoke about, one that especially stuck with me was the story of Charlotte Brown, who you suggested should be as much of a household name as Rosa Parks. Can you tell us about her? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postID=news_12069545 hero='https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/01/HAZEL_S-BUILDING_1966-KQED.jpg']\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Rae Alexandra: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Charlotte L. \u003c/span>\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Brown. I can’t remember how I stumbled across her exactly but as soon as I found her I was like why? Why do we not know who this woman is? And I do think that there was an active effort to erase her in some ways. So Charlotte took San Francisco’s omnibus railroad and cable company to court all the way back in 1863. So that’s almost a full century before Rosa Parks and it’s two years before slavery was officially abolished by the 13th amendment. So she was way ahead of her time. And taking on a large company at a time when black people only made up 2% of San Francisco’s population, this was really scary. But she had been traveling in April of 1863. She already had a ticket. She got onto the streetcar. And a conductor told her that she could not be there because there were white passengers.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">In your book you included some of her affidavit that she presented in court. Could you read from that so we can kind of hear her voice?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Rae Alexandra reading: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I lived one block from where I took the car. When the conductor first came to me and refused to take my ticket, I told him I thought I had a right to ride. It was a public conveyance. I told him I had long distance to go. I told him I would not get out. He took hold of my arm. I made no resistance. I knew it was of no use to resist. And therefore I went out and he kept hold of me until I was out of the car, holding on to me until I struck the walk. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> Wow.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Rae Alexandra: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">She went home and she told her family and she had really formidable parents. Her father, James E. Brown, had been enslaved until her mother, Charlotte Sr., who was a seamstress, had raised enough money to buy his freedom. So these were two both very determined people. And so her father and her took the cable car company to court and they won. And then her award got reduced to five cents, which was just the cost of the ticket. At the end of that, she got removed from another bus. So she and her father went back to court, and that time they had a much more sympathetic judge and she wound up winning $500. It was a definitive win.\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I love how bold it is. Like you’ve just finished this long drawn out court case with Omnibus Railroad, and then you go a couple of days later and you get back on the railroad.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Rae Alexandra: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">They just were not having it. This family was not having it. They knew that somebody had to stand up and do something about it. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">And what impact did this case ultimately have on the ability for black people to ride streetcars in San Francisco?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Rae Alexandra: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Honestly, it kind of didn’t help. That problem persisted. People of color continued to be removed from cable cars for many years afterwards. there wasn’t a state ban on street car segregation until 1893. Thirty years after Charlotte brought her case.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The book, by the way, is beautiful. I don’t know what this texture is on the cover, but it’s very pleasing to touch. Along with your 35 profiles, there were very nice illustrations of most of the women in the book. What was the process like to create those illustrations?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Rae Alexandra: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Adrienne Simms is a fine artist and illustrator. And I am astonished by what I gave her and what she produced from it, because one of the biggest challenges for this entire series was finding usable images. Sometimes that was impossible. Sometimes it’s me making a copy of a copy of a newspaper that’s 120 years old. So I was giving her like the worst, grainiest images in some cases, and she just sat with them and got to know the women and managed to, I think, give them the shine that they’ve deserved this whole time. I found it very moving to see her illustrations for the first time.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Well, it adds such a nice layer to be able to read these stories that have kind of been forgotten, but also see these women’s faces.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Rae Alexandra: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Some of these women I’m seeing for the first time with these illustrations. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Rae Alexandra, congratulations on your book.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Rae Alexandra: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Thank you so much, Olivia. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Thank you for coming to talk to us. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Rae Alexandra:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> Thank you. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Rae’s new book, \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://citylights.com/city-lights-published/unsung-heroines35-women-who-changed/\">\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Unsung Heroines: 35 Women Who Changed the Bay Area\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">, is available wherever books are sold. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">We are partway through our limited experiment with dropping two episodes each week, and we’d love to know, what do you think? Write to us at Baycurious at kqed.org. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Bay Curious Trivia is coming up on April 8th. Join us at KQED’s headquarters for a rousing game of trivia, where all the questions are related to the Nine County Bay Area. \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/event/6151\">Tickets and details at kqed.org/live. \u003c/a>\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Bay Curious is made in San Francisco at member-supported KQED. You can support shows like Bay Curious and projects like Rae’s Rebel Girls series with a donation at kqed.org slash donate. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Our show is produced by Katrina Schwartz, Christopher Beale and me, Olivia Allen-Price. Extra support from Maha Sanad, Katie Sprenger, Jen Chien, Ethan Toven-Lindsey and everyone on Team KQED. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Some members of the KQed podcast team are represented by the Screen Actors Guild, American Federation of Television and Radio Artists, San Francisco, Northern California Local. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I’m Olivia Ellen-Price. I hope you have a great day.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[baycuriousquestion]\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"excerpt": "San Francisco Bay Area history is full of women who had a powerful impact on the social, cultural and political life here. Rae Alexandra's new book Unsung Heroines: 35 Women Who Changed the Bay Area highlights the little known stories of these women.",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>Women have dramatically influenced San Francisco Bay Area history since before the Gold Rush, but their stories are often far less well known. Rae Alexandra’s new book, \u003ca href=\"https://citylights.com/city-lights-published/unsung-heroines35-women-who-changed/\">\u003cem>Unsung Heroines: 35 Women Who Changed the Bay Area\u003c/em> \u003c/a>shines a light on these untold stories, highlight these women’s impact on the social, cultural and political life of the Bay Area.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c!-- iframe plugin v.4.3 wordpress.org/plugins/iframe/ -->\u003cbr>\n\u003ciframe loading=\"lazy\" frameborder=\"0\" height=\"200\" scrolling=\"no\" src=\"https://playlist.megaphone.fm?e=KQINC8955735736&light=true\" width=\"100%\" class=\"iframe-class\">\u003c/iframe>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Rae Alexandra, an arts and culture reporter here at KQED was frustrated.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Rae Alexandra: \u003c/b>I think I learned there were no statues of women. \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Or, there were very few.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It was 2018 and she had just found out that just 12 percent of San Francisco’s street names, statues, parks and public art honored women.\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Rae Alexandra: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">And that made me angry.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Meanwhile, the names of important men were everywhere. Anza, Coit, Sutro, Sutter, Polk, Taylor, Fillmore. I could go on. So for Women’s History Month, she made a pledge to find and honor five women from local history to write about for KQED.\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Rae Alexandra: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">So that just in case somebody wants to add a statue later, they might have an easy list to look at.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It seemed like a simple idea, but once she started looking, she found troves of stories to tell. Countless women whose impact on local life, culture, and politics was profound yet overlooked.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Rae Alexandra: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Then I kept dipping back in because I kept finding more women. Couple. I’ll just do another couple.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">What started as a month-long project grew into an ongoing series, and now a book. It’s out this month. It’s called Unsung Heroines, 35 Women Who Changed the Bay Area. Rae Alexandra is here to talk with us about it. Welcome, Rae. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u003cb>Rae Alexandra: \u003c/b>Hello. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>I think for a long time, people would look back on history and see a lack of women and think, well, women weren’t able to participate. They often didn’t have as much education as their male counterparts. It’s no wonder they couldn’t contribute as much. But that isn’t really true, is it? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003caside class=\"alignleft utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__bayCuriousPodcastShortcode__bayCurious\">\u003cimg src=https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/02/bayCuriousLogo.png alt=\"Bay Curious Podcast\" loading=\"lazy\" />\n \u003ca href=\"/news/series/baycurious\">Bay Curious\u003c/a> is a podcast that answers your questions about the Bay Area.\n Subscribe on \u003ca href=\"https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/bay-curious/id1172473406\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Apple Podcasts\u003c/a>,\n \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/podcasts/500557090/bay-curious\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">NPR One\u003c/a> or your favorite podcast platform.\u003c/aside>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Rae Alexandra: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">People kept saying to me, well, San Francisco is a gold rush town, and maybe there just weren’t many women here, and maybe the women here weren’t in a position to do anything, and I just, it didn’t ring true to me. Because where there is life, there are women, and where there are woman, there are useful things being done. So I just didn’t believe it. And, of course, now that I’ve done the digging, that’s absolutely not true. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">So many of the people who you profiled in this book are names that are new to me. And I work on a podcast that does a fair amount of history stories. How did you find these women and their stories? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Rae Alexandra: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I was literally at one point g\u003c/span>\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">oing through the indexes at the back of books and finding a woman who’d been mentioned twice and then trying to do some research on newspapers.com in newspaper archives to see, did they do anything else? And sometimes they did and sometimes they didn’t. The oral histories that libraries have online and archives have online were very useful. I was constantly looking, I got obsessive about looking for. Teeny-tiny plaques on the side of buildings. Is there a woman on that? Is there a woman that? So there were an awful lot of dead ends but when you find a good one it’s a real joy.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Do you feel like this book, do you hope that it will create sort of a more complete history of the Bay Area? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Rae Alexandra: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Absolutely. \u003c/span>\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The thing that I found in the course of writing this is that now that the book has put the women in chronological order, you kind of do get an overview of the Bay Area from the very beginning up to the present day, and it does reflect the social and cultural events of our entire history. But once I started looking at even major events that we think we all know, like the 1906 earthquake, when you start looking at it from an individual working class woman’s perspective, it gave me a completely different idea of what that whole crisis was at the time. Breaking history down to small individual people is very different to hearing it from fancy historians perspective.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I love that. And that’s part of what makes your book, I think, so compelling is really, you know, looking at everything through that individual female lens. Yeah. I’d love to get into one of these stories now. Can you tell us about Tianfu Wu, whose contributions in Chinatown have led San Francisco city leaders to rename a street in her honor just this month? So this is very topical.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u003c/span>\u003cb>Rae Alexandra: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">She was trafficked from China in the early 1890s. She was sold by her father to pay off gambling debts. She wasn’t told anything that was happening. She was just, she was told that she was gonna be going to visit her grandmother. She was dropped off, put in a boat. She was left with her supper and a toothbrush and her father just said, you know, stay here, be quiet, didn’t say goodbye. And that was it and she never saw her family again. And it wasn’t for lack of trying years later, she did try and track them down and was unable to. And she found herself in San Francisco. She was under the age of 10 at the time. She was basically a domestic slave and the second place that she found herself was a gambling den and the owner of that gambling den was very physically abusive to her. So she wound up getting rescued in 1894 by a group of Presbyterian missionaries who operated out of the Occidental Mission House. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I found a newspaper report about it, and the reporters said that she was in such a bad way that the police officers who were escorting the missionaries had tears in their eyes when they found her. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">And what was the Occidental Mission home? What was their larger purpose at the time?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Rae Alexandra: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I mean, it was literally taking in children and young women, because what happened to the trafficked children is that once they reached a certain age, once they got to be adolescents, then they’re sold into the brothel system. And the girls working in the brothels had very short life expectancies because of what they were coping with physically. So the missionaries would take the girls. They were giving them Christian educations. There was an element here of trying to rescue these people from a life of sin, as they saw it. But they were educated, they were housed, they had playtime. So Tien ended up going there. She was raised in the mission house. Within about 15 months of her being there, there was a new superintendent who came in named Donaldina Cameron. And she became a mentor and a teacher to Tien. When Tien was little and she first got there and Donaldina was quite a strict teacher and Tien was quite strong-willed, they would butt heads a lot. And they somehow met in the middle. And it became a very mother-daughter relationship. And the two of them wound up, as Tien reached her teens, they wound up working together. She started off as Donaldina’s aide, just because Donaldina needed a translator. She didn’t speak Chinese. And when they were on rescue missions, it was really important that someone be able to communicate clearly with the poor girls in these situations. The two started working more and more closely together. She was going on rescue mission. She was a travel guardian for any girls trying to get out of the country. She went to court against brothel owners, which was extremely dangerous. She got death threats all the time. And she even, as the girls got older and were trying to leave the home, she would even vet fiancees. She’d bring in the grooms and interview them about whether or not they were appropriate and financially stable enough for her young ones. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>Truly an auntie in that way. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u003cb>Rae Alexandra: \u003c/b>They called her Auntie Wu. Donaldina retired at a certain point and Tien basically took over the whole running of the Mission House. She was working as a fundraiser as well by that point. She didn’t retire until 1951 and at the time that she did retire from the Mission House, Donaldina was living down in Palo Alto and offered Tien the cottage next door to hers that she also owned and they lived side by side for the rest of their and they’re even buried next to each other. In Los Angeles, which I think is quite remarkable. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u003c/span>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Yeah, quite a partner o\u003c/span>\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">ver many, many years, and get us to modern times. I mean, Tien was an unsung heroine, perhaps getting a little bit of flowers now. What’s happening with her naming in the city? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u003c/span>\u003cb>Rae Alexandra: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">So, t\u003c/span>\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">he old Mission House is still at 920 Sacramento Street, they still work with women dealing with domestic violence every day. I mean, if you go in there in the afternoon, it’s full of kids having the time of their lives. They’re still doing great work. And last year, at the end of last summer, the manager of special projects at Cameron House, her name’s Leanne Mar came up with the idea of trying to get a street named after Tien And then they roped in District 3 Supervisor Daniel Sauter. And they now, the street behind the mission house where all of the children used to play is now named for Tien. It’s part of Joy Street. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">When we come back, we meet another unsung heroine from Bay Area history. Stick around. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Sponsor message\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>Rae, last night I attended one of your book launch events, a night of bingo here at KQED, where you told stories of the unsung heroines between each round. It was super fun, even though I didn’t win a single game, and I’m a little salty about it. But of the women you spoke about, one that especially stuck with me was the story of Charlotte Brown, who you suggested should be as much of a household name as Rosa Parks. Can you tell us about her? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Rae Alexandra: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Charlotte L. \u003c/span>\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Brown. I can’t remember how I stumbled across her exactly but as soon as I found her I was like why? Why do we not know who this woman is? And I do think that there was an active effort to erase her in some ways. So Charlotte took San Francisco’s omnibus railroad and cable company to court all the way back in 1863. So that’s almost a full century before Rosa Parks and it’s two years before slavery was officially abolished by the 13th amendment. So she was way ahead of her time. And taking on a large company at a time when black people only made up 2% of San Francisco’s population, this was really scary. But she had been traveling in April of 1863. She already had a ticket. She got onto the streetcar. And a conductor told her that she could not be there because there were white passengers.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">In your book you included some of her affidavit that she presented in court. Could you read from that so we can kind of hear her voice?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Rae Alexandra reading: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I lived one block from where I took the car. When the conductor first came to me and refused to take my ticket, I told him I thought I had a right to ride. It was a public conveyance. I told him I had long distance to go. I told him I would not get out. He took hold of my arm. I made no resistance. I knew it was of no use to resist. And therefore I went out and he kept hold of me until I was out of the car, holding on to me until I struck the walk. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> Wow.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Rae Alexandra: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">She went home and she told her family and she had really formidable parents. Her father, James E. Brown, had been enslaved until her mother, Charlotte Sr., who was a seamstress, had raised enough money to buy his freedom. So these were two both very determined people. And so her father and her took the cable car company to court and they won. And then her award got reduced to five cents, which was just the cost of the ticket. At the end of that, she got removed from another bus. So she and her father went back to court, and that time they had a much more sympathetic judge and she wound up winning $500. It was a definitive win.\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I love how bold it is. Like you’ve just finished this long drawn out court case with Omnibus Railroad, and then you go a couple of days later and you get back on the railroad.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Rae Alexandra: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">They just were not having it. This family was not having it. They knew that somebody had to stand up and do something about it. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">And what impact did this case ultimately have on the ability for black people to ride streetcars in San Francisco?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Rae Alexandra: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Honestly, it kind of didn’t help. That problem persisted. People of color continued to be removed from cable cars for many years afterwards. there wasn’t a state ban on street car segregation until 1893. Thirty years after Charlotte brought her case.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The book, by the way, is beautiful. I don’t know what this texture is on the cover, but it’s very pleasing to touch. Along with your 35 profiles, there were very nice illustrations of most of the women in the book. What was the process like to create those illustrations?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Rae Alexandra: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Adrienne Simms is a fine artist and illustrator. And I am astonished by what I gave her and what she produced from it, because one of the biggest challenges for this entire series was finding usable images. Sometimes that was impossible. Sometimes it’s me making a copy of a copy of a newspaper that’s 120 years old. So I was giving her like the worst, grainiest images in some cases, and she just sat with them and got to know the women and managed to, I think, give them the shine that they’ve deserved this whole time. I found it very moving to see her illustrations for the first time.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Well, it adds such a nice layer to be able to read these stories that have kind of been forgotten, but also see these women’s faces.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Rae Alexandra: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Some of these women I’m seeing for the first time with these illustrations. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Rae Alexandra, congratulations on your book.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Rae Alexandra: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Thank you so much, Olivia. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Thank you for coming to talk to us. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Rae Alexandra:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> Thank you. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Rae’s new book, \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://citylights.com/city-lights-published/unsung-heroines35-women-who-changed/\">\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Unsung Heroines: 35 Women Who Changed the Bay Area\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">, is available wherever books are sold. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">We are partway through our limited experiment with dropping two episodes each week, and we’d love to know, what do you think? Write to us at Baycurious at kqed.org. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Bay Curious Trivia is coming up on April 8th. Join us at KQED’s headquarters for a rousing game of trivia, where all the questions are related to the Nine County Bay Area. \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/event/6151\">Tickets and details at kqed.org/live. \u003c/a>\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Bay Curious is made in San Francisco at member-supported KQED. You can support shows like Bay Curious and projects like Rae’s Rebel Girls series with a donation at kqed.org slash donate. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Our show is produced by Katrina Schwartz, Christopher Beale and me, Olivia Allen-Price. Extra support from Maha Sanad, Katie Sprenger, Jen Chien, Ethan Toven-Lindsey and everyone on Team KQED. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Some members of the KQed podcast team are represented by the Screen Actors Guild, American Federation of Television and Radio Artists, San Francisco, Northern California Local. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I’m Olivia Ellen-Price. I hope you have a great day.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"info": "What kind of no sabo word is Hyphenación? For us, it’s about living within a hyphenation. Like being a third-gen Mexican-American from the Texas border now living that Bay Area Chicano life. Like Xorje! Each week we bring together a couple of hyphenated Latinos to talk all about personal life choices: family, careers, relationships, belonging … everything is on the table. ",
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"info": "The Political Mind of Jerry Brown brings listeners the wisdom of the former Governor, Mayor, and presidential candidate. Scott Shafer interviewed Brown for more than 40 hours, covering the former governor's life and half-century in the political game – and Brown has some lessons he'd like to share. ",
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"marketplace": {
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"title": "Marketplace",
"info": "Our flagship program, helmed by Kai Ryssdal, examines what the day in money delivered, through stories, conversations, newsworthy numbers and more. Updated Monday through Friday at about 3:30 p.m. PT.",
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},
"mindshift": {
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"info": "The MindShift podcast explores the innovations in education that are shaping how kids learn. Hosts Ki Sung and Katrina Schwartz introduce listeners to educators, researchers, parents and students who are developing effective ways to improve how kids learn. We cover topics like how fed-up administrators are developing surprising tactics to deal with classroom disruptions; how listening to podcasts are helping kids develop reading skills; the consequences of overparenting; and why interdisciplinary learning can engage students on all ends of the traditional achievement spectrum. This podcast is part of the MindShift education site, a division of KQED News. KQED is an NPR/PBS member station based in San Francisco. You can also visit the MindShift website for episodes and supplemental blog posts or tweet us \u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/MindShiftKQED\">@MindShiftKQED\u003c/a> or visit us at \u003ca href=\"/mindshift\">MindShift.KQED.org\u003c/a>",
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"order": 12
},
"link": "/podcasts/mindshift",
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"google": "https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly9mZWVkcy5tZWdhcGhvbmUuZm0vS1FJTkM1NzY0NjAwNDI5",
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"morning-edition": {
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"info": "\u003cem>Morning Edition\u003c/em> takes listeners around the country and the world with multi-faceted stories and commentaries every weekday. Hosts Steve Inskeep, David Greene and Rachel Martin bring you the latest breaking news and features to prepare you for the day.",
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"onourwatch": {
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"title": "On Our Watch",
"tagline": "Deeply-reported investigative journalism",
"info": "For decades, the process for how police police themselves has been inconsistent – if not opaque. In some states, like California, these proceedings were completely hidden. After a new police transparency law unsealed scores of internal affairs files, our reporters set out to examine these cases and the shadow world of police discipline. On Our Watch brings listeners into the rooms where officers are questioned and witnesses are interrogated to find out who this system is really protecting. Is it the officers, or the public they've sworn to serve?",
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"order": 11
},
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"on-the-media": {
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"title": "On The Media",
"info": "Our weekly podcast explores how the media 'sausage' is made, casts an incisive eye on fluctuations in the marketplace of ideas, and examines threats to the freedom of information and expression in America and abroad. For one hour a week, the show tries to lift the veil from the process of \"making media,\" especially news media, because it's through that lens that we see the world and the world sees us",
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"link": "/radio/program/on-the-media",
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"pbs-newshour": {
"id": "pbs-newshour",
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"tuneIn": "https://tunein.com/radio/PBS-NewsHour---Full-Show-p425698/",
"rss": "https://www.pbs.org/newshour/feeds/rss/podcasts/show"
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},
"perspectives": {
"id": "perspectives",
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"order": 14
},
"link": "/perspectives",
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"planet-money": {
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"title": "Planet Money",
"info": "The economy explained. Imagine you could call up a friend and say, Meet me at the bar and tell me what's going on with the economy. Now imagine that's actually a fun evening.",
"airtime": "SUN 3pm-4pm",
"imageSrc": "https://ww2.kqed.org/radio/wp-content/uploads/sites/50/2018/04/planetmoney.jpg",
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"link": "/radio/program/planet-money",
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"apple": "https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/planet-money/id290783428?mt=2",
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},
"politicalbreakdown": {
"id": "politicalbreakdown",
"title": "Political Breakdown",
"tagline": "Politics from a personal perspective",
"info": "Political Breakdown is a new series that explores the political intersection of California and the nation. Each week hosts Scott Shafer and Marisa Lagos are joined with a new special guest to unpack politics -- with personality — and offer an insider’s glimpse at how politics happens.",
"airtime": "THU 6:30pm-7pm",
"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Political-Breakdown-2024-Podcast-Tile-703x703-1.jpg",
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"order": 5
},
"link": "/podcasts/politicalbreakdown",
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"google": "https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly9mZWVkcy5tZWdhcGhvbmUuZm0vS1FJTkM5Nzk2MzI2MTEx",
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"possible": {
"id": "possible",
"title": "Possible",
"info": "Possible is hosted by entrepreneur Reid Hoffman and writer Aria Finger. Together in Possible, Hoffman and Finger lead enlightening discussions about building a brighter collective future. The show features interviews with visionary guests like Trevor Noah, Sam Altman and Janette Sadik-Khan. Possible paints an optimistic portrait of the world we can create through science, policy, business, art and our shared humanity. It asks: What if everything goes right for once? How can we get there? Each episode also includes a short fiction story generated by advanced AI GPT-4, serving as a thought-provoking springboard to speculate how humanity could leverage technology for good.",
"airtime": "SUN 2pm",
"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Possible-Podcast-Tile-360x360-1.jpg",
"officialWebsiteLink": "https://www.possible.fm/",
"meta": {
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"source": "Possible"
},
"link": "/radio/program/possible",
"subscribe": {
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"spotify": "https://open.spotify.com/show/730YpdUSNlMyPQwNnyjp4k"
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},
"pri-the-world": {
"id": "pri-the-world",
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