How the Town Became a City: Santa Cruz, 1876 - (May 26, 2012)
The City Hall location shows how downtown development steadily progressed from its beginnings at the lower plaza toward the bay. By 1877, most of the early adobe or rough plank-sided one-story commercial buildings around the plaza had been replaced by much more detailed two-story structures of wood or brick. Santa Cruz Public Library has an online gallery with several early photos of the lower plaza, taken from the bluff at the end of School Street. As late as 1866, the brick Flatiron Building was the only "modern" structure. That all changed in the ten years from 1867 to 1877. Beginning at the plaza, the new-style buildings marched steadily south along Pacific Avenue and Front Street, and up Mission Street.
The lower plaza itself got the earliest new buildings. The 1867 St. Charles Hotel (at left in the photo) once stood on the corner of Mission Street and River Street (now North Pacific), where little Scope Park is today. The St. Charles got a third story in 1873, with a mansard roof in the trendy "Second Empire" style. Elihu Anthony built a new "Anthony Block" in 1877 (at right in the photo) to replace the original 1848 one-story wood building that stood about where the Town Clock is today.
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Looking at that corner today, you'll wonder how there was room for such large buildings. The parcels along the north side of the lower plaza were much larger back then, before Water and Mission Streets were realigned and widened.
Speaking of the Town Clock, the building that originally supported that clock tower was built in 1873. Known as the Oddfellows Building because it was home to the Santa Cruz chapter of that fraternal organization, the tall clock tower made it a local landmark.
The original wooden tower (shown at far right in this photo from before 1894) was rebuilt in brick after being damaged by fire in 1899. A comparison of the photos of the original tower and today’s Town Clock reveals that, when the tower was rebuilt, it was also somewhat redesigned.
Another funny story about the clock - most would agree these days that it’s pleasant to hear the clock chime the hours (the recorded sound is pretty good) as you’re walking around downtown, but that wasn’t always a welcome sound. In 1929, when the clock still stood atop the Oddfellows Building, the chimes were shut down because of complaints from residents in nearby hotels. So, from 1929 to 1976, that sound was not heard in Santa Cruz.
In 1964, the tower was removed and put into storage when the Oddfellows Building was remodeled. Ironically, the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake doomed the Oddfellows Building, but the unwanted clock tower was safe. In an early example of “reuse, recycle, restore”, the Oddfellows clock tower became the top section of the present Town Clock, completed just in time for the nation’s centennial in 1976.
Where did the Oddfellows meet before getting their own building? There's some disagreement. In an 1870 "bird's eye" view of town, The two-story building at left in the photo (with two oriel windows) is identified as the Oddfellows Hall and Post Office. John Chase, however (who I trust more), says the Oddfellows met until 1873 in the 1868 McPherson Building at the corner of Pacific and Locust (two buildings to the right in this 1880 photo).
The McPherson Building was the Sentinel’s first self-owned home. The newspaper offices moved from rented space in the building right across Locust Street (with a sloped roof in the photo). More irony – the brick building owes its survival through the 1989 earthquake to the fact that it was damaged by an earthquake during construction. While repairing the damage, the builders added iron reinforcing work to strengthen the brick walls, and so it still stands today, though remodeled several times.
Built for brothers Duncan and Alexander McPherson, who by that time owned the Santa Cruz Sentinel newspaper, the building remains today and is the third oldest building on Pacific Avenue (after Zoccoli’s and Lulu Carpenter’s). Never an especially attractive building, today's version - with a partial third-story and an unfortunate Mission Revival-style remodel - doesn't impress. Only the pizza parlor on the corner retains any of the old brick-wall-and-iron-cast-front charm.
Note the more-or-less chronological pattern of new building activity moving south down Pacific Avenue: the 1868 McPherson Building is closer to the lower plaza than the 1873 Oddfellows Building or the 1877 City Hall.
Speaking of the Town Clock, the building that originally supported that clock tower was built in 1873. Known as the Oddfellows Building because it was home to the Santa Cruz chapter of that fraternal organization, the tall clock tower made it a local landmark.
The original wooden tower (shown at far right in this photo from before 1894) was rebuilt in brick after being damaged by fire in 1899. A comparison of the photos of the original tower and today’s Town Clock reveals that, when the tower was rebuilt, it was also somewhat redesigned.
Another funny story about the clock - most would agree these days that it’s pleasant to hear the clock chime the hours (the recorded sound is pretty good) as you’re walking around downtown, but that wasn’t always a welcome sound. In 1929, when the clock still stood atop the Oddfellows Building, the chimes were shut down because of complaints from residents in nearby hotels. So, from 1929 to 1976, that sound was not heard in Santa Cruz.
In 1964, the tower was removed and put into storage when the Oddfellows Building was remodeled. Ironically, the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake doomed the Oddfellows Building, but the unwanted clock tower was safe. In an early example of “reuse, recycle, restore”, the Oddfellows clock tower became the top section of the present Town Clock, completed just in time for the nation’s centennial in 1976.
The McPherson Building was the Sentinel’s first self-owned home. The newspaper offices moved from rented space in the building right across Locust Street (with a sloped roof in the photo). More irony – the brick building owes its survival through the 1989 earthquake to the fact that it was damaged by an earthquake during construction. While repairing the damage, the builders added iron reinforcing work to strengthen the brick walls, and so it still stands today, though remodeled several times.
Note the more-or-less chronological pattern of new building activity moving south down Pacific Avenue: the 1868 McPherson Building is closer to the lower plaza than the 1873 Oddfellows Building or the 1877 City Hall.
