Last week's post showed some examples of the many and varied historical plaques that can be found in downtown Santa Cruz. I began to wonder where I'd find the oldest of these plaques. Arguably the oldest building is the one put up in 1866 by Alfred Baldwin. The two-story brick building, one of the few such to survive the 1989 earthquake, is now home to Lulu Carpenter's coffee cafe. The familiar blue "historic landmark" plaque, however, is definitely post-quake.
It turns out that attaching a plaque to an exterior wall is a relatively recent idea. At the Santa Cruz Civic Auditorium, a transition to such plaques can be seen from an older tradition - carving memorial information in a cornerstone.
Another interesting wall plaque (shown at left) can be found over a side entrance - the official City of Santa Cruz seal in use when the building was constructed.
Although its location high up on the wall makes it difficult to see details, the seal proudly depicts an old steam locomotive parked on a wharf, belching a column of smoke from its coal-fired boiler. To the left is a factory, also putting out a cloud of dense smoke.
The things Santa Cruzans are proud of have changed quite a bit since 1939!
Across Church Street, City Hall is a year or so older than the Civic, and a very simple dated cornerstone can be seen. At some more recent date, the City mounted a nice plaque just above the "1938" incised into plain gray concrete.
Still searching for the oldest downtown historical markings, I went to another venerable brick building - the 1882 Hall of Records, usually referred to as "The Octagon". There can be found a type of memorialization even older than cornerstones. The Octagon displays its date of construction and other decoration in the triangular area (the "tympanum") enclosed by the classical pediment over the entrance (sorry about the lamp post).
Across Cooper Street, the Leonard Building applied its name and construction date to the curved walls of the corner turret.
Moving back across the street, one local group deserves a mention for contributing many, many bronze historical plaques all over the county. The "Clampers" added one in front of The Octagon in 2018 (below left) - probably as part of the Abbott Square remodel.
Anyone curious about Santa Cruz history can learn a lot just by deferring that Pacific Cookie Company gratification long enough to stop and read the information provided on the many and varied historical markers.
