Half Moon Bay Memories & El Granada Observer

http://community-2.webtv.net/Velpics/HUM/

Be sure to go from page to page, 5 pages in all.

Thanks to Darlene Waegner for sending.

(Photo: Home that belonged to Vic Guerrero, son of Francisco. Later it was used as a small hotel).

Francisco Guerrero continued to spend a great deal of time in San Francisco. In 1850 he was murdered as he stood near the corner of Mission and 12th Streets. The fatal injury occured when a man following him on horseback struck him about the head with a slingshot.

On April 12, 1863 as Tiburcio Vasquez was seated near a window in a Half Moon Bay saloon, a volley of gunshots rang out. When it was all over, Vasquez was found dead, and the elusive murderer escaped.

At the time both Vasquez and Guerrero were witnesses for the prosecution in the famous Santillian land fraud case.

….end…

(Photo: In better times, this is what Pablo Vasquez’s barn looked like. Located near the Main Street Bridge in Half Moon Bay, it was demolished in the 1977s).

This left the northern 7,766 acres of the Corral de Tierra to Francisco Guerrero. Throughout his career, Guerrero held various political jobs in San Francisco. The common dividing line between the two halves of the Corral de Tierra was determined by the Arroyo de en Medio Creek in Miramar.

Guerrero built a ranch house known as te Guerrero Adobe on a hillside near a creek about one mile northeast of Princeton. Until 1906 the house was in fair condition, and included four rooms on the ground floor with an attic above. A porch extended across the entire front.

Tiburcio Vasquez constructed the first adobe in Half Moon Bay. Consisting of five small roms, it stood on the north bank of Pilarcitos Creek, northwest of the bridge in Half Moon Bay. His youngest son, Pablo, built a frame house nearby (now headquarters of DelMar Properties, a real estate firm). Pablo loved horses and he opened a livery business in an old barn near his home. The barn, erected in 1846, and which had fallen into severe disrepair, was demolished on February 18, 1977 as ordered by the City of Half Moon Bay.

…to be continued…

In the 1840s the Corral de Teirra was divided intow two Mexican land grants. Tiburico Vasquez (sometimes confused with his nephew, a notorious bandit hung in San Jose in 1875) ran two thousand head of cattle and 200 horses on his 4,436-acre rancho.

Vasquez didn’t just fall from the sky; he had been the supervisor of the Mission Dolores livestock in San Francisco when he applied for the southern portion of this immense land grant.

…to be continued…

Festive rodeos lasting several days were commonplace around Miramar in the 1840s. Accompanied by much merry-making and feasting, the round-ups included scores of “rancheros�, or owners, and their cowboys or “vaqueros.�

These exciting occasions were highlighted with spirited competition among the vaqueros to excel in horsemanship and use of the lasso.

Cattle chosen for later slaughter were lassoed by the vaqueros; thrown down and burned with owner’s hot brand. Otherwise the wild animals were released and allowed the roam another year on the Corral de Tierra.

The Corral de Tierra [encompassing the present day communities of Montara, Moss Beach, Princeton, El Granada, Miramar, stretching to Pilarcitos Creek in Half Moon Bay] means earth corral. It was so named because the surrounding geographical features form a natural enclosure for cattle.

Up until 1840 Mission Dolores used the land for grazing. The Coastside was isolated territory, cut off from civilization by mountainous barriers, and the hills concealed a considerable population of mountain lions and grizzly bears.

…more…

(Photo: The Bathhouse, where, in 1910, a big party was held to celebrate its opening.)

The abundance of new street signs planted in the dark loamy soil must have been an eerie sight: street signs, concrete sidewalks, some fields of artichokes and no houses. Or maybe they were signs of hope, of future, prosperous neighborhoods, home to happy families.

Realtor Charles Wagner was a very good salesman, who captured imaginations, selling $6000 worth of lots on one occasion alone.

On a cool September night in 1910, the Granada Bath House–a symbol of the “Coney Island West” built overlooking the Pacific Ocean near Surfer’s Beach–was officially opened with a big party. Three hundred guests, including two bus loads of the Moss Beach elite, dined and danced to the music of Popken’s Orchestra.

Two incompatible forces were moving parallel lines. Prospective lot buyers flocked to the Coastside while local agriculture and quarrying thrive. Reportedly, in 1910, 2500 Ocean Shore Railroad cars were filled with fruit, vegetables as well as stone from the Ebalstone and Ransome Quarry and the Sand Pits. The Coastside produced one of the largest crops of hay and grain ever.

…more…

Lucky to know it; lucky to be living it.

I think all of us who live in the Half Moon Bay area are exceptionally fortunate. It is a special place and a special place in time and a special place in geological time. Yes, a paradise–maybe not to be experienced in exactly the same way in 100, 200, 500 years from now– the perfect weather, the fine people, the lifestyle. There is nothing better.

It’s a thriller, a spy novel about the war, right now…sounds like the truth…Sizzling Hot….

will rip your heart out–and it’s one of the most violent movies I’ve seen lately.