Half Moon Bay Memories & El Granada Observer

Hello June.

Some of your readers interested in the Ocean Shore R.R. may not know that efforts to resurrect it began almost as soon as it was abandoned. Jack Wagner’s THE LAST WHISTLE is the best reference.

I recall several San Francisco newspaper articles during the 1930s; and as a teenager I got up the nerve to go to the company’s office in downtown S.F. to inquire of its progress, and met the President, George Middleton. The office was shared with a mining company–either Alaska-Juneau Gold Mining or Bunker Hill. I can’t remember and don’t know of any relationship with the new OSRR.

Mr. Middleton said the line would re-enter San Francisco by the old, seldom-used Southern Pacific’s Ocean View line. That track was now in the heavily built-up Mission District where people in homes could practically shake hands with the engine crew if a train ever went by. I remember being skeptical that the City would permit it.

Apropos of that time, I have a copy of the December, 1935, issue of “Railroad Stories” magazine and the article “The Ocean Shore Comes Back” by G. H. Kneiss, which told of the expected rebuilding, mainly to exploit the timber resources of the Butano Forest, close to the original route, but never reached.

There are a number of court cases involving the OSRR from that time on the Internet, mainly dealing with the railroad’s suits for incursions on its former right-of-way, some becoming precedents for other cases.

One of the more interesting is a 1941 appeal re an earlier decision about the injury from falling rocks in June, 1936, to a power shovel operator engaged by the railroad to clear the blocked north portal of the Pedro Point tunnel. A few months earlier the shovel had been “almost completely buried” by a slide at the south portal. I find it almost incredible how the shovel made it to the south portal.

This was before Hwy. 1 had been re-routed closer to the coast, and so the shovel had to have taken the long route past Green Canyon and over Devil’s Slide on a roadbed neglected for over fifteen years. What problems the operator encountered can only be imagined. Mr. Wagner’s book chronicled how all these efforts came to naught.

Angelo

These were published long after the Ocean Shore Railroad expired by the Western Railroaders.

Here’s Barbara Vanderwerf’s acclaimed book (and the only one that focuses on “Granada“.)

More recently, former Pacifica Tribune editor, Chris Hunter, wrote a well-received book about the Ocean Shore for Arcadia, for more info, click here

Here’s the granddaddy of all the Ocean Shore Railroad Books, and I think the best one: The Last Whistle by Jack Wagner

(Photo: Is this the Ocean Shore Railroad smokin’ through Pacifica?)

Mr. Vonderlin, I’ve enjoyed reading Half Moon Bay Memories and El Granada Observer as well as your Pescadero Memories, particularly references to the OSRR, which I became acquainted with in the late 1920s.

My uncle took my brother and me on a hike along the right-of-way from Thornton to Mussel Rock. Though the rails had been torn up, still it was obvious a railroad had been there.

In 1939 I made several bike trips down the coast from San Francisco, once climbing to the top of the collapsed tunnel at Pedro Point to view the grade south to Devil’s Slide. And I also drove to Santa Cruz in a friend’s Model A Ford, borrowed from his brother, always looking for OSRR remnants.

At Pescadero beach it looked like grading of the dunes had been done south of the “mysterious tunnel” bluff you described. On a much later visit I found the tunnel portal, and since the grading I’d seen earlier would have led to the tunnel site, I surmised that the OSRR had built the tunnel either as a pilot bore, or to use it to blow down the hillside for easier grading.

Your north portal pictures puzzle me as they don’t appear to coincide with this surmise. I’ve never seen anything about this in the OSRR literature.

Re the Palmer Gulch Trestle: I have a photo of it given to me in 1939 that shows the trestle had already started to sag in the middle. About 1960 a friend and I hiked down to it; by then it was sagging noticeably. On the north side was a large, weathered (tool?) box, about 12′x4′x4′ roughly. It had an old padlock on it which we left as is.

We walked across the trestle, and my friend took pictures, of which I have a couple. Unfortunately, they are now badly faded (Polaroid camera?). but the rotted ties are still evident. I don’t believe it burned down because I saw an internet picture of it taken a few years after our crossing, and it was in nearly collapsed condition, and the text said it totally collapsed shortly after. Regrettably I didn’t add it to my OSRR “favorites,” and have never found it on the Web again.
Thanks again for your interesting memories of the San Mateo coastside.

Angelo Misthos, Sebastopol CA.

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John Vonderlin replies

(email John: benloudman@sbcglobal.net)

Hi June,
I received this interesting email today. It reminded me the tunnel (s) story is not a mystery solved. I’ll get back to it. The gentleman from the cemetery has said he’ll show us it, so maybe it exists. I sent Angelo a picture of a burnt timber, though that might have happened after collapse. I loved that he lives in Sebastopol. I used to have a wonderful ranch/family orchard in the hills west of town during the Seventies. George Lichty, the cartoonist of “Grin and Bear It,” fame lived across the street. The Thomases who owned the American Opinion Bookstore (John Birch Society–remember them?) were at one corner, two gay interior designers from S.F. on another and a schoolteacher couple who were Sufis on another. A great time in my life to recall. Where has my youth gone?
Larry Fitterer and I are going to be lowering ourselves down the cliffs into “The Notch” and Acid Beach on April 9th or 10th. Yee-Haw. Hopefully, I won’t break my typing fingers or anything else. Enjoy. John

Old Coast Railroad by Galen Wolf

America has always sensed the humor of its early and sometimes haphazard transport. It is found in the ballads “Old Ninety-Seven” and “Casey Jones”. Or, in lighter vein, the “Toonerville Trolley.”

The Ocean Shore Railroad, for all the desperate need for its services to unlock the landbound coastside, ws loved, cussed and laughed at in equal proportions.

About the turn of the century, Half Moon Bay was truly disconnected. The little steam schooners that served as models for Peter B. Kynes’ “Green Pea Pirates,” had given up. The long wharf at Amesport (Miramar) was soon in bad condition.

The road to Half Moon Bay from San Mateo was fine blue macadam,

(Photo courtesy TP)

as far as the top of the mountain grade. From then on, it was a scraped dirt road. A road of the country, the clay and adobe of the fields.

In winter, this section ws hubdeep with mud. Sometimes four horses hitched to a light spring wagon would wrestle a half dozen crates of artichokes or sprouts to the top of the grade for transhipment.

The stage had bad days when the going was a wearisome three hours.

A few years later, Charlie Knapp performed miracles with an old Mitchell, but it was hardly consistent service.

So the promise of a railroad was an exciting hope to all of the coastside. And what a railroad it was to be! What a joyful, bouncing, squeaking, unreliable and intensely lovable train it became!

The main depot at Eleventh and Mission streets in San Francisco, was truly humble. The rolling stock, gathered from who knows what defunct branch lines, was varied, but always picturesque.

The engines were dragons…snorting, steaming, belching smoke, leaking steam everywhere and truly fire-breathing…the ideal of railroad balladry.

As one left the depot, the train climbed weakly up the gradient of Islais Creek. It then plumped down happily to Salada Beach, Vallemar, Rockaway and Pedro.

Here serious railroading began. A short tunnel, bolstered by dubious timber, brought one beyond Shelter Cove.

Ahead was the formidable monument of granite, Devil’s Slide. It had to be surmounted, could not be bypassed.

Read the rest of this entry »

From the San Francisco Call, December 7, 1912

“It is regrettable that the railroad commission found it advisable to permit the Ocean Shore railroad to discontinue the operation of a northbound train reaching San Francisco at 8:40 a.m. Morning communication is still maintained between Half Moon Bay and San Francisco, but at an early and inconvenient hour. Property owners who invested in homes along that railroad did so with the towns along the Ocean Shore would be actually suburban to San Francisco. The curtailed service will work serious hardship upon them during the winter months.

“Some day the Ocean Shore railroad will be a successful road. Natural conditions, the fertile land through which it passes, the scenic attractions of its route along the Pacific, the rapid transportation it will furnish, when completed, between San Francisco and Santa Cruz and the potential freight along its tracks and proposed route insure a remunerative traffic. But now it is in a bad way.

“Ultimately this road will be taken over by a bigger system, completed and made tributary to a continental line. California has room for the construction of new roads. The proposed line from Watsonville into the San Joaquin valley might make beneficial connnection with the Ocean Shore; the railroads now with San Francisco terminals might incorporate the Ocean Shore into their systems. The Ocean Shore has a future, but it deserves to have a present.”

From San Francisco Call, Nov. 6, 1912

“One hundred and thirty-six residents along the line of the Ocean Shore railroad petitioned yesterday to order the company to put on an extra train for the accomodation of those having business in San Francisco.

“They complain that the schedule the railroad proposes to inaugurate November 10 provides for insufficient service and businessmen living between San Francisco and Halfmoon Bay would be compelled to arise before sunrise in order to reach this city in the morning for work to take a train that would land them here at 7:40 o’clock.

“They ask that the schedule be arranged for arrival at 8:40.”

(Photo: “Longbridge” at Tunitas Creek, courtesy Redwood City Main Library)

Cont’d from SF Call, Oct 17, 1908

“Contractors started to work yesterday on the bluffs between San Gregorio creek and Long Bridge [Tunitas Creek]. Several hundred men and teams are at work grading the right-of-way between these two points, and it is expected that this part of the route will be completed in about 90 days.

“Contractors are also preparing to grade the right-of-way between Pescadero and San Gregorio. Work will be rushed as rapidly as possible to open the line to Santa Cruz in time for next summer’s business.

“The earnings of the Ocean Shore are increasing monthly, and as soon as the rod is open to Long Bridge, a large increase will come from the fact that it will be more advantageous for shippers between San Gregorio and Pescadero to ship by railroad than over the mountains to Redwood City by team.

“The following statement of earnings during the past nine months shows a healthy state of business and indicates large profits for this railroad as soon as it is open to Santa Cruz and Watsonville. In March the road ran only to Pedro Valley, and since June to Granada.

“The earnings are as follows: January, $4,406.62; February, $5,325,33; March, $8,904.47; April, $8,392.32; May, $12,373.27; June, $12, 621.46; July, $18,558.76; August, $19625.35;Sept, $21,066.23.

…to be continued…

From the San Francisco Call, Oct. 17, 1908

“Ocean Shore Road Open To Half Moon
“Graders Are Working On Bluffs Between San Gregorio Creek and Long Bridge

“The Ocean Shore railway this week extended the running schedule of daily trains from Granada to Half Moon Bay proper and Arleta Park. The company is now operating at this end of the line 30 miles of railway, running four trains daily and eight trains on Sundays.
“The grading between Arleta Park and Long Bridge [Tunitas Creek] is about completed and this laying of rails will commence next week. Chief Engineer Rogers says the trains will run to Long Bridge, which is three miles north of San Gregorio, about Nov. 15.”

…to be continued

The office building on the right is devoted to “Granada.”

Across from Wienke Way–at one time the way to the beach and the Moss Beach Hotel– on present day Hwy 1.

Passengers & the Ocean Shore Railroad, possibly near El Granada

(Photo Spanishtown Historical Society. Visit the SHS at the historic jail on Johnston Street in Half Moon Bay.)

Ocean Shore Railroad at Montara in the early 20th century
Photo: Marjorie Borda

Marjorie Borda, who sent me these photos, was born in Montara in 1912, in the Wheeler House. Her father, Willard B. Scott, worked for the Ocean Shore Railroad as a “telegrapher”, first at Montara, later at remote Tunitas Creek where she recalled artichokes as the main local crop.

Photo: The Wheeler House in Montara

Marjorie and her brother, Will, at Tunitas: