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Events: The Train Wreck of May 23, 1880
While train rides in the Santa Cruz Mountains were sometimes fun affairs and more usually just a part of a person’s daily commute, in the afternoon of Sunday, May 23, 1880, an excursion trip became the...
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Sources: Subdivision Plans
Almost every property in Santa Cruz County and in the surrounding areas was once a part of a larger property. On the coast and in the Pajaro Valley, most of these were Mexican ranchos. Elsewhere, they...
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Companies: Union Mill & Lumber Company
The story of the Union Mill & Lumber Company shares its origin with the Alpine Lumber Company in that both began with Hubbard Wilson McKoy, an early settler in the Felton area. In 1871, McKoy’s...
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Curiosities: Railroad School and District
Santa Cruz County was still an isolated community in the late 1860s when the first suggestion of a railroad to San Francisco entered the columns of local newspapers. From 1863 to 1866, an increasing...
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Car Stops: Arana Gulch and the Catholic Cemetery
The eastern limits of the municipal area of Santa Cruz—once comprising the City of Santa Cruz and the Township of Branciforte—have long been set at Arana Gulch, a depression formed by Arana Creek,...
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Curiosities: The Beach Street Cafe
What is the oldest commercial building on Beach Street in Santa Cruz? Is it the Casino and Neptune's Kingdom—the former Plunge Natatorium? Is it the Carousel or Giant Dipper? Or is it something people...
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Stations: Ellicott
Rancho San Andrés west of Watsonville hosted four Southern Pacific Railroad stations at various times, but the oldest and most versatile was Ellicott near the modern-day junction of Buena Vista Drive...
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Stations: Spring Creek
Like all of the other railroad branch lines in the Santa Cruz Mountains, the Loma Prieta Branch played host to a few short-lived stations. Spring Creek takes the award for being the shortest, while...
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Maps: Santa Cruz to City Limits
Mapping industrial areas can be a difficult task even when all the factors are known, and it is much more difficult when there remain unknowns. Santa Cruz's West Side industrial area remains poorly...
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Sources: Evolving Terminology
Everything is not always as it seems, and this is certainly the case when researching history. From changing colloquialisms to evolving definitions to extinct words, there is a wide range of linguistic...
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People: The Porter Family
There are a surprising number of tributes to members of the Porter family in Santa Cruz County. Donald T. Clark in his book, Santa Cruz County Place Names, includes the Porter Family Picnic Area,...
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Railroads: San Vicente Lumber Company Railroad
Far up Santa Cruz County’s north coast, Scott Creek winds inland from the Pacific Ocean along a gradually climbing path up to its source near Little Basin. Less than two miles from the coast is a...
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People: The Colton Family
 The Big Four of the Central Pacific Railroad left a significant legacy across California. In Santa Cruz County, the initial construction of what would become the Santa Cruz Branch was delayed twice...
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Stations: Swanton
Santa Cruz County has many towns and villages that found their footing once the railroad arrived. Most of the communities along the North Coast, though, existed in some form by the time the Ocean Shore...
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Curiosities: Bay State Cottage
John T. Sullivan and his wife were recent arrivals from New York when they became the proprietors of the Bay State Cottage in Santa Cruz in the summer of 1885. Sullivan was Irish born, but heralded...
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Infrastructure: Wyes
A wye is a common railroad track feature that can serve several different purposes. Usually triangular or Y-shaped, hence the name, the primary purpose of a wye is to allow a locomotive to reverse its...
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Bridges: Live Oak Area
The Santa Cruz Railroad had a goal—indeed a requirement—if it wanted to earn its first subsidy payment in 1874: it had to build 5 miles of operable railroad beginning in Santa Cruz and heading east....
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Curiosities: Santa Cruz County's Borders
What is Santa Cruz County? It is perhaps a strange question since it seems easy to answer: Santa Cruz County is an administrative division on the California coast surrounded by Monterey, San Benito,...
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Sources: Family History
The family history and genealogy industry is booming, with people now able to even analyse the DNA of their pets. In the United States and other former colonies with large populations descended from...
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Stations: Nuga
Out on the fringe of Watsonville Slough, 0.5 miles from the nearest road, the Santa Cruz Railroad Company established its least known and most remote stop, a place that the Southern Pacific Railroad...
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Stations: Watsonville Junction
Along the northern edge of Rancho Bolsa de San Cayetano, the gently meandering Pajaro River flows ever closer to the sea, leaving on both sides a vast, silted floodplain that provided the foundations...
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Curiosities: Coastal Shipping
Santa Cruz County did not always have rail services. Before 1876, travel to the remote northern cove of the Monterey Bay was difficult, with roads sometimes impassible and seas too rough to travel....
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Stations: Monte Vista
The Loma Prieta Branch of the Southern Pacific Railroad is the only line in the Santa Cruz Mountains where the terminus was substantially moved. Yet both of its terminal stations were given the same...
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Companies: Maywood Manufacturing Company
Everett W. Eyer liked the name of his hometown so much that he brought it with him to Santa Cruz. In 1931, he began producing commercial-grade unfinished furniture from a small workshop in the south...
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Curiosities: Stagecoach Lines
Before the arrival of the railroad to the Monterey Bay, people used other modes of transportation to traverse the Santa Cruz Mountains and reach San Francisco. For some, the primary methods were...
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