Waterfront News: Part II … Fighting City Hall

By Steefenie Wicks

The talents of the writers for the waterfront papers were rich and strong with the belief that rumors on the waterfront were more dangerous than the speculation of what was being written and who was writing it. 

In 1976 the “Waldo Point Garlic Press” was published on the waterfront and sold for 25 cents a copy.  The front cover of an issue published in December, 1976, has Phil Frank writing about the “Railroading of Frank Anderson,” who owned a nursery in town. Frank Anderson had been part of Sausalito since the 1920’s and was known and loved by many of the residents in town and on the waterfront. He was an outspoken figure who soon became a political cause as he faced off with the City over his property rights and faced eviction.  Phil Frank took up his cause and the front page of the Garlic Press Vol II issue no. 2, published in December of 1976 took on the town. Phil wrote:

The Railroading Of Frank Anderson …..

“It would probably make a good situation comedy for prime time TV viewers … an irascible old timer in a small town with a flair for the absurd, sets himself up in a nursery business that also dabbles in firewood, coal, railroad ties, pots plants and Victorian house parts.  Suddenly, the real estate that he occupies becomes prime commercial development property as the little town goes BIG.  Ensuing episodes show the old nurseryman up against the Southern Pacific Railroad, local commercial developers, city council and the county sheriff.  Sort of a ‘Walton’s’, ‘Beverly Hillbillies’, and ‘Ma & Pa Kettle’ in which the small town folks battle for their livelihoods and lives against, ‘PROGRESS.’

“For it was Frank Anderson who in the 1960’s sounded the alarm, ‘THE DEVELOPERS ARE COMING!’ as he watched his much loved downtown Sausalito fall store by store to the purveyors of jewelry, fashions, tourist gee-gaws and fast food services.  He watched the entire City oriented services disappear just because someone wanted to make a fast buck.

“He watched them drop, month by month … the florist, the barber, the cleaners, the Western Union, the music store, two groceries, the upholsterer, the shoe repair, the butcher, baker, laundry then the auto garage, the cigar store, the theater, the Porthole and the variety store. He watched all of these City oriented services disappear just because someone wanted to make a fast buck.

“A perennial thorn in the City Council’s side, Frank Anderson has, by means of an ever-watchful eye and an unflagging criticism, fought the Carmel-ization of Sausalito.”

It was apparent as shown in Phil Frank’s article, that the waterfront newspapers became the forum for articles that spoke to the communities not only on the waterfront but up on the hill.  This form of communication played an important part in helping to organize, not only the waterfront, but also the Sausalito Community.  This was a continuation of a movement that was fast turning into a political entity being born on the waterfront.

 

Phil Frank in his studio at Gate 3 in September, 1983.

Photo courtesy of Steefenie Wicks

Waterfront Newspapers: Part I … The Beginning

By Steefenie Wicks

From the mid 1970’s and well into the 1980’s when the Marin public was reading its newspapers, The Independent Journal, The Pacific Sun and the Marin Scope, there was a need on the Sausalito waterfront to have its own newspapers so that they could tell what was fact/rumor and what was fiction.   The Sausalito waterfront became the front page of many newspapers both local and national with its very public battle between developers and the waterfront community at the Waldo Point Harbor. Many residents of the waterfront community felt that the real story was not being told.  The real story that was being lived by the individuals and families of Waldo Point Harbor, who felt their existence was under attack by their own government.   Today we might call this group of waterfront residents the first to “Occupy” the waterfront.

Original and freethinking folks who tend to not play to the norm have always occupied the Sausalito waterfront.  This original thinking would lead to the birth of the first waterfront newspapers because the feeling was that the “straight” newspapers had no idea of what was happening and how it was turning into a political “hot bed”.   Enter the waterfront newspapers that were meant to serve only the residents who both lived and worked on the waterfront but somehow ended up on the dining room tables in homes on the hillside in Sausalito.  The small waterfront communities of Gate 6, Gate 5, Gate 3 and Galilee Harbor were to be the main recipients of this news that concerned them and their waterfront existence.   For it was during this time that the County found itself in an advocacy position against waterfront dwellers, believing them to be illegals and squatters inhabiting valuable space in this beautiful location.

The Garlic Press, Fresh Garlic, Knee Deep, Scuttlebutt, The Scuttlebutt Bulletin and the HARBORGRAM of Galilee Harbor, were the newspapers printed on the waterfront-by-waterfront residents and told carried the latest facts on the stories and rumors having to do with the political status of waterfront dwellers.

In 1977 the first issue of  ‘FRESH GARLIC’, was produced and its intended purpose was to serve the residents of Richardson’s Bay.  It sold for 10 cents a copy at the local Sausalito liquor store on Bridgeway.  Many waterfront residents felt that the new development plan of adding a new Pier that would house up to 150 new vessels would economically exclude them and their families.   The new plans for the area did not included a playground for the children.  The residents felt that the new developers saw no need to include children as part of the future of their project.

Many who wrote for the waterfront news papers felt that the waterfront was being was being fought over as if it were a favorite toy that was being sought after by County developers while the real residents were being evicted with no rights to appeal this movement.  The waterfront newspapers provided a format to talk back to the developers and the County government and make feeling known that all would not go quietly into the night.

Waterfront residents like Ale Ekstrom, who has lived in the anchorage for the pass 45 years, wrote many of the early articles that appeared in ‘FRESH GARLIC’.  Ale’s article, titled “Arrivals & Departures’ “ gives his insight into what was taking place.

The following is an excerpt from his article:

Arrivals & Departures At Waldo Point Harbor..

 “The week went by, the sounds of industry muted but prevalent.  Last Sunday was profaned by the continuing thump bump of maul and snarl of chainsaws carving the newest pier of green copper oxide treated wood spiked to creosote treated piles.  Someone must be anxious to finish the showpiece, but so far the link to the shore has been held back.  I suppose that last stage awaits the new iron barred and barbed wire gate, fashioned on special order by some delighted local blacksmith with lock and card coded key & alarm system.  Locked gates can stop traffic both ways.  Perhaps the new management will promise to prohibit dogs.  It’s not realistic to expect dog owners to be responsible.  Responsible government and responsible property management are supposed to be expected, but expecting one hand and “bleep” in the other; see which one fills up first.  Tumultuous behavior sure is tiring.  Summer soldiers throwing themselves into the ditch: I would have thought it more fun to pitch someone else into the ditch.  Everyone seems to be missing something, but none agree on what it is.  It it’s not too many dollars and not enough cents, it might be prayer and patience, less tiring than tumultuous behavior.  Repent or perish! How often is GOD on the wrong side?”

In conclusion it should be noted that Waldo Point Harbor is still in the process of development 34 years later.

Collage of early waterfront newspapers.

                                                Photo courtesy of Steefenie Wicks

Where was Otis sitting?

By Larry Clinton, President, Sausalito Historical Society

An August, 2010 MarinScope column presented two versions of the origin of Otis Redding writing his signature song, “(Sittin’ On) The Dock of the Bay” on a Sausalito houseboat.  Local author Derek Van Loan set the momentous occasion at Commodore Heliport, but  longtime Chronicle music critic Joel Selvin recalls that Redding was staying on Main Dock at the time. We invited comment from anyone who could shed further light on this controversy.

Last month we heard from Joe Tate, longtime waterfront dweller and former leader of the Redlegs, the legendary rock n’ roll band that formed in the houseboat colony during the late sixties. Joe says, “I was there and I saw Otis on the Main Dock.  I was staying on the Main Dock and one day we saw Otis walk to the end of the dock and sit down.  He stayed there for at least an hour.  When he left, Mike Bloomfield, who was also staying on the dock, saw him too. I asked Mike ‘Is that Otis Redding?’ He was very sure of it.”

Bloomfield, a blues legend himself, reached national prominence with the Paul Butterfield Blues Band. Tate still performs regularly at various Sausalito venues.

It appears that Redding wrote only the beginnings of the song in Sausalito. According to liner notes for a  DVD of vintage Redding television performances, Dreams to Remember: The Otis Redding Story, Redding “had come off his famed performance at the Monterey Pop Festival just months earlier in June 1967. While touring … he continued to scribble lines of the song on napkins and hotel paper. In November of that year he joined producer and guitarist Steve Cropper at the Stax recording studio in Memphis, Tennessee.”

Cropper, a frequent collaborator of Redding’s, told NPR’s Fresh Air that he helped Redding  complete the music and melancholy lyrics. “Dock of the Bay” was recorded on November 22, 1967 with additional overdubs added the following month.

Redding continued to tour after the recording sessions, but on December 10, his charter plane crashed into a lake outside Madison, Wisconsin. Redding and six others were killed.

Within days, Cropper was back in the studio performing the final mix of the song, which would become Otis Redding’s greatest hit – and his lasting legacy to the world.

Otis Redding, inspired by Sausalito

Sausalito Water: "The Sweetest on the Coast."

by Annie Sutter

This story appeared in the Fall 1991 issue of the Historical Society Quarterly. It has been modified.

In the rolling hills of what came to be known as Sausalito, fresh water springs and streams were abundant. They poured down to the bay, creating marshes and watering holes visited by deer, elk, mountain lions and even grizzlies. The water was also enjoyed by Indians who built steambaths or "temescals' in their beach huts, some of which were in the little cove at the south end of Sausalito which later came to be known as Whaler's Cove.

The area was first mapped by Juan Manuel de Ayala of the bark SAN CARLOS in 1775 and named Saucelito after the willow trees on shore. Other ships' logs had it noted as South Salieto, San Solito, and finally as Sausalito. The word circulated by visiting ships said that Sausalito's water was the sweetest on the coast and was reputed to stay fresh longer than any other. Ships took on both wood and water at the cove beginning in the 1820s, and according to the log of Captain Beechey of the exploration vessel H.M.S. BLOSSOM, William A. Richardson, an English sailor who arrived in San Francisco in 1822, had a profitable little water business going at Whaler's Cove by 1827. Richardson made it easy for visiting ships to find the anchorage with the sweet water - he put out the word for ships to announce their arrivals outside the headlands by cannon, then his crew of Indians would paddle out and guide them to the anchorage. In the 1830s, a "traveler of the period", William Osborne, observed ships' crews throwing casks overboard, tying them together through the handles and towing them ashore "like so many sea serpents." They were lugged up the hillside, filled and rolled back down to waiting longboats. A tedious task, and doubtless one with high cask casualties.

The watering facilities soon were expanded. During the 1840s a cistern was built along with a series of flumes to carry water down to the beach. In "Historic Spots of California," written in 1937, we find an idea of what remained: "Captain Richardson piped water to a great cistern 30' square and 15' deep which he had dug for the purpose. From this cistern pipes were run on a trestle and thence to a boat, the WATER NIXIE, and transported to San Francisco and distributed by horse and mule-drawn carts for the price of fifty cents a bucket." Another account has the hull of the ship CORDOVA being put to anchor in the cove and used as a cistern to which ships' longboats repaired for water. In the 1850s Richardson had added two more boats to his fleet, to carry water and sell it in San Francisco. He also began selling oysters (125,000 bushels annually were reportedly shipped to the city), produce, horses and cattle. In the 1850s the cistern became known as "The Water Works", a business which changed hands several times until it became a part of a large land purchase by the Sausalito Land and Ferry Co. in 1868, which continued to sell Sausalito's "liquid gold."

This photo, c1852 was taken a few years after the whalers visited the shores at the cove to take on wood and water, when rudimentary buildings and piers had been built.

Courtesy Sausalito Historical Society.

Gold in Hurricane Gulch

By Larry Clinton

Back in July of 1896, the San Francisco Call reported on the discovery of gold in a Sausalito creek.  As you can imagine, such a find created quite a stir. Here are excerpts from the article and subsequent reports:

Sergeant John Hayes is a State employee at the head of a little squad of policemen who look after the interests of the Board of Harbor Commissioners. He lives over in Sausalito at the head of Hurricane Gulch, named that way on account of the wind that sweeps down through it at all times, even when the remainder of Sausalito is calm and sweltering…

Back of his residence… is the bed of a creek… Last Sunday the policeman and some of his friends discussed mining and miners, topics quite familiar to Hayes, who was a miner in days long past in the environs of Pike’s Peak…It was all very interesting until the climax came. The dirt was all washed out of the pan, and there, in the residue were four little bright yellow specks… There was plenty of black sand, almost an infallible indication of good pay dirt, and some fine gold flakes were gathered in. But most of the gold was found on an adjoining piece of property… belonging to a man named Miller. So it was decided that before the news of the gold find was made known that particular piece of property must be bought up.

The property is triangular in shape and the major part of it is on a 45-degree fall to the creek and is valueless. Still, Miller was willing to sell the whole thing for $250, so Hayes says.

The day set for the purchase was yesterday, when an ill-advised newspaper was inconsiderate enough to publish the fact that there had been gold discovered in Hurricane Gulch, back of the Hayes cottage…

Miller read The Call yesterday morning, and when Hayes and his partners, Messrs. Root, Gilfett and Bloomer, who were all interested in the venture, ran Miller down and offered him the $250, that gentleman smiled and asked for a week’s time in which to think over the matter.

“He’ll want all prices for it now!” exclaimed Hayes, when seen yesterday afternoon by a Call reporter.

“That article should never have been published until I got hold of the property, and I’d show you how gold is panned out.”

Years ago there was considerable mining done north of Hurricane Gulch, but it never paid sufficiently to warrant extensive working… so it is comparatively a virgin field…

Two days later, the plot thickened when the Call reported:

Sgt. Hayes does not intend to let this discovery remain undeveloped.  He already has mapped out a scheme to form a mining company, the members of which own property along the banks of the stream.

“I do not want to be a bug, and I am willing to give my neighbors a chance,” said he enthusiastically yesterday, the fire of positive assurance and enthusiasm shining in his eyes…

“If I can form a company of my neighbors, each man putting up so much, and when the mine has been thoroughly worked each man taking his dividend, minus the expenses, which I do not believe will aggregate more than $2500, I will tell you, sir, each man of that twenty will not be obligated to work any more for a living…

“I shall see Mr. Miller to-night and make a fair proposition to him. I was the first to discover gold on this property, therefore I believe I have a miner’s lien on it.” 

The gold fever first taken by Sergeant Hayes in his own home has spread with wonderful rapidity. Yesterday morning, on an early boat to Sausalito, three men on horseback, having at their saddles picks, pans and blankets, took passage, according to Sergeant Mahoney, for Hurricane Gulch to stake out claims there, and later in the afternoon three of the regulation canvas-topped wagons that years ago traversed the plains drawn toward that loadstone, Pike’s Peak, were carried across on the Sausalito, destined for the newly discovered gold field in the gulch.

One month later, gold fever seemed to be subsiding:

Sergeant Jack Hayes…will soon close his bargain and purchase the land adjoining his… “Just before the rainy season begins,” said he yesterday, “I shall build a dam and sluice on my land and work the soil of the creek bed below for all it is worth. I know what I am talking about and I know I will find enough of the metal in the river bottom there at least to remunerate me and I believe to give me a comfortable sum in the bank.”

Mysteriously, there are no further newspaper reports of the mining operation, and the City of Sausalito has no record that a claim was ever filed. The County Recorder’s office has records of mining claims and grant deeds dating back to 1850, but  when I went there to check out this story, the records for the 1890s were missing.  So, was this a mini-bonanza for Sgt. Hayes, an attempted land grab, or perhaps an investment scam?  If we turn up any further information, we’ll put it in a subsequent column.

 

“House of the Bay-Window,” the residence of Sergeant Jack Hayes, who claimed to have discovered gold in the gulch just to the left of the tank.

San Francisco Call woodcut courtesy of Sausalito Historical Society