Stanford Village, Menlo Park
Sara
Tanke
My
first view of Stanford Village was in late June 1961. My husband had been
accepted into the Stanford University graduate program in Asian history, and we
had secured an apartment in Stanford Village, student housing located in Menlo
Park. The week we moved in, the temperature in Menlo Park was 107°, and I was
eight months pregnant. My clearest memories from the days before my son was
born on July 17 are of decorating his room with large copies of Tenniel
illustrations from Alice in Wonderland and
of refinishing, outside on the back porch, an antique cradle that his aunt had
given us.
We
rented our two-bedroom apartment for around $59 a month. But the low rent was
not the most important advantage of living in Stanford Village. I was a
twenty-four–year-old inexperienced mother whose own mother and mother-in-law
were many miles away. In Stanford Village I found friendly mothers older than I
who had two or more children and were very helpful and supportive.
It
was a congenial environment, with a babysitting co-op, other young families to
socialize with, and experienced moms to go to for advice. The back porches of
the apartments faced each other across a large grassy area shared by children
and parents.
Stanford
Village had 300 apartments, dorms to accommodate 1,500 men, a laundry, general store,
and nursery school. It was located on Middlefield Road at Ravenswood Avenue in
Menlo Park, where SRI International stands today. The map on the next page
shows Stanford Village in 1954. The buildings not shaded in black included
barracks-style apartments and dorm rooms. I read in the Stanford Daily of 1964 that there had also been a post office,
barber shop, drycleaners, soda fountain, butcher shop, bowling alley, service station,
and a chapel. Truly a village!
Here is a picture of me, my son, and a little of our apartment.
Stanford
Village in 1954
(Stanford
Research Institute buildings are shaded in black)
Map courtesy of SRI International
In researching
the history of the land on which Stanford Village stood, I learned that Ohlone
Indians inhabited the area when the Spanish colonized Alta California in the
late 1700s. The Spanish government granted a tract of land to José Dario Argüello
in 1795. Among Argüello’s posts were commandante of the presidios of San
Francisco and Monterey, and, briefly, governor of Alta California. This land grant,
named Rancho de las Pulgas, was confirmed later by the Mexican government and,
subsequently, by the U.S. government, as Alta California changed hands. Rancho
de las Pulgas contained around 35,000 acres; it was bounded by San Mateo Creek on
the north, San Francisquito Creek on the south, the Bay on the east, and the
hills on the west. The rancho was sold by the Argüello family in 1859.
The
development of the Peninsula—as the area south of San Francisco, bounded on the
east by the Bay and on the west by the Pacific, was called—was facilitated by the
completion of the railroad from San Francisco to San Jose in 1864. People and
cargo could travel back and forth easily, and many wealthy San Franciscans built
summer homes on large estates on the Peninsula.
In
1864, William Barron, one of the directors of San Jose’s New Almaden mine,
purchased 280 acres, bounded by the railroad, San Francisquito Creek, and what
would be Middlefield Road and Ravenswood Avenue. Barron developed the estate,
bringing in water for lush landscaping and a trout pond, and creating a deer
park. He had a gatehouse built as the entrance to the estate, the sole
remaining building today.
Milton
Latham, former senator from California (1859–1863), bought the estate when
Barron died in 1871. Latham purchased the fountain, which remains on the
property, in France. He sold the estate
in 1883 when he moved to New York.
The
estate was purchased by Mary Hopkins, the widow of the railroad magnate Mark
Hopkins, who, along with Leland Stanford, was one of the “Big Four,” the
founders of the Central Pacific Railroad. The estate was not far from the
summer estate of Leland and Jane Stanford. In 1888 she gave the 280-acre estate
to her adopted son, Timothy Hopkins, as a wedding gift.
From
the 1890 official map of San Mateo County,
Library
of Congress
 |
A page from the
Sunset Seed and Plant Co. catalog of 1895
|
The
Sunset Seed and Plant Company on the map on page 3 was Timothy Hopkins’s
business from about 1881 to 1898. The page from the 1885 catalogue on page 4
shows the greenhouses of the nursery. Hopkins was on the board of the Southern
Pacific Railroad, which founded Sunset
magazine in 1898. According to Kevin Starr, State Librarian of California, the
magazine was named in honor of the passenger train, the Sunset Limited, which
began operation in 1894 between New Orleans and San Francisco via Los Angeles.
The name “Sunset” was already in use by Timothy Hopkins’s business, so it’s
unclear which came first. In 1951 Sunset magazine
moved from its San Francisco offices
to a remnant of the Hopkins estate, where the Hopkins Sunset Seed and Plant
Company’s nurseries had been located.
The
1906 earthquake damaged the Hopkins summer residence so severely that he moved
his summer home to the gatehouse, which he enlarged. Timothy Hopkins, who was president of
Stanford University from 1908 to 1914 and a trustee until his death in 1936,
bequeathed the property to Stanford. His wife continued to live there until her
death in 1941.
In
1942 the estate buildings were demolished except for the gatehouse and its
gate. The United States Army leased the gatehouse to use as officers’ quarters
during World War II. The US government bought 140 acres of the Hopkins
estate. And in 1943 the Army built the Palo Alto General Hospital, soon renamed
the Dibble General Hospital (after Colonel John Dibble who was killed in a
military transport plane crash in 1943).
The hospital cared
for soldiers injured in the South Pacific. It specialized in plastic surgery,
blind care, neuro-psychiatry, and orthopedics. At its peak it had 2,400 beds.
(For comparison, the entire town of Menlo Park in 1940 had a population of only
3,258 residents.)
At
the end of the war, the City of Menlo Park purchased twenty-nine acres of the
Dibble General Hospital grounds on which the civic center buildings were
erected.
Stanford University took over around eighty-six acres to provide
needed housing because of the increase in student enrollment caused by veterans
entering on the G.I. bill. Stanford remodeled the hospital buildings,
installing bathrooms and kitchens, to accommodate approximately 2,000 students. The area was known as Stanford Village, and existed as
student housing until the mid-1960s. This land was also the site of the
Stanford Research Institute, a think tank established by Stanford. In 1970, in
response to Vietnam War protesters at Stanford who claimed that it was part of
the military-industrial complex, Stanford Research Institute became independent
and was renamed SRI International.
[\
We
moved out of Stanford Village in 1962 because my husband left graduate school
to return to his previous position at Stanford University Press. However, my
son went to the Stanford Village nursery school from 1964 until the nursery
school on the Stanford campus was built in 1966.
The
gatehouse of the Hopkins estate was listed on the National Register of Historic
Places in 1986. It is the oldest existing structure in Menlo Park. The Junior
League of Palo Alto-Mid Peninsula and the City of Menlo Park renovated the
gatehouse in 1996, and the Junior League became the tenant.
In
August 2014 I moved into an apartment across the street from the gatehouse.
One
day on a walk down Laurel Street, which borders SRI, I noticed some
army-barracks-style buildings. They were clearly from the era of the Dibble
General Hospital. A chainlink fence prevented me from exploring. I knew that
SRI had a closed campus and was reluctant to visit.
The
gatehouse, built by William Barron in 1864, with
the
fountain, purchased by Milton Latham in France, in the foreground
Fellow
students in my genealogy class encouraged me to pursue my interest, so one day I
braved the receptionist at the main entrance to SRI. It turned out that
“braved” is the right word. The receptionist was a fierce guard dog, who not
only refused me entrance, but also refused to contact a superior to inquire
whether I could enter or even to give me the name of anyone I could write or
call. It was fortuitous that someone of authority walked through the lobby
during this exchange. The receptionist directed me to him, and, unsurprisingly,
he was very hospitable and, after I explained my mission, took me on an
extended tour of the old buildings that were on the grounds. I took some photos
of the exterior of several buildings, but declined his offer to go inside since
the interiors had been extensively remodeled. This aerial view of SRI shows some
original buildings from the Dibble General Hospital that are still in use.
With
the visit to SRI, I feel that my story of Stanford Village is now complete.
Bibliography
- Cain, Julie. “From Floral Paradise to Commercial Nursery and Back: The Saga of the Barron/Latham/Hopkins Estate.” Eden: Journal of California Garden & Landscape Society, Vol. 15, no. 1 (Winter 2012).
- Gulker, Linda Hubbard. "Menlo’s oldest mainstay: The Gatehouse." InMenlo.com. January 24, 2010. Accessed March 12, 2017. http://inmenlo.com/2009/10/16/menlos-longest-mainstay-the-gatehouse/.
- “The Junior League of Palo Alto-Mid Peninsula.” Accessed February 18, 2017. https://www.thejuniorleague.org/
- "Menlo Park City School District." History of the District & Community / Thurlow Estate becomes Dibble General Hospital becomes SRI Int. Accessed February 16, 2017. http://district.mpcsd.org/Page/143.
- San Mateo County Genealogy Blog, “San Mateo County Places.” Accessed February 16, 2017. http://smcgs.blogspot.com/2015/04/san-mateo-county-places.html.
- The Stanford Daily, Volume 125, Number 47, 28 April 1954, “Future of Stanford Village”; Volume 145, Number 67, 28 May 1964, “Last Days of the Village”; and Volume 154, Number 21, 18 October 1968, “Last Days of the Village” [again].
- Streatfield, David C. "The San Francisco Peninsula's Great Estates." Eden: Journal of California Garden & Landscape Society, Vol. 15, no. 1 (Winter 2012).
- Sunset Magazine, 1888-1998 - Historical Portraits and Bibliography. Accessed March 03, 2017. http://web.stanford.edu/dept/SUL/library/sunset-magazine/index.html.
- "Sunset Seed & Plant Co. (Sherwood Hall Nursery Co.): Internet Archive. Accessed February 20, 2017. https://archive.org/details/sunsetseedplantc1895suns.
- “Timothy Hopkins: Palo Alto Founder.” The Tall Tree: Newsletter of the Palo Alto Historical Society, Vol. 35, no. 3 (December 2011). Accessed April 25, 2017. http://www.pahistory.org/
_________________
Sara
Tanke, an on and off member of SMCGS for several years. has lived in the SF Bay
area since 1959. Prior to that she lived
in Pocatello, Idaho and Fayette, Missouri.
Sara has been passionately engaged in genealogical research and writing
about her family history since 2004. You can contact Sara at
tankesara @ gmail.com.
© 2017 Sara Tanke - Please contact author for use of any portion of her story.
---------------------------------------
Get ready for the next Story event!
Craig Siulinski is presenting Life Story Writing, Enriching Your Family History at CGS this Saturday May 27. He will also be teaching a 10 week class at the College of San Mateo Continuing Education on Saturdays in the Fall, watch for details.
© 2017 Sara Tanke - Please contact author for use of any portion of her story.
---------------------------------------
Get ready for the next Story event!
Craig Siulinski is presenting Life Story Writing, Enriching Your Family History at CGS this Saturday May 27. He will also be teaching a 10 week class at the College of San Mateo Continuing Education on Saturdays in the Fall, watch for details.
