Happy Holidays

Here are a few links to Library of Congress blogs and materials to get you in the holiday mood.

Songs of the Winter Season Collected by Sidney Robertson Cowell  Collected by the California Works Progress Administration 1938-1939.  Here you'll find some wonderful ethnic and folk songs for the holidays.

Topics in Chronicling America: "Please tell me the truth, is there a Santa Claus?"  "In 1897, Virginia O'Hanlon writes to the New-York Sun with a simple question and the response goes on to become the most famous newspaper editorial ever published....This topic page provides useful information for searching about the famous "Yes, Virginia, There is a Santa Claus" editorial in Chronicling America's historic newspapers, including significant dates, associated search terms, as well as sample article links... Read more about it!"  Click on the links to the articles on the bottom to put yourself in a holiday mood.

Highlighting the Holidays: Tree Time at the Wright Brothers’ House

Highlighting the Holidays: A Kodak Moment

After checking out these holiday links take a side trip to the LOC Blog Page and sign up for those that interest you.

San Mateo County First Families Blog

Russ Brabec actively researches Daly City and Colma Pioneers.  He's compiled family histories using records in the San Mateo County Record Depository, newspapers and other resources. Check out his list of available families the San Mateo County First Families blog.  While you are there check the other pages where you will find links to cemeteries, place histories and more.  This is a slowly growing collection of San Mateo County materials.  Do you have information you'd like to share?  Are you looking for information on early San Mateo County residents.  Contact publications@smcgs.org to contribute to the blog.

San Mateo County Cemeteries: Sunset View

San Francisco’s Cemetery for the Paupers and the Indigent

By Russ Brabec

The San Francisco City Cemetery [also known as the Golden Gate Cemetery] at the site of the present day Palace of Legion of Honor was ordered closed in 1898, to the pleasure of the Outer Richmond District residents of San Francisco.  No burials were to be made after March 1898.  With nowhere to bury these souls, undertakers searched for land that would be approved as a new paupers cemetery.  A. Verkonteren in 1899 saw the benefit of burying paupers on property that he thought he owned in northern San Mateo County.  His widow, Olive Verkonteren, quickly sold the land in 1899, and the cemetery operated by the Hagen brothers, James, Joseph, and William, grew to encompass a full square block of the Abbey Homestead Association subdivision east side of Hillside Boulevard. The ledger books containing the burials, which for a long time were thought to be lost, were given in 2013 to the Colma Historical Association by Olivet Memorial Park. The books cover the years 1901-1904, 1907-1919 and 1922-1948.  The book for the period 1905 and 1906 may have been lost in the 1906 earthquake and fire, and burials because of that event may have overwhelmed the record keeping. The cemetery is not maintained and the gravestones were removed many years ago. "The land is currently owned by the privately held Cypress Abbey Corporation." 

• The Colma Historical Association is located at Hillside Boulevard and ‘F’ Street in Colma.

• San Francisco Public Library has a few pictures of the cemetery in earlier years. 

• A few interments are listed on Find-A-Grave .