Marin History Museum June 2017 Newsletter

As a child, Belle Claire Brown (1872-1940) rode horseback to her Sausalito elementary school. Later she returned to teach in both Sausalito and at the Fourth Street Grammar School in San Rafael. A slight woman with dark hair and gray eyes, she was a founder of Larkspur’s Women’s Club and Public Library. Brown served as Marin Chairwoman for the California State Landmark Commission, where she obtained protected status for the site of Sir Francis Drake’s landing, Reed Mill, and Mission San Rafael Archangel. We remember our Miss Brown most fondly as the first President (1935) of the Marin County Historical Society.

Source: Marin History Museum

Source: U.S. House of Representatives

Without philanthropist William Kent (1864-1928), Marin’s hillsides might be unrecognizable. In 1905, a thick stand of coastal redwoods on the southwest flank of Mount Tamalpais was to be flooded as a reservoir. Kent purchased the canyon for $45,000 and donated the land to the Federal government. In 1908, President Roosevelt renamed the track as Kent requested: Muir Woods National Monument. Kent also founded the Marin Municipal Water District to save Mount Tamalpais from fire, protect water, and create a park. As Congressman (1911-1917), he sponsored the legislation to establish the National Park Service.

Born in Tomales as the youngest of seven children, Major Newell Vanderbilt (1874-1945) graduated from the Mt. Tamalpais Military Academy where he became an academic and military instructor. After returning from the Spanish-American War, he received a BS degree from the University of California. Commissioned a Major in 1908, Vanderbilt and his wife, Effie Murray of San Rafael, resided on Fifth Avenue across from the Mt. Tamalpais Military Academy where he served as President from 1917 until the school closed in 1925. In retirement, the Major opened a nursery on Union Street in San Rafael, gaining fame for breeding delphiniums and classifying camellias.

Source: Marin History Museum

In the MHM archives are the records of the organization from the first day that it was incorporated.  Among those records is an Acquisition Book that records what

was given to the museum.

The first item recorded was this photograph of Chief Jose Calistro.  It was discovered by M. Trumbell  while doing government research work on the premises of W.J. Irving in Nicasio in 1936. Calistro was said to be the last full-blooded Indian chief in Marin County.  When the San Rafael Mission was closed in 1830, Governor Figueroa ordered the remaining Indians at the mission be given 80,000 acres of mission  lands.  They chose acreage on the Halleck Tract of the Rancho de Nicasio in Nicasio.  Timothy Murphy oversaw the move from San Rafael to the land in Nicasio and encouraged them to use the agricultural skills they had learned at the mission.  With Murphy’s help they were able to provide food and clothing for their families.  However, in 1844 the courts broke up these grants and re-granted the property to others.

“Chief John Calistro finally gathered up all the remnants of Indian properties and with the proceeds purchased some thirty acres… , thereafter making an attempt to uplift his people in a final struggle against the insidious voices of the white man.  But this little band was surrounded by every kind of demoralizing influence and the settlers were too busy to banish the vagabonds preying upon them.  It was soon necessary for the county to support these disheartened remnants of a once great race…” 

Usually it takes two to start a Ford:  one to push the button while the other cranks her up. Now, the other day ye editor happened to notice a young fellow piloting one of these “maokhines” all by his lonely.

There was plenty of gas in the tank but it was a hot day and he was out of “steam,” so he stopped a moment to tank up.

Then, in order to start off again he had to crank her up — well, he attached a cord make of sundry assorted pieces of rope, string and thread to the “button,” slipped his cord through the steering wheel, gave it a jerk twisting his crank at the same time, and off she went; and that was all there was to it, and so there you are.