Berkeley’s July Fourth celebration a century ago was combined with a “Defense Day” event to highlight military readiness for future wars, the Berkeley Daily Gazette reported.
Shattuck Avenue was lined with flags on 10-foot staffs downtown that merchants set up at 8 in the morning on Saturday, July 4, 1925, when three buglers from the Veterans of Foreign Wars sounded “Assembly.” Unexpected news that day was a “parade of umbrellas” downtown as a rare July rainstorm “let go with desultory downpours during the early morning hours.”
More than a 10th of an inch of rain was measured on the UC Berkeley campus. That made the month one of the three wettest Julys to date in Berkeley’s recorded weather history. There were patriotic speeches, music and athletic games at the Berkeley High School athletic field and “not a single motor mishap” in Berkeley that holiday weekend.
Earthquake news: The July 1, 1925, Gazette carried the story of the “thrilling escape” of a Berkeley resident from Southern California’s recent earthquake in Santa Barbara.
“Struck on the head and rendered unconscious when the building in which he was sleeping collapsed during the earthquake … was the fate of Edward D. Griffith, of 2010 Virginia Street” in Berkeley. “When he regained consciousness he found himself in a pile of brick and mortar in the wreckage of the home on West Montecito Avenue, where he had a room.
“He crawled out through a hole and aside from a sore head from the blow, a few bruises and his glasses missing, he was uninjured.”
L.E. Blochman, of 2011 Regent St., was staying in the Hotel Carillo and was “obliged to escape by a fireman’s ladder after the elevators and stairways were filled with falling bricks from the wrecked building.”
Naval visit: On July 3, 1925, U.S. Navy Secretary Curtis D. Wilber, accompanied by his wife, “slipped off the train at the University Avenue station in Berkeley and spent the day visiting at the home of Chief Justice Louis W. Myers at 163 Alvarado Road.”
Although he was scheduled to inspect midshipmen at Mare Island on July Fourth, his primary reason for coming to the Bay Area was for the marriage of his son, Lyman D. Wilber, to “Miss Henrietta Shattuck, of Berkeley.” The wedding was held July 6 at Stanford Memorial Church. Secretary Wilber’s brother was Stanford University’s president.
Apartment sale: On July 1, 1925, the Gazette reported the sale of the Castle Crag Apartment building at 2525 Durant Avenue by its original builder, F. J. Conner, to an “Oakland capitalist” for about $80,000.
The structure, built by Conner “15 years ago … was among the earliest of the better-grade apartment buildings and has always proved popular among a select clientele of Berkeley people. Many of the tenants have lived there since the building opened,” according to the Gazette.
That same apartment building still stands, one of a row of three older structures on Durant’s north side, between Bowditch Street and Telegraph Avenue.
Fire safety: “Weed burning to start on Monday,” the Gazette reported July 3, 1925. This involved city crews managed by the fire department to burn off grass and brush in vacant Berkeley lots.
“More than 6,500 lots have been condemned after surveys and posted with notices. The work will take several weeks,” the paper reported.
Earlier precautionary burning had not proved possible because grasses were too green, according to the fire department.
No smallpox: “Berkeley is free from smallpox now” was a headline in the July 2, 1925, Gazette. The article reported that “there were some 20 cases reported to the health office, none of them severe.”
Bay Area native and Berkeley community historian Steven Finacom holds this column’s copyright.