3000 B.C. Earliest evidence of human occupation in the San Francisco Bay Area; sparse hunter gatherer population
2000 B.C. Intensive human occupation of the Fremont coastal plain; beginnings of people specializing in the unique bay and marsh ecosystem (i.e.; shell mounds at Coyote Hills)
400 A.D. Ohlone culture (as encountered by the Spanish) established
1769 Ohlone population on the Fremont Plain estimated between 600 and 1200. Two tribal groups documented in the mission records. The Alson territory may have included Mission San Jose and Newark, while the Tuibun territory became Decoto and Alvarado
1772 Fages-Crespi expedition into the East Bay
1776 Juan Bautista de Anza expedition into the East Bay
1797 Mission San Jose established at the village called Oroysom
1797 2 September: Josefa, first baptism at Mission San Jose
18 September: First Christian burial ceremony at Mission San Jose
24 September: First Christian marriage at Mission San Jose
1806 Father Duran and Father Fortuny arrived; Lansdorff visited; cornerstone for perma-nent church placed by Chief Tarino; mission cemetery laid out.
1806 Measles epidemic
1809 22 April: Dedication of Mission Church
1811 January: Ohlones Cemetery dedicated
1814 A new soldier’s barracks was built, all roofed with tile. The barracks consisted of six apartments for the soldiers and their families, each with a kitchen on the side, a guard house, and a storage room
1820 A water-powered mill was built
1821 Mexico declared independence
1826 Captain Beechey visited
1827 Jedediah Smith visited
1829 Alfred Robinson visited
1830 Kit Carson visited
1833 Father Jose Maria de Jesus Gonzalez Rubio replaced Father Narciso Duran
1836 Jose de Jesus Vallejo appointed administrator; mission secularized
1837 Mission inventory; Vallejo adobe begun
1840 Jose Ainador replaced Vallejo
1842 Father Muro replaced Father Rubio
1846 John Fremont camped here; ship Brooklyn brought first Americans
1848 Treaty with Mexico; gold discovered
1849 Gold rush; Beard bought the mission; H. C. Smith opened store
1850 Post office established April 9, Red and North Hotel opened, California became 31st state September 9
1852 Mission San Jose photo; Rev. Brier taught school; Homer’s stage
1853 Alameda County created
1854 Strauss & Co. store opened
1858 Public school by Mission Pass Creek
1868 Earthquake destroyed the church; second public school built at Ellsworth and Vine; town surveyed
1869 Wooden church built
1877 Sunset Telephone and Telegraph Company
1878 Ancient Order of United Workmen organized
1879 Washington Hotel remodeled
1881 Juan Gallegos bought Palmdale
1884 Fire destroyed both sides of street; Gallegos Winery and water system built
1885 Fire Department organized
1890 Catholic seminary built; Victorian rectory built
1891 Dominican Sisters purchased seminary
1894 Fire destroyed west side of street
1897 Mission centennial celebration
1901 Standard Electric Light Co. Station
1905 Lachman bought Palmdale
1906 Earthquake damaged power house, Mission Hotel, and some houses
1909 First Chamber of Commerce organized
1913 Third public school built on Mission Boulevard
1916 Mission restored
1917 World War I began; Newark substation opened; Mission station closed
1919 Father John Leal came,Starr and Best bought Palmdale
1932 New fire district formed
1934 Firehouse built on Vallejo Street (now called Mission Boulevard)
1941 World War II began
1947 Sesquicentennial celebration
1949 Sisters of Holy Family bought Palmdale; Olive Hyde Center begun
1950 Mission remodeled
1950—1980 Antique stores flourish in village
1951 Chamber incorporated
1952 Houses under construction
1954 Fire station built on Anza
1956 Bryant Street School opened; City of Fremont incorporated; City Hall in former Mis-sion San Jose School
1960 St. Joseph School opened
1962 Olive Hyde donated buildings and parking lot to City of Fremont
1964 1-680 Freeway funnels traffic to Mission Boulevard; Mission High School opened
1965 Voters approve formation of Fremont-Newark Junior College District
1965 St. Joseph Parish Hall; Stanley playground
1967 Ohlone College opened at Serra Center
1968 St. Joseph wooden church closed; City Hall moved
1970 I-680 Freeway completed
1972 Ohlone College construction
1973 Committee for Restoration of the Mission San Jose formed
1974 Gallegos house moved up the hill
1976 U. S. Bicentennial celebration
1977 Father William Abeloe came; de Guadalupe sign removed
1979 Historic rectory moved; archeological work and official start of reconstruction of Mission Church; Callison Day Home built
1982 St. Joseph Church moved to San Mateo
1985 Church reconstruction completed and dedicated
1991 Dominican Convent Karcher Library dedicated
1993 Dominican Sisters centennial celebration
1995 Museum of Local History opened; Gary Soren Smith Fine and Performing Arts Center opened at Ohlone College
1996—1997 Mission San Jose bicentennial celebration
1997 Bicentennial Plaza groundbreaking (Two centuries at Missiom San Jose, 1797 - 1997; p. 223-225)
| The site of the City of Fremont, California was selected by the Spanish in the late 18th century as the location of their east Bay settlement. Using Ohlone (Mi-Wuk) Indians as labor, they built Mission San Jose (which stands today) in a climatically comfortable site warmed by inland canyon breezes and developed the area for farming, ranching, soap production, flour production, leather tanning, salt farms, and, of course, shipping. Once Mexico had obtained freedom from Spain in 1822, Church lands were secularized. In the case of Fremont, its namesake, General John C. Fremont, reduced Mission San Jose’s vast holdings to 28 acres and divided the remaining territory into large ranchos which he granted to Mexican land barons.
During the 1849 Gold Rush (which more-or-less coincided with the United States' take-over of California), the landscape changed again as settlers from the East and immigrants (most notably from Portugal) arrived to purchase and to squat the ranch and farm lands. In order to provide this farming area with a minimum of political structure (i.e., two elected justices of the peace and two elected constables), the County of Alameda in 1853 created the Washington Township (the 148 square miles now known as the Cities of Fremont, Newark, and Union City). In this stable agricultural community of orchards and vegetable fields, the loose reins of the county sufficed for government structure and control for almost 100 years. Eight small commercial centers, "towns," developed within the township to provide food, supplies, and gas to the rural community. They included: Niles, Irvington, Hardscrapple (euphemistically renamed Centerville), Mission San Jose, Warm Springs, Alvarado, Decoto, and Newark. [Aside: I am a little confused because I have read a different report describing the 6 towns of Washington Township being Alvarado, Mission San Jose, Centerville, Washington Corners, Vallejo Mills, and Harrisburg. Maybe there was more name changing.] While Newark developed industry, the other areas remained overwhelmingly agricultural and provided a Sunday destination for Oakland and Berkeley families to drive and purchase fresh produce. The only non-agricultural industries that developed included: Leslie Salt Company along the bay; a 1912 silent movie studio, Essanay Productions, near Niles (which brought Charlie Chapman, Wallace Beery, and Ben Turpin to town), seasonal fruit canning, a sugar beet refinery, sand and gravel quarrying which spawned a tile and clay manufacturing company, and Pacific States Steel plant in Niles established in 1937. After World War II in 1950 when tract homes from Oakland began to invade Washington Township, the township residents realized that they needed to organize and prepare for change. Schools were overcrowded, infrastructure was inadequate or nonexistent, and population increases were guaranteed. Alameda County was slow to react to their needs, so businessmen and their Chambers of Commerce organized a plan to incorporate five the eight towns (Niles, Irvington, Centerville, Mission San Jose, and Warm Springs) into the City of Fremont. Newark had been part of the union but due to its greater industrial development and resulting tax advantages, it incorporated on its own. Despite a small resistance effort from conservative citizens (who produced a survey showing 60% of the population opposed to incorporation), the measure was easily passed due to the numerous advantages incorporation offered residents (especially the business community sponsoring the measure). The main advantages involved an economy of scale, such as a single fire district and police department, and the greater ability to attract large industry as well as state and federal subventions. An aggressive move by Hayward in 1955 to annex the northern part of Washington Township catalyzed the towns’ efforts to incorporate. Alvarado and Decoto united to form Union City; Newark incorporated and remained Newark; and on January 10, 1956, Niles, Irvington, Centerville, Mission San Jose, and Warm Springs incorporated to become Fremont, the third largest (in area) city in the state of California. Although separately incorporated, these three new cities which previously formed the Washington Township are culturally united and call themselves and their community: the Tri-Cities. I derived the information for this page from: Stanley Weir’s "Separate Efforts--Similar Goals and Results: A Study of the New Public City of Fremont, California, for Comparison with Private New Communities" (1965), the San Jose Mission Museum, the Fremont Museum of Local History, and What’s Happening: The Tri City Magazine, Fremont, Newark, Union City (October, 2000). Anne Toxey (2000) |
--January 23, 1956--city of Fremont formed out of large portion of Washington Township
--made up of 5 existing towns, all unincorporated, and large areas of ag. land
--became 3rd largest city in CA at the time – smaller only than L.A. and S.D.
--"Fremont suggests a means of municipal problem-solving by incorporating early enough to foresee and be prepared for those problems… ’To the informed observer, Fremont is Foresight’" (Bartels, p.4)
--two greatest factors for incorporation were: "the desire for planning and zoning and the threat of annexation by Hayward." Other factors "had some bearing on the development of the move to incorporate the township, but it was relatively small" (Bartels p.53).
--"The story of Fremont’s incorporation is indeed unique and significant. To incoporate a city of such vast size was unheard of. The diverse composition of the area included within its boundaries had no precedent. The public spirit behind its formation was overwhelming. Yet in spite of these unique features, the same problems which traditionally have led many other populations of unorganized land areas to seek local control of their affairs through incorporation were evident in Fremont. In some case, the problems were not resolved. In most cases, however, they were at least considered, and in many, a ready solution resulted from immediate local action possible through cityhood" (Bartels p.137).
--"The advent of Fremont leads to the conclusion that traditional concepts of boundary-setting and incorporating of new cities need a thorough re-examination and re-statement to take account of this new giant. It is a new concept, in that it calls for the building of a city from its outermost extremities inward, rather than the reverse. Fremont exemplifies the idea of municipal building, rather than rebuilding" (Bartels p.152)
Source: Bartels, Ronald Earl, 1956, "The Incorporation of the City of Fremont, California: an Experiment in Municipal Government," M.A. Thesis, University California, Berkeley