Nostalgia & History > Oakland, CA: SP's First St. structures

The Sunday talk shows have a derisive expression for discussions that go into greater detail than they think their audience will tolerate before flipping the channel: "in the weeds." This thread will likely be "in the weeds" for most people on here, but hopefully at least a few will find it interesting.

One of the busiest bits of street running left in northern California is the Union Pacific, formerly Southern Pacific, main line that runs east down the middle of a road called Embarcadero West for several blocks through Jack London Square in Oakland, CA. Today all of the cross streets have automatic crossing gates and no other rail lines cross the UP, but that wasn't always the case. Squinting at old photos from back when Embarcadero West was called First St., you start catching glimpses of several towers that existed at various times along this stretch between roughly Broadway and Alice St. Some of these were probably crossing watchman's towers, but others were likely interlocking towers that controlled signals and switches. What follows are some photos I've found in the Western Railway Museum Archives that illustrate (not always conclusively) the sometimes confusing changes over the years. In some cases, an image is followed by a blown up version that shows something of interest in the distance. The dates and descriptions are what were written on the backs of the prints or on the negative envelopes, and are not guaranteed to be 100% accurate. As always, corrections, insights, and additional information are welcome.

79415: The oldest photo in this set had a date of 1891 written on the back. We are looking westbound down First St. at Broadway, and already a set of signals is in place on the corner. This spot will sprout a signal bridge a few decades later, see below.

74093: SP opened this depot on the north side of the block bounded by Broadway and Franklin St. in late 1908. This view looks to the northeast, and the tracks crossing the SP in the foreground are streetcar tracks heading for the Webster St. bridge. I don't know what the small brick building near the corner of Broadway and First is - any ideas?

58847: An eastbound train passing the depot ca.1910 as a streetcar on Broadway waits its turn. The photographer is standing at First and Franklin.

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59620: According to the caption on the back of this photo, we are now looking the other direction (east) at First and Franklin in 1907.

59620 blowup: Looking way down the street, a couple of towers are visible. According to a table on p.324 of Robert Ford's Red Trains in the East Bay, a mechanical interlocker was installed at "1st and Harrison" in 1898 to protect the crossing of the main line and a suburban line heading for the Harrison St. bridge. The other, smaller tower might be a crossing watchman's tower somewhere around Webster St., but I don't know that.

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79417: The caption on the back of this photo says that this is the westbound approach signal to "Alice St. Tower." Ford's book doesn't mention an Alice St. Tower, and I’m wondering if this and “1st and Harrison” are one and the same. If so, which name did the railroad actually use?

79417 blowup: Squinting off in the distance, I can just about convinced myself that I'm seeing the edge of the roof of the same tower I identified as “1st and Harrison” in 59620.

79418: This view looks north from the approach to the Harrison St. bridge, and to the right of the signal is the tower that the back of this print also labels as "Alice St. Tower." Although the bridge was rail-only, old maps of Oakland show it did more or less line up with Harrison St. (Alice St. was a block further east). This is unfortunately the best view I've found of the tower so far, and the name on the signboard is illegible. Does anyone know what SP actually called this tower?

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24466: According to Ford's book, the mechanical interlocker at "1st and Harrison" was replaced by an electro-pneumatic interlocker at "1st and Webster" in 1912. Thankfully, the company photographer stopped by in 1920 and recorded at least two views of the tower, one of which was close enough that the signboard can be read, identifying that this really is "1st and Webster Tower." This view looks north up the now-electrified suburban line off the Harrison St. bridge as it curves on to Webster, with the SP main line in the foreground. In 79418, the site this tower would eventually occupy is just out of the frame to the left.

24632: The backside of the tower. The swing bridge to the right with the streetcar on it is the Webster St. bridge used by Key System streetcars to reach Alameda. The very top of the Harrison St. bridge is just visible above the building behind the crossing gate to the left.

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43183: Back down by the station at First and Broadway, other signal changes are in evidence. This 1918 view looking west shows an eastbound train waiting while a westbound is in the station. A signal bridge now spans First St. just west of Broadway.

51951: This view looking east past the station in 1923 shows another signal bridge spanning First St. at Franklin. This is the only view I've seen showing this particular signal bridge.

51951 blowup: Just visible in the distance is a second signal bridge somewhere down around Alice St.

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74099 and blowup: This 1927 view shows the Broadway signal bridge a little more clearly, and also shows that Broadway is still without active crossing protection. A crossing tender's shanty (I assume) is visible to the left.

74100: Looking the other direction (east), the signal bridge at First and Franklin is now missing. According to Ford's book, the interlocker at “1st and Webster” closed in 1923 when the Harrison St. bridge was taken out of service, which may also have corresponded with the removal of this signal bridge.

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74101: Another view ca. 1925 from a slightly different angle allows a little better view down the street.

74101 blowup: Looking way down there, the little thing I identified as a possible crossing tender's tower is still there.

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46861: If the ca.1938 date on this John G. Graham photo is to be believed, by the late 1930's another tower had sprung up beside the depot with lettering declaring it to be the "Southern Pacific Signal Tower First and Franklin Streets." This structure has been the subject of several previous threads, see: http://www.trainorders.com/discussion/read.php?11,3553458 for the most recent. To the left of the depot is a Key System streetcar (which now terminates just shy of the SP after the Webster St. bridge was taken out of service in 1928) and also a wigwag crossing signal.

30662 and blowup: A 1948 Ted Wurm photo looking east. The blown up view shows a wigwag at the foot of the tower protecting Franklin St., and also that the small tower visible down the block in 74101 is now gone.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 10/22/14 02:58 by Evan_Werkema.

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75435: If you've stuck with me through all of this, thanks! Here's a train for your troubles - a Victor DuBrutz shot of a westbound freight passing under the now-searchlighted signal bridge at First and Broadway in 1954.

According to Henry Bender's book on SP depots, the depot at First and Broadway closed in 1960 and was torn down in 1963. The signal bridge lost its signals in 1995 when the line through Jack London Square was converted to CTC and a new Amtrak depot opened at the end of Alice St. The bridge was removed around 1997.

If anyone has any more information on the Alice/Harrison/Webster/Franklin towers, please chime in.

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Here's a Google map of the area in question. Other than First St. becoming Embarcadero West and the Posey Tube coincident with Harrison St., the street names are the same: http://goo.gl/maps/20hXq

Thanks, I am going to follow this through, lots of work digging these out and great effort. Not simply unloading a camera card.

Bob Jordan

Evan,

Thanks for your efforts to share these rare and historic photos with us! I grew-up in the East Bay, and while I was aware of the old SP depot on Broadway, I never knew about the rest of what was shown here. It would have been fascinating to spend just one day at this location back in the era shown just to see how many train movements passed there. Thanks again...

ShastaDaylight

Evan_Werkema Wrote:
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> 75435: If you've stuck with me through all of
> this, thanks! Here's a train for your troubles -
> a Victor DuBrutz shot of a westbound freight
> passing under the now-searchlighted signal bridge
> at First and Broadway in 1954.

A train, and fortunately still at least one signal tower. This one even has a visible operator.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 10/22/14 05:31 by lwilton.

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It would be interesting to see what these scenes look like today!

Evan_Werkema Wrote:
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> I don't know what the small brick building
> near the corner of Broadway and First is - any
> ideas?

No ideas, but note that it is clearly part of the new station construction. It appears to have lasted as long as the station, or almost as long, it can be seen in many of these images. There is a name or some such below the windows on the west-facing door visible in this first photo of the building, but I can't quite read it. Possibly there is enough resolution in the original image?

If I had to guess, I would say this might be a sidewalk ticket office for commuters to buy a ticket back home for the evening, without having to go into the main station building. Either that or an "Ain't California Wonderful!" brochure stand, trying to drum up business with color(?) prints of what can be seen along the lines.

I can't tell what technology is being used on the switches. It looks like many of them might be standard street-running switches with a lid over the mechanism, and some sort of hand-throw arrangement. Then again, maybe they a pneumatic or electric. They don't seem to be pipeline activated, at least I can't see any pipe plant. So it isn't clear to me if the towermen would be activating switches, or perhaps just controlling semaphores and possibly some form of pedestrian and traffic warning devices.

I do note that there seem to be semaphores on the corners with towers, and generally no semaphores on the corners without towers. Some times the semaphores are on the far side of the street from the tower. I suspect therefore that the semaphores were manually controlled from the towers. Physically how this was done I can't say.

Neat photos, and also interesting to see that even waaaay back then the streets were crap.

I don't think digital can compare with fine grained B&W film.

santafedan Wrote:
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> I don't think digital can compare with fine
> grained B&W film.

These days it can. The measuring scales used for film and digital are different, but if you convert them, really good 35 MM film has about 2800 dots per inch. That's about 3000 dots across a movie frame, where the perfs run vertically, and what, maybe 5000-6000 dots for a standard 35mm still camera exposure?

Of course the still cameras you can buy for any reasonable cost are at best around half way or less to this sort of resolution, but 4K digital movie cameras are all the big rage at the moment, and the Japanese are working on 8K and have shown it off. Movie cameras, as far as I know, are still back inthe dark ages, trying to be comparable with NTSC. But fortunately still cameras will now shoot movies at almost decent resolutions.

Film in Ye Olden Daze had much lower resolution, which is why early photographers shot things like 12x12 and 18x18 plates and even larger. But even with low resolution film, there were just an awful lot of dots in a frame that big!

The photo labeled Signal Bridge at 1st and Broadway reminds me of how quickly the gas tanks like the one shown in the background disappeared from the landscape... a tank like that would make an interesting modelling project...

Evan! Now you've gone and done it! You've stirred the pot and there's so much to look at. I need to find some spare time to see if I can answer any questions. If not, I still appreciate all the photos and input.