Many people think Oakland started with the Gold Rush in 1848. But really it began earlier.
First came the Indians for hundreds of years. There were small bands of Huchiums (later known as Ohlone) people living together for hundreds of years. There were 96 different tribal groups living in the East Bay.
Then came the Spanish missions and life for the Indians was virtually over. The Spanish showed up in the 1780’s to convert the Huchiuns to Catholicism. They told everyone to convert to Catholicism and actively worked to disregard their current religion. Within 40 years the Indians were dead due to diseases given by the Catholics.
In 1776, Don Luis Maria Peralta’s family from Spain arrived in Northern California, Monterey. The Native Americans attacked the priests in Mission San Jose, and Don Peralta won over quite quickly. Spain wanted to give him a present, so they gave him the entire East Bay in 1822. Peralta had four sons and divided it up between them in 1842, with:
- Ignacio from San Leandro Creek to Seminary Avenue
- Domino in Berkeley, Albany, and part of North Oakland
- Antonio from Seminary Avenue to Lake Merritt;
- Vicente north and west of Lake Merritt, to about Alcatraz Ave.
People tend to use the 1848-1850 as the big gold rush that brought people to San Francisco and up the miles through Oakland to the Sierra Hills. There were also a huge number of Chinese that came to help with the construction of the train, coming all the way from New York to Oakland. However, before any of this in the early 1800’s, groups started taking down the redwoods in Oakland, and sending them over to San Francisco for housing. They did not worry about whose land it was. They just conveyed the redwood trees down from what is now Park Boulevard all the way to the bay, and led with a small boat pulling over to San Francisco.
Oakland became part of the California State in 1850. In that same year, three former New Englanders moved to San Francisco: Edson Adams, Alexander Moon, and Horace Carpentier. They entered into a lease for 480 acres in Oakland, next to a boat landing along San Leandro creek owned by Vicente Peralta. There were maybe only a 100 people at the foot of Broadway in 1850. But once the transcontinental train arrived in Oakland at the bay in 1869, growth and development moved quite quickly.