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Oakland History
The earliest recorded inhabitants were the Huchiun tribe [1], belonging to a
linguistic grouping later called the Ohlone (a Miwok Indian word meaning
"western people"). In Oakland, they were heavily concentrated around Lake
Merritt and Temescal Creek, a stream which enters the San Francisco Bay at
Emeryville. Temescal is an Aztec word for bath-house, brought north by Spanish
colonizers.
Oakland, along with the rest of Northern California was claimed for Spain by
visiting Spanish explorers in 1772. During its days under the Spanish Empire in
the late 18th to early 19th century, and later under an independent Mexico in
the early 19th century, Oakland (along with most of the East Bay), was owned by
a wealthy landowner Luís María Peralta who named his area Rancho San Antonio.
Upon his death in 1842, Peralta divided his land among his four sons as most of
Oakland fell within the shares given to Antonio Maria and Vicente. They would
open the land to settlement by American settlers, loggers, European whalers and
fur-traders.
Full scale settlement and development occurred following California being
conquered by the United States during the Mexican American war, and the
California Gold Rush in 1848. Oakland was founded and incorporated in 1852 and
grew with the railroads, becoming a major rail terminus in the late 1860s and
1870s. Originally comprising the area west of Lake Merritt (now downtown and
Chinatown), it gradually annexed farmlands and settlements to the east and
north. Oakland's rise to industrial prominence and its subsequent need for a
seaport led to the digging of a shipping and tidal channel in 1902 creating the
"island" of nearby town Alameda. In 1906 its population doubled with refugees
made homeless after the San Francisco earthquake and fire who had fled to
Oakland. By 1920, Oakland was the home of numerous manufacturing industries,
including metals, automobiles, and shipbuilding.
World War II
During WWII, the East Bay Area was home to a massive Naval shipbuilding
industry. The industry attracted a huge amount of laborers from around the
country. Many of the new workers were African Americans from the western South
(Texas, Louisiana, Oklahoma, and Arkansas), who enjoyed great prosperity during
the war years.
Post-war years
View of Lake Merritt looking toward downtown Oakland and the Alameda County
Courthouse.Soon after the war, the shipbuilding and automobile industries
virtually evaporated, as did the jobs that came with it. Many who came to the
city did not leave and decided to settle in their new home of Oakland.
Meanwhile, many of the city's more affluent white residents fled the city after
the war in order to move into newly developing suburbs to the north and south of
Oakland's city borders.
By the late 1960s, Oakland, which had been quite prosperous and affluent before
the war, found itself with a population that was dominated by a lower income
class than had been typical for the city. Much of Oakland's current reputation
as a high-crime city can be traced to the transformation that occurred after
World War II, especially to the post-1965 era.
1960s and 1970s
Oakland was home to many activist groups during the 1960s and 70s. The Black
Panther Party, created in 1966, is one of the better known groups that formed in
Oakland. The city was also home to an innovative funk music scene which produced
well-known bands like Sly & The Family Stone, Graham Central Station, Tower of
Power, Cold Blood, and The Headhunters. Larry Graham, the bass player for both
Sly & The Family Stone and GCS, is credited with the creation of the extremely
influential "slap & pop" sound still widely used by bassists in many musical
idioms today. The latter three bands specialized in "East Bay Grease", which was
most common on the Oakland scene. East Bay Grease is quite different from the
sounds that come to mind when most people think of funk, which is usually stuff
either created or influenced by James Brown, Sly Stone, P-Funk, or the musicians
in the places where it all started--New Orleans. No doubt about it, it was
influenced by New Orleans, James Brown, and Sly (it proceeded P-Funk), but
unlike those relatively laid-back and simple sounds, it moved to a highly
syncopated 16th-pulse driven by the linear style of funk drumming pioneered by
David Garibaldi and Mike Clark, percussive bass lines, and fattened by staccato
horns. To this day, it's the style of music that probably best captures the
soulful and working-class Oakland spirit.
It was also during the 1960's when the Hells Angels Motorcycle Club's Oakland
Chapter, began to grow into a formidible organization. By the 1980's it was the
most feared and respected of all Hells Angels Chapters. Its Oakland Clubhouse
still sits at 4019 Foothill Bouelvard in East Oakland.
1980s and 1990s
In the late 1980s and 1990s, Oakland featured prominently in rap music, both as
the hometown for such artists as MC Hammer, Digital Underground, Spice 1,
Hieroglyphics and Del Tha Funkee Homosapien, The Luniz, Keak Da Sneak and Too $hort,
and for its featuring in the lyrics of several songs, such as Baby Got Back,
California Love and I Got 5 On It. 2pac, who grew up in Baltimore, New York, and
later Marin City, lived in Oakland longer than in any other city and began his
career as a roadie and dancer for Digital Underground. Outside of the rap scene,
Grammy award winning artists Green Day, En Vogue and Tony! Toni! Tone! (headed
by Raphael Saadiq) also emerged from the dynamic city. Currently, a rap movement
from the Bay, hyphy, is taking the hip hop world by storm.
The Loma Prieta earthquake occurred on October 17, 1989 in the greater San
Francisco Bay Area, measuring 7.1 on the Richter magnitude scale. Several
structures in Oakland were badly damaged. The double-decker portion of the
Cypress freeway structure, located in Oakland, collapsed, killing 42. The
Eastern span of the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge also sustained significant
damage and was closed to traffic for one month. Throughout the 1990s, buildings
throughout Oakland were retrofited to better withstand earthquakes.
On October 20, 1991, the Oakland Hills firestorm engulfed much of the Oakland
hills. 25 were killed and 150 injured and over 2,000 homes were destroyed. The
economic loss has been estimated at $1.5 billion. Many homes were rebuilt much
larger than they originally were.
In late 1996, Oakland was the center of a controversy surrounding Ebonics, an
ethnolect the outgoing Oakland Unified School District board voted to recognize
on December 18.
2000s
View of downtown Oakland looking west across Lake Merritt.Jerry Brown, who was
elected mayor of Oakland in 1998, initiated a plan to bring an additional 10,000
residents to downtown Oakland. The plan has resulted in several redevelopment
projects near Lake Merritt, Jack London Square, and other neighborhoods just
outside of downtown. These redevelopment projects have been controversial as
many residents see these projects as gentrification, resulting in the loss of
lower-income and minority residents in downtown Oakland. Additionally, the
weakening of the Bay Area economy in 2000 and 2001 resulted in low occupancy of
the new housing and slower growth and economic recovery than expected. As of
2004, the population of Oakland has increased to 409,300.
Additionally, the Oakland Athletics began searching for a site on which to build
a new baseball stadium. The Athletics were interested in a site near Telegraph
Avenue and 20th Street in downtown Oakland, but the site was instead slated for
a housing development. The site was favored by the Athletics for a new stadium
as it was accessible by public transit and nearby freeways. As of 2006, the
Athletics are pursuing alternative sites for a new stadium outside of downtown
Oakland.
In February 2006, the Oakland Ballet closed due to financial problems and the
loss of their performance facility, the Calvin Simmons Theater at the Kaiser
Convention Center. The Oakland Ballet had been performing in Oakland since 1965.
[2]
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