Oakland Underfoot

The place now occupied by 1111 Broadway was once the site of the Bacon Building, also known as the Bacon Block. It was named for Henry Douglas Bacon (1818-1893), “a pioneer capitalist of this city” who is also remembered at U.C. Berkeley as the benefactor behind the old Bacon Hall library building.

The Bacon Block or Bacon Building was the second structure here. The original Bacon Block, a wooden building that housed Smith’s Market and many other small businesses, burned on December 30, 1902. The newer steel and concrete structure housed many business offices as of 1904.

^{The Bacon Building in 1911.}

Between then and 1926, when J.C. Penney took over the entire property, at least four businesses in the Bacon Block/Building left their marks on Oakland’s sidewalks.

The Golden Gate Construction Company, “215 BACON BL’K”, was listed in the San Francisco directories of 1902 and 1907. It was listed in the 1910 Oakland directory at this address, but not in any other year. It was a partnership between Harry B. Williams and Joe Rosenberg until 1910, when John R. Sorensen of Berkeley replaced Rosenberg. The new partnership apparently lasted only a year. Oakland has a handful of these hard-to-read marks, none of them with a date. This firm also left the G. G. C. Co. mark, of which I’ve seen maybe three examples.

Harry Bennett Williams (1876-1957), not to be confused with the more prominent contractor Harry C. Williams, succeeded Golden Gate in the same office starting in 1911. He lived on the 900 block of 61st Street. From 1915 through 1926 he was president of the Merchants Exchange and in 1918 he headed the Cement Contractors’ Association. As of 1921 the business was at 1106 Broadway, which was across the street in today’s Key System Building, and a garage is also mentioned out at 61st Street. I think he was probably using his second stamp at that time. His marks are thinly scattered in north and central Oakland, none with a date.

Ernest Hilmer Sundberg (1870-1945), “308 Bacon Block”, was a South African immigrant who lived in San Francisco before moving to East Oakland, on E. 17th Street, then to Pacific Grove. His firm is listed in the Bacon Building in the 1912 and 1913 directories and across the street in the Oakland Savings Bank building in later years. This mark is rare; I have one dated 1912.

Michele “Michael” Bua had a partnership with Roberts, who may be Frank Roberts (whose F. Roberts stamps date from these years) or someone related to the Roberts Brothers firm (Delore Roberts, president and Arthur Roberts, vice-president), which never had a Bacon Building address. I interpret this date as 1922, and a 1924 date is unequivocal. Vallejo Street has a mess of these marks but they’re scarce elsewhere. The address 254 Bacon Building was used by several different firms in the early 1920s, including contractors and real-estate dealers, so it must have been a large office suite.

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