Archive for the ‘ Undated examples’ Category

A. Nelson

11 April 2023

5465 Lawton Avenue

Unlike the other examples of marks by A. (Albert) Nelson, which are hand-drawn, this one was made with a stamp. Interestingly, the periods after “A” and “Nelson” are triangles.

Also unlike the other examples, this one has no date. There are no cement workers named “A. Nelson” listed in the city directories of 1927 to 1937, so he may have lived elsewhere.

My thanks to Ken for spotting this. I surveyed this area early during my great quest, and my eye was less sharp than now. The area is so rich in stamps that I ought to survey it again.

J. A. Feeley

4 March 2023

1601 12th Avenue

I’ve recorded two different versions of Feeley’s mark from 1925 (here and here), and this example appears to be made with individual letters.

Ambo Concrete

11 June 2022

3798 Harrison Street

Ambo Concrete was an outfit run by Sam Sposeto, who may have been related to Angelo Sposeto. I have Ambo marks from two dates, 1976 and 1979. This mark could be any age. I assume W. S. Wayne worked for Ambo.

J. A. Marshall

2 January 2021

Lee Avenue at Perkins Street

This pristine mark, one of two at this locality, is officially the best J. A. Marshall impression in all of Oakland.

Mr. Marshall may be the contractor whose relative, architect Leola Hall, accompanied him and learned the foundations of her trade. However, he may instead be John A. Marshall, listed as a “cementwkr” in the Berkeley directory in 1905.

G. G. C. Co.

7 October 2016

g-c-c-co-2

The peculiar round mark of the Golden Gate Construction Co. is so rare that I had to document this example, one of two at 5519 and 5527 Market Street. The company was in existence in the first decade of the 20th century. Another one is next to Lois the Pie Queen.

The Lyon building and other delights

12 February 2016

As you walk up Broadway past the old Saw Mill building, you might notice two bronze letters in the sidewalk spelling out the word “NO.” That’s because you’re looking at it backward. Things make sense at the building’s main entrance, where a large stone/concrete lion with a dozen layers of paint looms over the door and the word “LYON” is spelled out in metal.

LYONsign

With that in mind, you can set out downhill from the doorway and see the letters rightly as the second half of LYON.

LYON-ONsign

Or go uphill instead to see their counterpart. I have to assume that both of these once had four letters.

LYON-LYsign

The building began in 1916 as Lyon Moving & Storage. It was quite grand, in the old Oakland style. Today, there are 53,000 storage companies in America, most of them quite bland and not a single one, I’m sure, with its name on the sidewalk in bronze.

In other developments, I spotted two more treasures during the week.

Blake & Bilger Company

blake-n-bilger

38th Avenue at Opal Street

This is probably the best-preserved Blake & Bilger mark in the city. The firm was a major builder of Oakland’s first sidewalks, from the first decade of the 20th century, but today there are maybe a dozen of these marks left.

1926 – J. H. Fitzmaurice (II)

1926ff

1501 Harrison Street

Fitzmaurice, founded in 1922 and still going strong as a general contractor, was the first sidewalk maker in Oakland to use the barrel-shaped stamp format, which it introduced in 1926 and used into the 1950s at least. Only a handful of this stamp’s first configuration — with “OAKLAND” placed above the center — have stamped dates inside the mark. So I had to capture this one even though I have another example from the Grand Lake neighborhood.

Bill Katsaros

11 July 2015

bill-katsaros

34 Montwood Way

There are several of these in the south-side gutters of Malcolm Avenue, all without the last year of the date. This is on a sidewalk, though.