North Bay
FORT BAKER
-15 October 1841: Samuel Throckmorton bought a large tract of land from Don Guillermo Antonio Richardson
-early 1850s: President Fillmore designated the site a military reservation. Multi-tiered fort similar to the one at Fort Point was initially planned
-1850: Lime Point Military Reservation established
-24 July 1866: US military pays Throckmorton $125,000 for 1899.66 acres of Marin, the Lime Point tract
-1897: Fort Baker opens, named for the former Senator from San Francisco and Civil War veteran Colonel Edwin D. Baker, who died at the Battle of Ball's Bluff (21 October 1861)
-1898: soldiers manning the guns Ft Baker lived in tents on parade ground site, housing and support buildings for these troops built after 1900
-Battery opening dates:
-Ridge 1879
-Duncan built 1905
-Orlando built 1905
-Wagner built 1905
-Yates built 1905
-Gravelly Beach 1870
-Cliff 187x (forward positions destroyed 1893 for Battery Spencer)
-Spencer: 1897 (dedicated 14FB02, for MG Joseph Spencer of Continental Army, as per General Order 16)
-Kirby (GO 16 of 14 February 02, honoring Lt Edmund Kirby, dead 28 May 1863 of injuries received 03 May at Chancellorville. Promoted that day to Brig Gen of Volunteers. Built 1905. William Dixon, father of the poet, planted Eucalyptus, Monterey Pine and Monterey Cypress
-Mendell, opened22 November 1902. GO 120, for Col George H. ~ an Engineer died 1902 in SF). Two rifles added 1905. Inactive 1943, when Battery Wallace was reactivated
-Alexander, GO 120, for Engineering Colonel, d. 1878, Mexican &Civil wars
-Guthrie (27DC04, GO 194, for Captain Edwin Guthrie, died 1874 of wounds received at La Hoya, Mexico. Split in two, the two guns on the left becoming Battery Hamilton A Smith (shrouded in permanent burlap camouflage net) honoring West Pointer Smith KIA 1918 in Soissons France, due to GO 13, 22 March 19 22. The rest became Battery Townsley
-Rathbone (GO 194, for Lt Samuel B Rathbone, died 1812 in Queenstown Heights, Upper Canada. Divided into two, left flank guns honoring BG James F. McIndoe (Engineers), KIA France 1918
-O'Rorke (GO 194) for Patrick Henry O'Rourke, KIA Gettysburg, July 1863
-Wallace (1917, for Col Elmer Wallace, died 1917 in France. Only new 12"long-range gun battery constructed on west coast during the 1920s. Casemated in 1943, when it was reactivated
-Smith (GO 13, for H. A. Smith, dedicated 22 March 1922)
-Townsley (for Engineer Clarence P Townsley, who died 1928)
-Battery Construction Number 129 (high summit east of Ft. Barry) finished 1943. Never armed, never named.
-08 June 1905: guns transferred to Coast Artillery Corps
-Headlands guns were originally designed for US Navy ships. Most were removed during World War Two
-1909: Mine casemate built
-1910s: Alcatraz military prisoners provided the labor to construct a road to Sausalito
-1918: 2200 foot tunnel built
-1935: tunnel enlarged and improved
-21 June 1937: deed recorded of condemnation 800 acres north of Rodeo Lagoon acquired to match Tennessee Point land. Army-owned coastal areas of Tennessee Point used by Searchlights.
-1937: Construction begins on mine depot, storage buildings, ammo bunkers, piers on site, plus minefield-manning ships. Boatshop and wharf built, temporary hospital for Coast Artillery on waterfront.
-1941: Mine construction finished. Planned since 1918, first supplemented, then replaced the one at Fort Point.
-01 October 1941: Ft Baker Station Hospital opens, to care for Harbor Defense personnel. $412K to build. 229 beds. Later used for rehabiltation.
-Ft. Baker's 2 lane bowling alley paid $400 for an automatic pin setter
-Sports team: Ft Baker Medics
-USN had two story, concrete signal stations at Ft Barry's Bonita Ridge and just above the GG Brige's toll plaza
-temporary hospital for the Coast Artillery garrisons of the Bay Area forts filled Ft Baker waterfront. Boat shop and wharf built. Horseshoe Cove used for munitions storage and as a Supply Depot.
-1942: Army Service Forces QM Corps establishes Marine Repair Shop behind Ft Baker Station Hospital
-1943: Battery Elmer J. Wallace reactivated
-1946: 481 harbor defense mines afloat in the Bay
-1949: Mine Detachment Artillery School closed and coast defense activities cease.
-Ft Baker was nerve center of Nike sites (Region 6), w/units at Forts Barry, Cronkite, Scott, Marin county, Angel Island +
-1954: State added 100 feet to tunnel
-1959: 21 duplexes (Capehart housing) built.
-Basement of Bldg 636 was command post of Army Air Defense Command
-1974: immediately to east of 636 was small cinema (where picnic benches are now)
-1974: further to East & South of 636 stood subunit of LAIR, a complete field hospital
-1990s: NPS entered partnership with Coast Guard and Bay Area Discovery Museum. 335-acre site plus 183 acres of federally-owned tidelands. Includes 46 historic buildings
-1990: Coast Guard Station established, leased from Park Service
-US Army Reserve cleared out July 2001
FORT BARRY
-16 July 1904: Secretary of War authorized construction of permanent post for two companies of Coast Artillery Corps
-27 December 1904: 1344 acres of Fort Baker west of north-south line (set by Point Diablo) became Fort Barry, For Civil War General William F. Barry 2nd Artillery Colonel (d. 1879); Fort Baker left with 893 acres
-1904: Departmental Rifle Range begun
-1905: Quartermaster invited bids for 21 buildings
-1907: buildings finished
-1908: new mine casemate built
-12 February 1908: 161st Coast Artillery Corps moves in
-1909: flagpole and gymnasium added
-Built 1910, Building 960: 12,000-square-foot, contructed as a Quartermaster depot. Under a 1994 agreement with the NPS, Headlands Center for the Arts can occupy eight structures with a total of 71,000 square feet of space, in exchange for renovation and stewardship
-1921: balloon hangar built (one of 3 in Bay Area, only one to survive), now used as a stable
-1922 - 1941: without permanent garrison
-1940 or 1941: Camp Spurr (for Col John P Spurr) built at Fort Barry on site of CCC buildings
-16 November 1941: new Ft Barry chapel dedicated. Forts Scott, Baker also got new chapels. All had steeples and electric organs
-27 May 1942: 12" guns test fired in evening
-WW2: Ft Barry offered a Land Mine School, replete with a mock village
-Fall 1943: Mendell Service Club replaces burnt out Ft Barry PX
-Fort Barry's Building 944, hosted the library, on the top floor
-16-inch guns were at Fort Barry
-Ft Barry Youth Hostel the old Bachelor Officer quarters
FORT CRONKITE
-17 December 1937: Fort Cronkite established as per GO 9, honoring the Artillery man MG Adelbert Cronkite (1861-1937)
-Fort Cronkite housed the Presidio Stables. During WW2, also housed the Coast Artillery and featured the weekly Foghorn and a offered a Commando Course
-1954: NIKE Ajax site, Battery Bravo built (deactivated 1974) at Ft Cronkite; radar station on Hill 88
-1974: Battery Bravo deactivated
-1980s: National Park Service gets over 200 acres of (most open space) from Army. Excluded was Coast Guard Radio Receiving Station
-California Marine Mammal Center located in a former missile site, the missile storage area now storing seal food, fish & fish mash
TIBURON
-1877: Tiburon's Lynde & Hough (cod processing) plant built
-1904: Cod plant to US Navy for a coaling station. Trestles, storage and cable railways put in, soon followed by a power plant
-1931: Coal as a fuel was obsolete and Navy gave the site to the state for the California Maritime Academy
-1933: John Roebling Company buys adjacent property and begins bringing in wire to spool for the big orange bridge
-August 1940: Navy took site back to use as an anti-submarine net storage facility for the Pacific and West Coast, patrolled by horseback sailors. 7 mile-long, 6000 ton net for blocking the Golden Gate (opened and closed by a tugboat in the middle of the opening) kept there.
-01July 1941: first mooring buoy of bay net project inplace. 10-ton concrete slugs (made at Tiburon Net Depot) weighted it down. 30' near shore, 150' at main channel. From St Francis Yacht Club to Point Sausalito
-Net finished summer 1941 and was authorized 15 September 1941. 1/4 mile off SF: net gate, 1000 yard long, movable section. 2 USN vessels at either end (one opener, one closer)
-1942: Navy housing project, Hilarita, built in Tiburon (police station and town hall now occupy site).
-May 1945: Navy announces plans to take over entire peninsula (3603 acres) for ammunition depot at Ring Point, leaving only downtown and railroad. Plans called off with Japanese surrender
-Korean War: net operations reactivated
-1958: the net was permanently terminated
-1961: Tiburon Marine Laboratory takes over site
TWO ROCK
-1929: RCA pays $127,500 to McClure family and leases out land for dairy uses
-August 1942: War Department buy 876 acres. Farmhouses and 400 sheep kept as camouflage. Transmitter located in a meadow. Army Security listening post. Laguna Ranch.
-Transmitter used during Cold War
-Mock Vietnamese Village, including rice paddies, thatch huts and tiger cages for interrogation- during that war
-1971: Coast Guard takes over 880 (876?) acre Two Rock as training facility, per Congressional bill transferring buildings, usable equipment and civilian employees. 3 courses offered.
-Today, about 420 "permanent" personnel and about 4,000 Coast Guard students go through Two Rock's seven basic schools (including CG's only culinary school).
-$44 million base for advanced training in electronics and telecommunications.
-About 4,000 students are trained each year
-About 334 military personnel and 55 civilian employees.
-200-student Two Rock Elementary School
HEADLANDS
-July 1941: US Army Corps of Engineers sought permission from Marin Water District for Air Corps Warning Service to use a portion of Mount Tam's West Peak as a detector site
-November 1941: Army selects Rock Spring (Mount Tam) for a camp and another site for equipment, abandoning former for another near latter when it realized people hiked nearby. After Pearl Harbor, both areas were fenced off and large section of the mountain top was closed off
-During World War Two, the prohibited areas of Mount Tam were leased to Army. One consisted of 49 acres along Ridgecrest Boulevard from Rock Spring to the road to Laurel Dell, designated Radar Site B78, manned by the 411 AAF Base Unit. Second lease was for area atop West Peak, including Mountain Theater, for another Radar Station aãnd barracks. Third lease on East Peak, consisted of unused Railroad tavern (barracks for a communications group), lease included the restaurant equipment, pump, water and such for $60/ month. 4th lease (entered early 1943) of 4 acres was for another radar site, along with old CCC Camp Carlson on road into Lake Lagunitas.
UC Camp California (Engineering School) became CCC Camp Carlson (though part of it became Camp Eastwood) around 1938. Currently Sky Oaks Camp of the Girl Scouts. Occupied 09 December 1941 by the California National Guard, then taken over by Army in 1945, although lease expired 1944.
Army also had a rifle range below Rock Spring; also closed Rock Spring, Barth's Retreat, Potrero Meadows, Rifle Camp, Colier Spring, Mountain Theater and Bootjack Camp
-1944: Army buildings on West Peak burn. Navy crash into East Peak kills alll 8 aboard
-1948: Army notifies Marin Water District of plans for permanent radar station on West Peak (part of SAGE Network of Air Defense Command). 82 acres leased for annual payment of $4400. Operated by Mill Valley Air Force Station, built and occupied in 1951. Quarters for 80 people, including 9 families. Linked to two other surveillance units, at Point Arena and Almaden
-1951: West Peak lowered from 2604 feet to 2567 for Mill Valley Air Force Station
-1951: Arturo Trail closed because of the Mill Valley Air Force Station. Held 125 active duty and civilian personnel. 1 mile below Tamalpais Theater. Building 106 (theater and bowling alley) still there, along with pool and tennis court. 300 personnel at its peak. Military still controls Water District land atop West Peak, the lease expiring in 2005; all other land went to the GGNRA in 1983
-Mill Valley Air Force Station had a co-located Army site that was the air defense command post, controlling fire of area Nike sites.
-Late 50s (?): 666th Aircraft&Warning Squadron opened. Under TAC control until October 1979, to FAA in 1980's.
-1985: Arturo Trail opens.
-prior to building of GG Bridge, ferries went between Presidio and Forts Baker Barry & Cronkite
-1910: army mounted searchlight at Lime Point
-1927: military spotlights established on Lime Point, Fort Miley, Presidio and two at Point Bonita. To find and aid ships. Lights reached 12500 yards. Drills held with government tugs Golden Gate, Argonaut and Hartley.
-Fall 1940: Chief of Naval Operations ordered test of submarine net at Tiburon, with three World War One net sections, pulled by USN tugs Eider and Dreadnought (which could open and/ or close the net in 4 minutes)
WW2
-Army built docks and storage buildings at Forts Baker, Scott and Yerba Buena Island
-150 California National Guardsmen in barracks at either end of the Golden Gate Bridge
-San Quentin's "war training classes" taught convoy cooks
-1000 San Quentin inmates put together Ration Book three in two shifts
-November 1942: San Quentin paroles 500 "to enter defense industry"
-Santa Rosa Naval Air Station built in WW2 as an Alameda NAS annex.
Became a Fleet Service Squadron in 1951, assisting Carrier Air Group 2 as it prepared to go to Korea.
When the FSS left in 1952, the NAS closed in its wake.
It was then reused for civilian purposes (as Santa Rosa Metropolitan) before being supplanted by the Sonoma County Airport
-04 May 1945: 9 die, 2 live when USN Catlina crashes at Wolf Ridge
-October 1972: Congress okays Forts Barry, Cronkite, Baker, Mason, Miley, Funston, Point and Baker Beach and Crissy Field going to newly established Golden Gage National Recreation Area
-1974: entire headland tract (30 acres) to NPS. Fort Barry launch trailer and nearby building once kept 4 diesel generators and the Battery Commander's trailer
-Hill 640 Fire road reveals old bunkers, once used for triangulation.
HAMILTON AIR FORCE BASE
-1840: Ygnacio Pacheco gets Rancho Sante Jose (now Ignacio, Hamilton & Bel Marin Keys) from Mexican Government
-1856: owned by Francis DeLong & Joseph Sweeter. Former subdivided 6000 acres (forming Novato)
-1929 - 1932: Air Corps Station, San Rafael
-03 July 1930: established
-17 March 1932: Marin County bought pea farm (435 acres?) and gave it to the Army for $1
-12 July 1932: construction begins on marshland. $7 million to build. Named for Marin native Lt Lloyd Andrews Hamilton, shot down over France in 1918
-01 March 1935: construction finished
-12 May 1935: Hamilton Army Air Field opens. Bomber base until 1940, when Fighters kept there
-1936: Opens, supplanting Crissy Field, though latter -despite being too foggy- serviced small military aircraft
-late 1943: becomes a reentry station (& evacuee hospital?) for returning Pacific injured
-1947: site becomes Hamilton Air Force Base
-29 July 1947: Captain Rhyerd and pilot Stewart witness two UFOs
-early 1950's: Nave bowling lanes built on 8.3 acre site at Nave Boulevard and North Hamilton Parkway. Closed mid-90s, sold to Lucky parent American Stores, which soon merged into Albertson's. Small stream designated a wetland.
-1969: closed
-01 October 1973: transferred to Air Force Reserve
-1974: working portions deactivated. 1800 acres left for other governmental use
-1975: Air Force vacated. Used as intro center for 180,000 Laos, Viet and Cambodians refugees. 411 acres to GSA (between airfield and housing areas, sold 85), rest to Navy (554 acres of housing and recreation areas and 732 of airfield)
-11 Jan 1976: closed, airfield to US Army Reserve as Hamilton Army Air Field, housing to USN; USCG west coast environmental disaster strike force opens. 411 acres to GSA
-1985: GSA portion sold
-1993: listed under BRAC
-1996: Navy leaves housing areas
-1998: Navy sells Novato housing areas for $8,130,000
-1999: divided into New Hamilton (400 acres, homes & recreation area; includes 183 acres with 558 Capehart wood frame units built in the late 50s; 9 acres of park and 109 acres of open space), Old Hamilton (1000 housing units straddling 101, including Rafael Village (503 units of concrete Wherry housing on 105 acres, built 51, to be razed)), PX, coll (huh?) housing. Coast Guard got one site of 8 acres (including 2 hangars) and one of 142 acres (282 homes), USN tract (408 acres). 183 acre
-700 acres of runway to become marsh; 80 bed homeless shelter; 100 acres commercial space from 7 hangars; 950 homes being built; 90-120 assisted living units
-Hospital Hill to got to another Federal Agency
-2003: about 2500 residents in nearly 1000 homes in 4 neighborhoods (1 more under construction)
-Novato paid $1 to Army for the 2000 acre base
-2003: California Coastal Commission okays submerging 630 acres of former airstrip (filled in over 100 years ago for farming) to form wetlands. The rest of the Hamilton Wetlands Restration Project will restore 1000 acres of tidal and seasonal wetlands, of runway and taxi areas. Inclusion of adjacent Bel Marin Keys will expand wetlands to 2500 acres.
Dredged material to come from the Port of Oakland. The entire project can take 5 years, with the federal government paying 75%, the state 25%.