Community
Oakland North is continuing with our feature. Every Tuesday, Oakland Animal Services will spotlight an “Animal of the Week” that’s up for adoption at their facility. This week it’s Vanilla.
The sleepy Rockridge district was an unlikely home for scandal. But in 1927, it came to light that a small Rockridge bungalow had become the international headquarters of a mystical society called the “Great White Brotherhood.”
“Rock Ridge—a part of the city below, yet apart from it.”
“Rock Ridge—a city beautiful where dreams come true. Where successful men are building their homes apart from the noise of a great city.”
“Rock Ridge—a private park residence place built to an ideal—planned in the Broadway hills for successful men.”
These advertisements were a part of a 1910 campaign by the Laymance Real Estate Company which spent the then-whopping sum of $38,000 to attract the rich to buy in a new part of Oakland, in the hills among sandstones known as “Rock Ridge.”
Oakland North is taking a look at the history of Rockridge. Go here to check out our page: We have stories on its early beginnings as a home for Oakland’s upper class by Ryan Phillips, a profile of one of Rockridge’s founding fathers by Amna Hassan, as well as what the area used to look like, in the words of some of its earliest settlers, by Megan Molteni. We also have photos of what the area looked like at the turn of the century.
Compare historical photos of Rockridge to those taken in 2012.
Take a look at some early photos of Rockridge, before the hills were built up and the BART station arrived. Photos courtesy of the Oakland History Room.
In 1954, local historian Frank X. Flood interviewed many of Rockridge’s first settlers about what it was like back in the “good old days.” These are their reminiscences in their own words.
The inspiration for a web project that contains interviews with 16 people “involved or impacted” by Occupy Oakland came from an exhibit at the Oakland Museum of California that documents the year 1968. “We thought, ‘What we would have done if we had a time machine and could go back to 1968 with a camera and a notebook?’” said Alex Abramovich, a journalist, artist and one of the co-creators of the project. “’What did we wish someone had done?’”
Meet Los Cenzontles, a Mexican folk band and musical academy based in San Pablo, California. To say that this group’s sound is eclectic would be an understatement. Their sound ranges from Tejano music to classic rock to re-imaginings of traditional Mexican musical genres such as the boleros, corridos, rancheras and the Son Jarocho.