A century ago, construction started March 27, 1925, on a new commercial building at the northeast corner of Telegraph and Durant avenues, the Berkeley Daily Gazette reported.
It replaced the Epworth Methodist Church at that site and would house various stores. The building still stands and is home to a Bank of America branch.
Chamber move: The Gazette reported March 25, 1925, that Berkeley’s Chamber of Commerce was going to move into the new tallest structure in the city.
The Chamber of Commerce announced that it would have offices in the 12-story office tower at the northwest corner of Center Street and Shattuck which would be getting under construction in 1925.
“The board of directors consider that the Chamber of Commerce should be located as near to the geographical business center of the city as possible,” M.B. Driver, the chamber’s president said in the Gazette.
“They believe the new building to be erected on the corner of Shattuck Avenue and Center Street occupies that position, midway between the university grounds and the proposed civic center.
“They also consider this a big stride forward for the Chamber of Commerce to secure not only such a central location but commodious quarters in this handsome modern building.”
The tall office building mentioned still stands today as the Wells Fargo Building.
Zoning issues: Neighbors in Central Berkeley had been fighting in 1925 for some time to prevent an expansion of the Marshall Steel Cleaning & Dyeing Works and the Troy-Manhattan Laundry.
Residents were trying to place an initiative on the local ballot that would rezone part of Grove Street (today’s Martin Luther King Jr. Way) near Channing Way from commercial to residential. The city attorney had blocked the initiative “because of technical errors” and the dispute had gone all the way to the state Supreme Court, which upheld the city attorney’s ruling.
This was one of Berkeley’s zoning flashpoints in that era. As neighborhood vacant lots filled in more densely with residential housing, old and new residents pushed back against businesses and factories that wanted to build or expand adjacent to homes. One argument was that such establishments, which faced few environmental regulations in those days, would disrupt the quality of life.
Business interests responded by saying they would leave Berkeley if they couldn’t expand. My impression, though, is that by the mid-1920s the owners of many of the owners or operators of Berkeley’s big businesses and factories were already living in the new “exclusive” residential districts in the eastern part of the city, where they themselves could avoid having a factory or laundry next door.
Proposed panel: Following up on his completed Committee of Sixteen project to create a long-term plan for Berkeley, Mayor Frank Stringham was proposing a new commission a century ago on March 26, 1925, that would “consider nothing but city planning and to have the present city Planning Commission deal exclusively with zoning matters.”
Annual banquet: Berkeley real estate agents were “hailed as city builders” at the 23rd annual banquet of the Berkeley Realty Board in the Hotel Claremont on March 25, 1925. More than 350 people attended.
Richard Ainsley, of Fresno, the group’s state president “praised Berkeley and its wonderful setting on hills opposite the Golden Gate and visioned the ‘city of tomorrow’ that will find its setting in the East Bay area.
“Millions are on the way to California … and the great interior valleys and your section here will be densely populated in the years to come,” Ainsley said. “California today is just in the making, and the future will depend much on the service that we as Realtors render in the building up of this great state.’ ”
Bay Area native and Berkeley community historian Steven Finacom holds this column’s copyright.