Emeryville Historical Society: Park Avenue District Walking Tour

A walk along Emeryville's Park Avenue District showcasing the many stories behind the historic buildings.

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Emeryville Historical Society: Park Avenue District Walking Tour

Emeryville, California 94608, United States

Created By: The Emeryville Historical Society

Tour Information

Emeryville, CA’s Park Avenue District is chock full of beautiful warehouses and important historical sites that played vital roles in Industry, recreation and science.

Notable sites include the Oakland Oaks Ball Park, the birthplace of modern greyhound racing, a steam car factory that almost revolutionized automobile manufacturing and other more notorious sites that helped give “The Rottenest City” its moniker.

* This tour is actively being edited and fact-checked and we hope to finalize it by early Fall 2023.*


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What You'll See on the Tour

Here at the foot of Park Avenue was once the nexus of manufacturing, transportation and political power in Emeryville. The south-west corner of Park Avenue, now the “Park Place” industrial units, was once the Commercial Union Hotel. Acr... Read more
This ornate two-story brick building at the foot of Park Avenue was built by the Air Reduction Company in 1917. Air Reduction Co. manufactured oxygen tanks for welding. Prior to its construction, it was the site of Emeryville’s first po... Read more
The Emeryville Warehouse Lofts was originally constructed as the Peck & Hills Furniture Company in 1905. The original wood construction was replaced with the current concrete building in 1922 and expanded between 1925-1926. Peck & H... Read more
Oklahoma native Owen Patrick “O.P. ” Smith is credited with the invention of the mechanical rabbit as a lure in Greyhound racing and received a patent for his “inanimate hare conveyor.” It is here in 1919 at the current site of the ... Read more
This 3-story brick-facade Warehouse is the last remaining structure from what was once the 10-acre Sherwin-Williams Paint factory. The building once supported the iconic “Cover The Earth” neon sign familiar to commuters and generations ... Read more
This building at 1420 45th street was erected for The Kirsch Company in 1926. Kirsch, founded by C.W. Kirsch in 1907, manufactured drapery hardware and was headquartered in Sturgis, Michigan. At the time they were the world’s largest manu... Read more
PG&E’s Transformer Repair Facility has been operating since 1925 and is among the utility company’s oldest active facilities. PG&E was among the many companies that established operations in the East Bay following the devastatio... Read more
This building that spans 4240-4250 Hollis was built in 1924 for the J.R. Watkins Company. J.R. Watkins manufactured homemade medical products including liniment, extracts, and salves. The Kirsch Company occupied the space in 1934 moving fro... Read more
Morehouse Mustard was founded in Chicago in 1898 by father-son team Miles and Lou Morehouse who sold their product from a horse-drawn wagon. When the family moved the business to Los Angeles in 1913, Morehouse became the first West Coast ma... Read more
Dugan’s Hotel and Restaurant was a two-story Victorian located at the northwest corner of Park Avenue and Hollis Street (1352 Park Ave.), kitty-corner from Old Town Hall. The structure was built after the turn of the twentieth century an... Read more
Emeryville incorporated as a town in 1896 acquiring this original 125 x 125 ft. lot at the southeast corner of Hollis and Park Ave in 1903. The original Town Hall was built that year at a cost of $8,491 and still stands as the oldest buildi... Read more
This brick warehouse at 1255 Park Avenue was built by the Fisher Body Co. in 1929 for $250,000. The building was mostly one-story with an elevated two-story section in the front that provided office space. The plant, which measured 262 feet... Read more
The stunning brick warehouse at 1219 Park Avenue was originally constructed around 1917 as Peoples’ Baking Company. Peoples produced a complete line of baked goods which it delivered to homes and stores in a fleet of trucks painted to mat... Read more
This two-story brick building at 1201 Park Avenue was built in 1913 for the California Cracker Company. This unique structure has narrow arched windows, pilaster corners, and a corbelled frieze. California Cracker Co. was a family run busin... Read more
The American Rubber Co. plant opened in 1907 at the Southeast corner of Watts Street and Park Ave. The company manufactured rubber conveyor belts, fire hoses, and other rubber products, employing a workforce of 150 at its peak. Like many ol... Read more
In 1919, Chinese investors built Western Canning Co. at 1250 Park Avenue. It was a network of brick buildings that stretched several blocks from Emery Street all the way to Hollis. Considered a modern plant by the standards of the era, the... Read more
The Pacific Coast League was established in 1903 to satiate a growing obsession with Baseball during the era. The Oakland team, dubbed the Oaks or “The Acorns” by some, originally played in Freeman’s Park which was located at 59th Str... Read more
The unmarked site now occupied by a strip mall and skate park was once the estate of Emeryville's founder, Joseph Stickney Emery.  Born in New Hampshire in 1820, Emery journeyed to San Francisco in 1850 in search of gold and fortune. He st... Read more
The Oaks building dates back to the 1890s and has always been a drinking and gambling establishment. It is considered the oldest card lounge in Northern California. Originally named “Congers” after owner John Conger, it later became the... Read more
The unassuming Black & White liquor store actually has some significant history and is likely the oldest building in the Park Avenue District outside of Emeryville’s Old Town Hall dating back to 1913. Livermore native George Cockerton... Read more
4053 Emery is a single-story, 5,000 square foot plant built for The California Pickle & Sauce Company circa 1910. California Pickle & Sauce was founded by A. Kreye and L.F. Helmond in Oakland in 1906. The operation had a fleet of tr... Read more
 Inlaid Floor Co. is an SF-Founded Company that specialized in hardwood floors with patterns and ornamental designs made out of different colored woods. They expanded their operation to Emeryville in 1917 operating out of this warehouse on... Read more
The Besler Building at 4053 Harlan Street was once home to the pinnacle of steam car technology that might have changed the world had it not been for the great depression and some poor financial decisions. Abner Doble, born in San Francisco... Read more
In c.1942 Albert Wright, a machinist, established the Albert Wright Screw Machine Products Co. in Emeryville. This one-story brick factory stood on a lot just south of Emeryville’s City Hall at 4062 Hollis Street. The Albert Wright Co. sp... Read more
The beloved comfort food cafe was originally built c. 1920 as the Holly-Park Service station before becoming a Rio Grande Oil service Station. It was later converted to a restaurant named the Ranch House. In 1964 it was acquired by Chinese ... Read more
The “Colonial Revival” style building on the corner of Park & Holden was built around 1905 and has lived a storied past as a hotel, gambling establishment, bar and bordello. A 1925 news clipping references the building as the St. Ju... Read more
Built in the 1920s, this two-story brick building originally operated as The Industrial Hard Chrome Plating Corporation. The two-story building had a smooth brick surface and a Gothic parapet. At the rear of the building was a mass of convo... Read more
The most contemporary structure on this walking tour, the aesthetic of these studios pays homage to Emeryville’s industrial past. The corrugated metal-sided, sawtooth-roof studios at 1425 Park were designed by local architect Joseph Costa... Read more
The earliest record of the site from 1912 lists the location as the “H. A. Potter Company” with records indicating they were either a hardware supplier or stove manufacturer. This current brick warehouse at 4056 Hubbard on the corner of... Read more
Pennsylvania-born George Westinghouse was the inventor of an air brake system for locomotives which previously had to be stopped manually. He received a patent for the invention in 1869 at the age of 19 and founded the Westinghouse Air Brak... Read more

 

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