Tour - Walking Waterhoods: Temescal Creek — Bay Street/Shellmound

Walking Waterhoods: Temescal Creek — Bay Street/Shellmound

Emeryville, California 94608, United States

Created By: Wholly H2O

Tour Information

This is a highly contested piece of land, with a long history of human habitation. First and foremost, what is now called Bay Street was once home to the largest village with the largest shellmound of the Ohlone people living on the shores of San Francisco Bay. Early reports by European colonizers, describe the mouth of Temescal Creek was spectacularly beautiful — a wide mouth pouring crystal clean water into the bay. The area was also home to elk, grizzlies, fox, coyotes and likely wolves.

The area where the current shellmound memorial is now was the original mouth of the creek before land was "added" through landfill, creating new land for the addition of a highway beyond the train tracks running along the shoreline. The creek is culverted (in a pipe) as it enters the Bay Street area, and as it leaves. Had you been here in 1600, you'd be in the middle of a thriving Ohlone village.

Tour Map

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What You'll See on the Tour

Prehistory at The Mouth of The Creek

Imagine standing in this spot 20,000 years ago when the marshy land extended 29 miles to the Farallon Islands. During the Ice Age, glaciers had retained much of the ocean in ice, and San Francisco Bay had little to no water. Close by, ther... Read more

Current Mouth of Temescal Creek Ecology

What once would have seemed a wide, beautiful creek has been shaped, forced underground, routed through tunnels and become a route for run off. Despite stormwater pollution caused by cement and pavement surfaces, efforts to fill the bay wit... Read more

Shellmound Memorial -- Ohlone Memorial Walkway Entrance

A granite structure and sign greets visitors at the entrance to the Ohlone Memorial Walkway.

Shellmound Memorial - Ohlone Memorial Walkway Map

The map on the granite entrance to the Ohlone Memorial Walkway shows the Emeryville coastline. The red dots on the map indicate the locations of the more than 425 shellmounds located around the bay at the time of the arrival of Spanish colo... Read more

Shellmound Memorial - Ohlone Memorial Walkway -- Ohlone settlement

The Ohlone people made their home in this area tor thousands of years, living, fishing, and hunting along the shores of Temescal Creek where it flowed into San Francisco Bay. Ohlone shellmounds were massive mounds of shells, tools, bowls, ... Read more

Oak Trees Along Ohlone Memorial Walkway

Part of the memorialization of the Emeryville shellmound includes facilitating the growth of native flora along Temescal Creek. You can see native oaks growing in this area. The Ohlone people used every part of the oak tree, from the acorns... Read more

Shellmound Memorial - Ohlone Memorial Walkway -- Plague

Colonizers and settlers who came to California in the 1700s and 1800s devastated the native population by bringing diseases which had never affected their communities before. After witnessing the death of their loved ones, many remaining O... Read more

Shellmound Memorial - Ohlone Memorial Walkway -- Gold Discovered

The discovery of gold in the California foothills drastically changed the colonial presence in the area. A sudden influx of tens of thousands of people to the area created a huge pressure to divide and utilize land that the Ohlone had live... Read more

Shellmound Memorial - Ohlone Memorial Walkway -- End of Ohlone Presence

In the late 20th century, activists began working to protect the remaining shellmounds. In 2005, organizers sponsored a 280-mile shellmound prayer walk, lasting two weeks, that visited shellmound sites in the nine counties of the San Franci... Read more

Shellmound Memorial - Ohlone Memorial Walkway -- Exit Arch

A second granite arch marks the exit of the Ohlone Memorial walkway.

Shellmound Memorial -- Sculpture

The metal sculpture found here shows a rendition of a typical Ohlone basket used to store food. Baskets were traditionally made with tule reeds, willow sticks, sedge roots, feathers and shell beads.The Ohlone tradition of burning all of one... Read more

Shellmound Memorial

The Emeryville Shellmound Memorial marks the site of a former Ohlone village and burial ground. The native Ohlone constructed the shellmound to keep villages above high tides and serve as long-term repositories for the dead. Shellmounds are... Read more

Shellmound Memorial Creek Representation

Temescal Creek is represented in the memorial since the shellmound bordered on the original path of the creek. The mouth of the creek and the shoreline of Emeryville was about 100 feet south of the monument, between where you are now and Ba... Read more

Shellmound Memorial "Layers"

The layers can tell many parts of a story. While the layers and character of this shellmound are often referrred to as "midden", that isn't wholly accurate. Archeologically, middens are how we refer to waste piles that are the product of hu... Read more

Nineteenth Century Shoreline of Emeryville

The position of the shoreline where Emeryville met the San Francisco Bay is shown here on this map overlay from 1878. The coastline ran roughly along existing Shellmound Street. This entire area along the street was covered with a beautif... Read more

Shell Mound Park

Shell Mound Park was a year-round picnic and pleasure grounds from the 1870’s through the early 20th Century. The park was founded along the mouth of Temescal Creek and what was the coastline at the time. The owner built a pavilion atop t... Read more

Ohlone Village

Ohlone peoples and their ancestors occupied this area since at least 800 BC. Over time, the site developed into one of the largest villages in the San Francisco Bay Area, due to the wealth of Temescal Creek and its outpouring into the Bay ... Read more

Top of The Shellmound

Consider the distance you just walked from the Shellmound Monument. Then look up 40 feet to the second floor of the apartments above you. (You can also see approximately 40 feet marked on one of the photos included here.) Now, hopefully, yo... Read more

Bay Street Construction and Recent Shellmound Removal

After the last of the paint and pesticide factories closed in this area, the buildings were removed and the site was purchased by mall developers. Because the previous excavation was performed with 1920s machinery, the job was not thorough.... Read more

Bay Street Shopping Mall

The current group of buildings covering this area were completed between 2002 and 2006 at a cost of $296 million. The group of apartments you see on the other side of the pedestrian bridge could only be finished after the certification of t... Read more

Concrete Creek

The size of this concrete stream bed tells a story. When you take the headwaters tour, you'll notice that creeks often begin with small flows from rainfall or a spring up in the hills. But here you see a large space that allows a great volu... Read more

Pedestrian Overpass

What luck! Now there is a bridge that connects the walk along Temescal Creek from the east side of the train tracks to the west. This bridge was 35 years in the making— laying low in the city's general plan until Bay Street's popularity ... Read more

Railroad Yard

You're currently standing over the Union Pacific (formerly Southern Pacific) railroad yard. It was positioned here to meet the transportation needs of the many factories that used to surround the area. Emeryville has a long history as a tra... Read more

Size of Original Shellmound

As you stand here, look back toward where you were on Bay Street when we showed you the peak of the mound. Then imagine it extending north for about the size of a football field. Then turn completely around and look toward the parking lot y... Read more

Sherwin-Williams "Cover The Earth"

Looking to the vast area south and east of where you're standing is the former site of the Sherwin-Williams factory. After the Oakland Trotting Park closed in 1915, a huge track of land opened up for manufacturers to develop in business-fr... Read more

Stormwater Management

These are rain gardens, a key element of stormwater management. Thanks to Peter Schulze-Allen, Emeryville is on the map for early adoption of stormwater management. Stormwater is rainwater that has hit the ground level and is running across... Read more

Purple Pipe Covers

As you walk through this area, notice the purple covers throughout the planted areas. Purple is the color used to indicate that the water is recycled. The truth is all water on the planet is recycled, as it is the same water moving through ... Read more

Open Culvert of Temescal Creek

This is the beginning of the open culvert of Temescal Creek. Look to the side to see a storm runoff valve. Since Temescal Creek is dry for most of the year, these channels serve mostly to control stormwater runoff that flows through the cre... Read more

Oakland Trotting Park

In many ways, the Oakland Trotting Park (later the New California Jockey Club) was the reason for forming the tiny city of Emeryville. The racetrack opened in 1871 in unincorporated Alameda County. As Oakland grew, it threatened to annex th... Read more