The Farmers' Union. On the Corner of Pacific and Soquel. Part 2.

Read: On the Corner of Pacific and Soquel. Part 1: The Bank

What was on the corner of Pacific and Soquel before the bank was there? Farmer’s Union was there, and I think it was the center of Santa Cruz bohemia. 

To make way for the new Bank of Italy branch building, the bank tore down an 1880s era “business block.” H. R. Lord, the contractor who took it down, said it was the “most solidly built building he had wrecked in some time. The timbers are very heavy, and the pillars which supported the second floor are of cast iron weighing 800 pounds a piece.” While it was being taken apart, a Branciforte man named S. R. Comms fell from the roof and died.

To get a sense of what the Farmer’s Union looked like, here are two photographs and a Sanborn map of the Farmer’s Union as they appear in William Casey’s Santa Cruz history blog.  

This photo is on display at Eric's Deli in Santa Cruz. I took a picture of it hanging on the wall.

We know quite a lot about the Farmer’s Union—and Santa Cruz in general—because of Ernest Otto. Many twentieth-century newspapers ran a column written by an older reporter who dug through the newspaper’s morgue to resurrect old local stories. Santa Cruz is particularly lucky to have had Ernest Otto. He grew up in downtown Santa Cruz, and worked all his life as a local reporter here. His history columns were reproduced for years even after he died. He was a genius in his visual memory, and could walk down a street in his imagination, recalling people and shops and advertisements and the price of lunch in a restaurant that had closed 50 years before.

When we imagine what was right here at the corner of Pacific and Soquel before the Bank of Italy building, we can turn to the memory of Ernest Otto, in a column he wrote in 1944.

FARMERS UNION BUILDING

The large building was erected by the Farmers Union, a stock company. Its walls were of stone, brick and frame. The rear wall was of lime rock and brick, the side wall to the south was of brick, and the Pacific avenue and Soquel avenue sides were of smooth board of several inches in width. A wide porch over the side walk, first a plank walk was along the entire Pacific avenue front and the porch also went along the entire length of the much narrower Soquel avenue side. At the corner of the second floor at the joining of streets was a large square window and in the corner below was the entrance to the side stairway which lead to the landing and then a turn reaching to the upper floor above.

It was quite a department store for those days. The grocers held the greater part of the stock. One section was given over to the grocer, another to the dry goods section. Considerable part was for a feed store.

FARM IMPLEMENTS

It also had a fine stock of plows, harrows, haw rakes, hardware and such apparatus used by farmers. There was an office room and also a hall and space for stock for the store upstairs.

The grocery was finally taken over and operated by John B. Bias and operated by himself and assisted by his sons.

The feed store finally was taken over by A. M. Johnston on his arrival from Rockford Illinois. This was the forerunner of the Sperry Flour company and Mr Johnston represented that large firm. He finally moved to the building now occupied by the Orchard candy store.

UNIQUE THEATRE

To the south of the Bias grocery was the Unique theatre. It was the days before the nickelodeon as the motion pictures were first called and for numbers of years it was a theatre with stock companies performing every night in the year. The Alan Roberts family and then Mack Swain.

For years most of the upper floor was the Surf office with an office on the lower floor. The two corner rooms upstairs were the editorial rooms and in one was not only the receiving room for the Associated Press by the Morse system but it was also the night office for the Western Union and telegrams could be dispatched much later than now until well after midnight.

PRINT SHOP

Over half was given to the printing office with its Campbell press first operated by hand and a hard job, but a man could be employed. Then by water, gasoline, and last by electricity. The hand type setters cases were next to the Soquel avenue windows. The stones of the composing room were scattered about and the two foot operated job presses were in the rear. There were two stock rooms, one for the paper. it was also the folding room as all folder was by hand and another side room was the stock room and the cutter for paper and other stock.

At the south end was the Farmers Union hall with social hall in front. The hall was used for dances, entertainments, etc. Churches which met there at times were the spiritualists, Buddhists, and African Methodist Episcopal Zion. In the large front room at one time was the meeting place for the Arions. Three other rooms in the front were housekeeping apartments as many places along Pacific avenue on the second floors were used for that purpose.

LIVELY CORNER

This was a lively corner for horse traffic and horses attached to vehicles were tied along Soquel avenue as the port posts were used as hitching posts. At the time of the earthquake a section of the real wall fell out of the stone and brick and through the opening near the press could be seen the blue sky above.

This Farmers Union building was the first business block on the east side of Pacific Avenue and what was Bridge street when erected, then it was changed to Minneapolis avenue and then Soquel avenue which it retained. For years Soquel avenue only extended to Ocean street, the city limits, and then was the Soquel Road.

The 1886 Sanborn map is the first to show the Farmer’s Union. The Farmer’s Union was just two years old. The Unique theatre on the lot next door was not yet built.  Note that little house on the lot behind the Farmer’s Union with the bay window facing a brick wall. That is Arcans Hall. More about it later.

A reporter from the Sentinel toured the building with the architect before it opened.

FARMERS' UNION BUILDING

Nearing Completion -- A Description of the Various Departments

Thursday morning a Sentinel reporter, under the guidance of John Morrow, who drew the plans and specifications, visited the Farmers' Union building, which is rapidly approaching completion. Entering on the corner of Pacific Avenue and Arcan street we come to a circular counter that is 24 feet long and will enclose the front office....The hardware department is 12x85 feet, and is separated by iron columns from the grocery department which is 22x85 feet. From the last named department stairs lead to the upper floor. This will be used for storing goods with the exception of 14x69 feet that will be devoted to a

Repairing Shop,

Where tinsmithing will be done and agricultural implements altered. The main room, without partition for the workshop is 69x100 feet. A square bay-window, 6x10 feet looks out on the Avenue and Arcan Street. The other windows are semi-circular in shape. A Cupola, 12x16 feet, lets in rays of light. A light shaft of the same dimensions is on the second floor, and will be enclosed by a railing.

You can see stairs and the light shaft on the map. (On that map, north is to the right.) Ten years later, the 1897 Sanborn map shows some changes:

The Surf has moved in with its “hand and water powered” printing press. A competing newspaper to the Sentinel, the Santa Cruz Surf, published from the Farmers’ Union for many years, where editorial, composition, and printing were all done under one roof. The Surf was Santa Cruz’s more progressive paper, and its editorials often overtly contrasted the racist, anti-union, anti-immigrant Sentinel. The windows of the Surf looked out onto a lively street, where pedestrians, streetcars, and freight wagons met before heading over the bridge toward the east side.

By 1897, the dry goods section is now furniture.  Arcan’s Hall has been remodeled, removing the bay window and turning the space between the two buildings into a “Canvas Shooting Gallery.” Given the number of salons on the street, this entertainment was probably quite lively.

The Farmer’s Union was like many commercial buildings of the day, where merchants cooperatively operated the building, something like a modern mall or farmer’s market. The proprietorship and specialties of the small shops changed over the years.

The south side of the second floor soon became used as a rentable hall for various groups; a successor to the “Arcans Hall” next door that preceded it. The room was rented to lodges, churches without their own buildings, and visiting lecturers. For the Farmer’s Union from the 1880s to the the early 1920s, the upper room at the Farmer’s Union was much like the Louden Nelson center is today. It seems that just about anyone was able to rent it.

This Sanborn map from 1905 clearly shows the location of the hall. (On this map, north is on top, the bridge across the river is to the right.)

A Community Center

Rental of the hall must have been relatively cheap, given the types of groups that used it.

Another bicycle club, the Wheelmen, meeting at Farmer’s Union. (1898)

This club, likely a precursor to “Another Bike  Shop” today.

The Unity Spiritual Society met often throughout 1889 to 1906. An early leader of the society, Mrs. Aldrich died in 1898. One can tell from this obituary that regardless of what you think about trance mediums, she must have given comfort to survivors, and was trusted with family secrets.

The Late Mrs. Aldrich

In the passing away of Mrs. M. E. Aldrich, the city of Santa Cruz has lost one of it most estimable characters, and her little cottage at Surfside has been a landmark of great interest, alike to visitors and residents here. Her death occurred Dec. 17th as the result of a paralytic stroke received some days previously. ...

Mrs. Aldrich was one of the ablest lecturers on higher philosophy of Spiritualism, and was also a trance medium, and was endeared to many hearts by her work in the spiritual field. She lectured for the Unity Spiritual Society in this city most acceptable for nearly two years. She returned from the East three years ago, after having spent a year visiting her other children, but her heart yearned for the little home on the shores of the Pacific, and on her return she rejoiced once more to be where from the windows and porch of her little home she could view the wave-beaten cliff and boundless waters of old ocean. The last rites over her remains were conducted by the Unity Spiritual Society.

One might think that New Age Psychics are a recent affair, so it is interesting to know that people—usually women—have been speaking with the dead and other spirits, and giving advice for more than 100 years. There has been a Psychic Fair in the Monterey Bay area for 30 years! And a Psychic Institute in San Jose.

It is not hard to understand the attraction of the Unity Spiritual Society. Here are three Sunday sermons from different denominations, on the same Sunday in October 1899, preached by two different women.  Which one seems the most interesting?

Union meeting at the Y. M. C. A. this afternoon at 4 o'clock, addressed by Mis Carrie Ellis of Oregon. Her subject will be "Come."

At Unity Spiritual Society at 2:30 P.M., the subject will be, "Are We Spirits Now as Much as We Ever Will Be; if so What Are Our Possibilities?"

Mrs. T. H. Organ will preach at the Blessed Hope Church this morning at 11 o'clock. The evening sermon will be given by Miss Carrie Ellis on the subject "Glad Tidings of the Gospel."

From 1900 to 1906  the Society rented the Farmer’s Union hall for twice-Sunday services; some advertisements for their meetings call it “Unity Hall.” Rev Kate Heussmann-Harveston “a gifted and inspirational speaker” was named pastor in 1905. She was already known here, offering lectures such as “Truth, Justice, and Love” and “Body, Soul, and Spirit” in 1904.

One report said she “delivered a brilliant lecture to a good and appreciative audience. The subject, "How to Measure one's Own Soul Power," was one that vibrated thoughts both uplifting and instructive.”

Another announcement promised:

Rev Katie Heussmann-Harveston, the highly gifted inspirational spontaneous speaker and spiritual evangelist, will conduct services and deliver a series of soul-thrilling, uplifting and enlightening New Thought lectures at the Farmers Union Hall every Sabbath for Unity Spiritual Church. True soul and divine inspiration can only come from God. All liberal, progressive thinking people should attend these lectures and exhibitions of twentieth century soul and psychic phenomena, and judge for themselves where does this power come from. All welcome.

A few months later, someone wrote a letter to the editor about her lectures, which reminds me of the sort of Yelp reviews the friends of restaurant owners write:

At the local Unity Spiritual Society last Sunday evening at Farmers Union hall, Rev. Katie Heussmann-Harveston, delivered an inspiring and eloquent lecture on "Who, What and Where is God," to a full house, the subject being one in touch with the universal question of the day, with all humanity. The speaker's discourse was received with rapt attention and earnest desire to better understand God and humanity, freedom, New Thought and progression.

But something happened to the unity of the Unity Spiritual Society in 1906 because in October an advertisement appeared that said the Society had suspended its meetings at the Farmer’s Union. Despite that, the group continued to meet through the end of the year, now led by Mrs. Stoddard. For the rest of 1906, Mrs. Stoddard conducted the weekly meetings (“What Has Spirits Done for Humanity?”)  “Messages” —from dead loved ones—seemed to be the most important part of the gatherings. The last time “Unity Spiritual Society” appeared in the Sentinel was December 1906; perhaps the group began to meet in a private home. Mrs, Stoddard remained a trance medium, and working from her home on Cedar street in 1920. Heussmann-Harveston was still practicing in 1917. Stoddard died in 1922.

For more references on spiritualism in Santa Cruz, go read Santa Cruz Spirituality: Spiritualist, Psychic, and New Age by Paul Tutwiler.

While the Unity Spiritual Society was meeting on Sundays, other groups without a lodge of their own also met at the Farmer’s Union.

Socialists, for example. In March of 1905, Henry McKee delivered a lecture that:

...gave a history of the development of industry from the earliest times up to the present. The trusts, he said, are the logical outcome of the system of private ownership of the title to natural opportunities and can not be abolished until the industries they represent are made the property of the nation.

In 1912, a lecture on “The Living Wage” was delivered by A. E. Eldridge in the Farmer’s Union.

I noticed while reading the newspaper of this time, that the Farmer’s Union shops beneath the hall included a furniture store that closed on Rosh Hashana, and a Jewish-owned second-hand store across the street, Morris Abrams. This history of Jews in Santa Cruz by Ross Eric Gibson ends with the 19th century. There is so much more of the history of Jews in Santa Cruz still to tell.

Right here, for 40 years, the fringe, the immigrant, the mystical, and the idealist gathered. The second story hall of the Farmers’ Union is place is where those people met, formed friendships, fell in love, and found their personal revolution. I realize that the Sentinel is not the best place to find news of such things, and the Surf is poorly indexed. (I know; I was one of the indexers). So the full history of what I would call Santa Cruz Bohemia may never be written. But as we shop at New Leaf for our GMO-free, locally grown food, and give our donation to the ecological and social service groups in our town as we walk out the door of New Leaf, give a thought to those who gathered above The Avenue a hundred years ago, who would have felt at home eating that same food.

The Last Days of Farmers’ Union

By 1912, the Farmers’ Union’s no longer seemed to be the place to meet. Perhaps the owners let it decline. There are very few advertisements for ad hoc meetings, so perhaps the hall was being used regular meetings that didn’t need to advertise.  An article (quoted below) reported the current tenants as: “J. B. Bias, S. C. Landram, Central Market, Commercial Cream and Butter Company, the Santa Cruz Surf, and several lodges which rent the hall space upstairs in the south east corner of the building.”

In 1912, the entire block was purchased by Pedro Chisem. Chisem had arrived in town two years earlier from Mexico, saying he had made his fortune in cattle and silver mining. (Shortly after arriving, he married his deceased wife’s widowed niece, a newspaper announcement that would have had the same effect on his reputation then as today.) He arrived in Santa Cruz around the beginning of the Mexican Revolution.

A front page story featured the transaction:

"What are your plans regarding your new property on Pacific avenue?" asked the reporter. "Well," replied Mr. Chisem, "I shall strengthen the building throughout and modernize it in many ways. It needs modern windows, a broader stairway, toilets upstairs, modern wiring, new flooring, and a more economic arrangement of the floor space upstairs. I shall undoubtedly put in more offices upstairs and arrange things better all through the building."

When he bought the Farmers’ Union, Chisem not only planned those initial improvements, he later filed plans to replace it with a four-story modern building. But by next year he had leased it to Morris Abrams, a downtown merchant who deserves his own installment of “On This Spot.” Abrams owned a second-hand store across the street, a descendant of which still stands.

Chisem’s obituary says he returned to Mexico in 1915 but "found that much of his financial interests there had been dissipated.”  Although he only lived here five years, “Chisem is credited with having lost $125,000 in Santa Cruz real estate and building operations.” His lasting gift to Santa Cruz is Piedmont Court, that pretty apartment building on High and Highland, which for a while was a retirement home for teachers, but is now a very expensive condo. (Here's a short history of Piedmont Court written by Margaret Koch in 1978.)

Abram’s lease perhaps interrupted the hall rental because after December 1913 there are no more public events advertised in the hall. Perhaps the new owners put the space to a more profitable use. Shops advertised themselves by their addressed rather than as being “in the Farmers’ Union.”

The last mentions I’ve found of Farmers’ Union events were in 1921. Roy Hammond—who later became mayor—kept a commercial sign-painting studio on the second floor. Roy and his wife were in the class of Santa Cruzans whose parties were described in the paper’s society section. This party report from 1921 is nostalgic over the new dances and new music in the old “social center,” and it gives a glimpse of the interior:

Hammonds Give Party In Hall Once Center of Old Time Gayeties

Social history, like all other historic phases, repeats itself. Which is introductory to the interesting fact that Roy Hammond, the sign artist, and his good wife, gave a party last night at the Hammond studio in the Farmers Union building, the gleeful dancers executing the modern steps of the foxtrots and onestep over the self-same floor that forty years ago bore the burden of young Santa Cruzans of that day, who danced the hours away more sedately, but none the less happily. It was Cooper's hall then, and Charley Canfield can remember when Minnie Chace, now Mrs. Minnie Hihn, slapped him good for pulling off her sheet at a sheet and pillowcase party held in the much used social center. The old hall still sports that heavenly blue paint for ceiling adornment, and the light fixtures, now carrying electric lights, are the original gas pipe drops of yesteryear. … The guests had a wonderful evening. Taintor's orchestra was extra peppy and most generous with encores. ...

(I haven’t seen that the Farmers’ Union Hall was called “Coopers’ Hall” elsewhere, so perhaps that was a mistake by the writer, or perhaps it’s something else to research.)

Here’s a later Hammond party in the old Farmers’ Union, this one featuring old wine.

Hammons Give Splendid Party

Mr. And Mrs. Roy Hammond entertained another jolly crowd of friends at a lively dance at the Hammond studio in the Farmer's Union building last night. The host and L. J. Wilson alternated at the piano, and with a trap drummer par excellence in the shape of Paul Johnson, and Bill Blodgett working a singing oboe the dancers kept on their toes till way past midnight. The men set a new style for April dancing in Santa Cruz—a coatless effect, which proved to be quite fetching. Some exquisite designs in silk shirtings were exposed, Harvey Crowe revealing a stunning mode in five colors which was the envy of the rest of the male contingent.

The refreshments—ah! there was a treat. Punch perfumed with the odor of a well known 1918 Santa Cruz county vine was liberally at hand and several kinds of delectable cake made by some artist cooks who were present last night to watch it disappear.

'Twas a fine, informal delightful success for more than a score of couples who attended, and will be long remembered.

A third party in July of 1921, is the last event at the Farmer’s Union that I can find.

So that was the Farmer’s Union. A successful business concentrator that became a home for artists and so was replaced by bank. That’s progress. But what about that little house that was on the corner before it was moved? Who lived there on this spot? What happened to the house after it was moved?

On the Corner of Pacific and Soquel. Part 3: The Arcans Hall

Download a version of these posts as a pdf with citations.