July 27

Exploration in 1769
Gaspar de Portolà named Santiago Creek. Father Crespi wrote in his diary; “We halted after three leagues’ travel near an arroyo of running water, although it was evident that it was diminishing because of the drought, and little by little the waters were being absorbed by the sand. It has willows, grapevines, brambles, and other bushes. It comes down from the mountains, and shows that it must have plenty of water in the rainy season.” The campsite was near today’s Santiago Creek Wildlife & Watershed Center in Orange County.

Overland journeys in 1846
Donner Party reached Fort Bridger. They rested for four days at the corral and cabins of mountaineer Jim Bridger, a fur trader, where they learned that Hastings, their guide, had left instructions to follow him

 

 

Accidents in 1862
The SS Golden Gate, sailing from San Francisco to Panama City, caught fire and sank off Manzanillo, Mexico. 204 people perished or were missing. Aside from her passengers, she carried $1,400,000 in gold bullion. Today the beach where she sank is called Playa de Oro.

Post offices in 1870
A U.S. Post Office opened in San Jacinto. The city, founded in 1870, was incorporated in 1888, making it one of the oldest in Riverside County. Some 44,000 people live there, according to the 2010 census.

Fairs in 1894
The Midwinter International Exposition opened in San Francisco’s Golden Gate Park. It featured an Electric Tower, a Royal Pavilion and an Egyptian-styled building that became the de Young Museum. 

Film in 1940
Warner Bros. introduced Bugs Bunny in the animated short “A Wild Hare.” Elmer Fudd would change a bit, but his voice and look were largely settled.

Crime in 1969 
Gary Hinman, musician and UCLA Ph.D. candidate, was murdered at his home in Topanga Canyon. Bruce Davis, a member of Charles Manson’s cult, was convicted for murdering Hinman and stuntman Donald “Shorty” Shea.

 

 

Sports in 1982 
Rickey Henderson, Oakland A’s, was caught stealing bases three times by the California Angels. Henderson was among the league’s top ten base stealers in 21 different seasons.

Crime in 1989
Charles Stevens, age 20, was arrested on an Oakland freeway on-ramp. He was watching police at the wrecked car of his last murder victim. He killed four people and shot at 10 others. 

Sports in 1999
Tony Hawk landed the first 900 on a skateboard (2 1/2 complete revolutions) at the X Games in San Francisco. Hawk launched a sports exhibition and tour, called Boom Boom HuckJam, appeared in films and a video game series. His foundation helps build skateparks in underprivileged areas. 

Environment in 2006
Some 125 people reportedly died in California over 12 days from a heat wave. It killed some 16,000 livestock in the Central Valley as well as 1 million poultry.

Environment in 2006
Trust for Public Land donated 6,845 acres of coastline property north of Santa Cruz to California for public use. 

Business in 2006
Intel, in Santa Clara, introduced microprocessors called Core 2 Duos. They were higher performance and consumed less power.

Government in 2007
San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom signed a $6.06 billion spending package, the largest budget in the city’s history.

Government in 2010
San Francisco supervisors voted to transform the abandoned Hunters Point Naval Shipyard into a waterfront community.

Business in 2010
Walt Disney Co., in Burbank, bought Playdom Inc. of Mountain View, for $563.2 million. Playdom makes social-networking games.

Martin in 2012
Tony Martin, singer and actor, died in Los Angeles at age 98. He appeared in over 30 films and was married to performer Cyd Charisse for 60 years.

July 28

Exploration in 1769
Gaspar de Portolà named Rio de los Temblores. He was with Father Crespí, 63 leather-jacket soldiers and a 100 mules loaded with provisions, marching north from San Diego to search for Monterey Bay. They named the river, now called the Santa Ana River in Orange County, after experiencing earthquakes.

Transportation in 1849
The Memnon, a clipper ship, anchored  in San Francisco Bay. She later set a speed record of 120 days from New York to San Francisco.

 

 

Accidents in 1938
The Hawaii Clipper airplane disappeared between Guam and Manila with six passengers and nine crew. “Flying boat” service from San Francisco to Manila involved about 60 hours of flying time over six days with stops at Hawaii, Midway, Wake Island and Guam. This was the first loss of a trans-Pacific China Clipper.

Sports in 1976
John Odom and Francisco Barrios, Chicago White Sox pitchers, no-hit the Oakland A’s, pitching 5 and 4 innings respectively.

Flight in 1976
Eldon Joersz set a world air speed record of 2,194 mph, flying a SR-71A Blackbird 61-7958, from Beale Air Force Base, near Marysville.

Sports in 1984
The Summer Olympics opened in Los Angeles. In response to the American-led boycott of the 1980 Summer Olympics in Moscow, 14 Eastern Bloc countries including the Soviet Union, Cuba and East Germany  boycotted the Los Angeles event.

Sports in 1991
Dennis Martinez, Montreal Expos, pitched a perfect game as they  beat the Los Angeles Dodgers, 2-0.

Accidents in 2005
Stephen McCullagh, 29-year-old assistant scoutmaster from St. Helena, and Ryan Collins, a 13-year-old Boy Scout, were killed by lightning in Sequoia National Park in the Sierra Nevada.

Government in 2009
Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger cut a half billion more from the state budget and signed legislation to wipe out the state’s $24 billion deficit. State lawmakers later hired 336 employees, adding about $14.4 million a year to the state payroll.

Government in 2010
Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, citing a cash crises, furloughed 156,000 state employees, requiring them to take 3 unpaid days a month.

Crime in 2010
Two women were charged with writing $2.6 million in bonus checks to themselves from Autonomy Inc., a software company in San Francisco.

Berg in 2011
Peter Berg, co-founder of the Diggers and founder of the Planet Drum Foundation, died in San Francisco. The Diggers were a group of radical social activists and Improv actors in San Francisco’s Haight-Ashbury. (1966-68).

July 29

War in 1846
The U.S. flag was raised at San Diego. Colonel John Fremont led the detachment of Marines and Sailors.

Race relations in 1849
A resolution passed at Rose’s Bar on the Yuba River said “that no slave or negro should own claims or even work in the mines.”

Religion in 1853
Pope Pius IX established the San Francisco archdiocese.

Education in 1879
University of Southern California was established in Los Angeles. It opened the next year with 53 students and 10 teachers. Today, the university is home to more than 33,000 students and nearly 3,200 full-time faculty

Sports in 1899
The Southern California Golf Association was formed. Five men met in a downtown Los Angeles bank and agreed to form a governing body to preserve and protect the game of golf in Southern California. Today there are more than 400 golf courses in Southern California on which nearly two million Southern Californians play.

Communication in 1914
The first transcontinental phone link, a test call, was made from New York City to San Francisco. The last pole was erected and the line completed on July 27. Commercial service started on January 25, 1915. 

Communication in 1920
The first transcontinental airmail flight left from New York for San Francisco. It stopped in Chicago, Omaha, Cheyenne, Salt Lake City, Reno, San Francisco then returned home through Los Angeles, Tucson, El Paso, Kansas City and Chicago.

Movies in 1928
Walt Disney released “Steamboat Willie.” It is considered the debut of Mickey Mouse and Minnie, although both appeared earlier in a test screening of “Plane Crazy.” “Steamboat Willie” was Mickey’s third film but the first one distributed.

Government in 1999
Governor Gray Davis abandoned the state’s effort to preserve Proposition 187, banning schooling and other public benefits for illegal immigrants.

McKibbon in 2005
Al McKibbon, jazz double bassist, died in Los Angeles at age 86. He brought bop, hard bop and Latin jazz to the George Shearing quintet and other groups in the 1940s and ’50s.

Snyder in 2007
Tom Snyder, television host, died in San Francisco at age 71. He hosted “The Tomorrow Show” (1973-1982) and his smoke-filled interviews inspired Dan Aykroyd on “Saturday Night Live.”

Business in 2008
Mervyn’s department store chain, in Hayward, filed for bankruptcy protection. It had 189 stores in 10 states in 2006.

Business in 2011
Yahoo Inc., in Sunnvale, Japan’s Softbank Corp. and China’s Alibaba Group agreed to launch Alipay, a Web payment service. 

 

July 30

Exploration in 1769
Gaspar de Portolà reached La Haba, the pass through Puente Hills from La Habra in San Gabriel Valley. He traveled with Father Crespí, 63 leather-jacket soldiers and a 100 mules loaded with provisions, marching north from San Diego to search for Monterey Bay.

Accidents in 1865
Steamboat Brother Jonathan sank off the Crescent City coast, killing 244 passengers. It was the deadliest shipwreck on the U.S. Pacific Coast at the time.

Inventions in 1877
Charlotte Gillard, of San Francisco, patented a child’s table tray. “The advantages of my device lie principally in its simplicity and its great durability. It can also be attached to or removed from a table very easily, and will be held rigidly when placed in position.”

Crime in 1878
Charles Bowles, English born gentleman bandit known as Black Bart, left poems at the scene of his crimes. He held up Wells Fargo stagecoaches 28 times. The sixth was in Plumas County, five miles from LaPorte.

 

 

Rancherias in 1910
Middletown Indian Rancheria was founded. Around 73 Pomo, Wappo and Lake Miwok Indians live on the 109 acres in Lake County. They own the Twin Pine Casino and Hotel in Middletown.

Movies in 1932
Walt Disney’s “Flowers and Trees” premiered. It was the first cartoon short in Technicolor and the first to win an Academy Award.

Sports in 1932
Summer Olympic Games opened in Los Angeles. The U.S. won 41 gold medals. Bill Miller of Stanford won a gold medal in the pole vault when he cleared 14′-1 ¾”. Later in the year he set a world record at 14′-1 7/8″. Babe Didriksen of Texas won two track gold medals and a silver.

Sports in 1959
Willie McCovey, San Francsico Giants, batted 4-for-4 In his major league debut. He played 19 seasons for the Giants and three more for the San Diego Pades and Oakland A’s.

Crime in 1971
Arthur O’Guinn, San Francisco police officer, was fatally shot while making a traffic stop. 

Sports in 1973
Jim Bibby, Texas Rangers pitcher, no-hit the first-place Oakland A’s, 6-0. It was the Rangers’ first no-hitter. Reggie Jackson, A’s slugger, said about one pitch, “That’s the fastest ball I ever saw. Actually I didn’t see it. I just heard it.” 

Sports in 1996
Tommy Lasoda retired as the Los Angeles Dodgers manager. In 2009, he marked his sixth decade with the Brooklyn / Los Angeles Dodgers organization.

Science in 1998
A panel of scientists advised California that diesel exhaust posed a serious cancer threat.

Business in 2001
Intel, in Santa Clara, introduced the Pentium III-M processor based on .13 micron chip technology.

Sports in 2002
Lisa Leslie, Los Angeles Sparks, became the first woman to dunk a basketball in a WNBA game. 

Government in 2008
San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom signed into law a $6.5 billion city budget.

Business in 2010
Walt Disney Co., in Burbank, agreed to sell Miramax for more than $660 million.

Crime in 2010
Authorities arrested Patrick Joseph McCabe, a 74-year-old former Catholic priest, in Alameda. He was handed over to Ireland’s national police service to face sexual assault charges dating from 1973-1981.

July 31

Overland trail in 1846
The Donner Party reached the Hastings Cutoff. James Reed wrote, “Hastings Cutoff is said to be a saving of 350 or 400 miles and a better route. The rest of the Californians went the long route, feeling afraid of Hastings’s cutoff. But Mr. Bridger informs me that it is a fine, level road with plenty of water and grass. It is estimated that 700 miles will take us to Captain Sutter’s fort, which we hope to make in seven weeks from this day.” Tragically, he was wrong.

Transportation in 1846
The sailing ship Brooklyn reached San Francisco from New York with 230 Mormons under the leadership of 26-year-old Samuel Brannan. They were to meet other Latter Day Saints crossing from Illinois.

Crime in 1969 
The Zodiac killer sent a poorly-spelled letter with a portion of a cipher to the San Francisco Chronicle, Examiner and Vallejo Times-Herald, claiming responsibility for the July 5 shootings.

Labor in 1979 
Cesar Chavez began a 12-day march from San Francisco to Salinas to draw attention to the 6-month strike of the United Farm Workers.

Sports in 1984
U.S. men gymnasts won team gold medal at the Los Angeles Summer Olympics. U.S. athletes won 174 gold medals. Synchronized swimming, rhythmic gymnastics and wind surfing debuted as Olympic events.

Sports in 1993
Oakland Athletics traded Rickey Henderson to the Toronto Blue Jays. He played for nine teams, 1979 to 2003, including four times with the A’s. He ranked among the sport’s top 100 all-time home run hitters and was its all-time leader in base on balls. 

Business in 1995 
Walt Disney Company, in Burbank, purchased Capital Cities-ABC Inc. for $19 billion. The deal included the ESPN sports cable network and made Disney the world’s largest media company

Sports in 1997
Oakland A’s traded Mark McGwir to the St. Louis Cardinals. That year he hit a record-breaking 62 home runs. McGwire averaged a homer once every 10.61 at bats, the best ratio in baseball history. He later confessed to taking steroids, although they were not banned at that time.

Grey in 2004 
Virginia Grey, film and television actress, died in Los Angeles at age 87. She appeared in over 100 films and 40 television shows.

Environment in 2006 
Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger and British Prime Minister Tony Blair committed to fight global warming, including market-based ways to stem emissions of the gases causing global warming.

Crime in 2006 
Olga Rutterschmidt, age 73, and Helen Golay, age 75, were charged with killing Los Angeles homeless men in hit-and-run car crashes to collect over $2 million in life insurance. Both were convicted of murder and sentenced to spend the rest of their lives in prison.

Business in 2006
SanDisk Corp., in Milpitas, agreed to buy M-Systems Flash Disk Pioneers Ltd. of Israel for $1.56 billion.

Crime in 2007 
Michael Schneider, a 44-year-old real estate broker, pleaded no contest in Santa Clara County to 173 felony counts related to bilking investors out of more than $43 million. He faced as much as 169 years in prison.

Education in 2007
Oakland’s University Preparatory Charter Academy closed, leaving over 400 students in the lurch. UPREP students went to top colleges and universities across the U.S. including University of California, Berkeley and Stanford University.

Government in 2008 
Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger ordered thousands of state workers laid off and pay cuts for most other state employees to ease the state’s budget gap of $17.2 billion.

Crime in 2008 
Ivan Miranda, age 14, was killed in the San Francisco Excelsior district in a gang motivated attack. Walter Chinchilla-Linar, age 23, and Cesar Alvarado, age 19, alleged members of MS-13, were charged with the murder.

Environment in 2009
California authorities said white striped fruit flies were found in Southern California. That was the first time the Southeast Asian pest was found in the Western Hemisphere. Several thousand traps placed in eastern Los Angeles County found seven flies.

Vidal in 2012 
Gore Vidal, author, writer of novels, essays, screen and stage plays and a public intellectual, died in Hollywood Hills at age 86. He was known for his wit, knowledge and willingness to antagonize what he considered false concepts.

Government in 2013 
A U.S. federal court ruled that football players could sue Electronic Arts, based in Redwood City, over use of their images in video games.

 

Government in 2013 
Oakland City Council ruled that clubs, spray-paint cans, hammers, sling-shots, fire accelerant and wrenches can no longer be carried during local demonstrations.

August 1

Religion in 1852
The First African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church was established in San Francisco. Reverend John Jamison Moore, its first pastor, also served as principal and teacher at the San Francisco Colored School. Today the church remains actively involved in the community and delivers a message of “wholeness of self.”

Immigration in 1881
A U.S. Quarantine Station was authorized for Angel Island in San Francisco Bay. Beginning in 1891, ships from foreign ports were fumigated and immigrants suspected of carrying diseases were kept in isolation. Some one million people were held, inspected and examined at the Angel Island Immigration Station. Today Angel Island is a California Sate Park.

San Francisco in 1901
San Francisco ended burials within city limits. Due to limited land, today most burials are at cemeteries in Colma, known as the “city of souls,” where around 1,400 people live and more than a million are buried.

Garcia in 1945
Jerome John “Jerry” Garcia, lead guitarist and spiritual head of the Grateful Dead for 39 years, was born in San Francisco. He was a great improvisational player who never performed the same song the same way twice. In 2003, Rolling Stone Magazine, ranked him 13th in their list of the 100 greatest guitarists of all time.

Television in 1956
KRCR-TV channel 7 in Redding-Chico began broadcasting. Originally a NBC affiliate, the station now known as NewsChannel 7 became an ABC affiliate in 1978.

Sports in 1977
Willie McCovey, San Francisco Giants, hit a National League record 18th grand slam home run. Earlier in the season he became the first player to hit two home runs in one inning for the second time.

Music in 1986
Grateful Dead’s Jerry Garcia was released from the hospital after 3 weeks in a diabetic coma. Afterwards he had to relearn how to play the guitar, as well as other, more basic skills.

August 2

Bear Flag Revolt in 1846
General Mariano Vallejo was released from captivity at from Sutter’s Fort. American rebels arrested him at his Sonoma home at the start of the California Republic, known as the Bear Flag Revolt, because he headed the local Mexican militia. 

Transportation in 1847
William Leidesdorff launched the first steamboat in San Francisco Bay. He was one of the first mixed-race U.S. citizens in California, school board president and city treasurer. His estate in 1856 was worth some $1,445,000, not including gold mined upon his land.

Duels in 1852
Senator James Denver challenged Edward Gilbert, Alta California newspaper editor, to a duel due to an inflammatory editorial. They met near Sacramento. First shots missed. Gilbert killed Denver in the second round.

Transportation in 1873
Andrew Hallidie tested a cable car near the top of San Francisco’s Nob Hill. 

Harding in 1923 
Warren Harding, 29th president of the United States, died in San Francisco at age 57 from a “stroke of apoplexy.”

Lang in 1976
Fritz Lang, legendary filmmaker, died in Beverly Hills at age 85. His most famous films, made in Germany, include “Metropolis,” (1927), the most expensive film at the time, and “M” (1931), the first film noir. 

Sports in 1982
Rickey Henderson, Oakland Athletics, stole his 100th base of the season. That year he stole 130 bases, setting the single-season record and is the only player in the American League who stole 100 bases in a season three times. 

Carcione in 1988 
Joe Carcione, fresh foods consumer advocate known as the Green Grocer on radio, television and newspapers, died in Burlingame at age 74.

Crime in 1991
Hedy Lamaar, legendary film actress and inventor, was arrested for shoplifting in Los Angeles. She co-invented a device essential to Bluetooth and other wireless communication and was inducted into the Inventors Hall of Fame (2014). 

Fire in 1997 
Fire in San Diego destroyed 11 homes, 30 cars, 15 other structures and caused the crash of an air tanker fighting the flames.

 

 

 

Lewis in 1998 
Shari Lewis, ventriloquist, puppeteer, and children’s entertainer, died in Los Angeles at age 65.

Race relations in 2000 
A San Francisco jury awarded 17 bakery workers at Interstate Brands Corp. $120 million for racial discrimination.

Crime in 2006 
Mel Gibson, actor-director, was charged with misdemeanor drunk driving five days after being pulled over by Los Angeles police. 

Crime in 2007 
Chauncey Bailey, 57-year-old editor of the Oakland Post, was shot and killed on his way to work by a masked gunman. In 2009 Yusuf Bey IV, 23-year-old leader of Your Black Muslim Bakery, was accused of murder for telling two of his followers to kill Bailey. 

Crime in 2008
Firebombs exploded outside the homes of two U.C. Santa Cruz biologists. They were similar to some used by animal rights activists.

Crime in 2010 
U.S. House ethics committee said Representative Maxine Waters, Democrat from Los Angeles, would be tried for her 2009 role in steering federal funds to a bank she was personally connected with. It ended after two years of mistakes, squabbles, racial attacks, personal rivalries and failures to end the investigation.

August 3

Crime in 1877
Charles Bowles, English born gentleman bandit known as Black Bart, left poems at the scene of his crimes. He held up Wells Fargo stagecoaches 28 times. His fifth was in Sonoma County, four miles from Fort Ross. He left his first poem  here. 

 

Allensworth in 1908 
Colonel Allan Allensworth filed the site plan for Allensworth in Tulare County. It was the only town in California founded, financed and governed by African Americans. Today it is a State Historic Park. 

Labor in 1913 
Four people died and many injured in the Wheatland Hop Riot. Authorities blamed it on the Industrial Workers of the World union, but that was never proved. The riot became one of the first 20th century showdowns between California land owners and farm labor.

North in 1952 
Jay North, film and television actor, was born in North Hollywood. At 6 years old, he began playing Dennis on the “Dennis the Menace” (1959-1963). 

Bruce in 1966 
Lenny Bruce, legendary stand-up comic, social critic and screenwriter, died in Hollywood at age 40. He invented the open, free-style comedy form including satire, politics, religion, sex and vulgarity, which got him into trouble with the law.

Music in 1968
Newport Pop Festival in Costa Mesa was the first concert to sell more than 100,000 tickets. Headliners included Jefferson Airplane, Tiny Tim, Grateful Dead, Chambers Brothers and Canned Heat. Jimi Hendrix played the next year.

LGBT in 1979 
Immigration inspectors at the San Francisco Airport stopped two Mexican men from entering the U.S. because their bags contained cosmetics. Immigration and Naturalization Service soon ordered agents to stop refusing entry to foreigners suspected of being gay.

Jones in 1983
Carolyn Jones, film and television actress, died in West Hollywood at age 63. She is best known for playing Morticia Addams in “The Addams Family” (1964-1966).

Crime in 2007 
Ving Rhames’ dogs mauled Jacob Adams, caretaker for the actor’s dogs. Adams died at the star’s Brentwood home.

Crime in 2010
Federal authorities in San Francisco seized over 200,000 counterfeit items at Fisherman’s Wharf valued at $100 million. The network imported goods from China that copied 70 brands. 

Science in 2011 
Stanford University scientists in Palo Alto reported finding a way to kill cancer cells by turning off their ability to absorb glucose, often the primary source of energy in rapidly growing tumors.