Rural Cemetery

WHOSE FAULT IS IT?

Jeff Elliott Leave a comment

It’s the town of Sonoma’s fault, or more precisely, the fault of that little crossroads known as Schellville, just south of Sonoma. But that’s getting ahead of the story.

This is the story of the search for Rodgers Creek. It began as I was writing the previous item, which described a 1909 prank that took place in the “hollow back of Rural Cemetery” and “the little valley back of the graveyard.” As someone who’s tramped around the Santa Rosa Rural Cemetery for a quarter century, I knew well the eastern border ended in a “hollow” with a stream, and recalled being told ages ago by a Knowledgeable Person that the stream marked the Rodgers Creek earthquake fault, which someday would lay waste to most of Sonoma County. In years since I’ve also overheard others describe it as the infamous Rodgers Creek and I’ve said so myself, demonstrating I had membership in the League of Knowledgeable Persons. But it struck me as curious that the newspaper story didn’t mention the creek by name, so I decided to do a little research just to verify it. This should be a zippy, two-minute Google, right? Six long days later…

The first thing I discovered was there’s lots of information about the Rodgers Creek Fault, as well as the Rogers Creek Fault. It’s also sometimes called both “Rodger’s” and “Roger’s”, and I often found mixed spellings within the same government documents and academic papers. Case in point is the official USGS report which used “Rodgers” – except once when it didn’t – but click on the link for the fault map and it’s now “Rogers Creek fault.” (UPDATE 2019: Those USGS links no longer are valid – see instead this recent report with maps.) Many other USGS publications also wobble between Rogers/Rodgers, yet a search of their earthquake fault database for “Rogers Creek” returns zip. And worst of all for me, not a single document mentions where the heck Ro?ger?s Creek can be found.

I thought the goal was at hand when I found an obscure 1896 Santa Rosa map that showed members of the Rogers family owned three parcels near the cemetery, and the creek likely flowed through at least one of these properties. (Rogers Way, next to the Fourth street Safeway, was developed from one of these family holdings.) Alas, this was a crazy-making coincidence. But another old map and another reading of the weighty Santa Rosa Creek Master Plan answered the question of what is behind the graveyard: It’s Poppy Creek, to which a drainage ditch extends along the southeastern cemetery border. And yes, as it turns out, the creek happens to overlay the earthquake fault.

(RIGHT: Section of map from Santa Rosa Creek Master Plan, pg. 200. CLICK or TAP to enlarge)

Once I stopped hunting for the celebrated lost creek of Santa Rosa, the real Rodgers Creek was easy to find: It’s a small stream about two miles south of Sonoma that runs between highway 116 (Arnold Drive) and 12 (Broadway). It was chosen as the name for the earthquake fault in 1949 not because of great geological significance, but because it’s so damn interesting. According to a 1921 survey, you can easily see that the creek was formed when a quake diverted the water flow from streams now gone dry, as well as other features that date the significant earthquake to about 200 years earlier (that’s two centuries from 1921, not today).

As years have since gone by, views of the Rodgers Creek Fault have evolved. It’s now orthodoxy that it’s part of the Hayward Fault Zone and stretches all the way to Healdsburg. Locally, it runs parallel to Petaluma Hill Road and east of Taylor Mountain, then cuts through the middle of Bennett Valley and Rincon Valley. It’s also believed that our “Santa Rosa pull-apart basin” (yes, it’s exactly as horrific as it sounds) is a few decades overdue for The Big One, which could mean a slippage of over six feet in a quake of 7.0 magnitude or greater, which is what happened when Rodgers Creek was created.

The current odds are estimated at a 31.7% chance of rupturing in a 6.7 magnitude earthquake or greater before 2045, the highest in the Bay Area (updated 2021). It would be a disaster of catastrophic proportion; right now would be a great time to download the PDF on Santa Rosa earthquake preparedness.

Rodgers Creek Fault Zone in yellow (California Geological Survey)
Rodgers Creek Fault Zone in yellow (California Geological Survey)

Obl. believe-it-or-not footnote: The pursuit of Rodgers Creek began as an attempt to clarify a story about a snipe hunt, an irony that was not lost on me as time passed with little to show for it. Most of my research was spent wandering down yet another “Rogers” blind alley: That Santa Rosa’s forgotten “Rogers Creek” surely was named in honor of seismologist F. J. Rogers of Stanford University, a member of the California State Earthquake Investigation Commission after the 1906 quake who performed the groundbreaking shake table simulations on seismic vibrations through soil. Famous newly-discovered earthquake fault, famous earthquake scientist with the same name – that couldn’t be a coincidence, right? But I was fooled again and tripped up by a different misspelling. In the commission report his full name was only mentioned once, and his initials were reversed into “J. F. Rogers.” There was much puzzlement as I wondered why Mr. J. F., a businessman well known nationally for selling small electrical industrial machinery – not unlike shake tables – had a secret identity as a renowned scientist. But had the commission made the further mistake of naming him “J. F. Rodgers,” I think my head might have exploded. One of the few men so named in that era was a prominent “roadmaster” (a railroad foreman in charge of track integrity). In Santa Rosa, the roadmaster  at the same time was William C. Rogers, who owned the land adjacent to the Rural Cemetery through which the mystery creek flowed.

As a result of these experiences, I’m calling upon Webster’s to add two new words to the unabridged dictionary: “roger,” meaning a small everyday coincidence, and “rodger,” meaning a coincidence that’s completely improbable. Both words will be pronounced the same, of course, so there may be some confusion.

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PLEASE DON’T BURY ME

Jeff Elliott Leave a comment

The married couple accepted that he was dying, but they just couldn’t agree what to do with his body afterwards. He wanted his remains cremated; she couldn’t stand the idea. So a deal was struck: For six months after his death, the mortician would hang on to his corpse. If she still opposed his wishes at the end of that time, she could bury him.

SIX DEGREES OF SEPARATION

Given the historic prominence of the Oates and Comstock families, it’s usually easy to find a “6 degrees of separation” link to Comstock House. This route, however, is a bit unusual:

Dana L. White (I) was a member of the Shaker community at Harvard, Massachusetts, from about 1838-1863.

In 1843, when he twelve, a utopian commune called “Fruitlands” was established nearby. Founding members included the family of Louisa May Alcott (II), who was about a year younger than Dana White. Although the commune only lasted a few months, it is possible that the children met, given that Fruitlands was based partially on Shaker principles and that the fledgling community had to trade handmade goods for food.

Around 1862, Alcott adopted a 4 year-old boy named Francis Edwin Elwell (III) who became a noted sculptor.

His son, Alcott Farrar Elwell (IV) married Helen Chaffee (V) and in 1907, Helen and another young woman were the guests of honor at a fancy soirée held at the home of Mr. and Mrs. James Wyatt Oates, where a little orchestra was tucked behind potted palms in the library.

Cremation was still a pretty exotic affair back in 1908 America, outside of the the San Francisco Bay Area. There had been only about 48 thousand cremations nationwide since record-keeping began in 1876, and nearly 1 out of 3 was performed in this area.* (Two crematories were operating in San Francisco since 1895, and one in Oakland followed in 1902.) Strongly opposing cremation were Catholics and other orthodox christians whose belief system demanded that a corpse be buried ready and waiting for a physical resurrection on judgement day. Someone who wanted cremation was probably a “free thinker,” a member of the Masons or Odd Fellows, or belonged to a religious group such as the Quakers. And that was the background of Mr. Dana L. White, who had been raised as a member of the “United Society of Believers in Christ’s Second Appearing,” also known as the “Shakers.”

White was probably an orphan when he taken in by the Shaker community at age seven. The movement was then at its peak, with about 6,000 members. That figure may seem small and cultish today, but it was a lot of people around 1840; today it would be the equivalent to a good-sized California city such as Richmond or Ventura (or any other cities with a pop. of about 103k, such as Wichita Falls, South Bend, or Cambridge). The Shakers viewed death as a dust-to-dust proposition. In their monthly journal, “The Shaker Manifesto,” letters and essays can be found calling for “rational burials” and ridiculing the notion that someone’s “never-again-to-be-animated form” would actually rise from their graves as “distasteful,” “false theology” and “idiotic.”

In the end, however, Mr. White did not win his post-mortem debate with his widow. He is buried in the Stanley section of the Santa Rosa Rural Cemetery.

Obl. Believe-it-or-Not footnote: Although he died in 1908, Mr. White might be another victim of the 1906 Santa Rosa Earthquake. The article below notes that he returned to town just a week before the disaster, and “was an invalid, and was nearly always bedfast” from that point on. He suffered from acute asthma for much (or all) of his life, and a man who lived about three blocks away died of pleuritis a few days after the quake, his lung problems presumably exacerbated by the great clouds of dust kicked up by the collapsing buildings and the fires that burned for two days. (Mrs. White was listed in the 1908 city directory as living at 914 Santa Rosa Ave, which would have been directly south of the modern Highway 12 overpass.)

*pg. 450, British Medical Journal, February 25 1911

DEAD MAN’S WISH PREVENTS BURIAL
Widow Opposes Cremation; Body Lies in a Vault Until Decision is Made as to its Disposal

The body of D. L. White, who passed from life January 30, reposes in a private vault at Stanley’s Cemetery. Mr. White himself favored cremation as the correct disposal of the remains of the dead, but his wife viewed that with disfavor. When he knew that death approached, he discussed the matter with the woman who was soon to be widowed, and the two agreed that when he had passed away he should placed in the vault for several months, and taken out when the window felt reconciled to incineration of the body, or, if her feelings remainder the same after a half a year’s reflection, she still opposed cremation, she should then dispose of it by burial.

Although Mr. White had lived many years in Santa Rosa, he was not well known here. Much of the time he was an invalid, and his acquaintances were consequently few. Those who knew him and had great admiration for his character. Studious, well informed, and possessed of high intellect, he was a charming companion for those who did know him. He was born in Boston, 77 years ago. At the age of seven he was placed in a Shaker community at Harvard, Massachusetts, and remained there until he was 32 years of age. He received a thorough education in literature, and was trained as a druggist, also as a botanist, the Shaker medicament being purely botanical. At the age of 32. He left the Shaker settlement. Much regret at parting was felt, both by himself and by those he left behind. He was an Indian Territory pioneer, and also a pioneer in Idaho. He was a miner in the latter territory and for a while had 180 men working for him. Although he prospered greatly while in good health, he saved no fortune; for he was a lifelong sufferer from asthma, and had frequently to abandon work and business, and spent large sums in travel and for treatment. After six years in Idaho he came back to Santa Rosa. For two years he was a partner of Jack Atkins, an old-timer now passed away.

Mr. White was married in Santa Rosa in 1873, to Sally Ricklifs, daughter of the late Peter Ricklifs. After a few years here, Mr. and Mrs. White removed to Truckee. He was in the drug business there seven years, and then went to Fruitvale. They again returned to Santa Rosa just a week before the great disaster of April, 1906. During all of his last residence here, Mr. White was an invalid, and was nearly always bedfast, with his wife as his constant and devoted attendant. His end was peaceful, painless, and calm. Deeply religious, and confident of the future, he had no fear of eternity.

– Press Democrat, February 8, 1908

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THE EARTHQUAKE GRAVESTONE

Jeff Elliott Leave a comment

For Santa Rosa and San Francisco, the 1906 earthquake was a painful family tragedy they couldn’t let outsiders forget. The locals wanted to celebrate the hustle of new construction everywhere – the shining city that was rising on foggy hills and the fine little metropolis being assembled on the Santa Rosa Plain. Trouble was, there can be no phoenix without ashes first; to boast of their truly remarkable progress, they had to also dredge up all the horrors that forced them to nearly start from scratch. It was a conundrum they didn’t escape until the great 1915 Exposition put San Francisco and the the rest of the Bay Area on center stage.

Santa Rosa allowed the quake’s first anniversary to pass virtually unnoticed, and it was almost time for the 2-year mark before the city created any sort of memorial for the dead. Even then, the tribute was unremarkable; an average-sized headstone for the seventeen people who were buried quickly in a mass grave. The monument cost the city $375.

(This is the first of four postings on the 1908 anniversary of the Santa Rosa earthquake.)



MONUMENT MARKS GRAVE OF VICTIMS
“To the Memory of Those Who Died in the Disaster of April, 1906”–A Neat Tribute

“In memory of those who died in the disaster of April, 1906.”

Such is the inscription cut into imperishable granite, marking the last resting place of many of the fire and earthquake victims in that big grave out on the hillside in Santa Rosa cemetery.

The monument, a big granite tablet, resting on a solid base, has been completed by Kinslow Brothers. Around the big plot a neat stone coping has been constructed and the entire surface of the grave has been cemented over so that for an eternity the weeds cannot destroy the neatness of the memorial. The monument stands in the center. On either side smaller headstones, erected by relatives, mark the graves of Joe Woods and the Bluth boys, George and Willie, two of the Press Democrat carriers, who lost their lives on the morning of the earthquake.

A raised block marks off the respective graves and tells the name of him or her who rests beneath, with the exception of four. The latter are designated “No. 1,” “No. 4,” “No. 6,” “No. 7”–they are the graves of the unknown dead, poor humans whose remains were never identified.

The names of the identified dead who were buried on the memorable April afternoon when the hearse made so many trips to the silent city bearing the mute evidences of the awful catastrophe: Mrs. C. Heath, Josephine Ely, Marshall Ely, George and Willie Bluth, John Murphy, Charles W. Palm, C. A. Trudgeon, Frank Downing, Nicholas Stampfli, Joe Woods, and John Murphy (two men of the same name being among the dead).

On the recommendation of the relief commission the City Council set aside a certain sum for the erection of a monument and coping and the work was entrusted to Kinslow Brothers who have just completed their contract very creditably.

It is a simple, but effective tribute to the dead. On each recurring anniversary, April 18, perchance some fragrant blossoms will be dropped on that chilly block of stone, indicating that some in the number who rest beneath, though lost to sight, are to memory very dear. They are sleeping. Even the giant tread of an earthquake cannot disturb them now.

– Press Democrat, February 11, 1908

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