{"id":109501,"date":"2026-03-03T10:31:31","date_gmt":"2026-03-03T13:31:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/automotive.einnews.com\/article\/897193031\/mZknGc7FZZhgNuds"},"modified":"2026-03-03T10:31:31","modified_gmt":"2026-03-03T13:31:31","slug":"berkeley-a-look-back-automobile-tax-bills-were-in-works-100-years-ago","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/new7.shop\/zerocostfreehost\/index.php\/2026\/03\/03\/berkeley-a-look-back-automobile-tax-bills-were-in-works-100-years-ago\/","title":{"rendered":"Berkeley, a Look Back: Automobile tax bills were in works 100 years ago"},"content":{"rendered":"
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\"Berkeley\u2019s<\/div>
Berkeley\u2019s then-new Hillside School, shown here, had just been completed in 1926, when the grounds were dedicated with a special ceremony. The building is now privately owned. (Steven Finacom for Bay Area News Group) <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n
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A century ago, Berkeley residents owned 15,000 automobiles, \u201caccording to Chief Assessor Harry J. Squires,\u201d the Berkeley Daily Gazette reported. \u201cThis is an increase of more than 3,000 cars over last year and based on the percentage of valuations meant that Berkeleyans have spent more than $11,000,000 on automobiles in the last five years.\u201d<\/p>\n

Squires was, on March 4, 1926, planning to mail out assessment cards and tax bills to \u201c13,054 motor car owners\u201d giving them the estimated taxable value of their vehicles, based on model make and year. \u201cHe expects that he will receive the names of owners of between 2,000 and 3,000 more cars from the state Motor Vehicle Department within the next 10 days.\u201d<\/p>\n

It may be of interest to note here that in the mid-1920s rail transit was still robust in Berkeley. There were two competing streetcar lines, numerous routes serving most of the city, interurban trains and regular ferries to and from San Francisco. Still, automobile ownership and use was rapidly growing.<\/p>\n

In the same issue of the Berkeley Daily Gazette, City Manager John Edy reported a plan to increase the number of paved streets in Berkeley to better handle increased traffic. Berkeley at the time had about 200 miles of streets: 170 miles \u201coil-macadamized,\u201d 22 miles paved and 10 miles \u201cunimproved.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cOil-macadamized\u201d streets, which placed tar over packed gravel, couldn\u2019t stand up to increasing traffic, so the city was planning to pave them with asphalt to create an \u201carterial highway system\u201d within Berkeley. \u201cThe plans call for certain streets to be paved and equipped to handle heavy traffic, which will then be diverted to them. This will save the cost of maintenance and will result in the city having more money to spend on the residential streets,\u201d Edy declared.<\/p>\n

School dedication:<\/strong> On March 8, 1926, the grounds at Berkeley\u2019s new Hillside School were dedicated. The ceremony involved speeches and recitations, singing the school song \u201cHillside, Oh Hillside,\u201d raising the school colors and \u201cbringing earth from the old school (and) ashes from the burnt building,\u201d which had been destroyed in the 1923 Berkeley Fire.<\/p>\n

The old school had been on a different site, on the southwest corner of Le Roy Avenue and Virginia Street. The new school was on Le Roy between Buena Vista Way and La Loma Avenue.<\/p>\n

Police facilities:<\/strong> Berkeley City Hall\u2019s renovation that I mentioned in last week\u2019s column was going to result in Berkeley\u2019s police station being \u201cmade into a scientific plant,\u201d the Gazette reported March 1, 1926.<\/p>\n

The construction of the City Hall Annex, still standing on Allston Way west of Martin Luther King Jr. Way (then known as Grove Street), and the transfer the of \u201cfire department and bacteriological laboratory\u201d and other offices freed up space in City Hall\u2019s main building for an expansion of the police facilities that had long been termed \u2018inadequate.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWithin three months the headquarters will be completely modernized with special bureaus for various police functions,\u201d the Gazette reported. \u201cThe entire ground floor will be utilized.\u201d<\/p>\n

The department would gain separate spaces for the juvenile division; traffic bureau; cases involving women or girls; and records and property storage, including a new vault, new switchboard and alarm system and a bigger office for the chief.<\/p>\n

Phone anniversary:<\/strong> On March 10, 1926, the Pacific Telephone and Telegraph Co. held an open house at its local headquarters at 2116 Bancroft Way \u201cin celebration of the 50th anniversary of the telephone,\u201d by which was meant \u201cthe first complete sentence of speech by wire.\u201d \u201cOld-timers\u201d who visited recalled that in 1884 (eight years after the device was invented) only four telephones were in all of Berkeley; in 1926, there were 22,000.<\/p>\n

Bay Area native and Berkeley community historian Steven Finacom holds this column\u2019s copyright.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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