San Mateo

It's strange to think that an electric commuter rail line rivaling BART in efficiency, speed, and comfort ran over 100 years ago between San Francisco and San Mateo, but run it did. The 40 Line, or San Mateo Interurban, began in 1892 with an initial segment operating between Market and Steuart Streets out to the county limits on San Jose Avenue. Three years later, the line reached Baden in present-day South San Francisco, and by 1903 service was opened all the way to downtown San Mateo. During the line's heyday, there was talk of extending it down the peninsula from San Mateo to Palo Alto to connect with the Peninsular Railway to San Jose. The 1906 earthquake put this plan on hold. Following much the same route as today's Mission Street, El Camino Real, and Caltrain, the San Mateo Interurban carried over four million passengers a year along its main and spur lines until 1949, when the system was shut down amidst much fanfare.

Ever since the DeAnza expedition camped in the area in 1776, residents and visitors have been making their way to San Mateo--situated in the shadow of its famous northern neighbor, San Francisco. This book trains the spotlight on the unique peninsular city of San Mateo, and illustrates its development from sleepy, oak-studded ranchos to today's bustling city with its own college, three high schools, churches, hospitals, and a population approaching 100,000.

Rising 2,000 feet above the rural San Mateo County countryside, Kings Mountain rests atop the redwood-ribbed backbone of the California Coastal Mountain Range. Despite inhospitable terrain, its forests lured Spanish padres who envisioned a chain of missions along the California coast. The community grew as its stately Sequoia sempervirens toppled before the influx of sawmills that sprang up in the 1850s. Named for early entrepreneurs Frank and Honora King, the mountain's story features rough-and-tumble sawyers, genteel dairy farmers, ghost towns, subdivisions, summer cabins, schools, and storied hermits. The celebrated annual art fair began in 1963 to raise funds for fire protection and grew into a nationally respected event that draws thousands.