Berkeley, a Look Back: Local turnout light in 1924 primary election

A century ago, on Aug. 26, 1924, Berkeley participated in a primary election.

California’s then-Gov. Friend Richardson lived in Berkeley and cast his vote with his family “in his home precinct at Center and Oxford streets,” the Berkeley Daily Gazette reported. He told the Gazette he had the unusual privilege of voting to confirm several judges he had appointed to the bench.

Turnout was initially light in the primary, “casting consternation into the camps of all candidates,” the Gazette reported, as hardly anyone voted before 8 a.m. Ultimately, only about a third of Berkeley’s 33,000 registered voters cast ballots.

The campaigns had actively distributed printed literature all of the day before and, in some cases, on doorsteps through the night.

“Extra girls had to be posted on the telephone exchange boards to handle the calls from numerous campaign headquarters.”

Precinct workers in a tent at Rose and Walnut streets became drowsy but then realized they were breathing natural gas coming up through a manhole cover. They evacuated the tent and asked for police to move it. The police reportedly refused because they couldn’t interfere with a polling station.

A call to the Alameda County clerk resulted in permission, and the fire chief came and measured out an appropriate distance to shift the tent so it was still within its assigned precinct.

Richardson said he was pleased with the election results the next day. He had campaigned against Berkeley’s two incumbent members of the state Assembly who had opposed his budget in the Legislature and succeeded in unseating one of them.

The other incumbent Assemblymember, Anna Saylor, lost the Berkeley vote but prevailed with votes from Oakland’s Rockridge area, which was in her Assembly district.

1924 Olympics: A century ago, the Olympics were held in Paris, just as they were this summer.

Unlike this year, no UC Berkeley athletes won medals in 1924, but the university did have a powerful presence on the U.S. team of more than 300 American men and women. Walter Christie, UC Berkeley’s track-and-field coach, was part of the coaching crew at the Olympic Games.

A retrospective article in the Aug. 25, 1924, Gazette said the U.S. team had generally excellent accommodations in the Château de Rocquencourt.

However, the quarters were about 12 miles from the stadiums, and local bus drivers often took more than an hour to cover that distance. In addition, competitions sometimes ended as late as 9 p.m., and the athletes got back to their quarters after kitchens had closed for the night.

The article also pointed out that athletes were given shared sleeping quarters and those who had finished their competitions tended to celebrate at night, keeping awake those who still had events the next day.

Wills triumph: A Berkeley sports hero returned home in triumph on Aug. 28, 1924. Nearly 800 people met tennis champion Helen Wills on University Avenue, where she disembarked from a train.

She had collected an amazing seven championships in singles, doubles or mixed doubles in less than four months, playing in the United States, at London’s Wimbledon and at the 1924 Paris Olympics.

New arch: Plans had been laid to erect a metal arch across San Pablo Avenue at University Avenue, welcoming visitors to Berkeley. At that time no highway existed along the bayshore, so San Pablo was the main driving route to points north.

On Aug. 26, 1924, the support poles for the new structure were put in place. They had been fabricated at “the Judson manufacturing plant in Emeryville.” A big celebration was planned for Sept. 11 that year.

Bay Area native and Berkeley community historian Steven Finacom holds this column’s copyright.