Vallejo Naval and Historical Museum

In Celebration of Dr. Martin Luther King Day On the same day, Aug. 23, 1963, Dr. King delivered his memorable "I Have a Dream" speech in Washington, D.C., Vall...ejo had its own march for equality in our downtown. The local march, led by Rev. Horace Morris of Friendship Baptist Church and many other clergy and civic leaders, was attended by more than 500 residents, including children. Photos: Vallejo Naval and Historical Museum #Change See more

On this day in 1911, the first landing of an aircraft on a ship took place as pilot Eugene B. Ely brought his Curtiss biplane in for a safe landing on the deck of the armored cruiser USS Pennsylvania in San Francisco Harbor.

Solano Chronicles, Jan. 17, 2021 By Brendan Riley Thomas Sailor Tom Sharkey, an Irish immigrant who learned to box in the Navy, began his professional s...tateside boxing career in Vallejo, Calif., in the mid-1890s and advanced to battle the era’s best heavyweights. He made a fortune with his fists, but died broke. Sharkey, born in 1873, left his home in Dundalk, Ireland, at age 12 and had sailed all over the world on merchant ships by the time he left his teens. At 19, he enlisted in the Navy and began boxing in organized bouts aboard the USS Philadelphia. In 1893 through mid-1894, when his ship was based in Honolulu, he knocked out a dozen other boxers, including British Navy heavyweight champion Jack Gardner. By August 1894 the Philadelphia was back on the West Coast, tied up at Mare Island Naval Shipyard. Sharkey, touted as the Navy’s heavyweight champion, knocked out three more boxers at matches held that month in nearby Vallejo. Tim McGrath, a manager and trainer in San Francisco, heard about Sharkey’s exploits but doubted his boxing skills. He figured on making some easy money by arranging a fight with a better-trained heavyweight and betting against the sailor. McGrath went to Vallejo and met with some of Sharkey’s shipmates who told him they were willing to bet $25,000 without even knowing who Sharkey would fight. Impressed by the sailors’ confidence, he asked to see Sharkey. When barrel-chested Sailor Tom showed up McGrath realized his betting strategy was flawed. I chased my fighter right back to San Francisco because I didn’t want him to be killed in a fight, he said in a 1929 newspaper interview. Then McGrath, always on the lookout for promising talent, worked out a deal to manage Sharkey, whose Navy enlistment was coming to an end. Following his first 1894 stateside fights in Vallejo, where he lived for several post-Navy years, Sharkey had 1895 bouts in Vallejo, Colma and San Francisco. They included a Colma fight against Australian Billy Smith, who claimed he was the area’s best heavyweight. Sharkey knocked him out in seven rounds. Also that year, he KO’d Sailor Burke in the third round of a scheduled 10-round match in Vallejo’s old Pavilion hall, located at the northwest corner of Georgia and Sutter streets. Sharkey’s standing among professional heavyweights rose sharply in 1896 with a ring victory in San Francisco over Joe Choynski, a formidable, well-regarded boxer. Later that year, Sharkey also fought Bob Fitzsimmons in San Francisco, winning on a controversial below-the-belt foul call against Fitzsimmons by referee and pioneer gunman Wyatt Earp. Sharkey also had bouts that year against greats Jim Corbett and John L. Sullivan. He was on the road, with fights in Chicago, New York, Philadelphia and Denver -- well on his way to a great boxing career. Sailor Tom, whose motto was Never give up the ship, never won a title but battled the best in his years in the ring. He scored 37 knockouts in 54 fights and got knocked out only once, by Fitzsimmons in a 1900 bout in New York. Boxing historians have described him as an early version of Rocky Marciano an aggressive brawler, short, squat, powerful, rough, with great endurance and seemingly impervious to the hardest punches. Sharkey’s biggest battle was an epic 25-round heavyweight title match against Jim Jeffries at Coney Island, N.Y., filmed under hot arc lights on Nov. 3, 1899. Jeffries, the reigning champion, was 6-foot-2, nearly 30 pounds heavier and had a longer reach but the 5-foot-8 Sharkey went the full distance. He lost the decision, leaving the ring after the hour-and-40-minute brawl with two cracked ribs, a cut-up face and a badly swollen left ear but still on his feet. Jeffries often referred to Sharkey as his toughest opponent. After ending his professional boxing career in 1904, Sharkey opened a saloon in New York that was one of the city’s showplaces. He also invested in real estate, owned a string of racehorses and got involved in an oil company in Louisiana. When he retired he had a $500,000 fortune, which would be worth about $14 million in today’s dollars. But by 1916 his investments had failed badly and he was declared bankrupt in federal court, San Francisco. In the mid-1920s Sharkey and Jeffries toured the country, giving boxing exhibitions in vaudeville shows. Sharkey also got a few character roles in Hollywood movies, worked as a carnival strongman and hired on at various California race tracks. During World War II, he had a job as a civilian guard in San Francisco. During many of his post-boxing years, he lived in San Francisco and often visited friends in Vallejo. Suffering from heart problems, Sharkey was in and out of the San Francisco City and County Hospital 10 times in 1952 and 1953. Other fighters, promoters, old-time reporters and followers chipped in to pay his expenses. Sharkey, 79, died in his sleep at the hospital on April 17, 1953 six weeks after his most famous foe, Jim Jeffries, had died. Author Thomas Myler, in his 2017 book, New York Fight Nights, said that the ailing Sharkey, when told that Jeffries had passed away, remarked, It took a long time but I finally beat the bugger in the end. Many more details of Sharkey’s life are included in a 2010 book, I Fought them All, by distant relative Moira Sharkey and her husband Greg Lewis. Sharkey was buried with full military honors in Golden Gate National Cemetery in San Bruno. A Navy color guard gave Sailor Tom a final three-volley salute at the gravesite. He was elected to the Ring Boxing Hall of Fame in 1959 and to the International Boxing Hall of Fame in 2003. ------ Vallejo and other Solano County communities are treasure troves of early-day California history. The Solano Chronicles column, running every other Sunday, highlights various aspects of that history. My source references are available upon request. If you have local stories or photos to share, email me at [email protected]. You can also send any material care of the Times-Herald, 420 Virginia St.; or the Vallejo Naval and Historical Museum, 734 Marin St., Vallejo 94590.

Happy Birthday Jack London! The author was a frequent visitor to Vallejo, where he was a member of the Vallejo Yacht Club. His adventures along the Carquinez Straits as a young man are described in his book "Tales of the Fish Patrol."

December 23, 1924 On this day in 1924, John Grider passed away in a hospital in Fairfield at the age of 98. Little is known about Grider’s early life besides th...at he was a horse trainer and that he came to California from Tennessee in 1845 as an enslaved person with George Wyatt. John Grider was a participant during the Bear Flag Revolt on June 14, 1846 in Sonoma where roughly 30 Americans and their families seized the Sonoma Barracks and proclaimed California an independent republic. Grider was the one credited with finding the paint in an old barn near the Sonoma Barracks so William Todd, the nephew of Mary Todd Lincoln, could paint the star and bear on the Bear Flag. During the Gold Rush, John Grider mined enough gold to pay for his freedom and also of his mother. Grider lived in Vallejo throughout most of his life in California working at a livery stable. In September 1914, Grider was selected to ride in an automobile and lead the Admissions Day Parade in Vallejo as the last known surviving member of the Bear Flag Revolt. He is buried in the Suisun-Fairfield Cemetery. Photograph of John Grider courtesy of the Vallejo Naval and Historical Museum. Photograph of the original California Bear Flag c.1890 courtesy of the Society of California Pioneers Museum. #thisdayinhistory #onthisday #sachistorymuseum

http://vallejomuseum.blogspot.com//californias-first-telep

Solano Chronicles, Dec. 20, 2020 By Brendan Riley The loot taken in Solano County’s only mail train robbery wasn’t much $14 in cash and a small silver spoo...n found in stolen registered mail pouches but the daring April 16, 1910, hold-up by two masked gunmen made headlines around the country, including the front page of the New York Times. Three months later, on July 15, a Sacramento constable arrested two men suspected of stealing a bale of hay. Three revolvers found in their wagon linked them to the late-night train robbery near Benicia, and Joseph C. Brown and Charles Dunbar Bishop eventually confessed. By late August they were starting 45-year terms in California prisons. Here’s a detailed account, drawn from various 1910 newspaper stories and a few columns written in later years, of the carefully planned robbery: Brown and Bishop had holed up in an abandoned shack near Benicia and, with high-powered field glasses, had been watching the mail trains come and go for days. They knew that eastbound trains took a few minutes to pick up speed after leaving a ferry that hauled them across the Carquinez Strait. The night of the robbery, they stowed away on one of those slow-moving trains. At a remote spot between Benicia and Suisun, they emerged from hiding, pointed their guns at Jack Marsh, the engineer, and Jim Blakely, his fireman, and ordered them to stop the locomotive. Marsh and Blakely then were marched back to the mail car, where two clerks were forced to throw out registered mail sacks. One clerk started to toss out sacks filled with newspapers but the robbers detected the ruse and threatened to kill him unless he handed over the registered mail sacks. The crewmen were then ordered to put the pouches in the engine cab and unhook the locomotive. The robbers took off in the engine, stopped a couple of miles down the tracks at a bridge over Goodyear Slough and unloaded the pouches into a small boat. Then the engine was turned loose, with the throttle wide open. As the locomotive passed the station at Suisun, the station operator saw it was running wild and alerted dispatchers, who ordered that the engine be shunted onto a siding at Tolenas, several miles down the line. The engine, almost out of steam, ran onto the siding and rammed into two boxcars. Had it not been switched from the main line, it would have run into a westbound passenger train that had stopped at Tolenas. While railway employees rushed to prevent a train collision, the robbers rowed from the slough to a point just east of Martinez, across the Carquinez Strait from Benicia, and made their getaway in a stolen horse and buggy. They hid out near Mount Diablo for a couple of days, and then went to Los Angeles. Investigators found a shotgun and other weapons abandoned by the robbers as they made their escape, and learned that the shotgun had been stolen from a Riverside, Calif., store. There were other clues, along with a $5,000 reward offered by Southern Pacific for information, but the trail had gone cold until the July 15 arrest of Brown and Bishop in Sacramento by Constable Michael Judge. Authorities determined that the three handguns found in their wagon also had been stolen from the same Riverside store. The two men immediately became the prime suspects in the train robbery case. Brown was the first to crack under questioning, admitting four days after his arrest to the gun thefts, the train robbery and other crimes. He also implicated Bishop, who held out but a few days later also confessed. A Sacramento Bee account stated that Bishop was highly incensed at Brown for making the confession and has on several occasions since being in jail here intimated to some of his jail mates that if an opportunity presented itself that he would do Brown bodily harm. On Aug. 22, the two men appeared before Solano County Superior Court Judge A.J. Buckles in Fairfield and entered guilty pleas to the train robbery. Several witnesses were called, including the mail clerks on the train, Tom Clancy and Herbert Block; and Constable Judge from Sacramento. The constable eventually collected a total reward of $10,000, or $5,000 per man, for the arrests and convictions of Brown and Bishop. Judge Buckles was prepared to impose 50-year sentences on Brown and Bishop but reduced the time after the county prosecutor, District Attorney Joseph Raines, said the pair had confessed and thereby saved the county time and money had the case gone to trial. The judge stated that he was convinced that they were criminals of the first water and that they deserved no leniency, the Oakland Tribune reported. The limit, he stated, was not too good for them, but he believed that 45 years would serve the ends of justice. Bishop was sent to San Quentin Prison, was paroled in late 1919 and eventually returned to his hometown, New Haven, Conn.. Brown was sent to Folsom Prison but escaped from a prison convict work gang near San Andreas in May 1917 and was never apprehended. ---- Vallejo and other Solano County communities are treasure troves of early-day California history. The Solano Chronicles column, running every other Sunday, highlights various aspects of that history. My source references are available upon request. If you have local stories or photos to share, email me at [email protected]. You can also send any material care of the Times-Herald, 420 Virginia St.; or the Vallejo Naval and Historical Museum, 734 Marin St., Vallejo 94590.

Need a last minute holiday gift? The Museum Giftshop is open today until 4:00. Books on local history, stocking stuffers, prints, cards, and coffee mugs featuring artwork by local artist Dorothy Herger... and lots more!

Some things never change: From the Vallejo Evening Chronicle October 8, 1869 Yesterday afternoon the heavens became overcast with a thick and heavy haze or smoke, which completely obscured the sun and objects in the horizon within the limits of common vision. A strong, sultry north wind sprung up, and the atmosphere was filled with floating flakes of ashes, during the continuance of the hazy appearance. The tules were reported to be on fire some distance above town, an...d fires were also stated to be burning in the mountains in the upper part of Napa County. The chemisal* and grass have been burning in that section for two weeks, and farmers along the foothills have been compelled to fight the fire to prevent the destruction of fences, crops and other property. These fires are supposed to be kindled through the carelessness of hunters who are very disregardful of where burning gun wads may alight. *Chemisal (also spelled chamisal) is a California rosaceous shrub (Adenostoma fasciculatum) which often forms an impenetrable chaparral.

There's still time for holiday shopping! The Museum Giftshop is open Fridays from 12 to 4 and Saturdays from 10 to 4 now through Christmas.

http://vallejomuseum.blogspot.com//election-hijinx-in-vall

Need a holiday gift that says "Vallejo?" The Museum Giftshop is open Fridays from 12 to 4 and Saturdays from 10 to 4 now through Christmas.

We Are Open! After being closed for nearly seven months due to the Covid-19 pandemic, the Museum has finally been able to reopen. Like most other businesses, we have implemented some new procedures and protocols, but we are confident that your visit will be safe and enjoyable. Masks, of course, are required and we have set up several hand sanitizing stations throughout the Museum and in the Giftshop. At present, no more than ten visitors will be permitted inside at the same time. The most difficult part of this new normal is our inability to host larger groups, i.e. community events, piano recitals, school field trips, etc. The Research Library is also closed for in-person research because social distancing cannot take place in that small space. But for now, we are just happy to be open again. Come on down for a visit!

Frank B. Head was a yeoman and chief petty officer aboard the U.S.S. Arizona when he died in the attack on Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941. Head was born on Colorado in 1909 and enlisted in the Navy in 1928. He later settled with his family in Seattle but re-enlisted in the Navy in 1935 at Mare Island. He left a wife and two children.

Solano Chronicles, Dec. 6, 2020 By Brendan Riley The trial nearly a century ago of a Vallejo, Calif., thug who killed his city street department boss was no ...ordinary court proceeding. The case that ended with Martin Colwell going to prison for the rest of his life marked the first, precedent-setting use of bullet fingerprints as evidence in American courts. Colwell’s 1926 conviction for gunning down John McCarty was not easy for the prosecution despite strong circumstantial evidence, including Colwell’s threats of revenge after McCarty fired him from a street labor gang two days before the shooting. Colwell also was known to be violent and had a lengthy criminal record that resulted in three previous prison terms, one for burglary and two for assaults with a deadly weapon. But prosecutors, after one deadlocked trial in a Fairfield courtroom, managed in a second trial to convince jurors of Colwell’s guilt with the help of famed criminologist Edward O. Heinrich, their star witness. Heinrich, the so-called Wizard of Berkeley and American Sherlock Holmes, produced microscopic evidence that the bullet fired point-blank into McCarty’s chest could only have been fired from Colwell’s .38 revolver. Heinrich reached his conclusion after test-firing a live bullet found in Colwell’s pocket, along with several others from a box of ammunition found in the defendant’s waterfront ark. Using a stereoscopic microscope, he compared the bullets with the bullet that killed McCarty and found similar rifling scratches on all of them. He then produced photographs of the marks, which he called bullet fingerprints. Such images had not been seen before in U.S. courts. Heinrich explained that gun manufacturers, to improve bullet accuracy, used steel bars with cutting edges to make spiral riflings inside gun barrels, and the rifling marks were never identical. The result is a gun barrel autograph on any bullet fired from the weapon. Colwell’s second trial began on May 18, 1926, and jurors found him guilty of murder on June 8. Three days later, Superior Court Judge William O’Donnell sentenced him to life in prison. Colwell, 59 when he started his term at San Quentin Prison, was later transferred to Folsom Prison, where he died in 1938. He’s buried in the prison cemetery, with a small marker identifying him only as inmate 14237. On Dec. 19, 1925, McCarty, 40, had just returned from work to his 915 Pennsylvania St. cabin when he heard someone calling him. Shot as he opened his door, McCarty staggered across the street to the Vallejo Ice Co. for help and kept saying, I fired Colwell. McCarty died in an ambulance taking him to the hospital. About two hours after the shooting, police arrested Colwell as he headed out of town, walking along the railroad tracks. His .38 revolver, with one chamber empty, was in his pocket along with three bullets. Four shells were gone from the box of shells found in his room. Colwell couldn’t account for the missing bullet, insisting he had been drunk the day of the shooting and remembered nothing. Officers also found opium, cocaine and other drugs, describing him as a walking drug store. Besides his state prison time, Colwell also had served county jail time. One newspaper account said he had run amuck in 1912 while being held at the Solano County jail in Fairfield and was sent to the state hospital in Napa. He escaped from that institution in 1916. Colwell used the aliases John Barry, Joe Kelly and Marty Holleran, but no matter what name he used Colwell wasn’t hard to identify. He had tattoos of an eagle, flags, an anchor, girls and stars on his arms and back, and of a full-rigged sailing ship on his chest. When not behind bars, Colwell, a Massachusetts native, had all sorts of jobs around Vallejo over a span of more than 30 years. Besides his street repair job, he had worked as a printer, fireman and carpenter and in his 20s may have acted in local theater groups. He also had merchant seaman papers and enlisted in the Navy at Mare Island in 1888. He had managed to save some money and used his savings to retain two prominent Vallejo lawyers, Thomas J. Horan and Arthur Lindauer, a former Solano County district attorney, to fight the charge that he killed McCarty. During the first trial, Vallejo Police Chief William Stanford testified that Colwell made a jail cell comment that If I did kill him, it was not me it was whiskey. But the defense attorneys managed to get a deadlock seven for conviction, five against -- mainly by putting on another criminologist, Chauncey McGovern, to contradict Heinrich’s expert testimony. In the second trial, the defense offered new alibi witnesses and kept trying to discredit Heinrich. But he was better prepared this time. At a juror’s request, approved by the judge, Heinrich set up his microscope in the courtroom to demonstrate how he photographed the bullets. One by one, jurors walked up to the microscope and peered into it. He also took additional photos that matched earlier images supporting the prosecution argument that the fatal bullet was fired from Colwell’s gun. After closing arguments, jurors deliberated for only an hour and five minutes before returning with their unanimous guilty verdict. Over the years, there have been references to the trial in articles and books about criminology and forensic firearm examination. They include a March 2008 paper about Heinrich published by the American College of Forensic Examiners. The paper includes details of the precedent-setting Colwell trial and concludes that Heinrich, who died in 1953, would have enjoyed seeing the procedures he developed or refined nearly a century ago still being used today to make mute evidence speak. ---- Vallejo and other Solano County communities are treasure troves of early-day California history. The Solano Chronicles column, running every other Sunday, highlights various aspects of that history. My source references are available upon request. If you have local stories or photos to share, email me at [email protected]. You can also send any material care of the Times-Herald, 420 Virginia St.; or the Vallejo Naval and Historical Museum, 734 Marin St., Vallejo 94590.

Thank you to everyone who watched the premier of the Virtual Vallejo Garden Tour on Sunday, September 20. If you missed it, you can still view it on this page, on the Vallejo Garden Tour's Facebook page or by visiting www.vallejomuseum.net. And if you enjoy the Tour, please consider making a donation to help support the Museum!

The Museum Giftshop is open today until 4 pm.

The Museum Giftshop will be open Fridays 12 to 4 and Saturdays 10 to 4, now through Christmas. (The Museum itself remains closed due to Covid restrictions). Season's Greetings!

Thank you to everyone who watched the premier of the Virtual Vallejo Garden Tour on Sunday. If you missed it, you can still view it on the Museum's Facebook page or by visiting www.vallejomuseum.net. And if you enjoy the Tour, please consider making a donation to help support the Museum!

NCL was horrified yesterday to see the bulldozers at work on 333 Soscol, which the City of Napa had determined was historic 12 years ago. Members of our Board n...otified planning staff of this apparent oversight last month and also spoke directly with City Council members. We assumed the City would act in good faith an put a hold on the project. The City's contempt for our shared built heritage and failure to follow the law is shocking and they must be held accountable. See more

Today is Giving Tuesday, a day to demonstrate your support for local non-profits like the Vallejo Naval and Historical Museum. Please visit www.vallejomuseum.net and click on the "DONATE" button to show your support! The past year has been challenging for all of us. When the Museum was forced to close in mid-March due to the pandemic, we envisioned an interruption that would last perhaps a month or so. But seven months passed until we were finally able to reopen in mid-Octob...er, only to close down again after five weeks. Even when we reopen again, only small groups will be able to visit, our research library will remain closed, and activities like school field trips, music recitals, fund-raisers, and community events will no longer be held for the time being. Many of these events generated significant revenue for the Museum. We look forward to reopening once the pandemic is under control, and providing more programs and events for our community. But for now, your support will keep us moving forward in preparation for that day. Thank you for your support!

For those who missed it yesterday. #VallejoGardenTour

Vallejo Garden Tour Navigation 0:00 Video Start 02:50 The Craig Yard... 06:46 The Gaea Yard 17:56 The Guidry Yard 23:27 The Horst Yard 30:06 Vallejo People's Garden 35:56 The McCoy Yard The 2020 Vallejo Garden Tour is going virtual, due to the Covid-19 pandemic. On Sunday, September 20 at 10:00 a.m. visit the Vallejo Naval and Historical Museum’s website at vallejomuseum.net or to start the Tour. You will enjoy five beautiful private Vallejo gardens and the Vallejo People’s Garden at Mare Island along with descriptions of the various plantings, landscaping techniques, water features, and more. Additionally there will be links to gardening websites, videos, and more. The link to the Tour will be active for at least two weeks, so visit as often as you’d like! The virtual Garden Tour will be free, but we encourage everyone to click the Donate Now button to support the Museum.

Vallejo Garden Tour | Sunday September 20 | 10am

We've received news that legendary Civil War Historian Ed Bearss has passed away. A decorated WWII Marine Corps veteran, Bearss, who was 97 years old, rose to n...ational prominence as a talking head during the Ken Burns documentary The Civil War, but that is only a small part of his fantastic legacy. Among his innumerable accomplishments, Bearss was the former chief historian of the National Park Service. He was known for his discovery of the ironclad USS Cairo in the Yazoo river and his efforts to have it raised and preserved, his tremendous efforts to protect hallowed ground, and for giving countless battlefield tours across the spectrum of American military history, but with a focus on the Civil War. As anyone who attended his tours can attest, his indefatigable energy and vigor put many decades younger than him to shame. Bearss lived a long and fruitful life pursing his passion for history, and engaging others in his interest. We won’t see the likes of this amazing charismatic personality again. He was one of a kind. Rest in peace. See more

"Votes for Women: A Portrait of Persistence." a special online exhibit from the Smithsonian Institution Travelling Exhibition Service. http://vallejomuseum.blogspot.com//votes-for-women-portrai

We have one of these murals in Vallejo at the old Home Savings on Sonoma Blvd. Now a dental office.

Today is your final opportunity to pledge. Help us reach our goal!

USS Ohio BB-12 in drydock at Mare Island August 10, 1915.