This month’s artifact is a beautiful color 1907 postcard view of the Healdsburg Plaza.  This postcard is one in a series of 25 postcard views of Healdsburg created by Mervyn Silberstein, talented local photographer.  The cards were printed in Germany. 

This postcard was donated to the Healdsburg City archives in the 1960s by founding Healdsburg Museum member, (the late) Jack Relyea.  The Museum has several copies of this postcard in the collection.  The postcard view, taken looking southeast, shows the original three-story City Hall that once graced the corner of Center and Matheson streets where Oakville Grocery is today.  By the late 1950s, the 1886 City Hall building had become a little shabby.  It needed cleaning, repairs and seismic retrofitting.  According to Healdsburg Tribune editorials, the Victorian-era masonry did not project the modern, businesslike image that Healdsburg wanted to convey in the late 1950s.  City officials decided that the building was unsafe and inadequate to serve the growing community; they would rather replace it than repair it.  The first City Hall was demolished in 1960.

The 1907 image in the postcard was taken from the center of the Plaza, next to the marble water fountain that was erected by the Ladies’ Improvement Club--to great controversy--in 1900.  The drinking fountain symbolized the temperance movement, since the Ladies’ Improvement Club installed this wholesome drinking fountain in place of a bandstand which they deplored.  The ladies believed that the Saturday night Sotoyome Band concerts brought rowdiness and alcohol to the plaza.  The bandstand pictured next to the drinking fountain replaced one that the “Lady Imps” had axed down in the middle of the night in their righteous prohibitionist fervor.  The iron benches, shown in the postcard across from the drinking fountain, were a far more appreciated gift to the community.  Purchased and installed by the Ladies’ Improvement Club in 1899, the sturdy iron benches still ornament the Plaza in 2007. 

Hundreds of these postcards were printed 100 years ago as a part of a promotion to “boost” the City of Healdsburg.  The Healdsburg Business Men’s Association, which evolved into today’s Chamber of Commerce, was organized in 1907 to promote the business interests and beneficial growth of the Healdsburg community.  The Chamber celebrates its 100^th birthday this year.  (The Museum celebrates this occasion with the Chamber of Commerce at a special “After Hours” event Wednesday, September 19^th at the Museum 5-7 pm.)  Happy birthday, Healdsburg Chamber of Commerce!

The above was researched and written by Holly Hoods.

For more information about the Museum's collection of historical artifacts, contact the Museum