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8.C. - Page 20 of 54 <br />William Kostura, Historic Resource Evaluation of the Redwood City Woman Club <br />By the end of 1908, Dingee was forced to relinquish both the Dingee Park subdivision <br />and his Santa Cruz cement factory to his creditor, the San Francisco banker William H. <br />Crocker. Crocker was the youngest and most prominent son of Charles Crocker, who had <br />been one of the four owners of the Southern Pacific Railroad. William H. Crocker <br />became the owner of the Crocker National Bank in San Francisco and of many real estate <br />tracts in San Francisco and on the peninsula besides Dingee Park. Rather than manage <br />the operations of Dingee Park himself, he turned its management over to the San <br />Francisco real estate firm of Baldwin and Howell and its Redwood City agent, H. C. <br />Tuchsen. <br />Thus, after one and one-half years of surveying, financial difficulties, and changing <br />ownership, Dingee Park was finally marketed in earnest beginning in April, 1909, and on <br />May first 200 lots were auctioned by Baldwin and Howell. By this date, Redwood City <br />had grown to the point that there was a fair demand for residential lots along the west <br />side of the County Road, and sales proved brisk. Some lots sold to speculators, for the <br />prices of lots were considered low and were expected to improve, but many lots sold to <br />people who intended to build homes for themselves. After some had been built, Baldwin <br />and Howell issued a promotional brochure for Dingee Park that featured drawings of <br />some of houses. Nearly all of them were in the Craftsman style, and were so attractive <br />that they could be counted on to attract more home -builders. <br />The attractiveness of the the housing stock in Dingee Park was by design. Crocker put <br />restrictions into his deeds for the "protection" of the tract, that is, to keep property values <br />from lowering. One of the restrictions was that no house or business building could be <br />built that cost less than $2,000. This was about what a well-built, four or five -room <br />bungalow with a spacious front porch would cost. Crocker also prohibited the sale of <br />intoxicating liquors within Dingee Park, and the establishment of certain businesses, <br />namely any "laundry, livery stable, hospital, undertaking establishment, factory, <br />manufactory, trade or occupation which shall, can or may be in anywise offensive, <br />noisome or noxious" to the neighbors. These restrictions were to remain in effect through <br />1920. Unlike upscale housing tracts in San Francisco at this time, there were no racial <br />covenants. <br />(One man, a former San Francisco builder named George Stierlen, built a house in <br />Dingee Park costing only $1,000 to build. Crocker sued to have him ejected from the <br />tract, and for the title to revert back to him.) <br />Exactly why Baldwin and Howell, and Crocker, chose to donate a lot to the Woman's <br />Club is unknown. It may be that they thought its wholesome goals would be an asset to <br />the neighborhood; or perhaps they admired the club in principle while realizing a <br />women's group would never have the economic ability to buy land and build without <br />assistance. Perhaps Baldwin and Howell, and Crocker, calculated that the social standing <br />13 <br />544 <br />