Meet Stephen Payne
The Howling Wilderness
Stephen Payne holds a doctorate in Public Historical Studies from UC Santa Barbara, a master’s degree in History from San Jose State University, and a baccalaureate in Anthropology from UC Santa Cruz. Stephen has also taught Santa Clara County and California history courses at local colleges for many years. Stephen’s family goes back five generations in Santa Clara County. The McClellan farm buildings in Steven’s Creek Park belonged to his great, great grandparents, who were settlers in 1849. In 1852 his great grandfather arrived in the valley, settling in Los Gatos. In the mid-1870s, the family purchased a farm near Campbell, where Payne Avenue is today.
Meet Paul Karz
Speaker & Trail Guide
My name is Paul Karz, and I have served as a Senior Interpretive Aide with California State Parks for the past eight years. Prior to joining State Parks staff, I spent more than 30 years in private industry as an Operations Manager with Intel Corporation and Texas Instruments. Throughout much of that time, I also volunteered as a State Parks docent, developing a lasting commitment to public history and community engagement. I am a Vietnam combat veteran, and following six years of military service, I earned a degree in Communications from California State University, Stanislaus.
Historical Glenwood
If you’ve ever driven south on Highway 17 from the Summit, you may have noticed an exit just past Inspiration Point for Glenwood Drive and another just a little further south for Glenwood Cutoff. If you estimated the size of a town based on the number of freeway exits it has, you might think Glenwood was a fairly sizable community. If you had been traveling by foot, buggy, horse, or train between 1880 and 1930, you would have indeed arrived at the lively town of Glenwood. After that time period, a stop in this stretch leads only to private bucolic neighborhoods. Today, if you listen very carefully, you might still hear a ghostly train whistle from the past carried in the westerly breeze. According to California Historical Landmark 449 located near Glenwood Drive and Eagle Road, the founding of Glenwood is credited to Charles C. Martin who homesteaded in the area in 1851. Before him a man named David Burns, identified as a bear trapper, lived there long enough to have Burns Creek named after him. Even earlier, the Parker and Bean families lived on the land and had respective creeks named after them. During this period, the area was known as Bean Hollow. A quote from the Santa Cruz Sentinel on November 25, 1917 sums up the location, “After them was named Bean Creek which flows through Mt. Herman and empties into Zayante Creek...The date was 1856 when only a horse trail connected Santa Cruz to Los Gatos via the mountains”. The same horse trail was originally a Native American footpath for nearly 10,000 years before any of the above-mentioned settlers arrived. The trail was also used by the Franciscan monks as they traveled between Santa Clara and Santa Cruz during Spanish rule.
What's In a Name
By Debra Staab
Let’s have a bit of fun reviewing the origin of some local place names. How many do you recognize? Do you know their backstories? Beehive The Beehive refers to a hill between Mountain Charlie Gulch and Hutchinson Road located at Summit West. The mountain has an elevation of 2,109 feet and is named due to its shape resembling a bee’s hive. Eccles Eccles was a railroad stop about 2.5 miles north of Felton along Zayante Creek. The name derives from John Sanderson Eccles, a gasfitter from Ireland, who deeded the right of way to the South Pacific Coast Railroad in 1878. A 310 foot long spur ran from the stop to the Union Mill on Lompico Creek. A post office, general store, hostelry, and passenger shelter were constructed at the site.
Logging in the Augmentaion
By Debra Staab
Aptos Creek springs forth from the southwestern slope of Santa Rosalia Mountain and flows south nearly 10 miles until it enters Monterey Bay at Seacliff State Beach. The word “Aptos” is believed to derive from Spanish settlers’ 1796 interpretation of the Ohlone word “Outos” as used to name their village at the confluence of Aptos and Valencia Creeks. Nature’s bounty is plentiful in the watershed which supports numerous species of flora and fauna. Native Americans tended to live on the edges of the forest which they entered to hunt, fish, and forage. It is estimated that there were nearly 200,000 acres of old-growth forest in the Santa Cruz Mountains including Coast Redwoods, Douglas Fir, and mixed hardwoods. The largest Redwoods reached colossal heights of 350 feet with unbelievably large trunks ranging from eight to 28 feet in diameter. The Ohlone showed great wisdom in caring for their environment including occasional controlled burns to purify the land and stimulate new growth.
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