In the 1850s, just as the Gold Rush was reaching critical mass, wood was needed to build housing and businesses and ships. The redwoods could be cut, but getting them down from the hills and hauled overland to San Francisco was a job for Paul Bunyan and Babe-the-Blue-Ox. In 1851, a creek running through the area was discovered to flow into a deep channel and thence into San Francisco Bay. Loggers soon learned to make good use of this water slide, sending the logs down to the Bay where they were barged or floated to San Francisco to be milled. It was not hard to come up with a name for the creek. “Redwood Creek” seemed appropriate. One of the first entrepreneurs to use the creek in this way was Dr. Robert Tripp (of Woodside Store fame).

The town that grew up around the deep water channel rejected earlier names, preferring the obvious association with the trees: Redwood City. Eventually there were so many trees cut down that the lumber industry began to decline. Silt began to build up in the creek from erosion. The port that had been developed for the timber industry was (and is) the only deep-water channel in the southern part of San Francisco Bay, and many diverse businesses grew up around the area. The coming of the San Francisco-San Jose Railroad caused a considerable decline in port activity, but the port throughout its long history has been down, but never out.

In 1882, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers designated the port as a “federally approved” project which allowed for federal funding for much-needed maintenance and dredging. Little by little the Corps increased the width to 100 feet and then to 150 feet. Port activity increased, but when World War I began, the port was not large enough to handle all of the battle-bound cargo and government turned to other larger ports. The port went into hibernation.

But by 1917, the port made headlines when a shipyard on Redwood Creek built the world’s first cement-hulled ocean-going vessel, called “The Faith”. The first of three-dozen “cement ships,” the Faith was launched on March 14, 1918, with a crowd of 5,000 cheering as the ship slid into the water. People were noticing the port again, especially business-people. The Pacific Portland Cement Company (later called Ideal Cement) built a plant there in 1924. They “mined” 30,000 acres of the bottom of the Bay, dredging up tons of clam and oyster shells from which limestone was extracted, a necessary ingredient in the recipe for cement.

The maritime business soon began using the Redwood City port. The Empire Lumber Company of Coos Bay, Ore., sent down a cargo ship which docked on Oct. 23, 1937, with a load of 340,000 feet of lumber designated for the housing boom on the Peninsula. It was an ironic twist. So much Redwood lumber had been moved out of the area through the port that new supplies had to be shipped in. The Standard Oil Company signed a 25-year lease with the port for a plant for distributing petroleum products. Huge warehouses were built for storing canned fruit from Santa Cruz and Santa Clara counties for shipping all over the world. New wharves were constructed that doubled docking capacity.

World War II brought civilian use of the port to a halt. The Navy needed it for the war effort. Vast amounts of every kind of supplies went through the port and on to the warfront. The Navy returned the port to the civilian port commission on Oct. 17, 1945. One of the first shipments to come into the port after the War was lumber, 500,000 board feet. Cement and oil companies revved up again. Leslie Salt Company began evaporating marsh-water and shipping the refined product all over the world through the port. The channel was deepened and widened. A second turning basin for deep-water ships was created.

In the 1950s, a lumber ship. “Alaska Cedar,” brought in over 2 million board feet from Crescent City. By the late 1950s, outbound shipments from the Port of Redwood City beat the Port of San Francisco by over 120,000 tons. More channel improvements were made in the 1960s. In 1968, a cargo ship left Redwood City bound for Tokyo, Japan. On board were 9,000 tons of redwood logs. They were small, less than 12 inches in diameter. The big trees had already been culled out. American sawmills didn’t want them. The Japanese did.

Many things changed in the 1970s. The petroleum companies were using pipelines now. The cement companies ceased operations at the port. The farmers in Santa Clara stopped growing and canning fruit and sold the land to electronic entrepreneurs who began growing “chips.”

The port has never stayed down for long. Over the years, business has fluctuated much like the tides, high and low. Real-estate along the area was developed, offices, restaurants, etc. ... Creative ideas for increasing shipping tonnage were developed. In October of this year, the U. S. Army Corps of Engineers announced it will be spending 11 million dollars of stimulus funds on the Port of Redwood City to dredge some 500,000 cubic yards of sediment, deepening the channel to 30 feet, allowing more heavily-laden ships to come and go.

Way back in 1931, the U.S. government offered a deal. They would contribute $26,000 for harbor improvements if the voters of San Mateo County would pledge a like amount. A Harbor District was formed and a bond-issue was placed on the county-wide ballot. Redwood City voters said “YES,” but the rest of the county said “NO.” So, like the Little Red Hen, the people of Redwood City said, “Well, we’ll just do it ourselves!” And they did.

They voted to amend the city charter and to reduce the port district to municipal status. They passed the needed bond-issues, collected the federal grants, and improved the port so substantially that they’ve made a profit ever since, with millions flowing back into the city’s general fund. That chuckle you hear in the background is Redwood City having the last laugh.