The Overland Stagecoach on the Peninsula

The great city was, however, isolated from the populated (and civilized) East Coast of America. To get to San Francisco, it took almost all summer of hard travel over the plains by covered wagon or many months by boat around South America. The westerners demanded that the government treat them like the Easterners and produce better methods of getting to the West Coast.

There were efforts to get improved transportation by stagecoach to the West Coast but the travel was expensive and there were few men willing to lose money on running this type of transportation business. To make it a paying proposition and at the same time deliver mail that now took three to four months to get here, Congress passed a bill in 1857 that provided a $600,000 subsidy to carry the mail from the Mississippi River to the West Coast. John Butterfield and other Eastern business interests rose to the occasion and mapped out a route that would carry the mail from St. Louis, Mo., to San Francisco, a 2,800-mile route. The route would go through Texas, New Mexico, and then to Los Angles in California, then turning north to end in Portsmouth Square in San Francisco. It was a horrendous undertaking that had to be done in a short time. Stations had to be set up in existing hotels, ranches where hotels were not available, or build them in the middle of nowhere, not more than 20 miles apart. Thousands of horses and mules had to be made available to spell the six horse/mule teams and keep the stagecoaches moving to make the trip in 25 days or less. It was a challenge of upmost proportions.

By September 1858, 140 stations had been set up and in operation. The number rose to 200 by early 1859. Meals of hard biscuit, beans coffee and sometimes steak were served twice a day at the passenger’s expense, and the trip to the West cost $150 to $200 a person. Because Butterfield thought fewer people would want to travel to the east, this fare was $100.

The Overland stage stopped in Redwood City, somewhere near Woodside Road and El Camino Real. From there, it traveled along the dirt El Camino Real (then County Road) to the San Mateo House. The San Mateo House was owned by Stockton and Shafter in the late 1880s. This was a magnificent visible, two-story wooden structure that sat not far south of the San Mateo Creek on El Camino Real. The stop of the stage was not long, only long enough to deliver the mail and any passengers who wanted to get off.

There was barely enough time to relieve yourself in the "outhouse” as the pace of the stage was always fast with very little time for passenger comfort. Many harried passengers opted to remain at stops along the way and catch the next stage after getting a little much deserved rest from the constant shaking rattling of the coach and horses. It was a pace that broke many a traveler.

The stagecoach used was a Concord type because of the better traveling roads. It crossed the San Mateo Creek bridge and continued north through the sparsely settled Rancho San Mateo, toward Millbrae and the 17-Mile House. At Uncle Tom’s Cabin (14-Mile House) roadhouse in future San Bruno, it crossed a large, deep, wide creek and continued along El Camino Real until it reached the 12-Mile House (at Baden/South San Francisco) along Colma Creek on the Mission Road. A new set of horses were probably changed here as there began a long haul after passing the marsh at the 7-Mile House (Colma/Kohl’s) then through sandy soil that culminated at the "Top of the Hill” (Daly City) where the Abby House stood. After taking either Mission Road or San Jose Avenue, it passed through the Bernal Cut and headed toward Market Street. Market Street led to Portsmouth Square where the company terminal stood at the intersection of Kearny and Washington Streets.

In the late 1850s, the San Bruno Toll Road was constructed across the marshes and around the east side of San Bruno Mountain, thus cutting much time off of the travel but this cut off and bypassed commerce to many of the roadhouses.

In March 1861, Congress discontinued the southern route of the Overland stage and it terminated in Sacramento after crossing the county through the Sierra Mountains along a more northern route.

The short but colorful era of the Overland Stage ended in 1861 in San Mateo County, but it has left us a great legacy of the Old West.

Rediscovering the Peninsula by Darold Fredricks appears in the Monday edition of the Daily Journal.