Dominican
This tree-lined neighborhood is a hard habit to break...
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h D he Dominican neighborhb prisoners out at San Quentin.) “The gentle undulations, the gracehood is a lovely suburban ful slopes, the abrupt acclivities of the hills, all carpeted with the 101 enclave of shade trees, cul-de-sacs, soft greensward...constitute an extended and lovely parhiking trails and century-old Victorians. terre, which gratifies the eye,” read a particuLn Narrow winding streets empty onto sylvan open Locust Av larly juicy valentine to the neighborhood nd L in d Ge n a l A v h r an it y space to the east and north. The locals are friendly, dA H ig er s v composed in 1884. With its balmy ni v U n the thrum of Fourth Street is close enough for conic a n v climate and easy train-and-ferryboat i v A A D om venience and removed enough for quietude, and the nd alm commute to the city, Magnolia Valley R a f ae climate is eternally September. But the Dominican’s Jewe ll (named after one of Coleman’s more Dr St most emblematic feature is the beautiful and internaabundant flora) attracted a bevy of Be lle tionally renowned 80-acre university that gives the St San Francisco pooh-bahs in search Mi neighborhood its name. Av s si of their own country estate, Chronicle on Av founder M.H. de Young among them. Bordered by the Montecito district on the south, 3rd Mis The area was more than just tucked-away Gold Hill open space on the east, enormous Barbier Fire S t Stn summer cottages, however. A rollicking dance Park on the north and Highway 101 on the west, hall was located in Laurel Grove, built by it’s an ideally secluded spot for tranquil reflection far Coleman for the use of local teens. Nearby was his from the bedlam of city living. That’s what inspired expansive 12-acre nursery. Another little project, the ornate and the area’s first householders to stake their claim hereabouts almost a luxurious Hotel Rafael (tennis courts, stables, observation tower, 101 century-and-a-half ago. (The Coast Miwok of earlier days preferred rooms) stood at the corner of Belle and Rafael. And in 1887 Coleman the flatlands below, at least partly because a rambunctious spirit sold 10 acres of Magnolia Valley to the Dominican Sisters of San Ranamed Yu’-tenm’e-chah was known to frequent these northern hillfael for $20,000, then turned around and gave half the money back to sides.) In 1871 William T. Coleman, a millionaire shipping tycoon, sweeten the deal. Within a year or so the nuns had built an impressugar merchant and former chief rabble-rouser of the San Francisco Vigilance Committee, purchased 1,100 acres’ worth of sunny San Ra- sive four-story Italianate Victorian at Grand and Locust to serve as fael with an eye toward future development. The previous landowners motherhouse and boarding school, and a four-year college—Marin’s one and only—was added in 1917. It was such a success, the order was had defoliated the landscape for farming purposes, and the first thing able to purchase de Young’s neighboring Meadowlands estate a few Coleman did was to blanket the neighborhood—and eventually much of northern San Rafael—with trees, native oaks and laurels and years later, expanding the campus and converting the publisher’s old summer home into classy dormitories. madrone to begin with but also acacia, eucalyptus, lemon, almond, Today Dominican is a full-fledged university with 2,000 students, pepper, pine, maple, cypress, orange, walnut, chestnut and more: some 60 interdisciplinary learning programs, an 11-to-1 pupil-professor 10,000 trees in all. ratio and, of course, a strikingly beautiful campus. Students from Next he hired Hammond Hall, the unsung genius behind Golden around the globe (nearly 80 percent of them supported by grants Gate Park, to lay out a new community with irregularly acreaged or scholarships) study literature, philosophy and religion, complete parcels and streets that would follow the contours of the hills instead biomedical research in the school’s new cutting-edge science center, of trying to dominate them. (Coleman also found time to dam Laperform in critically acclaimed dance and music productions and gunitas Creek and form the Marin County Water Company, which earn MBAs in a unique Strategic Leadership program. What’s more, would provide H2O to his new tenants as well as the the Dominican Penguins have won California Pacific titles in soccer, volleyball and basketball over the past half-decade. The campus also hosts the Conlan Recreation Center, where neighborhood residents can swim, exercise and play tennis for a minimal annual stipend. Barbier Park’s hiking trails offer plenty of recreation as well, as do local fixtures the Marin Tennis Club, the Marin Ballet Center and the Marin Shakespeare Company. But the favorite local pastime just might be relaxing and reflecting under one of Coleman’s canopied trees, just as the locals have been doing for generations. —MATTHEW STAFFORD Av
Pacifi c Sun Hom e & Gard en
photo by Ken Piek ny
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FFIRE Station 2, 210 Third St. LLIBRARYSan Rafael Public Library, 1100 E. St. PARKS Boyd Memorial Park P
Rafael purchased 10 The Dominican Sisters of San 7 and within a year 188 in acres of Magnolia Valley ool and college. had opened a boarding sch
32 Pacific Sun
P POST OFFICE 910 D St. P PUBLIC SCHOOLS Coleman Elementary, 800 Belle Ave.