Chapter 1: The Stage is Set

Chapter 1: The Stage is Set Early Junior College Developments in California The idea of two-year junior colleges in California was born over one hundred years ago. The evolution and growth of the junior college system in California has served as a model for the rest of the country, and the world for that matter. To better understand the formation and development of the Fremont-Newark Junior College District it is helpful to look at the history of junior colleges in the state.

An extremely valuable account of the history of the junior colleges in California is the “History of the Junior College Movement in California,” Prepared by Carl G. Winter, Consultant, Bureau of Junior College Education, California State Department of Education, October 23, 1964 (Revised December 21, 1964). The report covers junior college development in California from 1907 up to creation of the Master Plan for Higher Education in 1960 and the four year period following acceptance of the plan. The following summary is largely on this report.

In 1907 California adopted the first state law in the nation establishing the junior college concept as part of the state public education system. Proposed by State Senator Anthony Caminetti of Amador County, the act was short and sweet: The board of Trustees of any city, district, union, joint union, or county high school may prescribe postgraduate courses of study for the graduates of such high school, or other high schools, which courses of study shall approximate the studies prescribed in the first two years of university courses. The board of Trustees of any…(area)… wherein the postgraduate courses are taught may charge tuition for pupils living (outside) the boundaries of the district wherein such courses are taught. (Political Code-Section 1681, Statutes of California, 1907, Chapter 69, p. 88) (Winter, p. 1) Inherent in this brief statement are several forces that shaped the nature of the junior colleges over the subsequent decades. First, high schools were identified as the setting for the junior college. Under this law a total of 18 high school districts gave post-high school instruction for a period of time (Winter, p.4). From this founding legislation to the mid-1960s the junior colleges were overseen and regulated by the State Department of Education. Even to this day, although now separate from the K-12 system, community colleges are subject to a number of processes and regulations emanating from their K-12 heritage. A major example is the funding of the colleges on an average daily attendance formula. The colleges are still institutions of higher education with definite K-12 influences.

A second significant influence of this early legislation relates to governance. The 1907 law put the junior colleges under the jurisdiction of locally elected Boards of Education. This continues to this day, making California one of the very few state community college systems governed by locally elected bodies. The notion of the colleges being “community” institutions is quite different from the University of California and California State University systems. Tension between local control and outside regulation, including accreditation, is felt to this day.

Finally, the idea that junior college districts could, “charge tuition for pupils living without the boundaries of (a) district…” remained part of the funding structure for many years and profoundly affected the development of colleges. In fact, this was a major impetus for the existence of what eventually became Ohlone College. The residents of Fremont and Newark were sending tax dollars for student attendance at other nearby junior college districts but had no say in the operations of those schools. The desire to gain local control through establishing a separate college district with its own elected Board of Trustees was strong.

According to Winter (p.1), “Senator Caminetti was a firm believer in public education and one of the leaders in extending educational benefits to as many individuals as possible.” In the early 1900s two higher education leaders in California joined Caminetti in advocating for the junior college concept. Professor Alexis Lange, Head, and later Dean, of the Department of Education at the University of California in Berkeley proposed “six-year" high schools. The President of Stanford University, David Starr Jordan, proposed to the university Trustees that Stanford eliminate the lower division and require entering juniors to have earned 60 units at the junior college level. He borrowed the title "Associate in Arts” that was being used by the University of Chicago as an award after the first two years of study. (Winter, p. 1) In 1910, the Fresno City School District created the first post-high-school junior college with a curriculum focused on “mathematics, English, Latin, modern languages, history, economics, and technical work.” (Winter, p. 2) Seventeen school districts followed suit over the next few years. However, an obstacle to further growth came in the form of a ruling by the State Attorney General stating that “the attendance of students enrolled in "postgraduate" courses could not be counted in making apportionments out of the state high school fund.” (Winter, p. 3) Proponents were undeterred. In 1917, a bill introduced by State Senator John Ballard of Los Angeles, was enacted allowing the state to fund attendance in public post-high-school classes. The K-12 average daily attendance formula continued to be used. The law established the name “junior college” to refer to these classes.

Legislation 1921 enabled the creation of junior college districts independent from local school boards. Several other important pieces of related legislation were passed in the 1920s and by the end of that decade, junior college districts could be formed by a vote of the people using a variety of structures (Winter, p. 5-7):  

A district coterminous with a high school district A district embracing two or more contiguous high school districts

  

A county district embracing all the territory of the county not included in any other type of junior college district A joint district embracing two or more contiguous high school districts in two or more contiguous counties A joint district comprising all the territory in two or more contiguous counties not included in any other junior college district

The following chart (adapted from Winter) shows the number of junior colleges established in California organized by half decades from 1910 through 1964: 1910 - 1914 1915 - 1919 1920 - 1924 1925 - 1929 1930 - 1934 1935 - 1939 1940 - 1944 1945 - 1950 1950 - 1954 1955 - 1959 1960 - 1964

4 7 8 14 2 3 1 13 6 5 11

Great Depression 1930-1940 World War II 1941-1945 Post-War period begins Total of 74

A total of 74 public junior college districts were formed over the 58-year period from the original enabling legislation in 1907 through 1965 when the Fremont-Newark Junior College District was formed. Of these, 22 were created over the 20-year period before stock market crash in October 1929. During the Great Depression of the 1930s, only five new college districts were created. And during World War II, only one college was formed. In the 20-year post-war period leading up to the creation of the Fremont-Newark junior college district, 35 college districts were established, nearly doubling the number formed before the war. The post-war period was indeed a dynamic period for junior college development.

Winter’s report contains an excellent summary of “Important Dates in Junior College Development in California” presented in Appendix 1.

Wartime Economic and Population Boom in the East Bay Area On December 7, 1941 the shocking attack on America’s naval fleet in Pearl Harbor by the Japanese pulled the United States fully into World War II. The country’s attention turned to fighting the war. The nation’s young men joined the armed forces in record number, and more women joined the workforce. With fiscal and human resources directed to victory over Japan and Germany and the axis powers, only one junior college was created in California during 1941 -1945 war period.

An excellent description on the impact of the war on the economy and population in the East Bay region is Alameda County, California Crossroads: An Illustrated History, Ruth Hendricks Willard and David Lewis Wright, 1988.

The shipbuilders and shipyards of the East Bay area were called on to help bring the U.S. naval forces to a new level of strength.

Private shipyards such as Alameda’s Bethlehem Steel Shipbuilding Division and Oakland’s Moore Dry Dock Company became essential military producers. Moore alone employed nearly 38,000 workers and the combined Bay Area shipyard payroll reached nearly $40 million. Oakland’s Henry Kaiser established seven shipyards which, by the end of the war, had produced nearly 1/3 of the entire US merchant fleet. (Willard/Wright, p. 79) The presence of the military itself in the East Bay expanded greatly. Willard and Wright (p. __) cite the following major installations:    

The Alameda Naval Air Station was completed in 1940 The Oakland Naval Supply Depot was commissioned on December 8, 1941.

The Pacific Naval Air Bases Command, the Army Quartermaster Corps, the War Shipbuilding Administration and the Coast Guard were soon firmly established in Alameda County.

All commercial flights were delivered to San Francisco as Oakland became the departure point for all Pacific-bound military aircraft.

These war efforts required supporting supplies and services. According to Willard and Wright (p. 79), numerous and varied business enterprises flourished in response to these needs: Processing and packing food for the armed forces was second only to shipbuilding in economic importance; other war-related occupations included the production of blood plasma, drugs, life rafts, rope ladders, printed forms, steel drums, truck bodies, bomb fins and special paints. Thousands found work supplying the needs of the growing working class.

There were many new job opportunities available and thousands of people were drawn to the Alameda County area looking for work: The East Bay's population increased by half a million between 1941 and 1945. Berkeley’s population grew by about 30 percent and Oakland from 302,163 to 400,936. The sudden increase in population strained city and county services, almost to the breaking point. Because of the housing shortage many had to commute from other areas to their defense jobs, which made the transportation problems more acute than any other part of the United States. (Willard/Wright, p. 80) Post-War Junior College Developments in California Once victory was won overseas and soldiers returned home, the GI Bill allowed many to pursue a college education. The junior colleges were just the type of

institutions to meet the needs of many of these veterans. The following description of the impact of the GI Bill comes from The California Community Colleges History, 4faculty.org quotes from “America’s Community Colleges: The First Century” (Witt, et. al.): Following World War II, colleges were given a boost with the passage of the GI Bill. Under the GI Bill, any honorably discharged veteran who had served ninety days or was injured in the line of duty was entitled to a free college education. The government would pay for tuition, books, and fees at any approved institution. After the decline in enrollments nationwide, colleges scrambled to meet the demand. Once again, California blazed ahead of the nation with the establishment of 18 new public junior colleges in the first five years after the GI Bill passage (Witt, p. 128).

A post-war “baby boom” was also underway and the expected increased demand for higher education needed to be addressed.

In 1946, a "Liaison Committee" was jointly established by the University of California and the State Board of Education to identify the post-war needs for higher education. The state legislature provided funding for the committee to conduct a study to “chart the future of California's rapidly growing higher education system.” (UCHDA) The resulting report was entitled "Survey of Needs of California for Higher Education," also known as the “Strayer Report” after one of its principal authors, Professor George Strayer of Columbia University (Winter, p.21).

Among its many findings and recommendations, the report showed the need for a junior college district in the East Bay Area.

A local study group report in 1948 recommended establishing a junior college district for Alameda County and a special election was held in December, 1948. The voters turned down the proposed district. The defeat was attributed to “poor timing (i.e., following so closely upon a general election), small turnout (only 11 percent of the electorate), campaign domination by school officials, and opposition by the Oakland Tribune” (Staniford, p.11) Despite this defeat, the stage was being set for the formation of two junior college districts in Alameda County in the 1950s. Oakland had grown significantly during the war and post-war periods, and led the way by establishing its own district in 1953 (with two colleges). The central county area, especially in San Leandro and Hayward, had been growing steadily in step with Oakland. This led to the formation of the South County Junior College District (SCJCD) in 1959. The development of the SCJCD will be described in more detail below.

Post-War Changes in the Local Area Post-war growth in the northern and central regions of Alameda County was strong and rapid. This was not the case in the more southern part of the county. This area, which is now known as Fremont, Newark and Union City, at the time consisted of a number of small communities known generally as Washington

Township. These communities included Alvarado, Decoto, Niles, Mission San Jose, Irvington, Centerville, Warm Springs, and Newark.

Two local histories of the development of the greater Fremont area are: City of Fremont: The First Thirty Years – History of Growth, Mission Peak Heritage Foundation (MPHF), 1989, and Fremont: A Modern History of an All-American City, Allen Gardiner, In Cooperation with the Fremont Chamber of Commerce, 2002.

Both describe the post-war period and the social and political forces at play that led the various rural neighborhoods of Washington Township to incorporate into the cities of Fremont, Newark and Union City.

The Washington Township communities were somewhat isolated from the postwar economic boom in the Bay Area. The Township area was primarily rural and agricultural, with thousands of acres of apricot and almond orchards, walnut groves and cauliflower fields. Drying yards and packing shed buildings were commonplace. It was largely a Portuguese farming community. (MPHF, p. 18-19) As the post-war economic growth in the region continued into the 1950s, southern Alameda County felt the pressures of change. There were fears of uncontrolled development and its possible detrimental impact of the quality of life. Of equal concern was the worry that parts of Washington Township might be annexed by its powerful neighbors Hayward to the north and San Jose to the south. Over time, the residents of the area realized that growth was inevitable. (MPHF, p, 20) The road now called Fremont Boulevard was part of a patchwork of roads from Oakland to San Jose making up State Road 17, and also included what is now called Alvarado Boulevard in Union City. These roads were bypassed by the 880/Nimitz Freeway to provide more efficient traveling and commerce between Oakland and San Jose. (MPHF, p. 19-20) The planning and construction of the new freeway in the early 1950s made the southwest portion of what was to become Fremont a natural area for industrial development. The Nimitz was dedicated in 1957 and completed in in 1958. (MPHF, p. 21) Things were about to change for the residents of Washington Township.

Washington Township was still dependent on Alameda County and the Board of Supervisors in Oakland for many government services and subject to country rules and regulations. (MPHF, p. 17-18) To complicate matters there were a growing array of different tax districts in the Township. Gardiner (p. 19) cites 31 different districts in the 1950s including: schools, mosquito abatement, water, flood control, hospital, fire, and sanitation; and 80 separate taxing areas with taxes varying from four dollars to $7.75 per $100 of assessed valuation. Most of these special districts had their own governing boards, further complicating the political environment.

From Rural Towns and Townships to Incorporated Cities Mr. Jack Stevenson, Fremont’s first mayor, talked about how growth and development began to affect Washington Township in the early 1950s. After the Nimitz freeway was built he said the growth started to come, “within a year we had

development going wild around here compared to what it was prior to the freeway.

People started coming at us from a number of directions. They came from Oakland.

They came from San Jose. They came from the Dumbarton Bridge. They came down to the freeway from Castro Valley and from Niles Canyon Road.” (MPHF, p. 20-21) The several Chambers of Commerce in the Township pushed for a study of incorporation and a Committee to Study Incorporation was formed. On March 23, 1952 the first public proposal for incorporation of all of Washington Township was introduced in an open meeting at the Centerville Chamber of Commerce. (MPHF, p. 25) Wally Pond, Chairman of the Committee to Study Incorporation, “in 1954, Hayward decided to annex part of our study area. Well, that scared the pants off of us. It looked like the timing was right, so we changed the name from the committee to study incorporation to something like committee for the incorporation of the city.

We hadn't even picked a name for the city yet.” (MPHF, p. 22-28) When Newark incorporated the choice of a city name was simple: keep it Newark.

But for the rest of the Township the determination of a name was a bit more complicated, with five different towns being brought together under one roof.

Gardiner (p. 20-21) states that,

By March 1955 several names for the new city has been suggested Washington, Fremont, Mission City, Alvarado, Peralto (Sic.), Dumbarton and Union City. Any combination containing Washington was ruled out by the post office probably because of resulting confusion with existing California cities. The name Mission Valley also gained favor. Eventually the citizens committee approved the name Fremont by a very small vote.

The early incorporation discussions in Washington Township had Newark as part of the vision. However, that possibility began to diminish as the planning moved ahead. After a long period of negotiation and discussion, the people of Newark decided to go out on their own. In the midst of the Township planning, the City of Newark was incorporated by a vote of the residents on September 22, 1955. At the time Newark had a population of 6,055; incorporation was approved by a vote of 1,252 to 94. (Gardiner, p. 20) That same month the Alameda County Board of Supervisors established the boundaries for the proposed City of Fremont to include all of Washington Union High School District, with a small exception of a 1000 acre parcel of land south of Newark. The Board also set January 10, 1956 as the date for the incorporation election. Thus, the boundaries of Fremont ended up including only the five main communities of Niles, Irvington, Warm Springs, Centerville and Mission San Jose.

(Gardiner, p. 20) The communities of Alvarado and Decoto resisted inclusion and eventually incorporated in 1959 to form Union City, electing Tom Kitayama as the first Japanese-American mayor in California. (Willard/Wright, p. 82) The campaign for incorporation dominated the local scene in the fall of 1955. The arguments in favor of incorporation included planned development, avoiding annexation from the north and south, efficient and fiscally sound government, and

“home rule.” On January 10, 1956 the vote was 3,465 for incorporation and 1,852 against. Voters also approved a city manager form of government 3,406 to 1,167. Of 17 names on the ballot for councilmembers, five were elected. (Gardiner, p. 21) In December 1960 General Motors Corporation announced that it would locate its new Chevrolet assembly plant in Fisher Body Plant in Fremont. The plant would become Fremont’s largest employer and have a significant impact on the local economy. The Southern Pacific Railroad worked quietly behind the scenes helping to accumulate the amount of land needed for the proposed plant. (Gardiner, p. 26) Residential subdivision began to be developed and shopping malls such as the Fremont Hub, which opened in 1962, emerged to respond to the growing consumer market. Gardiner (p. 27) reported, “In the early 60s Montgomery Wards conducted a survey of Fremont and found that it “filled a void in their Bay Area strategy.

Wards 80 acres build the largest store in the Fremont Hub, 185,000 square feet.)

(Gardiner, p. 26) In the seven years (1957-1963), after incorporation, the population of Fremont increased from 22,000 to 71,000. (Gardiner, p. 28)