The Contra Costa County Historical Society has an unique archive of area maps, photographs, and other hard-to-find records. The California Revealed website features numerous 19th Century parcel maps - like those of Contra Costa.
California Revealed
Collection: Contra Costa County Historical Society
Contra Costa County Tax Assessor’s Maps
All Maps:
“Contra Costa County (Calif.). Assessor’s Deputies”
All Parcel Maps for Antioch
“Handwritten and colored map of T1N R1E, T1N R2E, T2N R1E and T2N R2E in Contra Costa County, California. Includes the land surrounding the present-day locations of Antioch, Brentwood, and Oakley with landowner names and school districts.”
“Handwritten and colored map of T1N R1E, T1N R2E ,T2N R1E, T2N R2E and New York Grant and Marsh Grant in Contra Costa County, California. Includes the land surrounding the present-day locations of Antioch, Brentwood, and Oakley with landowner names and school districts.”
“Handwritten and colored map of T1N R2E and T2N R2E in Contra Costa County, California. Includes the land surrounding the present-day locations of Antioch, Brentwood, and Oakley with landowner names and school districts.”
Compare some of the old parcel maps with a modern Public Land Survey System Maps view of Antioch & Oakley:
Need help understanding PLSS?
The map detail below encompasses the following area :
- Western Boundary - from A Street, Antioch
- Southern Boundary - imaginary line W/E from Antioch Municipal Reservoir to Carpenter Road, Oakley
- Eastern Boundary - Live Oak Road, Oakley
- Northern Boundary - San Joaquin-Sacramento Bay
Antioch’s old-vine sites North of E 18th St, like the “
Evangelho Vyd”, appear to be located on the Wilbur property (N of dotted line in Section 16).
The “Bridgehead Vineyard” is situated on land once owned by Joseph Ruckstuhl (sometimes spelled “Ruchstuhl” or “Ruckslatt”).
It is difficult to find information about east CoCo viticulture during the late 19th and early 20th Centuries. Parcels belonging to known grape-growers are identified with colored dots:
Blue: “Ruckstuhl family”
Ancestry
“Joseph Leo Ruckstuhl”
“Born in Oakley, Contra Costa, California, USA, on 13 Dec 1891, to Joseph Ruckstuhl and Josephine M Sprenger. Joseph Leo Ruckstuhl married Anita M. Kelley and had 1 child. He passed away on 15 Dec 1966 in Antioch, Contra Costa, CA.”
“Contra Costa Wine Heritage” post: “Ruckstuhl Vineyards”
Red: “Viera family”
Ancestry
“Cyril Viera”
“Born in Oakley, Contra Costa, California, United States, on 1888 to Manuel Rodrigues Viera and Elizabeth Agnes Whelihan. Cyril Viera passed away on 04 Oct 1910, in San Francisco, California, United States.”
Google Books
Pacific Rural Press, Volumes 67-68
January 30, 1904
“Mr Manuel Viera”:
“Agricultural Review: Contra Costa County” (p.70)
Green: “Trembath family”
Joseph Trembath’s property is identified and mapped on this page from the Bureau of Land Management GLO Records website. A very small plot of +130-year-old Carignan vines still exists!
Geni website
“Richard Trembath, Jr”
Images of America: Antioch, printed in 2005, features many photographs of early modern citizens of the Antioch/Oakley area. The three families mentioned above receive some attention by the author(s).
Google Books
Images of America: Antioch
Arcadia Publishing, 2005
According to the text, Antioch’s eastern city limits once were marked by 10th Street. Most local farms were to the East, beyond A Street, along Iron House Rd. Today, Iron House Rd is known as East 18th Street (and Main Street in Oakley).
The “Evangelho Vyd”, “Bridgehead Vyd” (in Oakley), and smaller old-vine plantings once were planted and tended by families like the Vieras, Trembaths, and Ruckstuhls.
“…Marsh Creek drains into the San Joaquin River not far from its mouth and this section of Contra Costa County, east of the Mount Diablo Range, rather resembles the great Central Valley. In the 1880s a considerable acreage of the sandy valley land between Antioch and Brentwood was planted to vineyard; of the several wineries built there, the largest were those of Joseph Miller and Joseph Ruckstuhl. Miller, a native of Portugal, had about twenty acres in Zinfandel. Ruckstuhl, a short, stocky Swiss, also specialized in Zinfandel and found a market for his wine in the eastern states. The same family has kept this property near the town of Oakley, and although the winery has not been operated since Prohibition, much of their land and that of others in the area is still in vineyard.”
Antioch Interactive Map:
http://www.antiochprospector.com
Contra Costa County Historical Society:
http://www.cocohistory.com/
“Stories of California’s Azorean Immigrants”
by Christopher A Howard
https://www.academia.edu/51010064/Stories_of_California_Azorean_Immigrants
Google Books
Contra Costa Farm Bureau Monthly, Volumes 1-4 (1918)
Internet Archive
Alameda and Contra Costa Counties Telephone Directory (1904)
by Sunset Telephone and Telegraph Company
Search Results: “Antioch”
Alameda and Contra Costa Counties Directory, for 1871-72
Publisher: Sacramento County Directory Pub. Co.
Search Results: “Antioch”
Google Books
Directory of the Grape Growers… (1891)
California Board of State Viticultural Commissioners
A.J. Johnson, Superintendent (254 pages)
Search Results: “Antioch”