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Contra Costa Marketplace - Dec 2015

their San Pablo Avenue home. Here they built the imposing Golden West Hotel. The hotel had a popular saloon on the first floor run by Cipriano’s brother, Jimmy. A men’s haberdashery shop was also here. Pinole’s menfolk could now drink and dress in style at the same time. The large wooden building was to survive many downtown fires, changing hands in later years to become the Trovatore Café and the Town Tavern. In 1958, the Golden West Hotel was razed to become a Standard Oil gas station; today the site is occupied by the Pump House gas station and convenience store. It was during the demolition of an old Pinole building belonging to Cipriano Silvas that a gem of Pinole’s past came to light. An intact business ledger was found, written by Cipriano in 1874-75. The ledger is a day-by-day record of the Silvas family’s living expenses, written by the father in Spanish in a fine hand of pen and ink. William McMaster, a descendant of Cipriano Silvas and Tessie Curran Baldwin, owns the ledger. The ledger chronicles more than just tallies of purchases. The book reveals how a large family of 13 carried on their daily needs in 19th century Pinole. In 1874-75, Silvas sold 333 bales of hay for $495.34 and 420 sacks of beans for $1,505.73. Freight costs to deliver goods to market were $79. His income from October 1874 to October 1875 was $1,922.07. His expenses totaled $1,683.95, for a profit of only $238 for the family to live on. Nevertheless, the ledger shows the family was self-sufficient through hard work, making most of their own clothing and raising and cooking their own foodstuffs. Yards and yards of materials were bought for sewing. In 1875, the family bought a ready-made suit for one of the little boys for $8. Sombreros were bought for $1 each and suspenders for $.50 each. The family made only one trip away that year to San Francisco that cost them $2. The ledger shows whiskey purchased for $2.50 a gallon. The family grew almost all its own food and raised animals for meat. Each month they bought a 50-pound sack of flour, a sack of sugar, and a 25-pound sack of rice. Flour cost $.04 a pound, sugar $.12 a pound, and rice was $.08 a pound. Since all vegetables and meats were raised by the family, there must have been an endless kitchen parade of cooking, baking, and preserving chores. During harvest time, “trabajadores” (workers) were hired to help in the fields and one household servant was employed. However, no cooks were hired. Entries also show purchases needed to run the ranch: human and livestock medicines, tools, ropes, lamp oil, gun powder, soap, writing paper, knives, forks, and spoons. Tessie Curran Baldwin was a granddaughter of Cipriano and Maria Silvas. Tessie inherited the ledger, as well as photos, documents, and a memory book from her family’s stay in early Pinole. The Silvas family made the change from the hard life of ranching to become Main Street business folks in 1870s Pinole. Although it seems that they combined ranching with the saloon and hotel business, the family enterprise gives us a rare glimpse of the pioneer spirit and family closeness needed to survive in 19th century Pinole. A page from Isabel Acosta’s memory book, dated February 1893, one of many items left to Tessie Curran Baldwin, granddaughter of Cipriano and Maria Silvas.


Contra Costa Marketplace - Dec 2015
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