El Cerrito Round-Up June 2018
El Cerrito Historical Society Quiz
With our El Cerrito Round Up issue, we thought it would be fun to include a quiz provided by
the El Cerrito Historical Society. How much do you know about El Cerrito?
Answers are at the conclusion of this quiz. Don’t peek!
1. Among the many entertainers who brought
jollity to El Cerrito, one famous striptease artist
occupied a special place in people’s hearts. This was:
a. Gypsy Rose Lee, who performed at the Kona
Club regularly from 1935 to 1937. It is said she was
discovered at the Kona Club by a Hollywood agent
and went on to make her first films.
b. Donna Powers, who went on to fame as “The
Girl in the Fish Bowl” at Bimbo’s Club in San
Francisco, and as a member of the Richmond City
Council, developed her act in the mid 1960s at the last
of the night clubs remaining in El Cerrito from the
Bad Old Days, the It Club.
c. Sally Rand, who began as a silent film actress
and won fame as a fan dancer with Sally Rand’s Nude
Ranch at the world’s fair on Treasure Island in 1939,
operated and performed at Sally Rand’s Hollywood
Club in El Cerrito during the 1940s.
d. Bubble dancer Noel Toy performed in the 1940s
at El Cerrito’s only Chinese-themed club, Forbidden
City East, a sister club to one in San Francisco’s
Chinatown.
2. For a time in the 1970s and 1980s El Cerrito
emerged as a leader in the field of recorded music
– at least when it came to folk and jazz and related
fields. Which of the following labels were based in
town:
a. Fantasy Records, which made a mint in the
1960s and beyond from the recording by the El
Cerrito band Creedence Clearwater Revival.
b. Arhoolie Records, one of the leading folks labels
in the world, focusing on Cajun, bluegrass, Norteno
and other kickass music.
24 MARKETPLACECONTRACOSTA.COM JUNE 2018
c. Kaleidoscope Records which, among other
projects, reissued reissue after reissue by the great
Western swing artist Bob Wills and his Texas Playboys.
d. Theresa Records, which specialized in jazz
and featured such artists as Pharoah Sanders, Idris
Muhammad and George Coleman.
3. El Cerrito’s city boundaries do not reach the
bay. In sections the boundaries do not even go west
of San Pablo Avenue. Why? Some, all or none of
these answers may be correct.
a. When El Cerrito incorporated 100 years ago,
Richmond had already absorbed much of the bayside
land into its territory.
b. The land was so swampy and increasingly
malodorous that city leaders did not think it was worth
adding to the city.
c. Gamblers who ran dens of iniquity in the area
were opposed to joining the city.
d. The operators of the Vigorite powder works,
which manufactured dynamite along Albany Hill,
fought efforts to become part of the city fearing they
would face closure.
4. By 1946, El Cerrito’s days as a Mecca of vice
were coming to an end. What was causing this?
Some, all or none of the following may be true:
a. Prominent citizens formed the Good
Government League, threw the rascals out of office
and cracked down on criminality.
b. A shootout at San Pablo Avenue and Central
avenues between gangsters tied to the Black