City of Millbrae
Millbrae History
Beginnings
Jose Antonio Sanchez, Jr., a Spanish soldier born in 1774, served at the Presidio of San Francisco for 45 years. As a reward for his years of loyal service, Mexican Governor of California Louis Arguello granted Sanchez a 14,600-acre area known as Rancho Buri Buri, stretching from present-day South San Francisco to Adeline Drive in Burlingame. After Sanchez’s death in 1843, two of his sons, Jose de la Cruz and Manuel, inherited most of the land that makes up Millbrae. Jose de la Cruz Sanchez inherited the 1,500 acres bounded by present-day Millbrae Avenue, El Camino Real, Skyline Boulevard, and Adeline Drive. When Sanchez lost the land due to a bad debt, it was sold at the sheriff’s auction to James Wilson for $1,000. Wilson resold the property to gold rush entrepreneur Darius Ogden Mills in 1860 for $20,000.
Mills built a grand estate on his new property, featuring a spacious mansion, conservatory, carriage house, elaborate gardens, and rolling hills filled with grazing dairy cattle. He named his estate Millbrae, combining his name (Mills) with the Scottish word for “rolling hills” (brae). Mills established the Millbrae Dairy along El Camino Real to supply milk and income for his estate. His family members built the original Sixteen Mile House, a rest stop and restaurant near the Mills Estate, which became an important early link to the beginning of Millbrae. An effort to save the original Sixteen Mile House in the 1970s was unsuccessful. However, this community effort, as well as a parallel effort to save the original Millbrae train depot, gave birth to the Millbrae Historical Society, which is housed in the actual train depot.
Millbrae remained a small, quiet town through the 1920’s, with mostly residential development concentrated in the Millbrae Villa subdivision, created in 1889 to the north of the Mills Estate. An expansion came in 1927 with the establishment of the 280-acre Millbrae Highlands subdivision.
A 1931 vote for incorporation failed to win approval. Lacking a municipal government, the residents formed the Millbrae Civic Club, which maintained the train depot, provided garbage collection service, created a volunteer fire department, arranged for local schools, and secured telephone service for the area. The incorporation debate waged on during the 1930s and 40s. Much of the debate centered on a battle between Millbrae residents and the City of Burlingame over the annexation of the land constituting the Mills Estate. Millbrae property owners signed an incorporation petition and submitted it to the County Clerk on September 3, 1946. When the petition was approved and an election date was set by the County Board of Supervisors, the City of Burlingame filed suit to nullify the incorporation resolution. After a court battle that carried all the way to the California Supreme Court, Millbrae’s incorporation petition was upheld by a vote of 5-2.
Becoming a City
A municipal election was held on December 10, 1946, resulting in the election of Millbrae’s first City Council. From the list of 23 candidates, William Leutenegger was elected mayor, and Harold Taylor, George Warman, James Kilpatrick, and George Kelly were selected as the first members of the City Council. Seating of the Council was delayed, however, by a lawsuit filed by Burlingame that dragged on in the court system for 2.5 years. On January 12, 1948, Judge James Atteridge dismissed Burlingame’s suit, and the San Mateo County Board of Supervisors certified the election results. On January 14, 1948, the elected members of the Millbrae City Council drove to Sacramento, where Secretary of State Frank M. Jordan presented them with the official incorporation papers, officially creating the City of Millbrae. That same day, the City Council was sworn into office.
Growth
History buffs may recall that San Francisco International Airport’s original name was Mills Field, since the land was leased from the Mills Estate. The name was changed to San Francisco Airport in 1931.
When the railroad opened, the station at Millbrae was known as the 17 Mile House, because of its distance from San Francisco. The land where the first Millbrae depot was built was donated by banker and philanthropist Darius O. Mills, who wanted his friends to be able to visit him by train at his estate called Happy House. Completed in 1864 as an adobe structure, the first Millbrae depot was used to ship milk from the Dairy Mill’s owned with his partner F.H. Green. Green also operated the first post office at the depot. The depot burned down twice.
The third depot was built in 1907. Railroad magnate E.H. Harriman controlled a number of railroads during this period, including the Southern Pacific (SP), and his men standardized the design of everything from locomotives to track spikes to depots. The Millbrae depot, with its semicircular bay window and cast iron columns, might be best termed Colonial Revival in style, with a colonnade supporting an arcade roof over the shelter platforms.
In 1976, SP wanted to destroy the Millbrae depot to add more parking spaces, but the newly formed Millbrae Historical Society saved it by having it declared a national historic landmark. The depot was moved about 200 feet to the south in 1980 to make room for the Millbrae Avenue overpass. This Millbrae depot ceased to be used in rail service in 2003 when the new Millbrae Intermodal Terminal for BART and Caltrain opened, and Caltrain passenger service shifted north to the new facility. In 2004 the building was converted into the Millbrae Train Museum.
Current Day
Millbrae is situated on the San Francisco Peninsula, just west of San Francisco International Airport, south of the City of San Francisco, and north of Silicon Valley. Millbrae is home to the largest intermodal center west of the Mississippi; connected through San Francisco International Airport, Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART), SamTrans, and Caltrain providing easy and direct access to the region as well as foreign and domestic destinations.
The Millbrae Historical Society created the Millbrae History Walk as a self-guided walking tour of some of the most interesting and historically significant landmarks in the City of Millbrae. Along the way, walkers will explore ten historic sites designated by the Society, as well as several other points of general interest. Bronze plaques placed at each site provide a brief description of its historical significance. The route of the Millbrae History Walk is highlighted with metal sidewalk markers to make it easier to follow. A map of the Millbrae History Walk along with a brief history of Millbrae is included in the Historical Society's Millbrae History Walk brochure.
Text courtesy of:
https://www.ci.millbrae.ca.us/403/About-Millbrae
https://www.rwcpulse.com/blogs/portal-to-our-past/2024/10/21/the-back-pages-of-millbrae/
https://www.caltrain.com/about-caltrain/caltrain-history/historic-stations/millbrae-1978