Preserving Petaluma’s architectural gems

In 1971, when I was young and ambitious, I purchased a small city block in Larkspur that had housed the first Toyota dealership in the country. The parcel also featured a beautiful old Victorian home on a creek. I financed that purchase through the Bank of Marin.

Over a period of many months, my Lark Creek Shoppes and Lark Creek Inn emerged as wildly successful enterprises. It was rare that we didn’t have at least a half-hour wait for lunch and dinner at our restaurant.

But, after three years of running Lark Creek, I was becoming burned out. It was then that I received a phone call from Bill Murray, longtime chairman of the Bank of Marin. Murray set up a meeting where he told me that he wanted me to move to Petaluma.

I was initially very dubious about this, but Murray said he had a personal friend, Petaluma Mayor Helen Putnam, who had a dream of restoring the city’s historic downtown into a vibrant and beautiful place. Murray, whom I had just met at that lunch, said I was “the guy.”

I was still dubious, as Murray went on to say that a member of his bank’s board of directors, Petaluman Dolph Hill, had inherited a key piece of real estate downtown, a 20,000-square-foot deserted feed mill. Murray said: “If you go to Petaluma and restore this property, the Bank will finance you and pave the way.” Well, zowie, I thought. When does something like that ever happen?

Meeting Putnam was also a joy. What a dynamo she was, and what power she retained. It turned out that Hill and his brother had been thinking about selling the long-vacant McNear Mill, and Murray put all the pieces together for Petaluma, for the bank, for Hill, for Putnam and for me.

Stepping inside the old mill for the first time, I realized that I had cornered the market on spider webs in Sonoma County. The roof was nearly nonexistent. There were no stairs to the second floor, and in a third of the building, no second floor at all. Exterior corrugated walls had been pried open, and there was no heat and hardly any light.

There were also a few earthquake cracks from 1906 in the masonry structure. On the plus side, as Putnam pointed out, it had been built in 1854 and was the oldest standing structure in Petaluma. Well, I loved it.

The first thing we had to do was the seismic retrofit, and we brought the entire building up to withstand a magnitude 8.4 earthquake. Take a look inside this building and see the steel. I believe it will out-stand anything in town in the event of a quake that huge.

Putnam had arranged for me to meet Downtown Association President Jim Williams, who also became a fan of the future Great Petaluma Mill. Between Williams, Putnam and Murray, it all came together.

But the story doesn’t end there. Putnam and I became good friends over the years, and in 1979 Putnam had moved up to become county supervisor. She called me one day and said: “Have I got a deal for you!”

My response was much like the one I had given Murray six years prior. Dubiousness was me.

Putnam told me that Petaluma had just welcomed the Wendy’s hamburger chain, which had purchased a lot on the corner of East Washington and Wilson streets. However, there was a glitch. The lot contained a run-down Victorian home that had been the residence of one of the town’s first mayors, William Farrell.

The home had been built for John Burns, an early grocer, whose daughter had married Farrell. Burns died in 1899 and his widow finished constructing the home with architect Brainerd Jones in 1900. Putnam wanted the house saved.

Well, my inner cash register was about to shut, with only this information, until Putnam said: “I’ve arranged for you to purchase the building for $1!” (Sound of cash register re-opening here.)

“But Helen,” I politely asked, “Where would I put it?”

“Oh, I’ve got that all arranged as well,” she said. “I’ve found a lot on the Petaluma River that would be just grand.” (She loved the term, “just grand.”) Oh, and she added, “I’ve already spoken with Bill Murray about it, and Bank of Marin is on board for the financing.”

The lot was quite pricey at $30,000.

The Farrell House was moved, on wheels, the three blocks to the turning basin at 3 a.m. one chilly morning and, at 5 a.m., Putnam showed up with a bottle of champagne to celebrate. I opened my third restaurant there and, although the building went through several changes over the years, the whole deal was actually, as Putnam had predicted, just grand.

The office building that stands at 222 Weller St. is now named River House and has become a Petaluma and Sonoma County historic landmark along with The Great Petaluma Mill at B Street and Petaluma Boulevard.

A year after moving the Farrell House, one more opportunity was presented by these avid Petaluma promoters. Another Victorian home on Petaluma Boulevard was in danger of being torn down. We were able to save it and move that one as well to the turning basin on the river. It is now The 1 C St. offices.

Gentleman Bill Murray and his Bank of Marin and Mayor Helen Putnam were there for me, and so was the city of Petaluma. I think we indeed started something good for our historic downtown, and I am most grateful to them for making it possible for me to be part of this super community. It was the right time, the right place and they were the right people. Zowie!

(Historian Skip Sommer is an Honorary Life Member of Heritage Homes and the Petaluma Historical Museum. Contact him at skipsommer@hotmail.com.)