Point Isabel is a
promontory
A promontory is a raised mass of land that projects into a lowland or a body of water (in which case it is a peninsula). Most promontories either are formed from a hard ridge of rock that has resisted the erosive forces that have removed the so ...
on the eastern shore of
San Francisco Bay
San Francisco Bay is a large tidal estuary in the U.S. state of California, and gives its name to the San Francisco Bay Area. It is dominated by the big cities of San Francisco, San Jose, and Oakland.
San Francisco Bay drains water from a ...
in the
Richmond Annex neighborhood of
Richmond
Richmond most often refers to:
* Richmond, Virginia, the capital of Virginia, United States
* Richmond, London, a part of London
* Richmond, North Yorkshire, a town in England
* Richmond, British Columbia, a city in Canada
* Richmond, California, ...
, United States.
[Topographic map](_blank)
TopoQuest, retrieved July 5, 2008
History
![Pointisabel2019](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/b5/Pointisabel2019.jpg)
Point Isabel is a hilltop in the ancient range of hills that also includes Albany Hill, Brooks Island, and the Potrero San Pablo.
Rising sea levels
Rising may refer to:
* Rising, a stage in baking - see Proofing (baking technique)
*Elevation
* Short for Uprising, a rebellion
Film and TV
* "Rising" (''Stargate Atlantis''), the series premiere of the science fiction television program ''Starga ...
following the last Ice Age formed San Francisco Bay and left the point as a rocky promontory joined to the mainland by a salt marsh that flooded at high tides. A large shell midden showed that Native Americans used the site, specifically the Huchiun Indians.
[Archived El Cerrito Historical Society](_blank)
Vol. 24, No. 3. 2008, El Cerrito Historical Society, retrieved October 23, 2021
In the 19th Century, Point Isabel was part of the
Rancho San Pablo owned by
Don Victór Castro whose father received it in a land grant from the
Mexican Republic
Mexico (Spanish: México), officially the United Mexican States, is a country in the southern portion of North America. It is bordered to the north by the United States; to the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; to the southeast by Guate ...
.
[Archived El Cerrito Historical Society](_blank)
2006 at the Wayback Machine
The Wayback Machine is a digital archive of the World Wide Web founded by the Internet Archive, a nonprofit based in San Francisco, California. Created in 1996 and launched to the public in 2001, it allows the user to go "back in time" and see ...
, El Cerrito Historical Society, retrieved October 23, 2021 Victor Castro named the point for his daughter Isabel. He used it as a landing for boats
shipping grain and other articles across the Bay. Castro also built a landing, slaughterhouse, and a hotel on this site.
[Five Creeks Tales of the Bay Shore](_blank)
Friends of Five Creeks After the United States took control of California, Castro was forced to sell much of his land.
Minna Quilfeldt purchased 500 acres around this land in the 1850s. Her husband, Richard Stege, used the land to raise bullfrogs and develop a resort.
In later years, the land was acquired by the
Du Pont subsidiary Vigoret Powder Works of San Francisco, which used it primarily to store explosives.
A wharf and railroad spur served the Vigoret site.
In the early 20th century, "training walls" were built in this area in order to keep channels open, which resulted in a marsh developing behind these walls. This provided habitats for shorebirds and waterbirds.
Around the same time, Stauffer Chemical began making sulfuric acid in the area. This site continued its manufacturing until 1997. Chemicals exposed in this area include arsenic, lead, mercury, benzene, acetone, PCBs, mercury, and many others.
In the 1930s, the San Pablo Avenue Sportsmen’s Club used Point Isabel for fishing and duck hunting.
During World War II, the Navy used Point Isabel as a shooting range.
The original hilltop, significantly higher than the present elevation, was dynamited for development in the 1950s. The rubble was used to fill marshlands, widening the point and connecting it to the mainland. A dump for industrial waste filled tidelands north of the original point, separated from it by a tidal channel draining Hoffmann Marsh. This area became known as "Battery Point" because of the large number of batteries buried there. Industrial uses from pesticide manufacturing to
waste oil
Waste oil is defined as any petroleum-based or synthetic oil that, through contamination, has become unsuitable for its original purpose due to the presence of impurities or loss of original properties.
Differentiating between "waste oil" and "use ...
recycling, as well as a pistol range, left the land north and east of Point Isabel among the most polluted brownfield sites along San Francisco Bay, although some of these have been remediated. In recent years, part of the original point, Hoffman Marsh to the east, and later Battery Point were acquired by the
East Bay Regional Parks District
The East Bay Regional Park District (EBRPD) is a special district operating in Alameda County and Contra Costa County, California, within the East Bay area of the San Francisco Bay Area. It maintains and operates a system of regional parks which ...
for its
Point Isabel Regional Shoreline
Point Isabel Regional Shoreline in Richmond, California, is operated by East Bay Regional Park District, and is a multi-use park for joggers, windsurfers, kayakers, photographers, picnickers, and people walking dogs. It has access for pedestrians ...
, and also by the State of California for its
Eastshore State Park
McLaughlin Eastshore State Park is a state park and wildlife refuge along the San Francisco Bay shoreline of the East Bay between the cities of Richmond, Albany, Berkeley, Emeryville, and Oakland. It encompasses remnant natural wetlands, rest ...
.
.
Environmental concerns
![TEPCO Beach](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/b9/TEPCO_Beach.jpg)
A portion of Point Isabel, locally known as TEPCO beach, is covered in thousands of pieces of broken ceramic dishware.
[Why this mysterious Bay Area beach is covered in thousands of broken ceramics](_blank)
by Grant Marek
SF Gate
Dec 30, 2020, access date October 23, 2021 The Technical Porcelain and Chinaware Company (TEPCO) was founded in 1918 and grew substantially until the death of its founder, John Pagliero, in 1968.
During the span of these fifty years, TEPCO discarded their broken dishware along the banks of Point Isabel.
Point Isabel served as a dumping ground for lead-filled battery casings, thus creating toxic emissions from within the soil.
[Silva, Spencer. “Leaking Lead Found at Point Isabel.” ''Www.Oaklandmagazine.Com'', 3 Oct. 2018, https://www.oaklandmagazine.com/leaking-lead-found-at-point-isabel/. Accessed 6 Nov. 2021.] Thousands of tons of soil was removed from this site in the 1970s and 1980s, which was supposed to have resolved the issue. However, in 2018, lead leaks have proved that the job was not entirely completed in the 1970s and 1980s.
The source of the recent lead leaks has not been discovered.
Notes
{{San Francisco Bay watershed
Landforms of Contra Costa County, California
Landforms of the San Francisco Bay Area
Geography of Richmond, California
San Francisco Bay