Glenwood, California, is an

unincorporated area An unincorporated area is a parcel of land that is not governed by a local general-purpose municipal corporation. (At p. 178.) They may be governed or serviced by an encompassing unit (such as a county) or another branch of the state (such as th ...

of Santa Cruz County. It is located at coordinates , and is 891 feet above sea level.

History

This historic community, registered as a

California Historical Landmark A California Historical Landmark (CHL) is a building, structure, site, or place in the U.S. state of California that has been determined to have statewide historical landmark significance. Criteria Historical significance is determined by meetin ...

, was founded by Charles C. Martin, who came around

Cape Horn Cape Horn (, ) is the southernmost headland of the Tierra del Fuego archipelago of southern Chile, and is located on the small Hornos Island. Although not the most southerly point of South America (which is Águila Islet), Cape Horn marks the nor ...

in 1847, and his wife, Hannah Carver Martin, who crossed the

Isthmus of Panama The Isthmus of Panama, historically known as the Isthmus of Darien, is the narrow strip of land that lies between the Caribbean Sea and the Pacific Ocean, linking North America, North and South America. The country of Panama is located on the i ...

. Charles Martin first

homestead Homestead may refer to: *Homestead (building), a farmhouse and its adjacent outbuildings; by extension, it can mean any small cluster of houses * Nguni homestead, a cluster of houses inhabited by a single extended family, typically with a kraal ...

ed the area in 1851 and operated a

tollgate A tollbooth (or toll booth) is an enclosure placed along a toll road that is used for the purpose of collecting a Toll (fee), toll from passing traffic. A structure consisting of several tollbooths placed next to each other is called a toll p ...

and station for

stagecoaches A stagecoach (also: stage coach, stage, road coach, ) is a four-wheeled public transport coach used to carry paying passengers and light packages on journeys long enough to need a change of horses. It is strongly sprung and generally drawn by ...

crossing the mountains. Later he developed a

lumber mill A sawmill (saw mill, saw-mill) or lumber mill is a facility where logs are cut into lumber. Modern sawmills use a motorized saw to cut logs lengthwise to make long pieces, and crosswise to length depending on standard or custom sizes (dimens ...

, winery, store, and the Glenwood Resort Hotel. It was known as Martinville from its foundation in 1851 until the establishment of the post office on August 23, 1880. Glenwood was a stop on the

narrow gauge A narrow-gauge railway (narrow-gauge railroad in the US) is a railway with a track gauge (distance between the rails) narrower than . Most narrow-gauge railways are between and . Since narrow-gauge railways are usually built with Minimum railw ...

South Pacific Coast Railroad The South Pacific Coast Railroad (SPC) was a Narrow-gauge railway, narrow gauge steam railroad running between Santa Cruz, California, and Alameda, California, Alameda, with a ferry connection in Alameda to San Francisco, California, San Franci ...

(SPC), which began service from

Alameda An alameda is a street or path lined with trees () and may refer to: Places Canada * Alameda, Saskatchewan, town in Saskatchewan ** Grant Devine Dam, formerly ''Alameda Dam'', a dam and reservoir in southern Saskatchewan Chile * Alameda (Santi ...

(north terminus, with a ferry to

San Francisco San Francisco, officially the City and County of San Francisco, is a commercial, Financial District, San Francisco, financial, and Culture of San Francisco, cultural center of Northern California. With a population of 827,526 residents as of ...

) to Felton in 1880. At Felton, the SPC bought and connected to the former ''Felton & Santa Cruz Railroad'' tracks, which ran the remaining six miles southwards through Santa Cruz and out onto a

wharf A wharf ( or wharfs), quay ( , also ), staith, or staithe is a structure on the shore of a harbour or on the bank of a river or canal where ships may dock to load and unload cargo or passengers. Such a structure includes one or more Berth (mo ...

Monterey Bay Monterey Bay is a bay of the Pacific Ocean located on the coast of the U.S. state of California, south of the San Francisco Bay Area. San Francisco itself is further north along the coast, by about 75 miles (120 km), accessible via California S ...

. To minimize length and steepness, six tunnels were dug through

ridges A ridge is a long, narrow, elevated geomorphologic landform, structural feature, or a combination of both separated from the surrounding terrain by steep sides. The sides of a ridge slope away from a narrow top, the crest or ridgecrest, wi ...

of the

Santa Cruz Mountains The Santa Cruz Mountains ( Mutsun Ohlone: Mak-sah-re-jah, "Sharp Ridged Mountain of the Eagle" or "People of the Eagle Mountain") are a mountain range in central and Northern California, United States, constituting a part of the Pacific Coast R ...

. ''Tunnel Number 2'' exited at Glenwood and ''Tunnel Number 3'' exited ''from'' just south of Glenwood. The railroad was acquired in the 1880s by the

Southern Pacific The Southern Pacific (or Espee from the railroad initials) was an American Class I railroad network that existed from 1865 to 1996 and operated largely in the Western United States. The system was operated by various companies under the names ...

, which broad-gauged the line in the early 1900s. The April 18, 1906

San Francisco earthquake At 05:12 AM Pacific Standard Time on Wednesday, April 18, 1906, the coast of Northern California was struck by a major earthquake with an estimated moment magnitude of 7.9 and a maximum Mercalli intensity of XI (''Extreme''). High-intensit ...

twisted some of the rails and damaged bridges and tunnels along the line. The Southern Pacific repaired the railroad, and it continued operations until March 1940. The routing of State Route 17 (SR 17), completed during 1940, barely bypassed Glenwood, contributing to its decline.U.S. Geological Survey maps, 1919 and 1940 Glenwood officially "disappeared" with the closing of the Glenwood U.S. post office in 1954. Mrs. Margaret Koch, a well-known local-history author and great-granddaughter of founder Charles Martin, served as Glenwood's last

postmistress A postmaster is the head of an individual post office, responsible for all postal activities in a specific post office. When a postmaster is responsible for an entire mail distribution organization (usually sponsored by a national government), ...

Status

The area is now a sparsely-settled semi-

rural In general, a rural area or a countryside is a geographic area that is located outside towns and cities. Typical rural areas have a low population density and small settlements. Agricultural areas and areas with forestry are typically desc ...

community. From Highway 17, the exit to Glenwood Drive, also known as ''Glenwood Highway'', passes through the site of the original town and by the historical marker (see image at right). It travels south into the town of

Scotts Valley Scotts Valley is a small city in Santa Cruz County, California, United States, about south of downtown San Jose and north of the city of Santa Cruz, in the upland slope of the Santa Cruz Mountains. As of the 2020 census, the city populati ...

and intersects with Scotts Valley Drive.

References

{{California Former settlements in Santa Cruz County, California Ghost towns in the Monterey Bay Area Ghost towns in California