A chronic landslide area in Berkeley would require sustained work to remove water if the earth movement was to be stopped, the Berkeley Daily Gazette reported 75 years ago on Aug. 1, 1942.

The slide in the vicinity of Cragmont, Keeler and Keith avenues had started moving in February of that year. The city had already spent $2,500 on drainage pipes and planned another $1,600 in work. Geologist and Professor George Louderback from UC Berkeley was advising on the project.

Thorsen House

Many Berkeleyans know the Thorsen House on Piedmont Avenue, just south of International House. It’s one of the grand “ultimate bungalows” built by the renowned Arts and Crafts architectural design firm of Greene and Greene.

The builders and owners of the house, Mrs. Caroline Canfield Thorsen and William R. Thorsen, died in early 1942. The July 29 Gazette reported on the probate of the will of Mrs. Thorsen, who had her own estate of nearly $200,000. Most was left to her husband (who died a month after her), and then two sons and a niece. She also left $5,000 to the Pacific School of Religion, $5,000 to Vassar College for scholarships and $5,000 to Berkeley’s First Congregational Church. Those individual gifts would each be worth about $80,000 in today’s dollars.

That same year, 1942, the house would be sold to the Sigma Phi fraternity and start its second — and current — life, as a fraternity house.

Bicycle license

Berkeley had about 4,400 bicycles in 1942, according to city statistics. Bikes had to be registered in Berkeley, and that was the registration count for 1941-42. Aug. 31 was the deadline to reregister, but by July 30, only about 700 cycle registrations had been renewed. A license cost 50 cents in 1942, equivalent to about $15 today.

Scrap drives

On July 26, 1942, the Berkeley Defense Council announced “that the scrap metal drive in this community … will be continued indefinitely.” Leaders of the drive asked that residents take scrap metal to two assembly points, the Live Oak Park playground and the Grove Street playground (Oregon and Martin Luther King Jr. Way). They said there were some 25,000 locations in town, presumably numbering all residential buildings and businesses and volunteers couldn’t respond to all the calls.

Gazette columnist Hal Johnson also reported “there is some talk of calling in all the pennies and nickels” for their metal content, particularly copper. And that was at a time when a penny could actually buy something.

The need for scrap metal for war industries renewed proposals to convert north Berkeley’s Solano Tunnel from rail to automobile use, the Gazette reported the same day. The tunnel was no longer being used by the Southern Pacific Railroad for commuter trains, and it contained 450 feet of double-tracked “90-pound” steel rails which were in demand for trackage to carry moveable cranes at manufacturing sites.

The Gazette noted that the tunnel, which could handle two trains at a time, was 31 feet wide, more than enough to accommodate two 12-foot automobile traffic lanes that would “relieve the heavy traffic congestion on Grove Street.” It would cost about $15,000 to pave the tunnel.

Regent dies

Garret William McEnerney, 77, died Aug. 3, 1942, in San Francisco. The attorney had been a member of the UC Board of Regents since 1901 and chairman of the board since 1937. McEnerney had practiced law in San Francisco since 1886 and was a graduate of nearby St. Mary’s College. He left some $800,000 to UC Berkeley, where the law library is named in his honor.