Sam or Mary Yancy on thu 5 feb 04
Clay in San Francisco? Adobe clay question and a story
Question for the experts. Do any of you know if adobe clay was ever used and/or fired for pots and bowls and so on or not? Reason is that I have used it for making adobe bricks that are still standing after 50+ years but never for pots and such - and have never fired it.
My story if you are interested (Clay in San Francisco):
Back in the late 40’s my dad and one of his old friends bought two houses in a “row” of five or six new houses on “Red Rock Hill” south of the “Twin Peaks” hill in San Francisco CA. The houses were all in a row and stuck together like condos today. The area was very sparsely populated at the time and the street (Diamond street) went to dirt road a block from our house. In any case, the back yards sloped up quite high. The ground was “red colored shale and rock covered. Nothing but trash grass and bushes grew on the land. Since I was just starting summer vacation, my dad “volunteered” me to clean up the back yards and build terraces.
Once I got though the shale and few large rocks, about 4-6 inches down I came across all adobe clay in both back yards. The clay was very-very hard and the only way to dig it was to water soak it one day, and scrape some off the next, than water again. The clay was yellow/orange in color and when wet very slippery, sticky and HEAVY. I used to clay to make hundreds of adobe bricks with a wood form and some of the trash grass and weeds in the area. Then I used these bricks to make the terraces (four in our back yard, two the next doors back yard). I covered the next doors walls with about an inch of smooth cement. I covered our adobe walls with cobble stones that I got from downtown streets that they were replacing with cement asphalt. Bent the frame on an old Buick that a friend of mine had carrying those cobble stones (VERY HEAVY). Anyway the walls were done – took more thay six months - also worked after school - and they still stand today. One of the funny things I came across when
digging was a water spring about three feet down in our back yard. Planted an apple tree over the spring and we had the best apples I ever ate. Made great apple pie. Nothing else ever grew well there and even with top soil the adobe would creep up over a couple of years. If you want to know where this was done, it was in San Francisco on 1536 and 1534 Diamond street. Lots of adobe clay up there.And I made $75!!
Sam in Daly City
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