The Tribune reported that friends of Louise in Tampa were alarmed by the knowledge that she and her parents were living in San Francisco.  Nobody in Tampa knew if they escaped the disaster.  Other Tampans such as Judge Donovan, Rabbi Stollnitz had relatives there.

Crowds watching the fires set off by the earthquake in San Francisco in 1906, photo by Arnold Genthe. Library of Congress at Britannica.com.

The night before the 1906 earthquake, renowned Italian tenor Enrico Caruso performed in San Francisco. The world-famous opera singer escaped the city’s Palace Hotel where he was staying at the time of the quake, however, the hotel itself was destroyed by fire later that day.

THE EARTHQUAKE AND FIRE

Info below combined from Britannica.com, U.S. Geological Survey website and California Dept. of Conservation.
 

Edison movie footage at Britannica.com from Library of Congress.

Figure at right shows the extent of the 1906 rupture seen at the surface. The total length was 296 miles. For comparison, the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake had a rupture length of about 25 miles (blue).

Below is a seismogram recorded in Gottingen, Germany, 5,654 miles away. It shows how the ground moved in Germany as a result of the 1906 San Francisco earthquake. Small wiggles, beginning 1/2 inch from left end, signal arrival of first compressional (P) waves. Large wiggles half way along represent arrival of slower-traveling shear (S) waves. The part of the record shown here spans about 1600 seconds or 26 minutes. The instrument subsequently went off-scale when surface waves arrived.

Bill Ellsworth, U.S. Geological Survey website. Images courtesy of same site.

The quake was followed by a massive fire that swept from the business section near Montgomery Street and the south of Market district toward Russian Hill, Chinatown, North Beach, and Telegraph Hill. The blaze continued for four days, until its smoldering ashes were ultimately extinguished by rain.  In the process, more than 500 blocks in the city center—covering some 4 square miles (10 square km)—were leveled. The inferno destroyed some 28,000 buildings, and the total property value loss was estimated at $350 million.  Some 700 people originally were thought to have died in the disaster, but the death toll is now believed to have exceeded 3,000. Moreover, about 250,000 were left homeless; survivors camped in Golden Gate Park and dunes west of the city or fled to outlying towns.

Red lines indicate the progression of fires.

Earthquake and fire map animations showing progressions of shaking and fire.
USGS Map showing areas of highest ground acceleration 

Earthquake shaking intensity map from ResearchGate.net by S. Tobrinner.
Color has been added to original B&W image.

1906, April 25 - A letter was received by Mrs. Brash which Louise sent on April 16, two days before the quake.

1906, April 28 - The Dodges were safe at a nearby mountain resort. The article claims that Louise and her parents left SF two days before the disaster, but Louise's report to the Tribune written Apr. 29th (see below this article) says she was in SF the day of the earthquake.

UNDERSTANDING THE ARTICLE

"Last Monday I passed through the city after the fire on the way to this point where my parents had been spending a few days." Louise refers to Monday, Apr. 23,  five days after the earthquake, one day after the fires were out, and five days before writing this letter from Camp Meeker.    So where was she before she passed through the city last Monday the 23rd?  Her passing "through the city" was not necessarily through the fire damaged area and was more likely a passing through the suburbs on the outskirts of the business district.

In the next sentence of the same paragraph she backtracks five days to the day of the earthquake..  "On the day of the earthquake friends took me out of the city on a wagon with them, and from a suburb we listened to the blasting...and watched..."  She was in San Francisco the day the quake hit. Her use of the phrase "out of the city" doesn't seem to mean out of San Francisco, but instead away from the central business district which was on fire.

Recall that in the April 25 Tribune article about the letter received by Mrs. Brash which Louise wrote two days before the quake (the 16th),  Louise stated she was "preparing to leave San Francisco."   Now in this article, she says she was taken out of the city the day of the earthquake.  It might be that she planned to leave with her parents on the 16th to go to Camp Meeker where they were to spend a few days, but either went there and returned, or remained in the city and only her parents left.

In the same paragraph, she immediately goes on to describe the beauty of the Santa Clara valley fauna along with great damage in San Jose and Stanford. "...but on every side were signs of shock.."  At this point she has traveled a good 15 miles or so southeast of the city of San Francisco and was on her way to Camp Meeker.

"We lost our trunks and articles of value..."  This would have been whatever was left behind in their apartments, indicating she could not or did not go back to retrieve anything.

"The shock did little damage here where my people were spending a few days..."  She refers to her parents at Camp Meeker.

...and though I was at our apartments in the city, I left it about noon the same day, spent several days with friends, and then after the fire made my way here in a roundabout way, driving a considerable distance."  She doesn't say what day she's referring to when she says "...the same day..."  She could mean the same day her parents left for Camp Meeker, but more likely she backtracks, referring again to the day of the earthquake, but in more detail, then she skips to Monday, the 23rd, after the fires when she left the suburbs and made her way to Camp Meeker.  This would be when she witnessed the damage in Stanford, Santa Clara and San Jose.

This trip would have started on Monday, Apr. 23 from the suburbs, "driving a considerable distance, as the trains were not running." through the Santa Clara valley, and on up to Camp Meeker.  She doesn't say SHE drove, nor does she say that the trip was driven the entire way.

"My father went down to the city to look for me...visited the refugee camps near the city, but we finally got word to him and he returned yesterday."  There were no bridges across the bay, the Oakland Bay bridge opened in 1936, the Golden Gate didn't open until 1937. Below is evidence he was in Oakland.

This was among hundreds of personal ads in this newspaper by persons looking for friends and relatives or persons announcing they survived and were trying to get word to others of their location.

 See The History of Transportation in San Francisco.

Louise doesn't say when she got to Camp Meeker, but it seems that at some time after her return they were able to get "word to" her father who had gone looking for her.  He returned on the 28th.

"One of the few things that I saved was the watch given me by the Women's Clubs of Tampa." You will hear of this watch again fifty years later.

People watching from suburb hillsides as downtown San Francisco burned.
Gallery of Photographs related to the 1906 San Francisco Earthquake, Fire, and Refugee Camps shows many of the downtown area buildings did not suffer catastrophic damage from the earthquake itself.

PROBABLE SCENARIO

The most probable chronological scenario is that Louise was planning to leave SF with her parents on the 16th as evidenced by her letter she sent to Tampa two days before the disaster.  She could have escorted them there, then come back into SF, but more likely she changed her plans and only her parents left.  On the morning of the earthquake, the 18th, she was somewhere in San Francisco's Western Addition or near the business district in her apartment.  (The earthquake started at 5:12 a.m. so she was probably in her apartment, sleeping.  ) By noon she was taken by friends on a wagon to an area in the suburbs where they watched the business district burning. This was probably somewhere in the Western Addition in the direction of Golden Gate Park and the Presidio.  She didn't mention where she stayed for those five days except that she was with friends.

On the 22nd, rain put out what was left of the smoldering ashes.  On Monday, April 23 when the fires were out she drove or was driven from the suburb in sight of the earthquake ruins along the west side of the burnt district and southeastward parallel to lower San Francisco Bay through Stanford, Santa Clara and San Jose.  Louise said the trains were not running.

Then she went from Santa Clara around the south end of SF bay, northwestward, probably in the vicinities of  Oakland, Berkeley, San Pablo, Napa, Santa Rosa and finally Camp Meeker.  If she was driving, it probably would have been her own car, if she had one.  This would have been unlikely because she had to be taken out of the city on a wagon, thus leaving any car she owned. However, if she lived outside of the burn district west of Van Ness Ave., she could have retrieved it, though she makes no mention of going back to her apartment. Having lost their trunks and valuables, it is doubtful she was able to gain access to the inside of her apartment.  It probably did not burn but may have sustained structural damage.

Some time around the 22nd to 25th, her father came down from Camp Meeker to look for her.  Somewhere in the surrounding area of SF,  he put an ad in the newspaper and waited at the Oakland Post Office.  Probably not seeing it, Louise arrived in Camp Meeker somewhere around the 25th or 26th.  Mr. Dodge had probably made plans with his wife of where he could be contacted if Louise arrived before he did.  Having received word she was at Camp Meeker, Mr. Dodge returned on the 28th.

Louise mentions having lost all their trunks and valuables and she probably didn't mean empty suitcases.  Valuables probably meant more than just jewelry.  Their apartment could have been a boarding house or apartment building as they had not been in SF for more than five months when the earthquake hit.  Later, you will see the importance of the fact they lived in an apartment and did not own their own home.

The Dodges were listed on the 1909 San Francisco city directory living at 1457 Franklin. The "r" denotes this is a residence.  This directory did not list spouse's names.  At this time Mr. Dodge was  73 and Louise was 34.

This location is a business and condos/apartments area today and located just one  street west of Van Ness Avenue, an area which was not damaged by the fire in 1906.  It is possible this was where the Dodges lived before the earthquake.  Compare 1905 and 1913 Sanborn maps to follow below.
 

The close-up below shows the area today is overrun by condos and apartment buildings. 

The David Rumsey Map Collection contains extremely rare map images of pre-earthquake San Francisco from 1905.  The pages are brown and heat damaged.

Below is enhanced and rotated (it was upside down with north at the bottom) from the David Rumsey Map Collection 1905 Sanborn Fire Insurance Map San Francisco - pages 257 & 258  The blocks have been moved closer together to conserve space and present them as large as possible.  The red rectangle marks the address where the Dodges lived on the 1909 San Francisco City directory.

The numbers in red inside each dwelling appear to be property numbers.  The Dodge's dwelling was about 80 ft x 20 ft and was 2-story with a basement.  The units were separated by brick-filled partitions.

This 1913 Sanborn Map from Library of Congress shows the building where the Dodges lived wasn't destroyed in the earthquake and appears to have remained unchanged.  They may have lived there when they first arrived in San Francisco in late 1905, and could have moved right back soon after the April 1906 earthquake.  This area west of Van Ness wasn't damaged by fire.  However, the mirror image building across Franklin St. was gone (X).

TampaPix has altered this map by moving the blocks much closer together.  The streets were actually about as wide as the blocks, except for Fern St. which was about half the width of the other streets.

The Dodge's apartment building has the footprint of the commonly used row house style for many  San Francisco dwellings of the period.     A terrain-view map shows this area with sloping streets downward from west to east.

Below: San Francisco earthquake of 1906 - Row houses in San Francisco, tilted by soil liquefaction after the San Francisco earthquake of 1906. From Encyclopedia Britannica.

In April of 1910 David & Helen Dodge were still living at 1457 Franklin St., but Louise was no longer living there.  Mr. Dodge was a retired clergyman and Mrs. Dodge worked as a housekeeper in a lodging house.  They were in their early 70s and had been married 44 years.

1910 CENSUS - LOUISE IN ST. LOUIS

By 1910 Louise had moved to St. Louis, MO and is found on the 1910 Census there as a lodger in the home of Michael Cultner and his family.  

There are four errors on her entry here:  She was listed as "Louis," male, and age 39.  Louise would have been 35 in 1910.  The columns for nativity of her parents have been edited out to conserve horizontal space.  It showed her father born in New York, which is correct, but her mother born in Iowa--incorrect.  Helen Dodge was born in Michigan.  All these problems can be a result of enumerator error and the info not being taken from Louise herself.  With so many errors, how can we know this was actually Louise? She had been there in 1904 to attend a woman's club convention and the St. Louis World's fair, as well as the Olympics.  But the best evidence is "Louis's" occupation:  NEWSPAPER REPORTER.  Was she a reporter because that used to be her career, or was she currently working as a reporter?  The last two columns answer this:  #21-Whether out of work on Apr. 15, 1910:  "No."  #22 - Number of weeks out of work during year 1909:  "0." 

1913 - DODGES OWE $2.50 IN TAXES FOR PALMER UNION OIL STOCK

This article of Aug. 29, 1913 listed thousands of stockholders who owed a tax on their shares.  The fact they owned stock shows that David & Helen Dodge were at least depending on investment earnings for income.  Recall also that David also was receiving a pension for being disabled in the Civil War.   Each owned 125 shares of Palmer Union Oil Company common stock and owed $1.25 each, indicating a penny per share tax.  The Fed began taxing income in 1913 so this may have been a federal income tax assessed on the company which was being passed to the stockholders. 

Palmer Oil Company - Oilfield discovery in 1908 at Cat Canyon, CA, began company's lengthy corporate convolution.
The search for oil and natural gas began in 1904 at Cat Canyon in the Solomon Hills of central Santa Barbara County, California.  Exploration companies unsuccessfully drilled there for four years before Palmer Oil Company discovered an oilfield about 10 miles southeast of Santa Maria. "Oil Age Weekly” on September 9, 1910 declared, “The Palmer Oil Company is generally concluded to have opened one of the biggest and richest oil fields in California by the bringing in of its two gushers in the Cat Canyon District, now doing 10,000 barrels per day between them. The success of Palmer Oil brought new investors, and the company was capitalized at $10 million by the beginning of 1911.

1913: WORST YEAR EVER 

Perhaps the most forgotten period in American economic history is the eight years that followed the creation of the Fed and the income tax in 1913. From 1913 to 1921 the growth rate came in at just 1.4 percent per year. The period included two long recessions: one beginning in 1913, in which that year’s level of production was equaled only two years later (and with the assistance of military production that did nothing for living standards), and another from 1919 to 1921 that was simply the worst depression the nation would ever suffer outside of the 1930s. The new income tax system hit persons making as little as $1,000 a year ($11,000 in today’s terms).
 

1917, APRIL 1
Louise entertained guests at her home at 2204 Dwight Way in Berkeley with a dinner party for her birthday.  Three male students from the university attended, along with her mother and Mrs. Ruf.  Louise was 42.

Louise served as a Precinct 28 polling place judge at the southwest corner of Dwight Way and Ellsworth for Berkeley city elections in Aug. 1918, June 1919, Apr. 1920, Aug. 1920, Oct. 1920, and Jan. 1921. This was a tent just down the street at the next corner.

2204 Dwight Way today, on the right.
Today this property is assessed at nearly a million dollars
.

The 1911 Sanborn Fire Insurance map below has been rotated to match the view of the house photo above.  South is at the top of the map.  The house today appears to have the same footprint as it did in 1911 and could be the same house.

Map courtesy of Library of Congress

       1920 CENSUS OF BERKELEY, ALAMEDA COUNTY, CALIFORNIA
2204 Dwight Way - David A. Dodge (83), Helen M. (82), Louise (44) single.
None had an occupation; they were renting their home ("R" in column 7)
This is a large dwelling and they were probably only one family of multiple apartments.

The census date was Jan. 1, so Louise would turn 45 later in April.

Typical of newspapers of the era, nothing was published about the event after it was held.

What was a "card party?"

History and photos St. Agnes Catholic church, San Francisco.

Site of the May 8, 1920 Agnetian Club card party & dance.
The Fairmont Hotel, a luxury hotel building in the Beaux-Arts style, on Nob Hill, built in 1907, as seen in this 1920 San Francisco postcard. Courtesy of SFGate.com, "1920: What San Francisco looked like 100 years ago"


 

1923, July 12 - This Tribune article claims Louise had become interested in politics and held several offices in Berkeley and had become well-known in musical circles as an assistant pipe organist at Trinity Methodist church in Berkeley.  The complete name of this church was "Trinity Methodist Episcopal church of Berkeley." No article of their organists or musical programs was found.
No article could be found that mention Louise in any civic or political office, or a church's music program.

1923, July 27 - Louise reported about the fires and wind storms that swept up and down the coast of California in 1923.  She was remembered in Tampa as "the originator of the annual carnival" which referred to Gasparilla.

The wildfires caused $10M damage in Berkeley.

KIRKBRIDE BUILDINGS - Formerly state-of-the-art mental healthcare facilities, Kirkbride buildings have long been relics of an obsolete therapeutic method known as Moral Treatment. In the latter half of the 19th century, these massive structures were conceived as ideal sanctuaries for the mentally ill and as an active participant in their recovery. Careful attention was given to every detail of their design to promote a healthy environment and convey a sense of respectable decorum. Placed in secluded areas within expansive grounds, many of these asylums seemed almost palace-like from the outside. But growing populations and insufficient funding led to unfortunate conditions, spoiling their idealistic promise (to put it mildly.)

Kirkbride buildings are named after Dr. Thomas Story Kirkbride, a nineteenth-century physician and asylum superintendent who authored a treatise on hospital design. This treatise and Dr. Kirkbride's other work had a far-reaching influence on the construction of American insane asylums through much of the latter half of the nineteenth century. Kirkbride buildings are most recognizably characterized by their somewhat unique "bat wing" floor plan and their often lavish Victorian-era architecture. Their design was an attempt at creating a space to facilitate the return to sanity. The buildings were conceived by Dr. Kirkbride and his contemporaries as active participants in treating the mentally ill.

Dr. Edmund T. Wilkins Superintendent from Mar. 1876 to Feb. 1891.

The first hospital for the mentally ill in California was the Stockton Asylum for the Insane which opened its doors in 1851. It was built to accommodate 80 patients but within 20 years the institution became desperately overcrowded. During the 1869-70 term, the California State Legislature passed an act enabling Governor Henry Huntley Haight to appoint Dr. E.T. Wilkins as a commissioner to research existing asylums in the United States and Europe to gather ideas and plans to build the second state asylum. Dr. Wilkins made an exhaustive report favoring the "moral treatment" of the mentally ill and presented it the governor on Dec. 2, 1871.  After reviewing it, the state legislature approved an act to build a second state hospital. In 1871, Dr. E.T. Wilkins, Dr. Benjamin Shurtleff of Stockton, and Judge C.H. Swift of Sacramento were appointed to select a site for the proposed asylum.

The trio issued a report that recommended a site at Rancho Tulocay, owned by Don Cayetano Juarez, due to its arable land and healthy water supply, as well as its proximity to the railway and Napa Embarcadero (wharf).

Rancho Tulucay was a 8,866-acre Mexican land grant in present day Napa County, California given in 1841 by Governor pro tem Manuel Jimeno to ranchero Cayetano Juarez.  The Tulucay name originates with the names Tulkays and Ulucas that were applied to the inhabitants of Tuluka, a Patwin village in the area. The grant was on the east side of the Napa River, between Soscol Creek on the south, and Sarco Creek on the north.   See source Wikipedia for more.

In 1872, approximately 192 acres of land were purchased from Juarez for $11,506. In 1872, Wright & Sanders of San Francisco were awarded the contract for the asylum, a building which was to be “constructed of either brick or stone that would accommodate at least 500 patients—cost not to exceed $600,000.”   Work began for the erection of the 500-bed, four-story, Gothic Hospital building.  Ground was broken in Oct. 1872 and construction began on Feb. 11, 1873, the cornerstone laid and the building was dedicated on Dec. 24, 1874. 

Front view of the main building which was known as "The Castle."
Postcard photo courtesy of Napa Valley Register.com.

Building materials included Vermont slate, Colfax marble, and millions of bricks manufactured on-site. The three to five story building was composed of one main “castle” and two identical wings. There were a total of seven towers, four of which were used to store water for the facility’s gravity-flow elevator system, as well as fire protection. The building was allegedly a mile in circumference. There was much political controversy surrounding the cost of the building. Democrats argued that the building was needlessly extravagant and expensive, and Republicans defended the cost as necessary to create a healthy environment for the mentally ill. The final cost of the building has been variously recorded as anywhere between 1.25 and 1.75 million dollars.

Originally named the Napa State Insane Asylum, the facility opened and admitted its first patients on Monday November 15, 1875. The seven-towered domestic Gothic structure was elaborate and ornate, and its uniqueness made it one of Napa's early tourist attractions.  The hospital faced west with wings extending on each side, allowing for plenty of fresh air to flow throughout the facility.   During the 1906 San Francisco earthquake, statues atop the roof and towers toppled to pieces to the ground but the buildings remained largely intact.  There was even an underground cog railroad that was used to carry meals and laundry to the hospital's wings.

The Hospital was once self-sufficient, with its own dairy and poultry ranches, vegetable gardens, fruit orchards and other farming operations that provided a large part of the food supply consumed by the residents.  Later, more land was purchased bringing the total to 2,062 acres.  This included a wharf on the Napa River, a siding at the Southern Pacific Railroad tracks, vegetable fields, a duck ranch, and the Skyline Park ranch.  Streams to the east were dammed at an outlying ranch bounded by Coombsville and Green Valley roads to provide the hospital's main source of water.  Cattle was raised on the Napa State Hospital Farm just northeast of Yountville which also provided beef for the Veterans Home of California, and San Quentin.

The average stay for patients was about three months to a year. A standard of moral treatment was established from the earliest days of the hospital, with occupational therapy programs and exercise classes as part of the treatment.   The Napa Asylum treated patients for a variety of ailments. Many of the early residents were admitted due to alcoholism or homelessness. Women admitted at the end of the 19th century were often diagnosed with acute mania, melancholia, or paranoia. By the early 1890s, the facility had over 1,300 patients which was more than double the original capacity it was designed to house. In 1893, the Mendocino State Hospital was opened and relieved some of the overcrowding at the Napa hospital. 

In 1922 the Department of Institutions was established and viewpoints changed.  The name of the facility was changed to "Napa State Hospital" and the term "insanity" became recognized as "mental illness."  The castle's main buildings became outdated and were demolished in 1949.

This rear view of the hospital shows laundry drying in the sun  propped on racks in the yard.  An orchard can be seen in the foreground.
Photo from Napa Valley Marketplace
 

BURIALS:

A two-acre piece of land on the eastern portion of the campus behind the administration building was designated as a cemetery for indigent patients from about 1875 through 1923 and became the final resting place for 4,368 patients' remains. These were patients for which nobody claimed their remains, hence the responsibility of burial fell on the State of California. For research purposes, the original name Napa State Asylum can be found on old death certificates issued prior to 1924 which is when the name was changed to Napa State Hospital.  At one time, the cemetery did have wooden crosses marking each grave, but in the 1920s after the burials stopped, the land became a pasture; by the 1940s a dairy farm was on it; and today, the site has an unused barn and an outbuilding on it.   Since land for burial on the campus was limited, an on-site crematorium was built at Napa State Hospital in the mid-1920s and was in use until sometime in the 1960s. In the 21st century, two old grave markers from this era were found. In 1983 a single marker was placed in remembrance of those buried on the hospital's grounds.  No bodies were ever exhumed from Napa State Hospital grounds, but the unclaimed cremated ashes of patients have been transferred elsewhere: The ashes of 440 patients were buried with numbered markers in the pauper's section at St. Helena Cemetery; and at least 5,100 patients' ashes were buried in a mass grave on October 28, 1968 at Napa Valley Memorial Park on Napa-Vallejo Highway. Napa Valley Memorial Park has in the past used the names of Inspiration Chapel and Chapel of the Chimes. Twenty-eight patients were buried in unmarked graves in the pauper's section at Tulocay Cemetery. Today, the few patients who do die at the Napa State Hospital are transferred to their county of residence for funeral arrangements to be made by the family or an appointed representative. The hospital has an annual memorial service in remembrance of the patients who died that year as well as the others of earlier years.

Today, the location of the original hospital is home to administrative offices and doctors' offices.
The patients' units are south of S. Oak Drive in buildings designed and laid out like prisons.  None of the patients are there voluntarily, they are all sent there by the State court system.

WHY WAS LOUISE HERE IN 1930?

We may never know the answer to this and can only make some general conclusions based on circumstances.   Her mother died in 1924 in Berkeley where they were renting their home on Dwight Way. Her father entered the veterans' care facility soon afterward and died in there May 1925. 

Except for the five years she spent in colleges at Ann Arbor, MI and Nashville, TN from 1895 to 1900, and the one to four years at most that she spent in St. Louis in 1910, she lived with her parents all her life, including at Winter Haven while she worked for the Tampa Tribune.  Her parents' deaths may have had a huge impact on her psychological well-being.  (But wait, there's more later.)  There is no evidence that she ever had a job after leaving Tampa except for her 1910 census in St. Louis. 

1932, April 5 - This article says Louise was visiting in Napa Valley and spoke "enthusiastically of the beauty and prosperous appearance of the valley."

Was she really just visiting?

How did the Oakland Tribune know this?

1932, July 31 - Louise received a card from Pierre de Coubertin in response to her message of well-wishes she sent him. Charles Pierre de Frédy, Baron de Coubertin, was a French educator and historian, co-founder of the International Olympic Committee (IOC), and its second president. He is known as the father of the modern Olympic Games and was particularly active in promoting the introduction of sport in French schools.
Info and photo from Wikipedia.

The 10th Olympic games were held in Los Angeles.