California Packing Corporation

Summary

Business	Cannery
Main Location	San Francisco
Aliases	Del Monte

Summary

Founded in 1916 as the merger of five major canners: Griffin and Skelley, Central California Canneries, J.K. Armsby, California Fruit Canners Association, and Alaska Packers Association. They canned fish from Alaska, pineapple from Hawaii, fruit from California.

Locations

Location	Years	Address	Details
Alameda	1925, 1941	Buena Vista at Sherman	Former Alaska Packing Corporation salmon cannery. aka Encinal Terminal.
Alameda	?	???	Warehouse for consolidating output from different canneries for eastern shipment. (California's Finest, p.142)
Atwater	1922-1939		December 1922 Western Canner and Packer notes city helping buy lot along SP tracks for California Packing Corporation to expand the present cannery. "The cannery closed November 27 after packing 160,000 cases of peaches and 7,400 cases of sweet potatoes. Arcadia Publishing's Atwater book says Del Monte left in 1939. The plant had started as the Atwater Cannery, a cooperative, in 1905.
Berkeley	1941	2424 Fourth Street	From Oakland City Directory, 1941.
Emeryville	-1989	1200 Park Avenue	. Now Pixar. Plant #7 was nearby according to "Baptista oral history":http://digitalassets.lib.berkeley.edu/roho/ucb/text/baptista_stella_adoa.pdf
Emeryville	1941	40th and Halleck
Fairfield	1926	???	Plant #60, Dried fruit. "Frank Butterfield bio":http://cagenweb.com/solano/biobutterfieldf.html
Fresno
Fruitvale	1941	3000 East 9th Street	(Now mall.)() Photo pg 394, Southern Pacific Freight Cars: Box Cars.
Hanford	1921, 1922
Kahului HI	1926-1934	120 Kane Street	See "HAER Survey":http://www.historicmapworks.com/Buildings/index.php?state=HI
Kingsburg	1922-2012	1101 Marian Avenue	Newspaper articles at time of closure said it had been open for 90 years.
Los Angeles	1921
Marysville	1921
Modesto	1969 - ~2000	4000 Yosemite Blvd	"Catsup, tomato sauce, tomato juice":http://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=1948
Monterey	1926-1962		Sardine cannery.
Mt. Eden	1931		Mentioned in 1931 Hayward Directory.
Oakland	1921, 1941	First and Myrtle	Still exists. according to signs on photo by James Bunger and 1941 Oakland City Directory.
Oakland	1941	First and Filbert Street
Oakland	1941	742 Saunders
Oakland	1941	85th Ave	Foot of 85th Ave
Oakland	1941	(1941) 1100 29th Ave
Planada	1922	Highway 120	Mentioned as Merced.
Rio Vista	1921,1922,1953		. Was Rio Vista Canning and Packing Company. Article in "June 1921 Canning Age":http://books.google.com/books?id=va3mAAAAMAAJ
Roseberry	1921
Sacramento		3rd and X Street
Sacramento		19th and R Street
Sacramento	1922, 1938	1600 2nd Street	(Front and P Street?) () "May 1922 Western Canner and Packer":http://books.google.com/books?id=2S0dAQAAMAAJ
Sacramento	1925	17th and C Street	Now Blue Diamond)
Salem	1916-	???	. (Former Oregon Packing Company, merged into Del Monte in 1916.) In SP warehouse until "1935":http://www.salemhistory.net/commerce/canneries.htm 1922 Western Canner and Packers mentions canned prunes being shipped from this plant.
San Francisco	1916, 1921	North Point Ave.	(now the Cannery). Started as "peach cannery":http://foundsf.org/index.php?title=Del_Monte_Foods, merged into California Fruit Canners Association. "rodhadeland.com":http://www.rodhandeland.com/SFWaterfront/FishermanPier39.htm suggests plant was originally set up by Fontana and Company in 1907.
San Francisco	1920, 1921	101 California Street	Headquarters.
San Jose	1919	Cinnabar Street	Former Armsby plant, mentioned in want ads in "May 22, 1919 San Jose Evening News":http://news.google.com/newspapers?id=GvwxAAAAIBAJ
San Jose	1919	849 Auzerais St.	West San Carlos Street () / 849 Auzerais (1936, 1940, 1945) Plant #3 cannery. Still referred to as "by the narrow gauge" in 1919. "May 22, 1919 San Jose Evening News":http://news.google.com/newspapers?id=GvwxAAAAIBAJ
San Jose	1923, 1936, 1940, 1945, 1949	725 W. San Fernando	Closed 1990, moved to Fresno) Grading and processing on 2nd floors along with bins, warehouse on first. Sulfur rooms in south end of building.
San Jose	1930	Montgomery Street at Cinnabar.	Former Richmond Chase plant.
San Jose	1931	Lincoln Ave.	Seen on 1931 siding list.
San Jose	1936, 1940	Auzerais and Meridian Road	(pit cracker)
San Jose	1936, 1940, 1945	7th and Jackson	Plant #39 (pickle factory)
San Jose	1936, 1940, 1945	Sunol and Auzerais St.	Plant #153 (by-products)
San Jose	1940, 1945, 1964	7th and Jackson	Plant #4 , #34. (Vinegar works)
San Jose	1964	Monterey Road	Seed farm.
San Jose	1964	734 The Alameda	Sales office, fruit and vegetable purchasing office.
San Jose	1964	Hostetter Road	Pit cracking department.
San Leandro	1928	Thornton Avenue	"Formerly H.G. Prince" according to 1928 Sanborn map. .
San Leandro	1931	752 Saunders	West of BART station, vacant as of 2005. . 1899-1973. Cannery, dried fruit, agricultural research. Was a packing plant for dried fruit until moved to San Jose in...1960's?... according to "obituary for Marie Fernandes":http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr
San Lorenzo	1922, 1931		Opposite SP station. December 1922 Western Canner and Packer notes that the cannery will reopen early in 1923 to can spinach from 250 acres. Leonard Perillo superintendent.
Sanger	1922		"July 1922 Western Canner and Packer":http://books.google.com/books?id=2S0dAQAAMAAJ
Santa Ana	1921
Santa Rosa	1921		: Source for blackberries, according to a July 1922 price list in Western Canner and Packer.
Stockton	1975	2716 East Minor	Filbert Street north of SP's Oakdale branch. . Lawsuit in 1977 said that Del Monte had warehouses for canned goods out there, and they needed the space to hold the production from the Emeryville and San Jose canneries in the 1970's - there wasn't enough space locally. December 1922 Western Canner and Packer notes it'll reopen on March 1. In 1922, canned 125,000 cases of spinach, 200,000 cases of cling peaches, and 110,000 cases of tomatoes.
Sunnyvale	1904-1926, 1930-?	185 Evelyn	Dried fruit receiving house formerly owned by Madison and Bonner, merged into CalPak in 1916, turned into warehouse in 1926, used for corporate seed department after 1930.
The Dalles	1921
Tulare	1922	???	("Not operating this season" in "1922 Western Canner and Packer":http://books.google.com/books?id=2S0dAQAAMAAJ
Visalia	-1922		. Burned down in "1922":http://books.google.com/books?id=2S0dAQAAMAAJ
Visalia	1922	???	Plant #16 "October 1922 Western Canner and Packer":http://books.google.com/books?id=2S0dAQAAMAAJ
Visalia	1922
Woodland	-2000
Yuba City	1921

Photos

Del Monte Plant #21, Milpitas John C. Gordon Collection, San Jose State

CalPak (California Packing Corp. aka Del Monte) Plant 51 John C. Gordon Collection / San Jose Library

California Packing Corporation Plant No. 184 Sunnyvale Library

Del Monte Plant #3 Preservation San Jose

Details

Bought Emeryville cannery from Virden Packing in 1927.

History comments that earnings in 1930 fell from $6/share to 9c, 1932 were worst losses ever.

San Leandro: See Arcadia book. Martinez and Saunders Street (1921 Western Canner and Packer Sacramento: See article on cannery Stella Adoa Baptista oral history on life in the canneries. Comment on Sunnyvale historical document suggests that some dried fruit receiving houses closed in 1926 as receiving was centralized at Plant 51 in San Jose. In 1920, had 61 plants, 53 in California, 4 in Oregon, 3 in Washington, and 1 in Idaho. Many 1920 references cited in March 1920 Canning Age in mention of customers of Main Belting Company, Philadelphia May 1921 Canning Age magazine summarizes the CalPak annual report. January 1923 Western Canner and Packer notes that pimientos are shipped from San Pedro or Santa Ana.

1963 corporate summary at University of Pennsylvania Dried fruit was 5% of their business in 1963, with three packing plants handling the fruit.

Alameda: Current buildings date from 1925. Designer: Philip Bush designed many other Calpak buildings. (See Alameda Magazine article.) Buena Vista at Sherman. Plans Listed as Benton and Buena Vista / in 1941 Oakland City Directory.

Kahului: Built 1926, sold to Maui Pineapple Company / Alexander and Baldwin in 1934.

Monterey plant was Monterey Fishing and Canning Company, started in 1902 by Harry Malpas and Otsaburo Noda. Became Pacific Fish Co in August 1908.

Merced: Largest cannery in the world being built to handle 1924 pack from company's great peach and apricot orchard" "Western Canner and Packer 1922 December 1922 Western Canner and Packer notes Del Monte is starting work on big cannery to handle pack of Planada-Tuttle orchard in 1924 season. Feb 1923 WC&P says it'll be largest cannery in world.