I never met a house that had written a book about itself until Alain Pinel Realtor Johanna Hall introduced me to the Craftsman-style cottage at 2516 Encinal Ave.
A court and a nearby street off Lincoln Avenue recall one of Alameda’s pioneer families. Edwin Baird Mastick was born in Burton, Ohio, on March 22, 1824, to Benjamin and Elizabeth “Eliza” Tomlinson Mastick, the second of nine children. When Edwin was still an infant, his parents moved to Rockport, Ohio. Edwin attended law school in Cleveland and began to practice law there.
In 1848, Edwin married Lucretia Mary Wood. She was born in Henderson, N.Y., on Feb. 28, 1824, the last of 12 children. Mastick Court and Wood Street bear the married couple’s surnames.
Alameda is famous for its Victorian-era homes built during Queen Victoria’s reign from 1837 to 1901. One of these, in the Stick style, is pictured on the right.
Alameda Museum Curator George Gunn tells us that George Stark built this home in 1880 for Isaac Ayer.
Peralta, Sausal, Leona and Arroyo Viejo creeks flow from the Oakland Hills and empty their waters into San Leandro Bay. Native Americans plied the bay’s water and the nearby marsh to reach the nourishment that the birds provided at the rookery on “Wind Whistle Island,” as the Indians called our Bay Farm Island.
