Stations: Orby

Orby served as the Coast Line Railway’s primary team track south of Davenport, where rolling stock could park along its 2,600-foot-long (52 carlengths) siding that ran from a point slightly east of Swift Street to just before the Cliff Drive (now Natural Bridges Drive) crossing. The station itself was located west of Swift Street and featured a sign and a platform, but no other facilities. Though few people lived in the vicinity of the station, passengers could flag trains or stop there. What other purpose Orby served when it was established is unknown, yet the Ocean Shore Railway a quarter mile to the south clearly saw the same potential. The Shore Line Investment Company, Ocean Shore’s real estate subsidiary, had purchased 35 acres of Louis C. Rapetta’s ranch in June 1905, though what the company planned to do with this is unknown. When the San Vicente Lumber Company began scouting for sites to erect a massive lumber mill, Ocean Shore offered the ranch, which, after some bureaucratic delays, the company accepted. The location was directly between the lines of the Ocean Shore Railway—which set up a station named Rapetti sometime in mid-1908—and the Coast Line Railway’s Orby station.

The Wm. Wrigley Jr. Company factory on Mission Street on the West Side of Santa Cruz, circa 1955. [Courtesy University of California, Santa Cruz – colorized using MyHeritage]

The San Vicente Lumber Company’s mill and yard quickly evolved into an interchange between the two railroads. A long, curving track passed through the yard, linking the lines and eliminating the need for the junction further west at Wilder’s Ranch. Trackage within the mill property catered to both railroads. Ocean Shore maintained a siding that ran along the north side of the Moore Creek fill to allow carloads of timber to be dumped into the adjacent millpond (today’s Antonelli Pond). Another spur supported a repair shop for the lumber company’s rolling stock, while a car shed straddled the main track through the yard. On the northern end of the property, two spurs connected to the main track just before its connection with the Coast Line Railway. These spurs allowed cars to be rolled directly from the lumber stacks to Orby’s siding, where the daily freight train collected them.

San Vicente Lumber Company viewed northeast from the Ocean Shore tracks across the log pond, circa 1920. [UC Santa Cruz – colorized using MyHeritage]

After the Ocean Shore Railroad collapsed in late 1920, the San Vicente Lumber Company took over most of the line and ran it until early 1923. By this time, the Santa Cruz Portland Cement Company plant in Davenport had extensive trackage and there was little need for the extra siding space at Orby. In response, Southern Pacific reduced its siding length to 43 carlengths in May 1923. However, a new freight customer arrived on the scene just in time to save the station. In November 1922, Walti, Schilling & Company acquired 70 acres from Stella Tolle west of Moore Creek on Shaffer Road. The company needed to replace its aging slaughterhouse and stockyard on 7th Avenue near Twin Lakes and this new location outside the city limits, on a large tract, and directly alongside the Davenport Branch, was a perfect solution. The company only needed 10 acres for its cold storage plant and modern slaughterhouse, so it leased the remaining acreage to G. Marcucci and P. Guidotti, who planned to grow artichokes on the property. The Walti–Schilling plant opened in late 1923, supported by a private spur installed by Southern Pacific.

The fire at the Coast Drum and Box Company factory on Mission Street, September 4, 1953. [Santa Cruz Sentinel-News – colorized using MyHeritage]

Although Orby maintained a flag stop until the end of passenger service on the Davenport Branch in 1932, few people lived around the station or called trains there. In 1936, the Santa Cruz City Council rezoned the area around the spur for industrial use, opening it up for development. The first customer was John L. Debenedetti, who negotiated with the Union Ice Company to erect a cold storage warehouse for artichokes and peas. Competition heated up the next year when two businesses opened a shared facility between Swift Street and Fair Avenue to the east. The Coast Drum & Box Company had been operating in Davenport since the late 1920s but had been acquired in 1937 by the Half Moon Bay Drum & Box Company, run by Louis G. Pardini. The company relocated in September 1937 to Fair Avenue, where it built a substantial box, drum, basket, and lumber mill. Directly to the west, the Santa Cruz Artichoke and Brussels Sprout Growers’ Association built a packing house, with its workers using the manufactured products from next door. Southern Pacific installed a split spur to access both facilities. The Half Moon Bay Drum & Box Company’s primary plant in Daly City burned down in May 1939, leading Pardini to shift all of the company’s operations south to Santa Cruz.

Label for Pfyffer Bros. Brussels sprouts, packed at the company's plant on the West Side, circa 1950.

Other vegetable packing plants moved in over the next two decades. Davenport Artichoke Growers and Shippers relocated from its namesake town in October 1940 and was rebranded as Pfyffer Brothers, owned by Fred and Joseph Pfyffer. The Birds Eye division of the General Foods Corporation took over the former Santa Cruz Artichoke and Brussels Sprout Growers’ Association packing house in summer 1951, though it had been operating in part of the facility since 1948. In turn, the growers association moved into a new plant on nearby Ingalls Street in February 1952. Edward V. Moceo, sales manager of the company, quit following the move. In 1959, he founded his own packing firm, E. V. Moceo Company, in a new facility on Almar Avenue, which afterwards served as the easternmost extent of the industrial area. Santa Cruz had become one of the largest vegetable packing centers in California, collecting produce grown along the entire Santa Cruz North Coast and San Mateo County coastline by train and truck. Every harvest season throughout the 1940s, four to five boxcars left daily from the spur at Orby, supplying grocery stores and restaurants across the Central Coast and beyond.

The Thomas J. Lipton Company factory on the West Side, circa 1971. [Courtesy UC Santa Cruz]

Despite all of this activity, Southern Pacific decided that Orby could just as well function as a northern extension of its downtown yard and, therefore, abandoned the station on August 1, 1954. That same day, the Wm. Wrigley Jr. Company’s chewing gum and candy factory opened to great anticipation. Construction of the plant had begun in 1951 and required the relocation of the Debenedetti’s warehouse and the installation of a 400-foot-long siding, which ran along the entire south side of the plant. The company employed hundreds of staff year-round, leading to the suburban development of the West Side to the city limits. The largescale factory also attracted other new industries to the area. The Borchers Brothers construction firm moved to Fair Avenue in 1964. It did not stay for long, though, and in 1968 the warehouse was taken over by Peerless Portable Metal Buildings. In 1970, the Mondo Bros. Distributing Company moved from Amat Street to a warehouse and office on a spur just beside Swift Street, wholesaling in beer and wine. The last and largest industry to arrive in the West Side came on July 6, 1971: the Thomas J. Lipton Company. This massive complex sat slightly below the railroad grade, so a forked pair of spurs curved down from Swift Street to two loading bays on the north side of the plant. It more than doubled the number of year-round jobs provided by the other businesses, cementing the West Side as a core industrial center in Santa Cruz.

Liquid cars parked behind a diesel locomotive beside the Wrigley plant, 2010. [Courtesy 1TrickPony at West Coast Rail Forms]

The year 1970 was the peak for the former Orby area, and the decline came swiftly after. Previously in December 1954, the Coast Drum & Box Company had rebranded as the Santa Cruz Veneer Products Company but the firm shut down in 1967 due to high costs and declining sales. It would not be the last. The West Side’s success had drawn hundreds of families to the crowded cliffs overlooking the Monterey Bay. Joining these were an increasing number of Silicon Valley tech workers who wanted beachfront property within reach of their workplaces. As a result, property costs skyrocketed and the local industries struggled to turn a profit. The packing houses shuttered first, followed by the larger industries. Reluctantly and with much public dismay, Lipton shut its doors on December 14, 2002, the last freight customer still operating on the West Side. Shortly afterwards, Union Pacific detached the Wrigley siding and Mondo Bros. spur and removed the Lipton spur.

A cement car and diesel locomotive on the Swift Street siding, 2010. [Courtesy 1TrickPony at West Coast Rail Forms]

Geo-Coordinates & Access Rights:

36.95933, -122.05028

The Monterey Bay Sanctuary Trail runs directly beside the Swift Street Siding, which was used into the mid-2010s to temporarily park rolling stock. Remnants of the spurs can still be seen beside the main track and almost all of the buildings that once used these spurs still stand, playing host to a wide variety of commercial and light industrial businesses. While the tracks are the property of the Santa Cruz County Regional Transportation Commission and trespassing is not allowed, most of the surviving rail infrastructure can be viewed from the safety of the adjacent trail.

Credits & Citations:

• Henry E. Bender, Jr., "SP Davenport Branch
• The Bulletin. 1907.
• Department of Commerce and Labor—Coast and Geodetic Survey. "Santa Cruz Harbor and Vicinity, California." 1910.
• The Illustrated Sporting and Dramatic News. 1907.
• San Mateo Times. 1930.
• Santa Cruz Evening News. 1922–1940.
• Santa Cruz Evening Sentinel. 1905.
• Santa Cruz Morning Sentinel. 1936.
• Santa Cruz Sentinel. 1959–2002.
• Santa Cruz Sentinel–News. 1951–1954.
• Santa Cruz Surf. 1908.
• Shore Line Investment Company. "Rapetta Ranch." Undated. Courtesy California State Library.
• Southern Pacific Company. Coast Division Time Tables. 1907-2923.
• Southern Pacific Company. List of Officers, Agencies and Stations. 1949.
• Southern Pacific Company. "Orby station plan." July 1909. Courtesy California State Library.
• Union Pacific Railroad Company. Roseville Service Unit—Santa Cruz Industrial Lead, Davenport, CA. March 17, 2004.