Northside, Berkeley, California

Northside
Neighborhood of Berkeley
A view of the Euclid Avenue business district, through the university's North Gate
Northside Location within Berkeley and the East Bay
Coordinates: 37°52′30″N 122°15′37″W / 37.8751°N 122.26018°W / 37.8751; -122.26018
Country	United States
State	California
County	Alameda
City	Berkeley

Northside is a principally residential neighborhood in Berkeley, California, located north of the University of California, Berkeley campus, east of Oxford Street, and south of Cedar Street. There is a small shopping area located at Euclid and Hearst Avenues, at the northern entrance to the university. The Graduate Theological Union is located one block west of Euclid Avenue, in an area nicknamed Holy Hill. The north fork of Strawberry Creek runs southwestward across Northside, mostly culverted under buildings and pavement, to the campus.

Northside is the oldest residential neighborhood in the Berkeley Hills. It was subdivided in 1889 by George Phelps, who named it Daley’s Scenic Park, after the land’s previous owner, Thomas Daley. Two years later, the entire tract was purchased for $4,000 in gold by banker Frank M. Wilson, who began to sell lots for houses.

Initial development of the neighborhood was begun in the 1890s with the erection of Victorian homes. In 1895, Bernard Maybeck began designing brown-shingle houses whose steep roofs echoed the contour of the hills. Maybeck's notions on hillside building stimulated Daley's Scenic Park residents in 1898 to establish the Hillside Club, formed to protect the hills from unsightly grading and unsuitable buildings, and taking its cue from the Arts and Crafts movement. Prominent club members included Maybeck, Charles Keeler, Benjamin Ide Wheeler, and John Galen Howard.

The cradle of the architectural style known as the First Bay Region Tradition, Daley's Scenic Park lost hundreds of buildings in the September 17, 1923, Berkeley Fire. The fire survivors are concentrated in a triangle along the southeastern slopes of the tract, where one can find houses designed by Maybeck, Julia Morgan, Ernest Coxhead, and A.C. Schweinfurth — influential architects of this movement. The that houses burned in 1923, most of them clad in brown shingles, were typically replaced with stucco apartment buildings in the southern part of the fire area while many single-family homes were rebuilt in the northern parts. Hilgard Avenue is the rough boundary between these two regions on the eastern side of Euclid Avenue while the single-family home zone extends further south on the western side of Euclid Avenue.