William D. E. Street, legendary early member of the Street family, in his 137th and final booking photograph made twenty minutes before a lynch mob strung him up from an oak tree in the park that now bears his name and contains his mortal carcass. (Photo courtesy of the Naglee Parke Police Department archives)Few residents of Naglee Parke today have any notion of the formative role played by the Street family in the early years of Santa Clara County, but this huge family has left its mark on the community in many ways and in many places. And notorious among this huge family was William "Dead End" Street, born in a crude adobe not far from the banks of the wide Coyote Creek on February 30th 1843, and destined to become a legendary character in the chronicles of the town. Here is his tragic story:
Before the gold rush, the whole area between what is now downtown San Jose and Coyote Creek on the east, and between Hedding on the north and Story on the south was the vast rancho of the Facil family. Don Credito Facil, the patriarch of the clan, had married a pretty dusky Indian maiden named Una Via in June of 1830, and the two of them began breeding like rabbits, pumping out descendants at the rate of one every nine months plus a day or two. One of these, pretty little Calle, grew into an extremely hot tamale and at an early age was wooed and won by a gallant American pioneer and explorer, Edward Street, known to his associates as Easy for his friendly demeanor and generous ways, particularly when drunk.
After they were married, Don Credito presented Easy and Calle with a charming two-story adobe that still stands at the corner of South 11th and Reed, at the time the only house within half a mile, and even then the place was festooned with bright blue tarps to keep off the rain. Calle, true to her heritage, was pregnant early and often, and within a few years had produced Margaret, Reed, Taylor, Hedding, Jackson, James, Julian, Antonio, Carlos, Salvador, Fernando, Orvis, William, Alameda, Camino, and Clara.
While a good many of these children were destined to take orders in the Catholic church and attain sainthood, son William was another story entirely. By age fifteen, William had a reputation as a horse-thief, barroom brawler, two-bit gambler, pimp for cheap whores, drunk, disorderly, jailbird, forger, burglar, con-man, and murderer. He never bathed, told puns, had breath that would stop a clock, and was notorious for ending sentences with prepositions, a habit that got his poetic license lifted for the third and last time in November 1880. At left is his booking photograph for his last arrest, shortly before he was hung at age thirty-seven.
Residents of Nagleeville (as the place was then known) favored a more direct approach to maintaining a civil society than is accepted practice today. They had enough of William's evil ways, poorly constructed writing, and hideous grammar, so a mob of citizens busted William out of the Nagleeville Municipal Clink on the night of November 20th, 1880, and took him down to the banks of Coyote Creek. Then as now, there were big oak trees with sturdy branches suitable for lynchings, a popular amusement at the time. The largest of these was selected, a lariat thrown over one massive branch, and its loop adjusted to William's grimy size 13 1/2-inch neck.
"Do you have any last words? And if ya do, be mighty keerful what you do with them prepositions, and no word-play from ya, neither!" Hank Naglee said as the crowd tensed before the awful moment.
"That's a mighty fine rope to do a pun-ishment with," William said, and with that the mob took hold of the rope and William took to the air.
They buried him in a shallow unmarked grave beneath that same great tree. The tree is still there, and so are the mortal remains of William D. E. Street, who wasn't worth much in life and whose major contribution was to provide a bit of nutrition to a mighty California oak that survives today, if you know where to look.
During the 1890s, Una and the other Street women continued to populate Santa Clara County just as fast as they could, and that was pretty fast. After a while, they concluded that all the regular names had already been taken. Unlike today when people just make up names out of thin air, traditions at that time were different so new children were assigned a number as a name at birth, a system that worked remarkably well even if it was a bit novel.
When civilized influences finally displaced the rough and tumble society of old Nagleeville and the place was renamed Naglee Parke in 1905, the entire area was laid out by surveyors, complete with lots and roads and respectability. Since the family had such a profound influence on the area, both good and bad, a decision was made to name all these new roads after the Street family, and that's how we have come to know each of these roads by the name of an early pioneer from that one large family. Although there was some talk about omitting William from the names for these new roads, he was included just the same, perhaps as an example to youth of what happens when a person decides to follow the wrong Street.
The same general attitude prevailed when it was time to formally name the little patch of open ground where William played as a child, engaged in fights as a young man, and where he was strung up by the mob and died. Since he was parked here for eternity, the place will be known forever as William Street Park.
SPIRITS OF THE PAST, nuggets of Naglee Parke history and heritage are brought to you by the TM Wright Memorial Library and Research Centre, where history is written the way it should be, not the way it was, and sponsored in part by a generous donation from the Henry M. Naglee Trust for Revisionist History and also by Naglee Brandy & Distilled Spirits Corporation, promoting better spirituality one drink at a time.
The TM Wright Research Centre, in cooperation with the Mt.Charley 1850 Chapter of E Clampus Vitus, provides detailed historic reports on all aspects of the Naglee Parke area of Santa Clara County for anyone who wants to know more about the past. Reports are guaranteed more or less accurate or your money cheerfully refunded.
Before the gold rush, the whole area between what is now downtown San Jose and Coyote Creek on the east, and between Hedding on the north and Story on the south was the vast rancho of the Facil family. Don Credito Facil, the patriarch of the clan, had married a pretty dusky Indian maiden named Una Via in June of 1830, and the two of them began breeding like rabbits, pumping out descendants at the rate of one every nine months plus a day or two. One of these, pretty little Calle, grew into an extremely hot tamale and at an early age was wooed and won by a gallant American pioneer and explorer, Edward Street, known to his associates as Easy for his friendly demeanor and generous ways, particularly when drunk.
After they were married, Don Credito presented Easy and Calle with a charming two-story adobe that still stands at the corner of South 11th and Reed, at the time the only house within half a mile, and even then the place was festooned with bright blue tarps to keep off the rain. Calle, true to her heritage, was pregnant early and often, and within a few years had produced Margaret, Reed, Taylor, Hedding, Jackson, James, Julian, Antonio, Carlos, Salvador, Fernando, Orvis, William, Alameda, Camino, and Clara.
While a good many of these children were destined to take orders in the Catholic church and attain sainthood, son William was another story entirely. By age fifteen, William had a reputation as a horse-thief, barroom brawler, two-bit gambler, pimp for cheap whores, drunk, disorderly, jailbird, forger, burglar, con-man, and murderer. He never bathed, told puns, had breath that would stop a clock, and was notorious for ending sentences with prepositions, a habit that got his poetic license lifted for the third and last time in November 1880. At left is his booking photograph for his last arrest, shortly before he was hung at age thirty-seven.
Residents of Nagleeville (as the place was then known) favored a more direct approach to maintaining a civil society than is accepted practice today. They had enough of William's evil ways, poorly constructed writing, and hideous grammar, so a mob of citizens busted William out of the Nagleeville Municipal Clink on the night of November 20th, 1880, and took him down to the banks of Coyote Creek. Then as now, there were big oak trees with sturdy branches suitable for lynchings, a popular amusement at the time. The largest of these was selected, a lariat thrown over one massive branch, and its loop adjusted to William's grimy size 13 1/2-inch neck.
"Do you have any last words? And if ya do, be mighty keerful what you do with them prepositions, and no word-play from ya, neither!" Hank Naglee said as the crowd tensed before the awful moment.
"That's a mighty fine rope to do a pun-ishment with," William said, and with that the mob took hold of the rope and William took to the air.
They buried him in a shallow unmarked grave beneath that same great tree. The tree is still there, and so are the mortal remains of William D. E. Street, who wasn't worth much in life and whose major contribution was to provide a bit of nutrition to a mighty California oak that survives today, if you know where to look.
During the 1890s, Una and the other Street women continued to populate Santa Clara County just as fast as they could, and that was pretty fast. After a while, they concluded that all the regular names had already been taken. Unlike today when people just make up names out of thin air, traditions at that time were different so new children were assigned a number as a name at birth, a system that worked remarkably well even if it was a bit novel.
When civilized influences finally displaced the rough and tumble society of old Nagleeville and the place was renamed Naglee Parke in 1905, the entire area was laid out by surveyors, complete with lots and roads and respectability. Since the family had such a profound influence on the area, both good and bad, a decision was made to name all these new roads after the Street family, and that's how we have come to know each of these roads by the name of an early pioneer from that one large family. Although there was some talk about omitting William from the names for these new roads, he was included just the same, perhaps as an example to youth of what happens when a person decides to follow the wrong Street.
The same general attitude prevailed when it was time to formally name the little patch of open ground where William played as a child, engaged in fights as a young man, and where he was strung up by the mob and died. Since he was parked here for eternity, the place will be known forever as William Street Park.
SPIRITS OF THE PAST, nuggets of Naglee Parke history and heritage are brought to you by the TM Wright Memorial Library and Research Centre, where history is written the way it should be, not the way it was, and sponsored in part by a generous donation from the Henry M. Naglee Trust for Revisionist History and also by Naglee Brandy & Distilled Spirits Corporation, promoting better spirituality one drink at a time.
The TM Wright Research Centre, in cooperation with the Mt.Charley 1850 Chapter of E Clampus Vitus, provides detailed historic reports on all aspects of the Naglee Parke area of Santa Clara County for anyone who wants to know more about the past. Reports are guaranteed more or less accurate or your money cheerfully refunded.
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