(On back of photo) "1879, Oakland, Calif."; "Showing corner of 14th St. and Broadway before 14th St. was cut through Grand Central Hotel in distance." Photographs, early history. Brayton Hall, College Hall 1871; Panorama of Oakland. 1879 (6/2002, G. Weininger) from Beth Bagwell, Oakland: The Story of a City, 1982, p.105ff: The University of California began in Oakland in 1853, as Contra Costa Academy, intended to prepare students for college; it was located in a house at 5th and Broadway, but by Sept. 1854 had moved to a tract of land between 12th and 14th Streets bounded by Franklin and Harrison, and became known as The College School. In 1855 the state chartered a College of California, which did not actually open until 1860, on the grounds of The College School. Henry Durant, who had been significant in founding The College School and was its principal, then became a professor in the new college. This highly academic college, in turn, became part of the new, more practically-oriented university in 1868 and the whole institution was relocated to Berkeley. (In 1873 and 1874 Henry Durant was elected Mayor of Oakland in recognition of his contributions to the establishment of the University and its preceding schools.)