{"id":431260,"date":"2026-08-13T01:06:15","date_gmt":"2026-08-13T01:06:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/431260\/"},"modified":"2026-08-13T01:06:15","modified_gmt":"2026-08-13T01:06:15","slug":"looking-back-when-santa-clara-partied-in-its-new-city-hall","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/431260\/","title":{"rendered":"Looking Back: When Santa Clara Partied in its New City Hall"},"content":{"rendered":"

Conversations about building a new Santa Clara city hall<\/a> and where it should be aren\u2019t new in the city.<\/p>\n

Back in the early 1950s, the city started talking about building a new city hall in the downtown, where the 1914 city hall stood, but the proposal for a 7-story building set off predictable controversy.<\/p>\n

By 1957, Santa Clara had reached for the shiny object of the time, urban renewal,<\/a> and in the spirit of \u201cout with the old and in with the new,\u201d the city council approved plans to build a new city hall as part of the El Camino Civic Center.<\/p>\n

Along the way, opposition from business and community groups threatened lawsuits and accusations of \u201cbackroom dealing\u201d risked derailing the modernizers. But the champion of Santa Clara\u2019s urban renewal plan, then-city manager Lloyd Brady, was undeterred and bulldozed every obstacle.<\/p>\n

SPONSORED<\/p>\n

\"Devid\"Devid<\/a><\/p>\n

When opening day arrived on Leap Day \u2014 Feb. 29, 1964 \u2014 there was nothing but general delight at the \u201cmodern mission\u201d style building.<\/p>\n

The Feb. 19 Santa Clara Journal predicted it was likely to be \u201cthe best attended municipal event in Santa Clara\u2019s history.\u201d Anticipated crowd sizes as the date approached ran from 2,200 to 5,000. The day before, the San Jos\u00e9 Evening News had settled on a considerably more modest forecast: 1,500. The Journal published a special insert for the event.<\/p>\n

According to the tour script [See: City Hall Dedication Guided Tour Script February 29 1964 below] prepared for the day, the 23-acre site cost $305,976 and construction alone cost $1,459,000; not counting furnishings, some of it manufactured by San Quentin inmates. The 75,000 sq. ft. building was financed by the city\u2019s water and electric utility revenues as well as sales taxes.<\/p>\n

SPONSORED<\/p>\n

\"Santa\"Santa<\/a><\/p>\n

The ceremony was a 2.5-hour civic pageant [See: City Hall Civic Center Santa Clara Dedication Program Feb 29 1964 below] that modern sensibilities would find difficult to endure. Mayor Frank Keller welcomed the guests. Master of Ceremonies Superior Judge Joseph Kelly introduced 325 local dignitaries, according to the Santa Clara Journal. The event cost $3,500 \u2014 about $38,000 in today\u2019s dollars.<\/p>\n

State Senator Edwin J. Regan of Weaverville gave the keynote, substituting for New York Governor Nelson Rockefeller, after a scheduling conflict emerged. The Native Sons of the Golden West and the American Legion took part, \u201cMiss Santa Clara\u201d Carolyn Huff helped host tours of the new building, and the Wilcox High School band provided music.<\/p>\n

Also on hand were members of the former councils credited with buying the land and pushing construction through: Gene Burgess, Maurice Dullea, William P. Kiely Sr., Al Levin, Ed Moore, A. John Nastari, W.J. Nicholson, Joseph Rebeiro, Victor Salberg, Robert H. Simons, Anthony Toledo, James Viso, and Austen Warburton \u2014 all invited, the Evening News noted, \u201cto take a bow for their foresightedness.\u201d<\/p>\n

Almost stealing the show was sculptor Benny Bufano\u2019s 7-story \u201cUniversal Child\u201d monument, \u201cThough uncompleted,\u201d the Journal wrote, \u201cits monumental size is certain to attract attention.\u201d So, Santa Clara did get a 7-story structure; it just wasn\u2019t city hall.<\/p>\n

Mary Hanel, former local history librarian, contributed research to this story.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Conversations about building a new Santa Clara city hall and where it should be aren\u2019t new in the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":431261,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[29],"tags":[6036,88,90,89,197,76827,2921,2922],"class_list":["post-431260","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-san-jose","tag-bay-area-news","tag-san-jose","tag-san-jose-headlines","tag-san-jose-news","tag-santa-clara","tag-santa-clara-city-hall","tag-santa-clara-weekly","tag-silicon-valley-voice"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/431260","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=431260"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/431260\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/431261"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=431260"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=431260"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=431260"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}