The Setting...

Long before shopping malls and intersecting 8-lane freeways, Southern Alameda County was home to a diverse group of peoples making their living off the land.

The Spanish and Mexican imposed themeselves on local Native Americans in the 18th and early 19th centuries; then, with the California Gold Rush of 1848, Anglo immigrants replaced the established Mexican landowners in the San Francisco East Bay.

By the latter 19th century other European and Asian immigrants were also settling on the land once owned by Don Guillermo Castro - the Mexican landowner who had title to most of present-day Hayward and Castro Valley.

Hayward and Castro Valley became especially well-known for their German and Portuguese populations at this time. Now, through the lives of one of these German families - the Jensens - we can glimpse a long-forgotten way of life in the San Francisco East Bay.