By 1862 Wharf Road had a two hotels at the edge of the lagoon where the town of Bolinas was growing around the busy wharf area. It was an economy facilitated by schooners commuting between here and San Francisco, serving business and people. Most hotel visitors came from San Francisco or Oakland or East Marin. But some came from as far away as Sacramento. Families would come to enjoy the beauty and respite from inland heat. Since it is a long trek to Bolinas, many families packed trunks of everything they would need and stayed for the whole summer, while the working husbands commuted by schooner or horseback. And so the Summer colony was born. Many of those families eventually built summer homes here in the late 1800s and have kept them for generations. Townspeople opened their homes as very popular and busy boarding houses.
Bolinas with its general merchandise store, saloons, pleasant beach and busy wharf, was the center for the carpet of ranches and farms that were the foundation of the local economy from Stinson Beach, Bolinas and up the Olema Valley. So people came by hiking, wagon, horseback, schooner, then Stanely Steamer, early cars and by boat from Stinson.
Generations of Bolinas residents and Summer Colony families tell stories of their childhoods in Bolinas, playing at the beach every day, fishing, boating, clamming, musical events, movies in the old community center, parties around a piano, tennis contests, surfing and picnics and the ever odd, charming and brief 4th of July parade, first recorded in 1895.
Perhaps what has changed the most is what one wears to the beach. In the 1800s women wore their full-length dresses, corsets, hats, and men wore suits and boots. That gave way to long wool swimming dresses. By the 1940s there were one piece bathing suits, then bikinis arrived. In the 1970s many people went naked. Today we're more modest and varied.
Having very limited parking, a small beach and few facilities, Bolinas gladly gives way to Stinson Beach as the most wonderful beach and beach town. But summer in Bolinas is still a special time with an interesting history.
