December 18, 2003

Kitty Monahan: Keeping the past alive in New Almaden

By Jeanne Lewis
Staff Writer

La Casa Grande on Almaden Road is an old brick building that still stands tall and proud as it did in the 1850's when it provided residence for the Quicksilver Mine Company managers. More current memories are of the old time melodrama plays at the Opry House where patrons were encouraged to throw popcorn and boo and hiss at the performers. Kitty Monahan, president and founder of the New Almaden Quicksilver County Park Association is one reason the building still stands.

“The association started because years ago I would go to the Quicksilver Park and the old museum all the time, and the park rangers kept asking me to leave. So I formed the group and now we all work together,” the gray-haired petite dynamo explains with a gentle laugh.

The New Almaden Quicksilver County Park Association began in 1979 and is under the direction of the Santa Clara County Parks Department. It includes Casa Grande, now the residence of the New Almaden Quicksilver County Park Association, park headquarter staff, and the New Almaden Quicksilver Mining Museum displaying the lives of the miners and families.

A community activist for trails and open spaces, Monahan serves as a board member and volunteers for many of the county and city’s advocacy groups. The night before her interview with The Almaden Times, she attended the Almaden Valley Community Association meeting, where the debate on zoning changes for New Almaden raged on.

“Kitty is a hard worker who feels strongly about the things that she feels are important,” Bob Boydston, president of Almaden Valley Community Association says. “I must admit that I have my hands full when she becomes convinced that a certain course would be best for the community. She is tenacious as a bulldog and the community is blessed to have a person like Kitty looking out for its interests. There should be more like her, but I think she is probably one of a kind.”

Monahan has served on the Santa Clara County Parks and Recreation Commission, Preservation Action Council, Friends of Santa Teresa County Park, Citizen’s Advisory Board of the Santa Clara County Open Space, Santa Clara County Trail Task Force, California Conservation and Bay Area Ridge Trail. She shows up wherever she’s needed, rolls up her sleeves and gets the job done. It may take years working through bureaucracy, but this rural guardian persists until a solution is achieved.

The determined campaigner received commendation by the City Council for Women in History Month in 2003 and was proclaimed Almaden Citizen of the Year in 1988, but more important to her is that open spaces are saved and history preserved.

“Kitty is a rare individual who cares deeply about her community and preserving the history of our area to share with others. Kitty’s long list of involvement and commitment to our community makes me proud to call her a friend and resident of our neighborhood,” said Vice Mayor Pat Dando. “Her passion for history and teaching children is her legacy for future generations.”

Monahan speaks passionately about her own Adopt a Trail and says it takes two visits a month to keep Deep Gulch Trail in order. That trail and its area are now usable for hiking and equestrians. Volunteers are instructed by a trail boss and learn how to trim plants and trees as they enjoy the outdoors. There are 20 adopted trails already. She’d like to see the same thing happen with parks, citizens and park personnel working together to protect the open spaces.

At the top of her list of things to do is saving Casa Grande, which is still on the undecided list as to be restored or demolished.

“The museum and park offices will remain, but it is uncertain what will happen to the Opry House. It was built after 1920 and that’s the cut-off year for preservation of a building. If we can keep it, the county could use it for meetings and events. They have no place to meet right now. Plus it has its own history since it was built. It should remain,” Monahan said.

“My first love, of course, is the Quicksilver Park and the museum,” she adds, followed by details of how they moved mining artifacts from the cottage on Almaden Road, restored the current location and dedicated it in June 1998.

“I had retired and started visiting the old mining museum as I had always collected mining equipment,” said John Slenter, Quicksilver Park interpreter and mining aficionado, “and Kitty put me to work.” Monahan agrees that John provided invaluable help with the museum along with many other volunteers, getting the new building ready, providing information to visitors and changing the displays.

Monahan is proud of the work being done on the Blacksmith Museum, which once was the old carriage house on the property. Already in place are large pieces of equipment, anvils that cost $5 when purchased and now the few nuts and bolts that hold them in place cost $10. The work is donated by talented and devoted volunteers. The new museum will open on Pioneer Day 2004 when it will be dedicated.

Besides her community activism, her work as president of the Quicksilver Association and running the museum, Monahan, an outdoorswoman, finds the time to provide tours of the park by horse, van or hiking. Museum tours and special events are held throughout the year.

Who is this woman with the energy of two or three people? Monahan is a San Jose native, whose family still lives in the house off the Alameda where she was born. Her mother, Violet Rose, had the distinction of living in San Jose for three centuries, when she passed away at the age of 103 in 2001.

Monahan became an elementary teacher, teaching in Los Angeles, Seattle and Salinas. She belonged to a convent, teaching at Sacred Heart School in San Jose. Disillusioned she left the nunnery and taught at Overfelt High School in the East Side Union School District as a math teacher for 25 years before retiring in 1993.

In 1970, she moved to New Almaden and soon after purchased her home near Casa Grande. Years before, part of the house was moved from English Town by the Quicksilver Mine and attached to the cabin at its present site. Rustic with dark beamed ceilings and donated gymnasium wood floors she helped install, the added kitchen nook was a group effort. Nooks and crannies hold gifts of collectable chickens, mining artifacts and an étagère full of Mickey Mouse collections, which her students at Overfelt High started for her. There also are pictures of Monahan and her friends, happy and smiling, hiking or riding horses.

Outside, Monahan has created a mini farm. There is a chicken coup for two where the Dixie Chicks live, producing an egg a day. An aviary houses an assortment of wild birds. There are four horses, three belonging to Monahan and one she takes care of for a friend. Graywhacky, a stray cat she adopted, inspects it all.

Monahan tells of moving part of the hill on her property to provide more room for parking. The day before, her two dogs chased wild turkeys off the property and disappeared into Quicksilver Park. With a neighbor’s help, they found the small canines, which are now quarantined to the house in case the wild birds return. It is here at her home that her spirit is replenished with the animals she cares for and on the land that she loves.
Monahan later greets visitors at the museum, eagerly telling them stories of the quicksilver miners and their families and all that happened in New Almaden long ago.

Kitty Monahan, a woman who can move mountains, is saving history for the next generation to enjoy and living it now in New Almaden.

For more information on the New Almaden Quicksilver County Park Association or Adopt a Trail, call 408-268-6541. The New Almaden Quicksilver Museum is open Friday noon to 4 p.m. and 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday and Sunday.