120 PUNCHMAGAZINE.COM teams armed with trowels and brushes called in. Chemical tests run. Over the next two decades, several makeshift burial sites for the drowned crews of the San Mateo Coast's early shipwrecks are unearthed. It seems the strong winds and a century of beachgoers have eroded the dunes—as well as the lids of some old redwood coffins, revealing skeletons shrouded in sailcloth. Theories have been volleyed as to which ship these lost souls belong. The Franklin perhaps? The Coya? The Hellespont? What is known for certain is that these were humble seamen. The officers and the upper class would have received more proper burials in San Francisco. The Peninsula’s past refuses to remain buried. Remnants of the lost ships and the rum runners are everywhere if you care to look for them. Their bones—like the names of the points, like the lighthouse, like the fog itself—serve as reminders of what happened here. Their memories will not be lost to the sands of time. PHOTOGRAPHY COURTESY OF: LIBRARY OF CONGRESS Davis, daughter of one of the lighthouse keepers at the time. “They sailed in on the south side of the tower and were audacious enough to use the lighthouse derrick to unload their ships. Once, one of the dories hit the rocks and the cargo was lost. There were lots of divers in the area after that.” The San Mateo coastline's Wild West Days ended with Prohibition’s repeal in 1933. SANDS OF TIME Fast-forward to 1980 and follow a day tripper as he treks through the dunes of foggy Franklin Point. This serene spot sits just a few miles from Pigeon Point Lighthouse and gets its name from the shipwreck that happened here over a century earlier. Something, half-buried in the sand, stops this coastal visitor in his tracks. Is that…? He leans in for a closer look. It's a skull. The human kind. The horrified hiker hurries away to report a possible murder to the police. The investigation that follows reveals that the bones require not the homicide squad, but historians. Excavation sites are roped off. Archaeological chasers to deliver moonshine to thirsty clientele in San Francisco and along the coastside. Locals like Jack Mori at Mori’s Point and John Patroni at Pillar Point Harbor kindly offered their private piers as drop-off points (for a cut of the profits, of course). The coves near Pigeon Point became a popular place to hide out or stash cases of “coffin varnish.” These brazen bootleggers even made use of Pigeon Point Lighthouse. “They were quite ruthless men,” described Jessie Mygrants Fog phantoms in the SHIPWRECKS STILL SPEAK What remains of the historic ships buried beneath the waves? Most wrecks have been dismantled or burned, though occasionally an artifact will wash ashore. In the 1970s, abalone divers discovered the bell, cannons and two-ton anchor from the Rydall Hall, a ship wrecked off Point Montara. Who knows what might surface next? ABOVE: (lower left) Prohibition agents stand amidst confiscated cases of scotch whisky in the hold of a ship.
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