Sheriff Nesbitt Home
66 Capitol Street

Sheriff Nesbitt was Sheriff Quinn in East of Eden. The house was built in 1881, the same year Nesbitt married Frances Dunham. In 1882 he was elected Marshall of Salinas City. He was elected County Sheriff in 1902. He retired in 1923 and died in 1933.

Dr. Henry C. Murphy House from 1901-1950
402 Cayuga Street

Dr. Murphy delivered John Steinbeck and cured him of pneumonia. He appears in East of Eden as one of the doctors to attend Adam after his second stroke. His grandsons, Dennis and Michael, both became writers. Dennis Murphy's work of fiction, The Sergeant, was published in 1958 and Michael Murphy, a co-founder of Esalen, has written several non-fiction books. Popular lore has Michael and Dennis as the models for Aron and Cal in East of Eden.

John Berges Home
123 Central Avenue

Part of the original fence remains. Handsome John Berges, who caught Mary Steinbeck's eye, and shy Marty Hopps, are listed in East of Eden as casualties of World War I. When Cal walks Abra home, the two pass the Berges house. John Berges is also mentioned as a friend of John Steinbeck's in "The Summer Before."

Steinbeck House
132 Central Avenue

Nobel Prize-winning author John Steinbeck was born and raised in this home. He went to Stanford in 1919. He returned in 1933 to help care for his ailing mother. Parts of "The Chrysanthemums," The Red Pony, Tortilla Flat, and "The White Quail" were written here. In East of Eden, Steinbeck describes the house as "the high white house of Ernest Steinbeck. It was an immaculate and friendly house, grand enough but not pretentious, and it sat inside its white fence, surrounded by its clipped lawn, and roses and catoneasters lapped against its white walls." The Steinbeck House is an important icon in Lewis Buzbee's Steinbeck's Ghost. One dusk, Travis Williams thinks he catches sight of a teenager in a window of the attic where the young John Steinbeck wrote. The 1898 Queen Anne house is presently owned by the Valley Guild, which operates the home as a restaurant that showcases local produce and raises money for charity while exhibiting memorabilia relating to the author. A gift shop offers Steinbeck works and other pieces chosen to reflect the era.

For a recorded history by Destination Salinas, call: 831-401-9587 # 1

Peter Krough Home
146 Central Avenue

This 1894 Queen Anne house belonged to the Krough family whose drugstore is mentioned in East of Eden.

Glen Graves Home
147 Central Avenue

Glen Graves was a close friend of John Steinbeck. He is mentioned in "The Summer Before." According to researcher Carol Robles, part of the 1955 East of Eden film used interiors from this 1910 American Four Square house.

Gilfillan home
153 Central Avenue

John Steinbeck called Edith Gilfillan Wagner his first writing teacher. She was the mother of one of his closest friends, Max Wagner, and it was in her kitchen that John Steinbeck first heard the story that became "How Edith McGillcuddy Met Robert Louis Stevenson." Max is mentioned in "The Summer Before." Max's brother Jack would later ask Steinbeck to help bring A Medal for Benny into script form. In 1924, Max left Salinas and joined his family in Hollywood in the movie industry.

Bradley Sargent Home and Tennis Courts
154 Central Avenue and 158 Central Avenue

Designed by architect William Weeks, this house was built in 1896 for B.V. Sargent, Jr., a Monterey County District Attorney who is credited with being the first California attorney to use a photograph as admissible evidence in court. According to researcher Carol Robles, Steinbeck would watch players on the tennis courts, then on the site of the Spanish style home at 158 Central Avenue.

Davies Home
202 Central Avenue

The house was named one of the best examples of the Tudor style of architecture in Salinas by historian Kent L. Seavey. It was the home of author Mary Davies Kelly until her marriage in 1949. Mary Davies Kelly wrote Dream's End: Two Iowa Brothers in the Civil War, called one of the best accounts ever written of Union military operations west of the Mississippi River.

Five Gables House
338 Church Street

Home of Herb Hinrichs, boyhood friend of John Steinbeck, who was said to be the little boy named Andy in Cannery Row. The home is a unique Victorian Gothic Revival.

Carr/Williams Home
Corner of Church and Howard (Now the Courthouse Annex)

About 1908 Matthew W. Williams, a Salinas Valley pioneer, purchased the Jesse D. Carr house for his family. His four daughters were known locally as the “Williams girls”. Matthew died in 1918; his last surviving daughter Jenny died in 1955.

In East of Eden, Adam sits on the curb of the Williams Family Plot listening to the wind crying in the cypresses and staring at the mountains to the east of Salinas. When Dessie returns to the ranch, she and Tom remember the Williams sisters, Jenny and Belle. In "The Time the Wolves Ate the Vice Principal," the wolves sniff at the iron fence of the Williams house on their way from the courthouse to Church Street.

In a 1977 interview Holger Abeloe recalled the Williams House: “it was a beautiful old house, three- stories high, had an elevator in it, and the furniture in that house was just something out of this world…the piano they had there came around the Horn. The doors were made out of mahogany that came from the Philippine Islands, and it was a beautiful place.”

Louis DeLaney Ranch
East Lake Avenue

According to historian Burton Anderson, Louis DeLaney made the first commercial shipment of lettuce in 1919 from his ranch on East Lake Avenue. Unfortunately, the rail shipment took 20 days to reach New York and spoiled due to insufficient ice. Adam Trask in East of Eden loses his lettuce shipment in much the same way

The Ensen People, Ancestors of Ohlone/Costanoan-Esselen Nation LITERARY MARKER!
200 Lincoln Avenue

The Ensen, named after the rich blackberry brambles along the Salinas River banks, are among the ancestors of present-day Ohlone/Costanoan-Esselen Nation tribal members. Their languages, emerging from silence, are being taught to new generations. Among the surviving stories is one about Coyote’s picnic in Salinas. "Let Ka Lai. Let Cha’a. We are Here. We Live."

John Steinbeck Library
350 Lincoln Avenue

Opened in 1960, the building was named for author John Steinbeck in 1969. Mary Davies Kelly, author of Dream's End: Two Iowa Brothers in the Civil War, visited the Library while researching her family in the 1990s. The Steinbeck Library and the efforts to save the Salinas Public Library system in 2004-2005 feature in Lewis Buzbee's Steinbeck's Ghost. To Travis Williams, the statue of Steinbeck on the library lawn is special, almost alive, and a guardian of the library. Travis finds the library more real than his own room in the new house or the house where he once lived. Unlike the houses, the library still belongs to him. Lisa Eisemann used the Steinbeck Library to research her books about her grandmother and the Salinas Police Department. Other local authors visiting the library include Burton Anderson, Betty Brusa, Junis Childers, José Carlos Fajardo, Lee Richard Hayman, Bowen Lyam Lee, Brigid Massie McGrath, Pauline Pearson, Michael Roddy, Irv Rodgers, Edward Ryder, Melchizedek Maraon Solis, and G.M. Weger. Children's author Carol Diggory Shields was a children's librarian here for many years.

Site of the San Francisco Chop House
116 Main Street

In East of Eden, Deputy Sheriff Horace Quinn walks from the depot to eat at the Chop House before visiting the sheriff, and has breakfast with Will Hamilton, Sam Hamilton's prosperous son.

Site of the Abbott House (1874), Later Named the Cominos Hotel (1920)
150 Main Street

In East of Eden, a numb and shivering Adam orders brandy at the Abbot [sic] House Bar, and Mr. Lapierre makes him hot rum. The Cominos Hotel, razed after the 1989 Loma Prieta Earthquake, appears in "The Chrysanthemums." Not surprisingly, this area is the site of the Half-Way House where the energetic and entrepreneurial city of Salinas began. The Cominos Hotel sat on the right side of this lot, across from the present site of the National Steinbeck Center.

For a recorded history by Destination Salinas, call: 831-401-9587 # 34

Site of Berges and Garrisere
Corner of Main and Central

In East of Eden, Cal walks with Aron to Berges and Garrisiere to buy champagne for dinner. The original building was demolished.

Site of Griffin's Saloon
153 Main Street

In East of Eden, Joe Valery visits Mr. Griffin's saloon with Alf after the funeral of one of the town's madams. Ironically, "Mr. Griffin didn't like anything about liquor."

Maya Cinema
153 Main Street

The Maya Cinema, with "its packs of kids hanging out in front," is part of the Salinas Oldtown scene described in Lewis Buzbee's Steinbeck's Ghost.

Site of Krough's Drug Store
156 Main Street

In East of Eden, Kate sends Therese to buy toothbrushes and tooth powder at Krough's drugstore. Later, Adam's nurse wants permission to phone Krough's drugstore for the things she needs. Building was demolished.

Once the Monterey County Bank Building
201 Main Street

Designed by William Weeks around 1906, the Monterey County Bank building is an imposing classical building that figures in both literature and the life of Salinas. It appears several times in East of Eden. Kate visits Dr. Wilde, a "combination doctor, priest, psychiatrist to his town," whose office is upstairs in this building, to collect pills. Later in her career, the bank is the first stop in her unvarying Monday afternoon routine, called "Kate's Walk" by Steinbeck researcher Pauline Pearson.

For a recorded history by Destination Salinas, call: 831-401-9587 # 12

Site of Porter and Irvine's
210-214 Main Street

Porter and Irvine's is Kate's second stop on her walk in East of Eden. Kate looks "at dresses and sometimes makes a purchase--elastic, safety pins, a veil, a pair of gloves."

For a recorded history by Destination Salinas, call: 831-401-9587 # 15

Site of Odd Fellows Hall and Town Clock
215 Main Street

When Cal follows Kate in East of Eden, he looks at the clock, a town landmark that was once on the Odd Fellows building in Salinas.

For a recorded history by Destination Salinas, call: 831-401-9587 # 83

Site of Bell's Candy Store (Nance Building) LITERARY MARKER!
242 Main Street

Kate's last stop on her Monday walk in East of Eden is here to buy the requisite two-pound box of mixed chocolates. It is also where her son Aron and his friend Abra sit and sip celery tonic, after Adam's humiliating business losses.

For a recorded history by Destination Salinas, call: 831-401-9587 # 18

Site of the Elks Building, Farmers Mercantile, and Logan Music
247 Main Street

The Elks are mentioned in "Always Something to Do in Salinas." In East of Eden, the Farmers Mercantile is Kate's fourth stop, just after Minnie Franken's beauty parlor. There she visits Dr. Rosen in his upstairs office at about 3:30. In "The Time the Wolves Ate the Vice Principal," Mr. Logan locks his music store, just evading the prowling pack, while in East of Eden Adam Trask buys a "tall gothic" Victor victrola there and returns regularly to see the new records. He also considers joining the Elks.

For a recorded history by Destination Salinas, call: 831-401-9587 # 19

Site of the Jeffrey Hotel
269 Main Street

The Jeffrey is mentioned in "Always Something to Do in Salinas" and Hot Type and Pony Wire, in connection with the 1936 Lettuce Strike. This is the place where the mysterious strike expert, Colonel Sanborn, set up a command center. While the older part of the hotel is gone, the taller building remains. For a number of years it served as a bank. In 1993 Bill Jeffrey gathered his father Jim Jeffrey’s stories in Those Were the Days When Salinas and I Were Young.”

For a recorded history by Destination Salinas, call: 831-401-9587 # 17

Site of Muller Mortuary
313-315 Main Street

Kate is taken here after her suicide in East of Eden.

For a recorded history by Destination Salinas, call: 831-401-9587 # 24

Site of Skating Rink
Near 300 Block of Main Street

In East of Eden, Cal passes the skating rink on one of his restless night walks after taking Abra home. Steinbeck describes the empty skating rink: "a floor with a big tent over it, and a mechanical orchestra clanging away." The owner sits miserably in his booth, "flipping the end of a roll of tickets against his forefinger."

Site of Steinbeck's Father's Feed Store and the Masonic Hall
332-334 Main Street

Located on the ground floor of the Masonic Hall which was built in 1897, the feedstore is mentioned in America and Americans in the story of Mr. Kirk, a miser who buys chicken and pig feed there every Saturday. Since he owns neither chickens nor pigs, the ten cents worth of middlings he buys are presumably for his family. After his daughter and wife die of starvation, Mr. Kirk buys only five cents worth of middlings every Saturday.

For a recorded history by Destination Salinas, call: 831-401-9587 # 21

Salinas Valley Agricultural Fields LITERARY MARKER!
Corner of Williams Road & Freedom Parkway (within view of fields)

From here, you can see the agricultural fields of Salinas. The stories of the workers and farmers in these fields are told in books such as Pocho, by José Antonio Villarreal; The Hunger and the Hate, by H. Vernor Dixon; America Is in the Heart, by Carlos Bulosan; Los Braceros, by José-Rodolfo Jacobo; Beyond The Gates of Heaven, by Expedito A. Ibarbia and in works by Cesar Chavez, John Steinbeck and others.

First Mayor's House
20 Station Place

Originally built on Gabilan Street in 1868 by Salinas’s first mayor, Isaac J. Harvey, the house is among the oldest in Salinas. Before being moved to its present location, the house also stood on Monterey Street, and then on Romie Lane. Harvey’s granddaughter Florence Margaret Baker, who was born in the first floor front bedroom, lovingly describes the house and its blooming garden in Isaac Julian Harvey, California Pioneer. Her vivid words capture the ambiance of an earlier time in Salinas.

Restoration began when the house was moved to Station Place in 1999. Original family documents and a February 1880 Californian magazine article, “How Gardens Grow in California” by writer Josephine Clifford, were used to restore the gardens. Clifford wrote her article about a garden at a cottage on the outskirts of Salinas. In 1882 Clifford married Jackson McCrackin (sometimes misspelled McCracken) and the McCrackins moved to the Summit area of Santa Cruz County.

Josephine continued to visit Salinas. The Salinas Weekly Index of 28 April 1892 records that she was a guest of Father Sorrentini. She is buried in the Old Cavalry Cemetery on Old Cemetery Road off West Market (California 183) just outside of Salinas.

For a recorded history by Destination Salinas, call: 831-401-9587 # 4

Former Site of Salinas Chinatown's Joss House LITERARY MARKER!
1 Soledad Street

On this site, four lots were leased by Chinese merchants to begin construction of Salinas' second Chinatown in 1893. Chinatown was once a vibrant community with beautiful restaurants, gambling houses, Chinese stores, opium dens, and Tong Wars. In his youth, Steinbeck and his friends explored Chinatown. The author later used these memories in East of Eden when he describes easterly breezes with "odors in from Chinatown, roasting pork and punk and black tobacco and yen shi" and "the deep blatting stroke of the great gong in the Joss House," whose tone hangs on the air.

Using family memories, interviews and dedicated research, Lani Ah Tye Farkas, author of Bury My Bones in America, relates family experiences in Salinas Chinatown of the early Twentieth Century.

In America Is in the Heart, Carlos Bulosan goes to a Mexican restaurant on Soledad Street soon after reaching town, but quickly returns to the freight yards where the hobos sit "gloomily in the dark." In his writings, Wellington Lee also describes the unique and international district of the 1950s and 1960s, with "cafes, bars, pool halls, and hotels operated mostly by Chinese, Filipinos, Mexicans and Negroes," as a busy and exciting place.

Site of Shorty Lee's Store
12 1/2 Soledad Street

Lee Yin, or Lee Yong Nom, known as Shorty Lee, was the honorary mayor of the Salinas Chinatown. His story appears in Wellington Lee's Salinas Chinatown Memories. The building is no longer standing.

Site of the Republic Café
37 Soledad Street

This was a gathering place of many groups beginning in the 1930s and the proposed site of a museum and cultural center in Salinas Chinatown.

Alisal Picnic Grounds Old Stage Road

This was the stagecoach route from the San Benito County line to an area north of Gonzales. W. E. P. Hartnell’s el Seminario del Patrocinio de San José stood within walking distance of the picnic grounds that are mentioned in East of Eden. This is the place where the pink azaleas grew and the setting for one of the important scenes in East of Eden. It was also one of Steinbeck's favorite places to walk.

Site of the Sperry Flour Mill
Off West Market Near New Street

This is the area where the Steinbeck family kept their horses, including Steinbeck's pony, Jill, described in "The Summer Before." Steinbeck's father came to Salinas to manage the Sperry Flour Mill.

Site of Lang's Bakery
31 West Market Street

Lang's Bakery stood on property once owned by Samuel Hamilton, John Steinbeck's maternal grandfather. In East of Eden, Lang's pastries are part of Kate's carefully contrived supper parties for Faye.

Site of the Pub, Now the Growers Pub LITERARY MARKER!
227 Monterey Street

According to historian Burton Anderson, the Pub, now the Growers Pub, was the place where many important agricultural business meetings were conducted. In The Hunger and the Hate by H. Vernor Dixon, Freeman Mitchell meets protagonist Dean Holt at "the Pub, a modern bar and restaurant” on Monterey Street.

National  Steinbeck Center
1MainStreet

The National Steinbeck Center is the largest U.S. literary museum dedicated to a single writer. The National Steinbeck Center contains the Steinbeck Museum and Archives and hosts the annual Steinbeck Festival, a tradition in Salinas for 30 years, author talks, and other programming.

For a recorded history by Destination Salinas, call: 831-401-9587 # 31

Salinas Assembly Center LITERARY MARKER!
1034 North Main Street—the Japanese Garden

The year following President Roosevelt’s Declaration of War on December 8, 1941, the Salinas Rodeo Grounds were appropriated for use as the Salinas Assembly Center. Over 3,500 Japanese Americans from the surrounding area were detained here before being sent to internment camps away from the coast. After their transfer, the rodeo grounds became the Salinas Garrison of Fort Ord. Salinas resident and award winning poet Violet Kazue de Cristoforo, herself an internee, voiced her experiences in Poetic Reflections of the Tule Lake Internment Camp 1944. Active in the Salinas Valley JACL, she was instrumental in securing the monument at the Salinas Community Center Park, 940 North Main Street, to recognize the Central Coast Internees. The Issei of the SalinasValley: Japanese Pioneer Families, edited by Mae Sakasegawa, tells the stories of many of these families.

California Rodeo LITERARY MARKER!
1034 North Main Street

Known for its week-long cavalcade of events, California Rodeo "Big Week" is the largest community event held in Salinas, with parades, barbecues, cowboy poetry presentations, fireworks, concerts, and a carnival--not to mention the real rodeo, one of the largest. A young John Steinbeck rode his pony Jill in the horse parade. Jody in The Red Pony dreams of riding in this rodeo. In East of Eden, the Salinas Race Track and Rodeo Grounds is where Olive Steinbeck starts her hair-raising ride in an army plane, her reward for selling World War I Liberty Bonds. The rodeo is also mentioned in Sweet Thursday and "Always Something to Do in Salinas." In Expedito A. Ibarbia's Beyond the Gates of  Heaven, Juliette Freikerson and Fech Delkegger participate in rodeo events.

During the forties, the Salinas Rodeo Grounds were appropriated for use as the Salinas Assembly Center. For additional information, see the listing for the Salinas Assembly Center.

View of Fremont Peak
North Main and San Juan Grade Road

This site offers a view of Fremont Peak. As a child, Steinbeck played on this mountain. In East of Eden, Fremont Peak is a prominent feature. After Samuel Hamilton's funeral, Adam listens to the wind crying in the cypresses and looks "at the mountains to the east of Salinas, with the notable point of Frémont's Peak." Steinbeck's short story, "The Time the Wolves Ate the Vice-Principal," opens with the "light just beginning to come up behind Fremont Peak." In Travels With Charley, Steinbeck visits Fremont Peak and surveys his home terrain for the last time. Jim Martinez identified this as part of the Santa Rita area, a historic site for indigenous people.

Site of Lettuce Sheds in the 1930s
End of East Gabilan Street

According to historian Burton Anderson, lettuce sheds at the end of East Gabilan Street “were the scene of violent strike activity during the 1936 Salinas Lettuce Strike.” Reporter John V. Young was on the scene and included the 1936 Lettuce Strike in his memoir, Hot Type and Pony Wire. Lore places John Steinbeck in the Alisal area, observing strike conditions.

Henry Fenchel's Tailor Shop
14 East Gabilan Street (Now an Alley

Henry Fenchel, the German tailor mentioned in East of Eden, was taunted during World War I because of his German heritage.

Site of Harold's Union Service Station
1222 De La Torre

Former business site of Harold Gordon, author of The Last Sunrise, a memoir of years he spent in a Nazi Concentration Camp as a young boy.

Site of Reynaud's Bakery
18 Central Avenue

East of Eden's Dessie Hamilton, with her warm laughter and infectious gaiety, has her dressmaking establishment next to Reynaud's Bakery. When Dessie returns to the ranch in King City, she sells her house to Adam Trask. The site was demolished when Salinas Street was extended.

Red Light District California Street

According to Pauline Pearson, this area of town was known as the "Red Light District" from the 1800s to the 1940s. This is where the fictional Cathy Trask lives and works as Kate for the madam Faye in East of Eden.

The Chinese Association of Salinas Building
1 California Street

The Chinese Association of Salinas building, constructed by the Chinese community in 1937, functions as the Chinese community center in the Salinas Chinatown area. Organizational meetings and cultural events are held here. Generations of Salinas' Chinese residents have maintained contact with the Chinese language through the Chinese school classes taught here.

The Alisal LITERARY MARKER!
Alisal Street, Hebbron Street, and East Market Street
The Marker is located at Cesar Chavez Park

In the 1930s, "Okies" settled in the Alisal area. Many of the packers involved in the infamous 1936 Salinas lettuce strike lived here as well. "The Salinas Lettuce War" of 1936 is recounted by John V. Young in Hot Type and Pony Wire, an account of his years as a reporter. According to researcher Pauline Pearson, residents said John Steinbeck was seen in the area observing the conditions of migrant workers. The Grapes of Wrath, his novel about "Okies," appeared in 1939, but did not reference Salinas. The Alisal is also mentioned in H. Vernor Dixon's The Hunger and the Hate, a novel about the Salinas lettuce industry

Railway Station, Now an AMTRAK Station LITERARY MARKER!
Station Place

Once a busy Southern Pacific Railway Station, the train was important to Salinas and to agriculture. Robert Louis Stevenson mentions the railway “junction at Salinas City” in “The Old Pacific Capitol.” Steinbeck's characters arrive and leave at the Salinas train station. Molly Morgan arrives at the Salinas Train Depot before taking the bus to the Pastures of Heaven. Shark Wicks arrives and departs. In East of Eden, Adam takes the train to Salinas for Samuel Hamilton's funeral and his cathartic reunion with Kate. Later Adam buys an ice plant but his lettuce shipment east by rail fails to arrive on time and he suffers financial losses.

Carlos Bulosan mentions the Salinas Freight Yards in America Is in the Heart. Freight lines and refrigerated cars also figure in The Hunger and the Hate. In Steinbeck's Ghost, written in 2009, Travis Williams can still hear the "long, low whistle of a freight train" breaking the evening stillness." Today the First Mayor's House and several train cars are in the same location.

For a recorded history by Destination Salinas, call: 831-401-9587 # 2

Site of Delfin Cruz's Editorial Office LITERARYMARKER!
37 1/2 California Street

Delfin F. Cruz was editor and later owner of the respected Philippines Mail. Mr. Cruz was an advocate of Filipino rights.

Earlier Site of the Index-Journal
137 Monterey Street

The Index-Journal, later The Salinas Californian, moved here in 1928 from the southeast corner of Gabilan and Salinas Streets. Between 1948 and 1949, the newspaper moved to a new building at 123 Alisal Street, where it continued to chronicle events in Salinas. John V. Young, who wrote a memoir of his years as a journalist, Hot Type and Pony Wire, worked here briefly. John Steinbeck researched the early issues of the paper here for his novel, East of Eden. Eventually Steinbeck arranged to have issues microfilmed and sent to New York.