If you drive from downtown Los Altos across Foothill Boulevard and then head towards Los Altos Hills Town Hall, you will be driving on West Fremont Avenue - one of the main thoroughfares of our Town. As you approach Town Hall, you will come to a "Stop" sign and Fremont Avenue kinks to the right (see the red dot ) as it continues its way to finally terminate where it meets Arastradero Road (Marked by a green dot ) If you continue to drive the stretch of West Fremont between the two colored dots, about half-way along this stretch of the road, you will encounter a road on your right called Snell Lane . That is the focal point of this account - starting about a century ago, the story of the development of a piece of our town of from open land, to orchard, to Silicon Valley suburbia

 (1)   A map of the general area around 2025, showing the different main roads, cul-de-sacs and driveways of what is today seen as semi-rural suburbia, where the zoning resulted in lots of minimally one acre in area, and frequently somewhat larger.

 (2)   Here is an aerial photograph of the same area, but taken in 1947.

Take a look at the the orchard area which is located near the top left portion of the frame - the land that appears to have the darkest shade of gray in the image as a whole. Notice also the arc of "open space" that frames the top-right side of of this orchard area. Today this area is still open space grassland, scattered with just a few trees - and appears much the same as it must have done before the orchards changed the landscape. It is known today as as Esther Clark Park

Now just to show the change in a visually graphical manner, we take the images  (1)   and  (2)   above and super-impose one on top of the other providing a composite image showing today's development with the orchard trees in the background .

 (3)  The two maps layered one on top of the other. Note the darkest black lines criss-crossing through the orchard trees - these are the "lot lines" that mark the borders of each of today's individual land parcels.

The above three pictures are the prelude to introduce you to the series of pictures that follow. They are a sequence of aerial photos captured at different times over the last 95 Years - nearly a century.. (The earliest aerial picture we have dates from 1930 and is shown below as the next picture in this series) But the story really starts in 1925 when Jack Snell purchased 35 acres in Los Altos Hills. The land he purchased included what would eventually comprise all of Snell Lane and Snell Court. He planted bareroot apricot trees which grew into what we know as the Snell apricot orchard. Their daughter Evelyn was also born in 1925, and two years later Jack Snell and his wife Helen McCloskey moved into the house they had built in the orchard. The driveway leading to that house from West Fremont Avenue eventually became what we know today as Snell Lane. The early aerial photos show it as the southernmost of three roads entering the orchard, but over time, these roads changed their alignment or disappeared completely to be replaced with new ones adapted to serve the subdivided properties. The main trunk of Snell Lane morphed from its original straight line to curving gently between adjacent lots, it extended further over time, developing a number of side-branches off both sides that led to further subdivided properties. So let us take a look at the earliest aerial picture we have - this one was taken in 1930 - just five years after Jack Snell bought the property, and three years after he moved into his newly built home.

 (4)   Taken October 6th 1930, this aerial photograph has been annotated with some of the major roads marked in red, and the borders of the orchard are in blue.

The location of today's Town Hall is also marked, but it must be remembered that the Town of Los Altos Hills did not yet exist in 1930. It would only come into being a quarter of a century later and after an intervening World War. The orchard in which Town Hall was eventualy established belonged to Arthur Fowle, later passed on to his son John. Arthur donated the land on which Town Hall now stands upon the Town's incorporation in January 1956.

The following image is taken from the same source negative as the picture immediately above, but is "zoomed in" to show just the orchard at the maximum resolution offered by the negative.

 (4) Detail   The same picture as the previous one, but this time enlarged to show as much detail as can be garnered from the original negative. The orchard occupies roughly the lower 2/3ds of the frame.

When Jack Snell originally purchased the 35 acres in 1925 (in what would eventually become the Town of Los Altos Hills), it included all of what is today Snell Lane and Snell Court. The Southern-most road of the three "driveways" shown in the image above is roughly where Snell Lane is located today - except that today's Snell Lane is curvy rather than a straight line, and is more extensive, with other roads branching off it. The other two driveways effectively disappeared and were replaced by new roads when the land was sub-divided many years later.

Bareroot apricot trees were planted over the whole property, which grew into what we know as the Snell apricot orchard.

Jack Snell was married to Helen McKloskey and they had a daughter who was born in the same year that they purchased the land, and whom they called Evelyn.

They moved into a house on the land in 1927. Jack spent his time working on the orchard as well as his automotive repair business in Palo Alto.

The young Evelyn Snell lived in that house her entire life including after she was married to Stan Troedson. Together they had five children who all grew up on the family estate.

Stan Troedson was also very active and well-known in the local community. He is best remembered for his contributions to Little League fields in Los Altos Hills. Stan died an early death at age 52 due to cancer, after which one of the Little League fields was named after him.

Extract - From Los Altos Hills Town Newsletter, March 1978
	Acting on a suggestion by the Little League Board, the City Council recently remamed the Little League Field Stan Troedson was a founder of the Hills Little Leagur and a tireless and dedicated worker for th youth of our Town. He was a talented compassionate, fun-loving coach and a friend who loved children and who now leaves a legacy for all the children who become involved in the sport at the field. The City Council desired, in some measure, to continue Stan Troedson's spirit of goodwill and generosity so that many of our town's families can enjpy the good fellowship he worked so hard and devotedly to achieve. The Resolution that was adopted by the City Council was presented at the Little League Awards Dinner to the Troedson Family. Mrs Troedson was recognized and presented with an engraved plaque of the Resolution naming the field the Stan Troedson Field.

In 1968 about 2/3 of the 35 acres were subdivided into 16 lots plus the acreage for Snell Lane. The largest lot was retained by Evelyn for her home and some open space. Later her large lot was subdivided into five lots including one for Evelyn as well as the road for Snell Court.

Not much more detail can be gathered from the above image despite its magnification. More details of the three structures that appear on the property (each at the end of one of the three driveways on the property) are still not evident. Bear in mind that this picture was taken in 1930 - before the war - so this is not too surprising. Aerial photography had only reached a minimaly practical degree during the the First World War, and there was not much impetus in the next few years to improve it. But as we shall see in subsequent images, the technology of cameras, their lenses, and film resolution had improved by leaps and bounds during the course of the next quarter century

 (5)   This picture shows the same location, but we are now nearly two decades later. It is 1947 and the aftermath of war is just behind us, servicemen are returning to civilian life, but it would be nearly another decade before Los Altos Hills would be officially incorporated as a Town. .

 (6)   Here is the wider aerial view taken from the same negative from which the immediately previous image detail was enlarged. When we compare this situation (1947) with that of 1930 (image number  (4)   above, not much change is apparent except for the nextdoor neighbor to the North on West Fremont Road which is now also fully planted as an Orchard.

The curve of undeveloped land on the immediate right (East) above this new orchard and to the right of the Snell orchard remains open undeveloped land to this day. It is now known as Esther Clark Park - technically it lies inside the borders of Palo Alto and is not even part of Los Altos Hills. Being relatively untouched open grasslands, it serves to remind us what the surrounding neighborhood probably looked like before the advent of the orchards.

 (7)   This picture was taken on May 2nd, 1968. A lot has happened during the intervening 20 years or so since the previous photo was taken.

About half way through this time-span, in January 1956, the residents of this part of Santa Clara County voted to incorporate and form the Town of Los Altos Hills. And that triggered a major impetus for some developers to purchase orchards and sub-divide them into smaller lots (minimum size one acre) for single-family residences..

 (7) Detail   In 1968 the evidence of the prior Orchard's presence is still very apparent, but now the remaining trees are scattered across multiple backyards, The former driveways that were the early connectors to West Edith Avenue have now become larger feeder roads with a number of cul-de-sacs branching off to serve the different land parcels.

The intervening years have also seen a marked improvement in the image quality of aerial survey photographs, but the impact of satellite imagery must still wait a while before it becomes widely available for civilian use.

Evelyn died in 2017, thus ending an era which covered the first three-quarters of a century's history of the former orchard. The house was sold and replaced by a new large house.

Extract - From Evelyn Troedson's Obituary - 2017
	Born in San Francisco to her loving parents Helen (McCloskey) and Jack Snell, the family moved to Los Altos Hills when Evelyn was two years old, where she spent the rest of her life on the family's apricot orchard. Evelyn attended Los Altos Grammar School, Paly High and the College of Notre Dame in Belmont. Shortly after WWII, Evelyn met the love of her life, Stan Troedson. The two worked hard and laughed a lot as they raised their 5 children with the demands of Stan's automotive businesses in Palo Alto and the family apricot orchard. Stan's untimely death in 1977, due to cancer, was an enormous loss to Evelyn. She persevered and enjoyed a fulfilling life, surrounded by her growing family, her St. Nicholas Mass group, her Stanford Pink Lady friends, bridge, Paly High lunches, family vacations to the Mauna Kea and special times with her grandchildren. Evelyn's greatest loves were her children and grandchildren, her faith and her country. She enjoyed the SF Giants and 49ers, reading a good book, working in her garden and a nice glass of wine. Evelyn was a loving and supportive mother to her five children and their spouses, as well as 16 beloved grandchildren, and 2 great grandsons.

 (8)   In 2001, Satellite imagery was still not common for civilian use. There was a thriving industry that captured aerial imagery from low-flying aircraft and assembled these images (captured as digital files on CD ROM's and DVD's) and these were sold to interested parties (such as Town Planning Departments) for a handsome price. The advent of Google Earth via The Internet essentially wiped out that business within a very few years.

The following picture takes us through the millennium to 2001.

 (8) Detail   This is a detailed "zoom in" to a portion of the previous 2001 image.

 (8) Detail of Detail   This is an even more detailed "zoom in" to a portion of the previous 2001 image. Despite pre-dating today's satellite-based digital images, these materials showed pretty good resolution - certainly a huge improvement over their 1930 predecessors.

Acknowledgement
	The idea for this web-page came from the basic research and spadework performed by Patty Woolsey. It was she, as a member of the Town's History Committee, who felt the urge to document some of the history in the area of town where she lived. Accordingly she searched around and assembled some source materials, "joined the dots" and passed them on to me. From there it was a logical step to add some aerial photographs that I had collected over time and come up with this web page you see before you. Any errors or omissions are however entirely mine!