Christens Come Home

On Saturday, October 4, 2014, Hartford Properties had the pleasure of facilitating the Christen Family Reunion at our office located at 1427 Valencia Street in San Francisco. Our office is the ancestral home of the Christen family who first lived and operated a dairy on these premises. One only has to look at the porch before opening the front door to know the Christen family roots run deep here.

The Christen family brought photos and artifacts of their ancestors to adorn the party including a very rare Christen Dairy Ranch milk bottle. Although the original dairy operated on site from the late 1800s, the dairy was ultimately moved to Daly City where the Christen family had acquired a vast amount of land that would become the Serramonte shopping center and its adjacent neighborhoods. Indeed, a street in the Serramonte neighborhood is named after the Christen family and is a reminder that once the land was a large working dairy ranch before being developed for housing and retail businesses.

Highlights of the reunion included hearing stories from multiple Christen cousins of their memories of being in the house when they were children and what their Uncle Harry was like. Harry Christen was the last Christen to own and operate the dairy business before the land in Daly City was sold in the 1960s. By all accounts, Harry seems to have been a serious man whose main focus was running the family business. It was said Harry would walk to St. James' church at 23rd and Guerrero every Sunday to attend mass and another Christen descendent recounted how he had to ask Uncle Harry's permission to get married.

It was also fascinating to hear how many of the Christen descendants continued to live in the neighborhood before branching out to other neighborhoods in San Francisco and finally spreading across the Bay and then out of state. It was wonderful to have the Christens gather here, in their ancestral home, and celebrate such a vibrant, well-detailed family history that is significant in the history of both San Francisco and Daly City.

The Christen family history is an excellent depiction of how San Francisco and Daly City were shaped by the people who first came to live here. Originally from the German part of Switzerland, John & Margaritha Christen and their eight children took up residence here on Valencia Street in 1899 and began the J.A. Christen & Sons Dairy. From this one family with their small business grew a large dairy ranch and many descendants who know and honor their history today.

We think the house was happy to have its family back and it was an honor for Hartford Properties to be involved.