How the Piedmont became Oakland’s “City of Millionaires”

In 1893, hundreds of banks shuttered, thousands of businesses went under, and a healthy portion of railroads went bankrupt. The stock market fell to an all time low.

Lesser men than Frank Havens were shooting themselves in the head and kicking chairs out from under their feet at a rate not matched in the previous decade. But not Havens. Born in 1848 when adventurers were teaming across the nation to strike it rich in the California Gold Rush, Havens spent his childhood in Sag Harbor watching the desperation in men’s faces as the whaling trade collapsed. He learned early and painfully the cyclical life of the commodity: whale, oil, or gold — nothing was more or less valuable than anything else. Every resource would have its day. Boom would follow bust.

Money. That was what he learned to watch.

Once in San Francisco, Havens secured an entry level position in a savings and loan company. There he learned there was nothing to be gained by simply holding onto other people’s cash until they came to get it. Havens quit banking and joined the securities rush. As the Southern Pacific and Central Pacific railroads spread their tentacles throughout the state, stockbroker offices sprang up around Montgomery and Sansome streets. He worked his way up to partner in one firm and then formed his own company, the…