Talk:Wildcat Canyon Regional Park

Rifle Range,Horse Stables, Private Home
I have no official sources for this information so I am adding it here.

I grew up on Arlington Blvd. in El Cerrito in the 1950s-60s. Every other week end in the late 50s there was a column of military vehicles including tanks,jeeps,and personnel transport vehicles that would proceed up Arlington to Rifle Range Road and then down to the range at the bottom of Wildcat Canyon.They would fire large caliber weapons (we recovered 20 mm and .50 caliber projectiles in later years from the site)as well as machine guns and other weapons with could be clearly heard from our house, a good 2 miles away.As kids we used to hike up to each target and inspect them. There were deep trenches lined with heavy timber where soldiers raised and lowered the targets. Some of these targets were way up the hillside,maybe 500 yards. Others were at different distances.

The tanks going up Arlington ruined the pavement and it had to be replaced in the early 1960s.No tanks ever used the new pavement and the firing range was used for National Guard and Police agencies until the 1970s. All of the target trenches were filled in by the park service.

Also there was a horse stable just South of where Rifle Range Road bottoms out. I believe there were horses for rent but I'm not sure of this.All evidence of these stables were eliminated by the park service.

There was an old house near the bottom of Rifle Range Road. Someone was living there at least into the 1960s. It has been demolished and nearly no sign of it remains.

The Nike Base which used to extend all the way along the ridge was in operation during the 1950s and early 60s and was later completely eliminated. For years kids used to visit the abandoned silos and buildings.

Every few years the canyon used to be visited by Mountain Lions. I personally had a very close encounter with these cats at night alone while camping in the bramble on the West side. BrianAlex (talk) 23:16, 14 July 2019 (UTC)


 * Thanks very much for the information; we can't directly use WP:OR but often memories and keywords and rough dates provide breadcrumbs that lead to discovering reliable sources that we can add to the page. Gotta be something in the newspaper about tanks rolling down the street, right?  When I have the time I'll use Newspapers Extended to try to find an old article about that and will add the content to the page when I do with the source. Cheers! BBQboffin (talk) 19:13, 21 October 2023 (UTC)

Article reclassification
This article meets the requirements for Start class. Bruin2 (talk) 05:08, 19 September 2014 (UTC)

Added project
Added article to WP:Protected areas. Bruin2 (talk) 14:01, 22 August 2017 (UTC)