Caltrans is re-installing mission bells along the route of El Camino Real throughout most of the state—from Orange County to San Francisco. The bells historically marked the path of "The King's Highway," which linked the missions, pueblos and presidios in California.

Now, with the appearance of the cast metal bells, 18 inches in diameter and suspended from hooked pipes, El Camino is retaining a vestige of its past from before Sunnyvale developed around it.

Jeff Weiss, a spokesman with Caltrans, said he wasn't sure when installation of the bells would occur on the approximately three-mile stretch of El Camino Real within Sunnyvale city limits.

But two of the new mission bells have already been installed—one just past El Camino's intersection with Sunnyvale-Saratoga Road on the southbound side, and one near El Camino and N. Fairoaks on the northbound side. Caltrans' specifications state that the newer bells will be installed approximately every one to two miles along the route in each direction, and the Office of State Landscape Architecture selected their placement.

Both of the newer bells join several older, monochromatic bells that were already part of El Camino in Sunnyvale. A group called the El Camino Real Association installed the original mission bells throughout the state between 1906 and 1915 to preserve the history of the route. According to Caltrans, over 450 mission bells were placed on the route of the entire El Camino Real—which stretches from San Diego to San Francisco—by 1915. After a number of bells were vandalized, the California State Automobile Association and the Automobile Club of Southern California took over their maintenance.

Due to theft, that number had shrunk to 75 by 1960. Caltrans became responsible for the bells in 1974 and replaced many with concrete versions designed to halt vandalism. Budget cuts restricted maintenance efforts, so later on, many bells were cared for and installed through an "Adopt-A-Bell" program and the efforts of local groups such as the California Federation of Women's Clubs.

The current efforts are due to a Federal Transportation Enhancement Activities grant that Caltrans received in 2000, which covers bell installation from San Francisco to Orange County. Approximately 70 mission bell markers will be installed along the route of El Camino in Santa Clara and San Mateo counties by the end of 2004. The bells will follow El Camino's route down state highway 82 through downtown San Jose and will continue along Highway 101 to Southern California.

In Sunnyvale, the mission bells will decorate a stretch of El Camino that has since become more famous for auto dealerships and strip malls. Chiyo Winters, a longtime resident of Sunnyvale and a docent with the Sunnyvale Historical Society, said that the current developments have their roots in the 1950s, when the town began to grow.

"That was the old stagecoach route," Winters said. "The railroad developed along that line, and it let you off approximately where Rooster T. Feathers is today. We called that, 'The Junction.'"

Winters also recalled that El Camino served as the "winter road" to San Francisco until the early 1940s because the Bayshore Highway would flood every year. "I remember it as a two-lane road," she said. "It was the slow way to go to San Francisco. You only go that way if you have to."

A good deal of what defines Sunnyvale lies along El Camino—city hall and the library were built nearby in the 1960s, and many early housing developments sprouted up among the orchards that originally lined both sides of the historic road. "When you would drive down El Camino and wanted to turn on Pastoria, you'd miss it because it was completely dark," Winters said. "But the intersection with Mathilda was lit—they called that the entrance to the city."