Willow Glen Resident
News
Photograph by Vicki Thompson
Past Life: The owner of the home at 1070 Bird Ave. wants to modify the property to allow for three additional units. The residence was the former home of John 'Jack' Holmes, one of the two men who kidnapped and killed Brooke Hart, an heir to the Hart Department Store.
Bird Avenue home was once owned by famous kidnapper
By Eli Segall
The painful memory of San Jose's most notorious killing, the 1933 mob lynching in St. James Park, was recently resurrected at a Sept. 13 San Jose Planning Commission hearing.
Well, sort of.
The commission voted 4-1 to recommend the city approve a rezoning application for a home on1070 Bird Ave., north of Willow Street. The commission approved two residential units for the 0.29-acre site.
Since the 1960s, successive owners of the house have made structural and architectural changes without obtaining building permits. These changes include a studio apartment above the garage in the back lot and a converted basement apartment below the main house. Property owner Norm Dreyer wanted three permissible units, and sought city approval to legalize these changes. The planning department compromised on his request, recommending two legalized units.
The original zoning allowed only one single-family dwelling.
The San Jose City Council will vote on the application Oct. 24.
The picturesque Victorian, built in 1889 and purchased over a year ago by Dreyer, is the former residence of John "Jack" Holmes, one of two men arrested, and ultimately lynched, for the November 1933 kidnap and murder of 22-year-old Brooke Hart.
Hart was a member of one of San Jose's most prominent families and heir to the famed Hart Department Store in San Jose.
Dreyer was aware of the home's dubious distinction before buying it.
"I was somewhat concerned if Hart was murdered inside the house, but thankfully I found out he wasn't," Dreyer said. "That kind of stuff just freaks me out. I even asked the tenants if they'd heard weird things at night."
Holmes lived in the house with his wife, Evelyn, and their two children, David and Joyce, at the time of the infamous events. David was attending Willow Glen Elementary School.
Holmes, an oil company salesman, met his friend and accomplice Harold Thurmond while the latter worked at a service station on San Carlos Street at Delmas Avenue. Strapped for cash, the two concocted a plan to kidnap and hold for ransom the son of retail mogul Alex Hart.
The 1930s had seen a rash of kidnappings, with ransoms ranging from $30,000 to $200,000. The men saw this as opportunity. The two kidnapped Hart as he left his father's store on Nov. 9, 1933.
Hart was beaten, brought to the San Mateo Bridge and thrown into the bay. His body was found Nov. 25, 3 miles downstream, half eaten by crabs and fish.
The public was outraged, and rumors of a lynch mob forming began to swirl immediately.
The two were caught hiding in a downtown hotel and held in the county jail on Market Street. A lynch mob formed, overpowered the guards, and dragged Holmes and Thurmond from their cells on Nov. 26. The two men were beaten, stripped and hanged in nearby St. James Park.
The lynchings caused shockwaves in the otherwise quiet, semi-rural town. At the time, San Jose's population was roughly 60,000. Today it has swelled to 1 million. Back then it known as The Garden City, with parks, tree-lined streets, and countless apricot, prune and strawberry orchards.
"It was a real black eye, a real tragic situation," said Leonard McKay, a Willow Glen historian and longtime San Jose resident.
