Menlo Park's centennial year starts on Friday, Dec. 4, at a park that exists because of the reason the city exists. The kickoff is the city's annual "Shop local! Light Up the Season" tree lighting at Fremont Park, on Santa Cruz Avenue at University Drive. The park began as a memorial to Camp Fremont. That World War I Army camp created the Santa Cruz Avenue downtown, and a few years after it closed, Menlo Park incorporated.
The city was incorporated on Nov. 23, 1927, so the 100th anniversary falls in November 2027. The celebration that leads up to it begins about five weeks after this post goes up, under a string of lights a few steps from the park's Camp Fremont plaque.
A camp of 28,000 next to a town of 2,000
The Menlo Park Historical Association's Camp Fremont exhibit describes the Menlo Park of April 1917 as a sleepy country community. It had a couple of hotels, a few businesses including several bars, and perhaps 2,000 residents clustered around the Southern Pacific station.
That summer, the federal government picked the area for a training camp. Stanford's trustees agreed on July 26, 1917, to lease 6,000 acres to the War Department, and construction started the next day. The camp was built to train an Army division, which at the time meant 28,000 soldiers. In other words, a training ground for roughly fourteen times the local population went up beside a railroad town.
The Eighth Division's headquarters stood on El Camino Real across from Ravenswood Avenue. A temporary YMCA road ran between Santa Cruz and Middle avenues, a little southwest of today's San Mateo Drive. The 1867 Menlo Park station, which the historical association identifies as California's oldest passenger station, was enlarged to handle the extra traffic from the camp.
The war ended on Nov. 11, 1918, and Camp Fremont formally closed in August 1919. The association says its effect on Menlo Park outlasted it. A new downtown grew up along Santa Cruz Avenue, and within a few years the City of Menlo Park was incorporated. Atherton, next door, had incorporated as a town on Sept. 12, 1923. Menlo Park followed in 1927.
The street that holds the farmers market, the holiday shopping and this year's debate over the 600-block plaza dates from those postwar years. Our recent piece on Santa Cruz Avenue's Fourth Fridays and the plaza question covers the street as it stands today.
The corner a resident bought as a memorial
Fremont Park was not planned by the city at first. In the late 1930s, Menlo Park resident J.F. Carl Hagens led a private effort to buy the lot on the south corner of Santa Cruz and University avenues as a memorial to Camp Fremont. The city then added a smaller lot next to it. According to the historical association, Hagens owned the building at 1036 Doyle St. that served as City Hall from 1935 to 1939.
The park was dedicated on Nov. 11, 1938, the 20th anniversary of the Armistice, under the name Memorial Park. Former U.S. Senator Samuel M. Shortridge dedicated it, and former President Herbert Hoover also spoke. A parade came first. It started along Oak Grove Avenue from the train depot, turned down Valparaiso Avenue and reached the park by way of Johnson Street. Mayor J.E. Cooper reviewed the parade from a stand on University Avenue.
The park's oldest object is older than the park. A plaque marking the Camp Fremont site was dedicated in 1923, during a reunion of Eighth Division and 319th Engineers veterans. It first stood on a concrete slab at Valparaiso and El Camino Real. It later moved to the southwestern end of Live Oak Avenue, near where the division's headquarters had been, and then into the new memorial park. A second plaque, honoring the 319th Engineers' commanding officer, was added to the slab in 1964.
When the park was redesigned in 1995, the monument moved from the north corner to the south corner, away from the streets. Anyone at the Dec. 4 lighting can find it at that corner.
What the Dec. 4 kickoff includes
The city's event listing calls the evening a "winter wonderland" that rings in the holiday shopping season and kicks off the centennial celebration.
- When: Friday, Dec. 4, 5:30 to 7 p.m., rain or shine
- Where: Fremont Park, Santa Cruz Avenue at University Drive
- On the program: free family entertainment, youth performances, centennial and winter-themed photo spots, and hot cocoa while it lasts
- The tree: the city is lighting "our beautiful Menlo Park oak tree" this year while it gives "our beloved pine tree a well deserved break"
- Ages: all ages welcome
The listing also asks attendees to shop and dine at Menlo Park's small businesses while they are downtown. One of the newest options is on Santa Cruz Avenue itself. The Almanac reported that the restaurant at 712 Santa Cruz Ave., formerly Mrs Khan, reopened on Oct. 14 as Dragon General, with chef-owner Minjun Li serving a broad Chinese menu.
A short walk through the city's founding
The 1938 dedication parade gives a ready-made route for an evening before or after the lighting. The historical association records its stops in this order:
- The train depot. The parade started here. The 1867 station was enlarged during the war to handle traffic to and from Camp Fremont.
- Oak Grove Avenue. This was the first leg out of the depot.
- Valparaiso Avenue. The parade turned here. The 1923 plaque first stood at Valparaiso and El Camino Real.
- Johnson Street. This was the approach into the park.
- Fremont Park's south corner. The Camp Fremont monument now sits here, with its 1923 and 1964 plaques.
The historical association also has an online exhibit on the history of the Menlo Park train station on its main site. It works well as background reading before the walk.
A centennial year with most of its calendar still open
The overall plan for 2027 is lighter than the word "centennial" might suggest. At its March 21, 2026 priority-setting workshop, the City Council saw a centennial planning presentation from Judi A. Herren, assistant to the city manager and city clerk. It described centennial activities folded into existing city events rather than a separate festival series.
| When | What | What the city has said |
|---|---|---|
| Dec. 4, 2026 | Light Up the Season at Fremont Park | Listed as the kickoff |
| December 2026 to November 2027 | Seven centennial activities built into existing city events | Outlined in March without names or dates |
| November 2027 | A dedicated centennial event | Month given in March, with no day |
The presentation names three kinds of partners: the Menlo Park Historical Association, local businesses and community groups. It said more details would come in August. The city council's Oct. 27 agenda, posted Oct. 22, has no centennial item on it.
Residents can still help shape the year. In its July to September 2026 newsletter, the historical association asks for suggestions on how to celebrate the incorporation centennial. You can reach it at (650) 330-2522 or [email protected]. The city's centennial runs through the November 2027 anniversary, and the Camp Fremont monument at Fremont Park is the most direct link the city has to how it began.
At Maria Afzal Real Estate Group, we follow Menlo Park's civic calendar as closely as its market. If you have family photos of downtown, a house with a story tied to the city's early years, or questions about how a home's history can shape the way it is presented, we would be glad to talk. Request a complimentary luxury marketing consultation, and we will bring the same care to your property's story that the city is bringing to its 100th year.
