Petaluma and Santa Rosa Railway Powerhouse

Built in 1903. Listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1991. 10 historic topographic surveys show this location, the earliest from 1935.

From the record

“The Petaluma and Santa Rosa Railway Power House is a historic building in Sebastopol, California, U.S., built to serve the Petaluma and Santa Rosa Railroad, an electric interurban railway of Sonoma County. It is also known as the Hogan Building and the P&SR Substation.”
Wikipedia article Petaluma and Santa Rosa Railway Powerhouse, CC BY-SA 4.0.

One of 73 National Register listings published here for Sonoma County · listed in 1991 · category: Building · built in 1903.

Sources: the Wikipedia article · the case file at the National Archives · the National Register database, National Park Service

The listing

What is counted as historic. The nomination lists 1 building as contributing to the listing.
Address. 238--258 Petaluma Ave., Sepbastopol, 95472
When was it listed? July 1991
Category. building
Census division. Sebastopol
When was it built? 1903
National Register reference number. 91000918 - the number the National Park Service assigned this property when it was listed, and the key its nomination file is catalogued under at the National Archives.

Then and now

1935 to 1983

The ground this property stands on, surveyed 48 years apart. Drag the handle to wipe between them. Both sheets are United States Geological Survey originals; neither has been altered.

Topographic sheet covering Petaluma and Santa Rosa Railway Powerhouse, surveyed 1983

Topographic sheet covering Petaluma and Santa Rosa Railway Powerhouse, surveyed 1935

Fires near this property

171 since 1992

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal wildfire occurrence database lists 171 fires within 5 miles of Petaluma and Santa Rosa Railway Powerhouse between 1992 and 2020, burning about 155 acres in total. 1 started naturally. 11 were recorded as arson. Distance is straight-line from the map coordinates, so a fire counted here may appear on a neighbouring settlement's page as well.

Reported cause	Fires
Missing data/not specified/undetermined	71
Equipment and vehicle use	53
Smoking	16
Debris and open burning	11
Arson/incendiarism	11
Misuse of fire by a minor	4
Power generation/transmission/distribution	3
Recreation and ceremony	1
Natural	1

The most recent of them, most recent first, with the day each was reported and the service that recorded it.

Date	Cause	Size	Reported by	Name on the report
8 September 2010	Equipment and vehicle use	6.0 acres	Sonoma-Lake Napa Unit	VALLEY 2
8 September 2004	Equipment and vehicle use	under an acre	Sonoma-Lake Napa Unit	BARNETT
6 September 2010	Equipment and vehicle use	under an acre	Sonoma-Lake Napa Unit	BODEGA
5 September 2002	Equipment and vehicle use	under an acre	Sonoma-Lake Napa Unit	BARNETT
4 September 2008	Missing data/not specified/undetermined	under an acre	Sonoma-Lake Napa Unit	BARNETT
4 September 2005	Missing data/not specified/undetermined	under an acre	California Department of Forestry & Fire Protection	not named
29 September 2007	Missing data/not specified/undetermined	1.0 acres	Sonoma-Lake Napa Unit	PEAKS, CDF TAC6
28 September 2018	Missing data/not specified/undetermined	under an acre	California Department of Forestry & Fire Protection	BURNSIDE

Every fire recorded in Sonoma County

Mines and quarries near this property

5 within 5 miles

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal mineral resources record lists 5 workings within 5 miles of Petaluma and Santa Rosa Railway Powerhouse: 3 unknowns, 1 past producer, 1 occurrence. None of them still produces. What was taken out: Mercury, Sand and Gravel, Construction, Stone, Crushed/Broken. Distance is straight-line from the map coordinates, so a quarry counted here may appear on a neighbouring settlement's page as well.

Site	Commodity	Status
Bloomfield Quarry and Mill	Stone, Crushed/Broken	Past Producer
Mark West Creek	Sand and Gravel, Construction	Unknown
Sand Pit	Sand and Gravel, Construction	Unknown
Unnamed Prospect	Mercury	Unknown
Unnamed Prospect	Mercury	Occurrence

Every working recorded in Sonoma County

Maps showing this location

10 surveys

United States Geological Survey topographic sheets whose coverage includes this point. Matched by taking the coordinate the National Park Service records for this property, then testing that coordinate against the published boundary of every sheet.

1935 USGS Sebastopol quadrangle1:48000
1942 USGS Sebastopol quadrangle1:62500 - 3 printings
1947 USGS Santa Rosa quadrangle1:250000
1949 USGS Santa Rosa quadrangle1:250000 - 2 printings
1954 USGS Sebastopol quadrangle1:24000 - 6 printings
1954 USGS Sebastopol quadrangle1:62500
1958 USGS Santa Rosa quadrangle1:250000 - 3 printings
1962 USGS Santa Rosa quadrangle1:250000
1964 USGS Santa Rosa quadrangle1:250000
1983 USGS Napa quadrangle1:100000

Listed places nearby

6 within 8 miles

Other National Register properties close enough to walk or drive between, ordered by distance from this one. Both positions come from the same geocoding pass that matched these properties to their map sheets.

Property	Distance	Listed
Sebastopol Depot of the Petaluma and Santa Rosa Railway	under 500 feet	1996
George A. Strout House	0.3 miles	1980
Gold Ridge Farm	0.7 miles	1978
Hicks House	3.4 miles	1987
Llano Road Roadhouse	4.2 miles	1978
Hinds Hotel	5.4 miles	1979

Sources for this property

National Archives record	The nomination case file for reference 91000918 in Record Group 79.
Wikipedia article	Community-written account of this property, licensed CC BY-SA.
Sonoma County	All 73 listed properties in this county.

Provenance

Listing record. National Park Service National Register of Historic Places, listed-properties dataset, current to 2026-05-22.
Map join. Address geocoded through the United States Census geocoder, then tested against the published boundary of every sheet in the USGS Historical Topographic Map Collection.
How this page is made. Listing fields come from federal records; map-sheet coverage is a labelled coordinate-to-boundary calculation, not a source-field claim.
Wildfire. Short, Karen C. 2022. Spatial wildfire occurrence data for the United States, 1992-2020 [FPA_FOD_20221014]. 6th Edition. Fort Collins, CO: Forest Service Research Data Archive. https://doi.org/10.2737/RDS-2013-0009.6 Collected with United States Government funding and usable without additional permissions or fees.
Mines and quarries. USGS Mineral Resources Data System (MRDS) https://mrdata.usgs.gov/mrds/ A work of the United States government, no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105.