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When Nick Perry walked into the Mountain View History Center in the late 1990s, he was a young teenager and curious to learn more about his family’s history.
Now decades later, Perry has received an award from the Santa Clara County Preservation Alliance that recognizes his contributions to preserving Mountain View’s history, along with his leadership role with the Mountain View Historical Association.
“Through his published works and his tireless contributions to the Mountain View Historical Association, Nick Perry has done more than anyone I’ve met to preserve the history and heart of the Mountain View community,” said Robert Cox, the association’s vice president, in a June press release.
In a lot of ways, Perry’s familial story mirrors the hidden history of Mountain View. When he started his research, Mountain View was not identified on any maps, according to a previous Voice article. Nor were there any textbooks about its history, Perry said.
So, Perry set out to change that, first by developing a website that later became the basis for two books, Images of America: “Mountain View” (2006) and “Mountain View: Then and Now” (2012).
Perry’s research cut new territory, using photographs, maps and other primary sources to show how Mountain View has changed over time. But his research also did more, uncovering stories about the city’s growth that had been buried or forgotten.
This included a deep look into some of the city’s more objectionable practices, like its displacement of migrant populations in the name of urban development.
Perry grew up hearing stories about the lives of his great-grandparents and grandparents who had settled in Mountain View in the early twentieth century. They were Mexican migrant workers who eventually had the means to purchase a home in a neighborhood that had a rich history of accommodating Mexican-Americans.
But the city had other plans for the community and in 1969, with the backing of eminent domain, destroyed the neighborhood to make way for the Shoreline Boulevard and Central Expressway interchange. The project evicted dozens of families from their homes, Perry said, including his own.
“People driving up and down Shoreline Boulevard, probably don’t realize that when they see those little lots on the side of the road, where one of them is a community garden, those were people’s backyards. Those are scars of a pretty tumultuous event in the city’s history,” Perry said.
Perry’s family was fortunate to have enough money to purchase back their house before it was demolished and relocate it to another part of the city. Still, the scars run deep in Perry’s family, enough so that it shaped his trajectory not only as a chronicler of Mountain View’s past but also as an urban planner.
Perry holds a bachelor’s degree in urban studies and master’s degree in city planning from U.C. Berkeley. He was an urban designer for the San Francisco Planning Department for over a decade and now works for Santa Clara Valley Open Space Authority.
“Not all change is good. Just because something’s growing, doesn’t mean that’s progress,” Perry said, adding that it was important to involve communities in projects that impact them.
This is not to say that urban growth is inherently bad either. Perry described many positive developments that have occurred in Mountain View, especially in the latter part of the twentieth century. He cited the revitalization of the downtown center in the 1990s, and the city’s emphasis on transit-oriented development.
Mountain View also was a pioneer in affordable housing, Perry said. It planned for a range of different housing types, depending on people’s income levels and life stages. It was not just planning for single-family homes, he added.
Still, it has become increasingly difficult for lower-income families to remain in Mountain View. Before, it was possible for migrants of modest means – like Perry’s family, who started off as cannery workers and farm workers – to save up enough money to move into the middle-class. But that is not the case today, Perry said.
“Some folks who are coming in from Latin American countries, they’re cramming into apartments, and if they do make it into the middle-class, they probably have to move out of Mountain View,” Perry said. “Because there’s not a lot of middle-class housing, unless they’re lucky finding something that’s affordable.”
While Perry no longer lives in Mountain View, this hasn’t dampened his enthusiasm for sharing his knowledge of its local history. Perry plans to return to Mountain View to give a talk about two neighborhoods – Jackson Park and Castro City – in honor of Hispanic Heritage Month. The event takes place at the Mountain View Public Library on Thursday, September 26 from 6:30-8:30 p.m.
Perry also has some tips for young people interested in exploring their local histories. It’s a lot easier today using the internet, he said. It doesn’t require going to a library or the archives anymore. But this also could be a drawback.
“A lot of the things that I really got a lot out of at a young age was making the connections that I did with folks who lived through the history, talking to them, getting to know them and their stories and forming new friendships,” Perry said.
“So, get out there and interact with people and listen and ask questions and make those connections.”
