Stanford University - Quad Yearbook (Palo Alto, CA)

Page 22 text:

Stanford Dear Stevens: On the Palo Alto Farm, Near the south end of San Francisco Bay, The Stanford Campus lies upon the flats, But climbing on the west the Santa Cruz Green forest-covered heights and pasture slopes Beyond which rolls the ocean, — fifteen miles By crow-flight, it is said, but thirty miles By stage. The tawny Stanford Quadrangle, Red-roofed and framed even now in January In fields of oats bestudded with live oaks. Stretches three hundred yards on either face And looks across the Bay three miles away, — Hid by the arboretum and the town Of Palo Alto, — to the splendid wall Of the Coast Range, the very hills of God, The ramparts of the New Jerusalem, — In August shadowy yellow, brown and white. After the rains now slowly growing green. But softened by the distance and the haze Into the blending tints of palaces You see in dreams; and when the mists are thick, Mere ghosts of mountains merging into cloud. Beyond the Coast Range lies the San Joaquin, An empire valley, — viewless miles of flat. To which the so-called Kansas plains are Alps; Then the Sierras and beyond them — home! After the summit of Mount Hamilton, Marked by the flashing signal of the Lick, The Coast Range sinks to southward on our right Toward San Jose to join the Santa Cruz That run behind us with projecting spurs To Tamalpais beyond the Golden Gate, Low cut but clear against the northwest sky. — William Herbert Carruth. 1