This story by staff writer Andrea Gemmet ran with a photo essay by staff photographer Marjan Sadoughi:
Just steps away from busy Ravenswood Avenue, the Gatehouse seems to exist in a separate time and place. Occupying a corner of Menlo Park’s Civic Center complex, the quaint building gleams with white paint amidst a deeply shady thicket of oak trees and shrubs.
While it gets regular use as the headquarters of the Junior League of Palo Alto-Midpeninsula, it’s easy to overlook this unassuming throwback to the 1860s. On an unseasonably cold January morning, water burbles from a French fountain adorned with burly mermen, drowning out the traffic noises. Only the occasional shriek from an indignant toddler at the nearby daycare center pierces the reverie that surrounds the place.
Once upon a time, the Gatehouse was the point of entry for a grand, 280-acre estate owned by William Eustace Barron. It changed hands several times after he lost his fortune in 1875, and by World War II, the estate was gone, all its buildings demolished except for the Gatehouse and its gate. It was pressed into service as officers’ quarters during the war, and eventually purchased by the city of Menlo Park.
Remnants of that bygone era of great estates reveal themselves in surprising details — a leaded glass window that appears covered in a delicate lace of frost, the turned wood of white-washed railing. The rough scales of the shingle roof evoke the curved tails of the fountain’s fish. In the garden, a single blossom holds the promise of spring on its pollen-sprinkled stamen, in defiance of the winter chill.
Change of plans: Research campus to leave Menlo Park, make way for more housingJune 12, 2026 6:46 pm
