HERCULES: HOW DYNAMITE BUILT A CITY

About 100 years ago Hercules was a sleepy little company town on the nearly deserted banks of San Pablo Bay. Its boundaries gently sloped over grass-covered hills into valleys filled with trees and wildlife. A full day's travel southwest was the bustling city of San Francisco.

At the time, there were few homes and no highways. There was, however, the West Coast's largest explosives plant, owned and operated by California Powder Works.

The history and growth of California Powder Works is tied closely to that of Hercules. The company's first home was near Santa Cruz. That was back in 1861 and California Powder Works was making a highly explosive black powder. By the end of the decade, the company was also making dynamite in a plant further north, located in what is known today as San Francisco's Golden Gate Park. As more people moved to San Francisco, California Powder Works was forced to find a new location (there was some concern about having highly explosive materials near homes and people) and the company began buying up land on the secluded shores of San Pablo Bay.

A new plant - replacing the Santa Cruz and San Francisco facilities - was built between 1879 and 1881. California Powder Works couldn't help but influence the lives of early town's people: It employed many of them and between 1881 and 1919, 59 lives were taken by explosions - 24 in one incident.

Hercules incorporated on Dec. 14, 1900. It was largely a bid by California Powder Works to get the county Board of Supervisors to pass laws regulating the use of explosives. The name "Hercules" was the name of the first black powder explosive made by California Powder Works. The company had chosen the product's name because Hercules, a mythical Greek hero, was said to have great strength.

By 1917, during World War I, 7 million pounds of dynamite were produced every month in Hercules, making it home to the largest explosives-producing plant in the United States. The plant no longer exists. Progress and time changed its mission over the years and labor unrest finally closed the plant's successor in 1977.

Much of the property used as a buffer zone around the old plant now supplies the foundation for many of the homes in Hercules.

Today, Hercules' eight square miles are home to about 22,000 people. Still, parks and open space cover about a third of the city, and include the large 58-acre Refugio Valley Park plus 800 acres of open space and trails.