Updated October 2022
The William M Stephens family was a successful African American family from Oakland. They owned the Stephens Restaurant, and Virginia, their daughter, won acclaim at the age of fourteen when her name Jewel City was selected for the Panama-Pacific International Exposition buildings in a competition sponsored by the San Francisco Call-Post. Virginia was the first African American woman to receive a law degree from the University of California Berkeley’s Boalt School of Law in 1929.
Circa 1925 – photo by M.L. Cohen
Stephens Family papers, MS 5, African American Museum & Library at Oakland, Oakland Public Library. Oakland, California.
The Stephens Family
Stephens Family papers, MS 5, African American Museum & Library at Oakland, Oakland Public Library. Oakland, California
William Stephens was born in 1870 in Accomack County, Virginia. He moved out to California while still a child and attended school in Oakland and San Francisco. After graduation, Stephens completed Heald College coursework before working with the Southern Pacific Railway in 1886. Beginning as a Sleeping Car Porter, he worked his way up to a clerkship under H.E. Huntington, assistant to the company’s President.
In 1894 he lived at 1132 Linden Street in West Oakland.
In 1898, Stephens resigned from Southern Pacific and took a position with the Crocker family, traveling with them throughout the United States, Canada, and Mexico. Through these travels, Stephens learned about the hotel and restaurant business.
In 1901, he married Pauline Logan (1874-1929) of Tehama, California.
Stephens Family papers, MS 5, African American Museum & Library at Oakland, Oakland Public Library. Oakland, California.
Pauline gave birth to one daughter, Annie Virginia (who went by Virginia), on April 7, 1903. Due to his daughter’s health problems as a young girl, Stephens resigned from his post with the Crockers and began working at an Oakland social club. He moved on from this position in 1915 to manage the clubhouse at the Hotel Del Monte Golf and Country Club in Monterey County.
Pauline died in May 1929.
William died on November 21, 1932
Stephens’ Restaurant
Stephens worked at the Del Monte Hotel for about nine years. It was there he learned more about the restaurant business. His first venture was known as the Joy Lunch Room. From his very first business, he was successful, and in 1927 the old Joy Lunch became known as Stephens Restaurant.
Stephens Family papers, MS 5, African American Museum & Library at Oakland, Oakland Public Library. Oakland, California
The restaurant soon became the dining rendezvous of the ultra-fashionable folk of the city and gave lucrative employment to young African American men and women.
Stephens’ Restaurant grew from small quarters into an ample establishment seating over 200 people, occupying three locations near Lake Merritt.
Stephens Family papers, MS 5, African American Museum & Library at Oakland, Oakland Public Library. Oakland, California.
The restaurant enjoyed great success during the 1920s and 1930s and was usually filled to capacity. Stephens took great delight in employing African American high school and college students so they could earn money for their education.
The final location of the restaurant was 200 East 14th (now International Blvd) at 2nd Ave and was in business until 1938 when Narcisi’s Italian Restaurant opened.
Stephens Cocktail Lounge
In 1936 it was announced that the restaurant added a cocktail lounge and was under the management of George Devant and Charles Simpson (Stephens’s nephew.) Charles inherited the recipes that made the restaurant famous.
Known to gourmets for years as the
“home of real Southern cooking”
Oakland Tribune Mar 27, 1936
Virginia Stephens
Born in Oakland on April 7, 1903, Annie Virginia Stephens was the only child of William and Paul. She attended public schools in Oakland until the family moved to Pacific Grove, where she graduated from high school.
In 1915 the San Francisco Call-Post held a naming contest for the buildings within the Panama-Pacific International Exposition – Virginia won the competition (1300 titles were submitted) when her name “Jewel City” was selected; she was twelve at the time.
“We regret to say that when it was discovered that Miss Stephens had colored blood there was a sudden silence on the part of the press and the recognition ever given her was a season ticket to the grounds.”
The Crisis, Vol. 11 pg 36, No. 1
College
Virginia attended the University of California at Berkeley and received a bachelor’s degree in science in 1924.
While at Berkeley, Virginia and Ida L. Jackson was charter members Rho Chapter in 1921 and Alpha Nu Omega, a graduate chapter of Alpha Kappa Alpha. These were among the first Greek sororities for African American women west of the Mississippi.
African American Museum and Library at Oakland.
Encouraged by her father to attend law school, she enrolled in the Boalt School of Law at UC Berkeley and earned a degree in 19 9. At that time, she was only the second woman to receive a law degree from the school and the first African American woman to complete the progr m. Virginia passed the California Bar in the same year, the first African American female Attorney in California.
Virginia married attorney George Coker (1906-1970) The Cokers helped tutor African American students for the State bar exams They moved to Virginia and maintained a private law practice there for almost a decade.
In 1939 after working in private practice for ten years, they moved back to California, settling in Sacramento. Virginia was appointed Attorney in the State Office of the Legislature Council in Sacramento in May 1939 In this capacity, she helped with drafting and amending legislative bills and worked under four different legislative councils:
Upon her retirement in 1966, Virginia attained the position of Deputy of the Indexing Section Virginia died in Sacramento at 83 on February 11, 1986.
More:
- Guide to the Stephens Family Papers – Online Archive of California
- Menu from the Stephens Restaurant – Oakland Public Library
- Virginia Stephens Coker – The Black Past
- Letter re Jewel City – November 16, 1915
- Activities Among Negroes – Oakland Tribune May 18, 1924
- Admitted to the Bar – Oakland Tribune September 13, 1929
- Large Volume of Business At Restaurant – Oakland Tribune October 19, 1930
- Stephans’ Expects Capacity – Oakland Tribune December 30, 1935
- Annie Virginia Stephens Coker – WordPress
- Annie Coker: A pioneer California lawyer –
Thank you so much for an excellent job. I truly enjoyed your post. At 92 I don’t get out much to actually view the sites as much as I would like, so much of what I write is going to be from memory, conversations with old friends and the internet. Oakland has a great history and I believe a great future. Keep up the good work. ME
This page is great, good research, thank you. I’ve linked to it from a newly transcribed article, here: https://oaklandwiki.org/Activities_Among_Negroes/Sun%2C_May_18%2C_1924 – Morgan
By the way, Delilah L. Beasley writes, on September 16,1923:
“Attorney Myrtle B. Anderson, native daughter, has the distinction of being the first California negro woman to be admitted to the bar. She was recently admitted in the state of New York. She has returned to California, and is making a lecture tour on “The Spoiled Children of Civilization.” Miss Nanna Burroughs, founder of the National Training School for Negro Women, is touring the state on a lecture platform. She has an international reputation as an orator.”
https://oaklandwiki.org/Activities_Among_Negroes/Sun%2C_Sep_16%2C_1923
According to the book Emancipation: The Making of the Black Lawyer, 1844-1944. Myrtle B Anderson wasn’t admitted to the bar until 1933 https://books.google.com/books?id=1lOIjQUG4aoC&lpg=PA490&dq=%22Myrtle%20B.%20Anderson%22%20bar&pg=PA490#v=onepage&q=%22Myrtle%20B.%20Anderson%22%20bar&f=false
Thank you for this. Even though it was a disgusting sign of the times, I seethe over the failure to recognize Virginia’s contribution to the Panama Pacific Exhibition because she was Black. Their great-great grandchildren are still at it.
Virginia Coker (as I knew her as a child) and her husband, George Coker, lived next door to my family home on 41st Street in Sacramento when we lived there (1953-1957). They were my parent’s best friends. We called them Aunt Virginia and Uncle George. I never forgot them all these years and always wondered what happened to them after we lost touch (around 1963) when my dad died. I remember much about the Cokers. They were always so good to us. I just found this on the internet and I had no idea that Virginia was so famous (they never told us anything about their past life). Virginia kept some family items in a glass case that were from the 1906 earthquake/fire in San Francisco (she might have said they came from her aunt’s house during the fire). I always felt that she was “aristocracy”. I knew that she work in something “legal” at the Capitol and that George also worked at the Capitol. How much does a 6 to 10 year old kid pay attention to details. I have photos of George (my dad was always taking family photos and George came out and was in our family photos – usually taken at Easter when everyone was all dressed up). I don’t remember Virginia going out much. I visited her inside her house. George also occasionally drove us kids in his Cadillac convertible to south Sacramento to visit some people he knew (maybe relatives) who lived in a rural area. I remember George put the top down on the Cadillac and drove it up to 100 mph. I thought that was so thrilling. I had no idea Virginia had accomplished so much in her life. I am thrilled to find her story and the story of her family and their businesses on the internet. I have a letter from Virginia from when my dad died and I still cherish it. She was a very fine lady. George was a fun man. We moved to Oakland in 1957 and I became an “Oakland” girl. How thrilling to find out about the Stephen’s family life and businesses in Oakland. Wish I had known more about them when I grew up.
It tickles me when I am able to connect someone with their history or someone they knew. I don’t understand why we weren’t taught about families like the Stephen’s family in school, especially here in Oakland. They were truly a special family.