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Duncan McDuffie (September 24, 1877 – 1951) was areal estate developer,conservationist, andmountaineer based inBerkeley, California, United States.
McDuffie is best known for developing theClaremont andNorthbrae neighborhoods ofBerkeley andSt. Francis Wood district in San Francisco. His upscale developments were laid out as "residential parks," with streets following the contours of hills and underground power lines. Like many other developments at the time, his developments includedracial covenants to exclude non-whites from home ownership, and he also promotedsingle-family zoning laws to exclude non-whites.[1][2]
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McDuffie was a notable conservationist, and was president of theSierra Club from 1928 to 1931 and 1943–1946.
In 1934 McDuffie helped create theEast Bay Regional Park District in theBerkeley Hills.
McDuffie helped establish the California state park system with the help of his friend GovernorC. C. Young. He won thePugsley Medal for his service on theCalifornia State Parks Commission.
McDuffie was an accomplishedmountaineer in theSierra Nevada, and made first ascents ofMount Abbot andBlack Kaweah.
Along withJoseph N. LeConte andJames S. Hutchinson, he pioneered a high mountain route in 1908 fromYosemite National Park toKings Canyon, roughly along the route of the modernJohn Muir Trail. In 28 days, they completed a trip of 228 miles through the high mountains, including several previously unexplored sections.[3]
McDuffie suffered fromParkinson's disease for nearly 20 years before his death in 1951. The Sierra peakMount McDuffie is named after him.
Duncan McDuffie, a prominent real estate developer in Berkeley who built the Claremont Court and Uplands neighborhoods in the early 1900s, was a big champion of single-family zoning. His developments all came with racial covenants, which barred homeowners from selling or renting their homes to people of color. But he also wanted to make sure that neighborhoods next to Claremont, including Elmwood, wouldn't allow families of color to move in, because he thought it would lower property values. And he was especially worried about a Black-owned dance hall that was looking to move into the neighborhood next to his subdivision. The single-family zoning designation in Elmwood prohibited the dance hall from moving in, and it also made the neighborhood more exclusive, because developers could charge more for single-family homes than they could for duplexes or cottage apartments.
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