This building memorializes the contributions of the Abbey Land and Improvement Company to the developement of Colma. The company established Mount Olivet Memorial Park,the fifth cemetery to be built in Colma, and constructed a streetcar line along the main electric railway at El Camino Real to their office and cemetery. The Mission Revival style office was designed by the corporation's vice president, San Francisco architect William H. Crim. The square tower at the southeast corner of the building marks the original entry to the Mount Olivet Cemetery office and the arcade served as the boarding area for the electric railway. The bell in the courtyard once hung in the building tower. Cypress Abbey Company donated the building to the town.

This bell used to hang in the tower of what is now the museum building. It was rung to signal workers of an approaching funeral. Upon hearing the bell the workers would change into their uniforms and participate in the handling of the burial services. Almost all of the cemeteries has such a bell.

Old Colma Railroad Station Depot Building Circa 1863

In 1870, Southern Pacific railroad assumed ownership of the San Francisco and San Jose railroad,which had originally been opened as an independent railroad in 1863. The second stop south of San Francisco, in what then was the center of the larger northern San Mateo County area historically known as Colma was called the Schoolhouse stop. The name for the station came from the nearby one room schoolhouse on San Pedro Road, the most recognizable landmark in the rural landscape at the time. Schoolhouse stop was one of the twenty-one stops built between San Francisco and San Jose. In 1863-1865, Southern Pacific constructed the passenger depot adjacent to the Schoolhouse stop. The passenger depot was necessary to shelter passengers. The station was where the farmers and teamsters stopped enroute to San Francisco.

This building, located in the Historical Park, is a reproduction of a blacksmith shop.  The Blacksmith was frequently the local Jack-of-all-Trades working with metal fittings and equipment pertaining to trains, farming, gun making and in the later years, automobiles.  Blacksmiths could also be skilled in woodworking and were frequently the wagon makers in their community.  The essential features of a blacksmith shop include a forge, bellows, anvil, quenching tub, metal-forming tools and a workbench with a vice.  Here in Colma each monument company had its own blacksmith shop.  The making of chisels and keeping them sharp was a never-ending job related to the lettering on monuments.