Oak Creek, San Ramon: Tom Gentry’s 1965 housing tract

Published July 12, 2026 · Last updated October 6, 2026

Oak Creek was one of Tom Gentry's early housing developments in San Ramon, built between 1965 and 1968 on former walnut orchard land along a seasonal creek. The development offered predominantly California Ranch-style homes in several sizes and designs, while its advertising emphasized the orchard setting, rustic details, and a distinctly California character.

Mapping Oak Creek

The Oak Creek tract forms part of the larger southern San Ramon neighborhood, one of the city's earliest suburban districts developed during the San Ramon Village era. Streets in this tract follow a Wyoming theme, with names such as Laramie Avenue, Cheyenne Avenue, and Butte Avenue. 

The Oak Creek housing tract by Tom Gentry occupies an area south of Pine Valley Middle School in San Ramon. Base imagery from Google Maps.

Oak Creek homes and architectural style

Oak Creek's original homes were predominantly California Ranch-style houses, reflecting the architectural character of suburban development in the mid-1960s. Tom Gentry offered several variations in size, floor plan, and exterior design.

The Oak Creek home designs

The original model homes provide a useful cross-section of Oak Creek's architecture. Tom Gentry selected four models for the 1965 opening on Cody Court, with a fifth added in 1966. Although buyers could choose among different elevations and options, these models document the versions Gentry chose to put on display.

The Walnut

This design offered approximately 1,294 square feet with 3 bedrooms and 2 bathrooms.

Original Walnut model today via Google Street View.

The Willow 

This design offered approximately 1,202 square feet with 3 bedrooms and 2 bathrooms.

Original Willow model today via Google Street View.

The Pine

This design offered approximately 1,472 square feet with 4 bedrooms and 2 bathrooms.

Original Pine model today via Google Street View.

The Oak

This design offered approximately 1,288 square feet with 3 bedrooms and 2 bathrooms.

Original Oak model today via Google Street View.

The Elm

This design offered approximately 1,288 square feet with 3 bedrooms and 2 bathrooms. Added in 1966.

November 1966 newspaper clipping for the Elm model at Oak Creek. Priced from $21,500, the Ranch-style home featured a fully gas-equipped “garden kitchen” and seamless indoor-outdoor living rooms—hallmarks of mid-’60s California suburban design.

The original Elm model is camera shy, for now.

Marketing Oak Creek

Gentry's advertising gave Oak Creek a distinct identity beyond its house plans. Newspaper advertisements repeatedly emphasized the mature walnut trees, seasonal creek, rustic architectural details, and a California setting.

Grand opening advertisement for Oak Creek, published in October 1965. The campaign introduced Tom Gentry's “Old California” theme, using rustic architecture and the model homes to establish the development's character.

The advertising paired that setting with the conveniences of a new house. Oak Creek homes featured a “Garden Room Kitchen” equipped with Caloric's Ultra-Ray broiler, while later advertisements promoted choices such as four different fireplace facades.

July 1966 advertisement for Oak Creek emphasizing the community's walnut orchard setting and natural creek.

Buyers could choose from four different fireplace designs, an unusually broad level of personalization for mid-1960s tract housing. The option reinforced Tom Gentry's emphasis on individuality within production housing from an ad dated October 8, 1967.

Together, the models and advertising show how Gentry presented production housing in the mid-1960s: standardized homes that could still offer variation, individual character, and a strong sense of place.

Oak Creek and The Orchards

After Oak Creek built out, Tom Gentry turned his attention to the adjoining The Orchards development. Developed beginning in 1968, The Orchards followed Oak Creek as the next phase of Gentry's work in southern San Ramon.

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San Ramon — the making of a suburban city

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