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2010-04-14T11:47:00.001-07:00

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1000 - The End of FogBay

2009-05-14T08:37:00.000-07:00

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The End of FogBay
I will end FogBay the way I began it, with a photo of the Golden Gate Bridge. It is remarkable to think that after its construction in 1937, many locals thought the bridge to be an eyesore. It was San Francisco photographer Ansel Adams who helped change public opinion when he announced that he felt the bridge actually enhanced the Golden Gate landscape. The story of a local photographer helping others to see the beauty of the San Francisco Bay seems a fitting way with which to conclude FogBay.

- - - - -

Personal Note:
During the one thousand posts to this site, I've featured a lot of the remarkable things that make the Bay Area a wonderful place to experience. I hope you take the time to visit the ARCHIVES link at the bottom of each page and view some of those past posts.

FogBay has been very rewarding to research, shoot and assemble. It has taught me a lot about photography and given me a deeper appreciation of the Bay Area. Although there are easily another thousand interesting posts to be written about San Francisco, after four years I'm ready to move on and try new things with my photography.

To this end I've started FogPhoto.com, a new photoblog which will allow me to be a little more creative in my photography without the constraint of attempting to illuminate a story. I've got a lot of exciting plans for FogPhoto and its wider format means that I may even turn my camera horizontally once in a while.

I would like to thank all the FogBay readers who took the time to write in, offer their generous support, and provide their insights. I will truly miss reading your comments. I hope you'll find the time visit me at FogPhoto occasionally.

Best wishes and thank you,

999 - 'Sunny' Days in San Francisco

2009-05-13T13:29:00.000-07:00

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'Sunny' Days in San Francisco
In 1911 San Francisco was in shambles, not only from the great earthquake and fire, but from years of graft and corruption by Major Eugene Schmitz and his string-pulling, party boss Abraham Ruef. Into the ruins stepped a remarkable man, James 'Sunny Jim' Rolph, who would eventually serve five consecutive terms as mayor and leave as San Francisco's most beloved political figure. Sunny Jim, later called 'The Mayor of All the People' was born in the Mission District, made his fortune in the shipping business, and gained popularity as the head of the post-earthquake relief committee.

Sunny Jim had a flair for the dramatic, always wearing cowboy boots, a black cutaway jacket, a black pearl in his cravat, and a carnation in his lapel. In many ways his cheery personality mirrored the live-and-let-live city. His good-natured administration took a relaxed stance on the city's tradition of vice. Prohibition enforcement wasn't a priority and his campaign promise to 'clean up' the brothels meant compulsory medical checks every four days rather than shutdown. When Communists protested City Hall, he invited them in for a chat instead of calling the police to club them down like in other cities.

Under his administration San Francisco rebuilt and blossomed, the Municipal Railway was started, work began on the city's Hetch Hetchy water system, and the Pan-Pacific Exposition was held. But his most proud achievement was the construction of a stunning new City Hall, 30 feet taller than the U.S. Capitol. Sunny Jim Rolph's governing philosophy was best summed up by his quote, "You must think of the city as your best girl and treat her well."
[ MAP B-13 ]

998 - Tessie Wall's Townhouse, Powell Street

2009-05-12T13:55:00.000-07:00

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Tessie Wall's Townhouse, Powell Street
During the early 1900s Tessie Wall was San Francisco's most famous madam. Born in San Francisco, Tessie a former dancing girl, was already well known for having out-drank boxing champion John L. Sullivan when she opened her first "lodging house" on O'Farrell Street in 1898. Successful from the start, Tessie opened a second high-class establishment on Larkin Street after the earthquake of 1906. It was then that Tessie met Frank Daroux, a Republican state political boss who quietly ran a number of gambling parlors and pool halls. The two fell in love and married in a secret civil ceremony in Philadelphia to protect Frank's public political reputation.

Tessie's wealth allowed her to indulge in her passion, buying antiques. She bought gilded oil paintings, a Napoleon bed, dinner service designed for William Rockefeller, and european draperies from the Spreckles mansion, She also became famous for every year buying hundreds of tickets to the Policemen's Ball and becoming the unofficial queen of the annual events. Wearing a diamond tiara, she would slam hundreds of dollars on the bar and yell, "Drink that up boys! Have a drink on Tessie!"

In 1917 Frank sued for divorce citing long quarrels and Tessie's unwillingness to give up her businesses and move away with him. Heartbroken, Tessie tried to stab herself with a carving knife and then unsuccessfully attempted to patch up their relationship. After a wild, public divorce trial Frank was finally granted his request by a judge. A few months later Tessie spotted Frank coming out of the St. Francis Hotel with a woman on his arm, Tessie ran up and begged him to return to her. Frank refused, turned away, and Tessie shot him three times with a revolver. As she was arrested she famously cried, "I shot him 'cuz I love him, damn him!"

Frank survived the attack, refused to prosecute his ex-wife, and eventually moved to the east. Tessie sold her businesses for a small fortune and retired to this townhouse, filled with her antiques and numerous portraits of Frank. Tessie's last public appearance was at the Policemen's ball in 1932. She appeared in a high blonde wig, a flowing white satin gown and wearing all the diamonds that she owned. She died a month later at the age of 63, still in love with Frank.
[ MAP G-15 ]

997 - Steaming in at High Tide

2009-05-11T18:03:00.000-07:00

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Steaming in at High Tide
On the California coast the Pacific Ocean rises and falls twice a day. Funneling through the Golden Gate, the rising tide fans out eight miles to the farthest parts of the Bay where it piles up in the narrower and shallower areas. Therefore the Bay's surface is never level. A boat passing under the bridge at high tide and reaching the southern end of the Bay two hours later would travel uphill four feet. By which time the tide at the bridge might have begun to ebb and the difference in the elevations might be as much as seven feet.

A high tide passing under the bridge will reach Alcatraz in ten minutes, the Ferry Building twenty minutes later, and Richmond ten minutes after that. Finally the delta port of Stockton will receive that same high tide six and a half hours after it passed the Golden Gate. Conversely, one sixth of the Bay flows out of the Golden Gate on the ebb tide. As the tide reverses itself every six hours, its flow accelerates from zero at slack water to a maximum tide crest of 4,600,000 second-feet, which is about seven times the flow of the Mississippi River at its mouth.
[ MAP B-7 ]

996 - Steam Train, Niles Canyon

2009-05-10T00:04:00.000-07:00

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Steam Train, Niles Canyon
Shown above is one of the steam engines of the Niles Canyon Railway. In the 1910s, Niles Canyon was the center of American film-making long before anyone had heard of Hollywood. Niles Canyon was the location for films by Wallace Berry, Chester Conklin, Bronco Billy, and Ben Turpin. Charlie Chaplin made many movies here including his masterpiece, The Tramp. Over 300 westerns were shot here.

After statehood in 1850, Californians were eager to link San Francisco with the rest of the country via rail. The federal government became enthused with the idea in 1861 when the silver riches of the Comstock Lode were needed to help finance the Civil War. So in 1862, the Central Pacific Railway began building eastward from California while the Union Pacific began building westward from Omaha. The government agreed to pay $16,000 to $48,000 for every mile of track laid and soon the two railroad companies were in fierce competition.

At first, things went slowly for the Central Pacific. Working against the western slopes of the Sierras, they only laid 50 miles in two years. One problem was the mostly Irish immigrant workers, only one in ten of them lasted more than a week in the harsh conditions. As an experiment, the railroad hired 50 Chinese workers. They proved to be such hard workers that immediately thousands more were imported directly from China to work on the railroad. Unlike the white workers, the Chinese provided their own food of rice, vegetables, and tea. This proved a much healthier diet and avoided the scurvy that had plagued the other workers.

By 1869 12,000 Chinese were working on the railroad and their hard work meant the Central Pacific gained 500 miles (and millions of dollars) more than originally planned. By the time they met the Union Pacific on the Great Salt Lake Basin, the Chinese workers had bored 18 tunnels of at least 1,000 feet long. Right at the end, the Chinese laborers laid more than ten miles of track in less than 12 hours, a record never broken. Despite their efforts, the Chinese were not allowed to attend the Golden Spike ceremony at Promontory Point.

[ MAP N-17 ]

995 - The Great Sand Waste of the Outside Lands

2009-05-07T13:04:00.000-07:00

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The Great Sand Waste of the Outside Lands
Prior to the 1860s, the western two-thirds of San Francisco, the 'Outside Lands', was only sand dunes and coastal scrub. The undesirable land had no level ground and was covered in ever-shifting dunes, some more than 100 feet tall. However the growing city needed land, so local developers began to employ huge steam shovels to level the sand hills and fill in the extensive tidal marshes. By 1864 the area had it's first toll road, Geary Blvd, extending from the city, seven miles west, to the ocean.

At first the area attracted only businesses that required lots of cheap land like race tracks, cemeteries, dairy farms, and orphanages. But eventually the road prompted many downtown residents to move out and settle along the road. Within a few years there were 3,000 residents and local boosters, hoping to attract more homeowners, renamed one area 'The Sunset' and another 'The Richmond' due to its perceived similarity to Richmond, Australia.

Soon prestigious neighborhoods were also being developed, such as Presidio Terrace, Lake Street, Sea Cliff, and Presidio Heights (photo above). By the turn of the century the reclaimed area, highlighted by the lush, expansive Golden Gate Park, had been transformed from barren sand dunes into a series of residential neighborhoods with trees, lawns, parks, and landscaped hills. The former Outside Lands were no longer recognizable as the Great Sand Waste.
[ MAP F-10 ]

994 - The Ghost Fleet, Suisun Bay

2009-05-06T17:59:00.000-07:00

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The Ghost Fleet, Suisun Bay
Appearing like a gray metallic forest in the distance, the Ghost Fleet of Suisun Bay, about 20 miles northeast of San Francisco, is the mothballed National Defense Reserve Fleet. First established in 1946, the fleet grew over 300 ships by 1955 and today still numbers over 70 vessels. In theory, the laid-up ships can be ready for active duty in 20 to 120 days. In practice, the mostly useless, rotting ships and their weapons are obsolete and present a rusting, toxic danger to Suisun Bay.

For decades local environmentalists have been pressing the military to come up with a solution to the pollution coming from the ships. A 2007 study found that nearly 20 tons of toxic metals like lead, zinc and copper have flaked off the fleet's paint. In addition, the tightly tethered fleet costs $5 million a year to maintain. Unfortunately no solution or timetable has been put forward by the government for dealing with the gray giants.

Most famous among the Ghost Fleet is the historic battleship, USS Iowa, known as 'The Big Stick' it was the lead ship in her battle class, earning nine battle stars during World War II and two during the Korean War. It has been proposed that the USS Iowa become a floating 900-foot museum to be harbored permanently off San Francisco's waterfront. But it is unlikely that anything will happen to the fleet for years to come.

[ MAP G-14 ]

993 - The Pan-Pacific Exposition of 1915

2009-05-05T18:02:00.000-07:00

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The Pan-Pacific Exposition of 1915
To celebrate the completion of the Panama Canal, the U.S decided to host an exposition in 1915. San Francisco was chosen as the site over the rival cities of Baltimore, Washington, D.C., Boston, San Diego, and New Orleans. The Pan-Pacific Exposition was important to the city not only because the canal shaved 7,872 miles of New York to San Francisco ocean travel, but as a chance to showcase a city rebuilt after the earthquake of 1906.

The Exposition's grounds covered a massive 635 acres, over 67 city blocks on San Francisco's northern waterfront. The Exposition featured eleven exhibit halls (for a few years I lived on the spot that once held the the Horticulture Palace) plus the 43-story Tower of Jewels, hung with over 102,000 pieces of hanging cut glass and backed by mirrors. Dozens of foreign countries also built palaces showcasing their exotic foods, customs, and arts. In addition, each of the 48 states had their own pavilion. Oregon built a Parthenon out of Redwood trees, Philadelphia sent the Liberty Bell, and Virginia reproduced Mount Vernon.

The amusement park feature the Aeroscope, a huge structure resembling the Eiffel Tower, that carried 118 passengers at a time to a height of 330 feet. Overhead, biplanes performed acrobatics and below, a racetrack featured Kentucky thoroughbreds. There was a five-acre simulation of the Panama Canal and the Scintillator, a barge that floated out in the San Francisco Bay, packed with 48 beaming searchlights, that projected seven colors of light up into sky.

The Pan-Pacific Exposition lasted nearly 11 months and with much regret was closed in December of 1915. The only remaining buildings from the Exposition are architect Bernard Maybeck's Palace of Fine Arts and rotunda, shown above. The Palace housed 11,400 paintings and sculptures of then living artists. These structures have since been rebuilt to a more permanent construction.
[ MAP E-10 ]

992 - Filoli Mansion and Gardens, Woodside

2009-05-04T22:58:00.000-07:00

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Filoli Mansion and Gardens, Woodside
The beautiful 654-acre Filoli mansion and gardens may look familiar to you. That's because you've been seeing it for years. It has been featured in a dozen of films such as Heaven Can Wait, The Joy Luck Club, The Game, and The Wedding Planner. You might also recognize it as Blake Carrington's mansion in ABC's Dynasty television show. It was here that famous fight between Joan Collins as Alexis and Lynda Evans as Crystal, ended in the garden's lily pond.

The actual history of the Filoli Estate begins in 1915 when architect Willis Polk designed the Georgian style house as a country estate for William Bourn, a gold magnate. The name came from a shorten version of Bourn's credo, 'FIght for a just cause, LOve your fellow man, LIve a good life.' Bourn and his wife resided here until their deaths in 1936.

The estate and its vast property including 16 acres of formal gardens were acquired by Mr. and Mrs. William Roth in 1937. Mrs, Roth lived here until 1975 when she donated 125 acres, including the house and the formal gardens, to the National Trust for Historic Preservation. Today the Filoli estate and the beautiful formal gardens are open to public for viewing and are available for special events.

MORE FILOLI PHOTOS

[ MAP Q-12 ]

991 - Italian Pastries on Columbus Avenue, North Beach

2009-05-03T17:48:00.000-07:00

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Italian Pastries on Columbus Avenue, North Beach
Where would you rather be on a Saturday morning than on a sidewalk cafe table in North Beach? Early on, the Bay Area was nicknamed "New World Italy" due to the similarity in its temperate climate, golden hills, and rich soil. The city attracted many immigrants from northwestern Italy. The first to settle in San Francisco were traders from the port city of Genoa followed by others from Tuscany. As a culturally-strong community, the Italians tended to remain to themselves rather than assimilate into the rest of San Francisco society.

Although united by a common language, the immigrant Italians here were actually divided into distinct regional and often rival groups. The rural Ligurians turned to farming, implementing widespread irrigation. They were responsible for turning much of San Francisco's sandy land into lush and fertile gardens of spinach, cauliflower, broccoli, fava beans, radishes and artichokes. The business-minded Tuscans ran the fruit and vegetable markets as well as boarding houses and stables. The coastal Genoese and Sicilians operated the city's fishing fleets.

By the early 1900s the Italian community was so well established in North Beach that city renamed the district's 80-foot wide boulevard from Montgomery Avenue to Columbus Avenue, recognizing and honoring the Italian community. However, up until the 1940s most residents of North Beach still only spoke Italian. It wasn't until Mussolini's fascist aggression during World War II that the Italian community broke its self-imposed isolation and embraced a more American identity.
[ MAP E-14 ]

990 - Your Next Car, Waiting at Port of Richmond

2009-04-30T09:47:00.000-07:00

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Your Next Car, Waiting at Port of Richmond
After six test drives and researching a dozen websites, you've finally decided on the Toyota Camry Hybrid in Sky Blue Pearl with the navigation package. You shake hands at the dealership or accept one of the online quotes from Edmunds.com. So what happens next? Chances are, your car arrives with hundreds of others aboard an enormous automotive cargo ship at Port of Richmond, one of the largest seaports in America. The Port of Richmond's 18 terminals receive up to 23 million tons of goods annually. Along with vehicles, the majority of the cargo is oil and other petroleum products.

Like a trail of ants, the cars are driven out of the ship's vast cargo hold by an army of dockworkers and your Camry is parked in an assigned spot dockside with thousands of others awaiting transport. The Port of Richmond is served by a vast rail network operated by four major rail companies including the Union Pacific Railroad and the Richmond Pacific Railroad. Your new car is then loaded, three-high, into automotive train cars and shipped to a depot near your dealership where it is cleaned and prepped. It is there that you pick up your new car, look at the invoice, and quietly decide that the 'destination charge' is a big scam.

[ MAP J-11 ]

989 - Elephant Seals, Chimney Rock Beach

2009-04-29T09:56:00.000-07:00

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Elephant Seals, Chimney Rock Beach
Winter along San Francisco's coast brings the opportunity to see the migration of hundreds of giant Gray Whales. However, another lesser-known wildlife viewing opportunity in winter is the Elephant Seal breeding colony on a beach below Chimney Rock on Drake's Bay. Elephant Seals can reach 16 feet in length and weigh in excess of three tons. The sound of trumpeting males (bulls) can heard a mile away.

The bulls arrive first in December and stake out a location on the beach. They are then followed by the pregnant females who eventually give birth to a single pup. Elephant Seals spend 80 percent of their lives in water and are able their breath underwater for over two hours, making the birthing period one of the few extended periods they are on land. By March the breeding pairs are gone, leaving behind some smaller, younger Elephant Seals on the beach.

Tomales Point, not far from Chimney Rock, is home to another wildlife species. There, a herd of hundreds of Tule Elk freely roam 2,600 acres of open grassland and coastal scrub. The Tule Elk, once virtually extinct, are shown here having lost their seasonal antlers. Both the Elephant Seals and the Tule Elk can be viewed in the Point Reyes National Seashore, about 25 miles north of San Francisco.

[ MAP I-5 ]

988 - Critical Mass, Market Street

2009-04-28T17:59:00.000-07:00

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FOGBAY STORY UPDATE:
In November, FogBay posted on the Princess Taiping, a small Chinese junk of 600-year old design, and her attempt to sail from China to San Francisco and back again. Last night the vessel's attempt was ended, just hours before completion of the 17,000 mile voyage, when a huge freighter collided with the junk, cutting it in two and sinking her near Taiwan. All 11 crew members were rescued and treated for hypothermia.

Critical Mass, Market Street
Love it or hate it, Critical Mass is a force that can't be ignored in over 325 cities, around the world today. The grass-roots movement started on September 25, 1992 in San Francisco by a few dozen bicyclists attempting a 'Commute Clot' to take back the streets from cars. The political-protest rides grew in size and soon a thousand or more bicyclists were joining the monthly rides. It is hard to capture in photos the size of Critical Mass as it takes quite a while for all the riders to pass any given spot.

One of the purposes of the event is to shutdown motorized traffic and take over the streets. The name 'Critical Mass', was coined as car traffic would be stopped at intersections while the huge mass of bike riders would pass through. Nearly every San Francisco driver has sat at an intersection on a Friday night while hundreds and hundreds of raucous bicycles whiz by ignoring traffic lights and right-of-way rules.

Critical Mass is spontaneously organized with no membership, leadership or predetermined route, this is just one of the concerns that authorities have while trying to coordinate safety. Some see the event as a pure celebration of freedom and a protest against global warming, while others view it as a confrontational takeover of the streets by mob rule. However you feel about Critical Mass, it has struck a common note and spread worldwide. One Critical Mass ride in Budapest, Hungary in April of last year attracted over 80,000 bicyclists.

MORE CRITICAL MASS PHOTOS

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987 - Islias Creek Channel, Bayview

2009-04-27T18:02:00.000-07:00

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Islias Creek Channel, Bayview
Driving south along San Francisco's waterfront near the Bayview district, you'll cross over a rundown industrial channel. What most don't realize is that the short waterway is all that remains of of Isias Creek, once, the largest body of water in San Francisco, covering nearly 5,000 acres. Hundreds of years ago Ohlone Indians harvested wild cherries, mussels, clams, and shrimp on its shores which ran from the Bay all the way to the southern slopes of Twin Peaks, four miles away. Later, Islais Creek provided fresh water to the friars of Mission Dolores and irrigation to the settlers of early San Francisco.

Unfortunately the Gold Rush was hard on the creek as the dozens of Butchertown slaughterhouses located here dumped their offal and garbage into the waterway. Following the 1906 earthquake, the city voted to cover 90% of the creek with earthquake debris, reducing it to a culvert running underground from here to Glen Park in the city's center. The remainder was turned into an industrial shipping channel. Over the coming years the channel became home to the largest copra coconut processing plant in the U.S. as well as the largest sardine canning industry in the world.

Today, the processing plants are gone and local civic groups such as Friends of Islais Creek are working to improve the condition of the creek and nearby areas. Working with groups such as the Sierra Club, Friends of the Urban Forest, and the Port of San Francisco, the area has started to improve. Recently the Hawaiian Outrigger Canoe Club announced they were moving to the channel and there are plans to build parks, boat docks, and a promenade. Fittingly, a museum and wildlife sanctuary named for the creek's original inhabitants, the Ohlone, is also being built.
[ MAP M-16 ]

986 - Opening Day on the Bay

2009-04-26T18:00:00.000-07:00

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Opening Day on the Bay
For part of San Francisco's social society, 'Opening Day' doesn't mean the start of the Giant's baseball season, instead it means the official opening of the sailing season on San Francisco Bay. Sunday was Opening Day on the Bay, an opportunity to put on white pants, a blue blazer, and invite friends aboard your yacht to cruise and to toast good fortune. This tradition dates back to 1917 and is organized every year by the Pacific Inter-Club Yacht Association on the last Sunday in April. Opening Day on the Bay is kicked off with the blessing of the fleet at the Corinthian Yacht Club, the second oldest yacht club in America, followed by a parade of ships, many decorated and adorned with flapping flags and streamers.

MORE OPENING DAY PHOTOS

[ MAP C-11 ]

985 - Angel Island Immigration Station

2009-04-23T17:41:00.000-07:00

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Angel Island Immigration Station
Angel Island in San Francisco Bay has been called the 'Ellis Island of the West' because here, between 1910 and 1940, nearly one million immigrants passed through, or were denied access to, America. Japanese, Korean, Filipino, Indian, and Chinese immigrants were questioned, inspected, and processed here at the immigration station. These include an estimated 19,000 Japanese Picture Brides. Due to anti-immigration exclusion acts, over 175,000 immigrants, mostly Chinese, were detained here for months or even years.

As a military base from 1850 to 1946, the beautiful one-mile-square island has had a long history of forced confinement. It served as a prison for Native Americans, a detention center for enemy aliens during World War I, a quarantine station for smallpox victims, and an internment camp during World War II. Now owned by the Park Service, the immigrantion station has recently reopened after a $16-million refurbishment. Pictured above is the island's fog warning bell, one of the detention barracks, and a monument installed in 1979 to commemorate the achievements the Chinese immigrants made to America.
[ MAP J-11 ]

984 - The Outdoor Exploratorium, Fort Mason

2009-04-22T18:10:00.000-07:00

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The Outdoor Exploratorium, Fort Mason
In March, San Francisco's 40-year old Exploratorium opened 19 new exhibits outdoors at Fort Mason. The array of outdoor structures and instruments are placed in various locations on the Fort's piers and lure passers-by to conduct their own observations of the san Francisco Bay. The installations include a sky mirror, wind arrows, and examinations of corrosion and barnacles. One device focused on the Golden Gate Bridge, uses GPS to record slight motions of the structure as it expands and contracts in various temperatures. These movement, of up to 16 feet, can be observed hour-by-hour using the Exploratorium's pier side telescopic instrument.

However a bigger move for the Exploratorium may yet come. Under a current plan, the museum could move from the Palace of Fine Arts where it has been since 1969 to a new larger home on Piers 15-17 along San Francisco's waterfront. This $175 million plan would triple the space the museum now has and is expected to increase attendance by 200,000. If approved by port officials and the Board of Supervisors the new Exploratorium could be done as early as 2012.

MORE OUTDOOR EXPLORATORIUM PHOTOS

[ MAP E-12 ]

983 - iFly, Vertical Wind Tunnel

2009-04-21T00:04:00.000-07:00

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iFly, Vertical Wind Tunnel
If you're like me and you're always looking for ways to recreate scenes from the greatest movie ever, Point Break, you might want to visit iFly in Union City. iFly is a vertical wind tunnel facility that allows visitors to experience the sensation of body flight without an airplane or parachute. The 120-150 mph wind tunnel provides enough propulsion to lift 'jumpers' 25 feet off the deck, where they execute flips, somersaults, or just hover. iFly provides pre-flight training and safety classes, gear, and an in-tunnel instructor for first time customers. Prices start at $49 per hour and iFly is open to people aged 5 to 105.

MORE IFLY PHOTOS

[ MAP N-16 ]

982 - The Hidden Beauty of Cayuga Park

2009-04-20T00:06:00.000-07:00

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The Hidden Beauty of Cayuga Park
Cayuga Park is the most charming San Francisco park that you've never seen. In 1986 it was a dilapidated, overgrown park on a dead-end street in San Francisco's Excelsior District. The 11-acre park sat nearly unused while overhead BART trains noisily rumbled by. It was then that the parks department assigned former-lawyer turned gardener, Demi Braceros to tend to the park. Braceros took on the challenge to make 'something beautiful' out of the forgotten park. He spent the first year carting away wheelbarrows full of trash and weeds. Braceros then fixed the park's drainage problems, terraced the hillsides, and created some walking pathways.

But the most unusual addition to the park were the hundreds of hand-sculpted statues, created by Braceros, that hide in the park's lush gardens and pathways. Using a chisel and chainsaw, Braceros, who emigrated to San Francisco from the Phillipines in 1973, created all the art himself. His sculptures range from spiritual to inspirational to local flavor to just plain fun. The park contains totems of Barry Bonds, Willie Brown, Herb Caen, John Lennon, Michael Jordan and Princess Diana. Beside the sculptures, the park has a playground, basketball and tennis courts, a large playing field, and three networks of pathways around the perimeter of the field.

MORE CAYUGA PARK PHOTOS

[ MAP R-9 ]

981 - Tesla Motors, Menlo Park

2009-04-19T18:03:00.000-07:00

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Tesla Motors, Menlo Park
Silicon Valley might become the new Motor City. Shown above is the Tesla Motors showroom in Menlo Park. Tesla, a San Francisco Bay Area start up, is building pure electric cars that score as high in performance and looks as they do in environmental friendliness. The Tesla Roadster Sport goes from 0 to 60 in a neck-snapping 3.7 seconds with a top speed of 125 mph and 288 horsepower. Not bad for a zero-emission vehicle, huh? The body is hand crafted carbon fiber and, as a fully electric vehicle, it needs only a single speed gearbox.

The Tesla is powered by a microprocessor-controlled lithium-ion battery pack with over 100,000 mile lifecycle which can travel nearly 250 miles without a charge. To fully recharge the battery takes only 3.5 hours, with partial cycles being faster. The $109k roadster is Tesla's first model but in the spring of 2011 the company is launching a sport sedan to be priced at only $49K with a 300-mile range and only a 45-minute recharge. So sell your old hybrid Prius, the Tesla is faster, sexier, and far more green.

MORE TESLA PHOTOS

[ MAP Q-14 ]

980 - Taking in the Views, Land's End Trail

2009-04-16T10:01:00.000-07:00

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Taking in the Views, Land's End Trail
Perhaps the most beautiful hike in San Francisco is the Land's End Trail, a segment of the city's longer Coastal Trail. The Land's End Trail connects two of the Golden Gate's most popular landmarks: the Cliff's House and the Legion of Honor. The 3.5 mile roundtrip trail offers high cliff top paths through cypress trees and 30-mile views down the California coast. The westernmost promontory on the trail is Point Lobos, named for the sea lions that live there.

In the 1880s, locals would pay a nickel for a ride along these cliffs in an open-air railroad carriage. Today only hikers and dogs on leashes can take in the views. The area's wild dramatic and rocky coast was also the site of a dozens of shipwrecks. Remains of three ships, Ohioon, Lyman Stewart, and the Frank Buck are still visible. Other sites along the trail include the USS San Francisco memorial, the Sutro Baths ruins, and the gun batteries of West Fort Miley. Pictured above is a rock labyrinth laid out above Mile Rock Beach.
[ MAP G-4 to A-2 ]

979 - The Long Now Foundation, Fort Mason

2009-04-15T18:01:00.000-07:00

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The Long Now Foundation, Fort Mason
The Long Now Foundation was established in '01996' to develop projects that provide an alternative to today's faster and cheaper mind set and promote slower and better thinking. They hope to creatively foster responsibility in the framework of the next 10,000 years. The name of the organization was coined by one of their founding board members, musician Brian Eno.

Among their projects is the creation of a 10,000 year all-mechanical clock. The top photo is of the Orrey, a mechanical planetary display for the 10,000 year clock. The lower photo is of the Chime Generator which mechanically creates a progressive algorithm that generates a different bell ringing order for each day over the next 10,000 years.

Other projects by the Long Now Foundation include the Rosetta Project which is building an archive of all documented human languages. The foundation also offers seminars in long-term thinking by other board members including well-known technologists such as Stewart Brand, Esther Dyson, Mitchell Kapor, and Danny Hillis. The Long Now Foundation projects are available for viewing at Fort Mason and are free to the public.
[ MAP E-11 ]

978 - Sunday Night Seisiún at The Plough and the Stars

2009-04-14T10:00:00.000-07:00

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Sunday Night Seisiún at The Plough and the Stars
Pictured above, the Irish pub, The Plough and the Stars on Clement Street, carries on its decades-old tradition of the Sunday night seisiún. A seisiún is an Irish tradition where people assemble and drink to the local musicians after a long hard days work. At The Plough and the Stars anyone is welcome to bring a fiddle, flute, accordion, concertina, tin whistle, mandolin, banjo, or guitar and sit in with musicians. The seisiúneers play traditional Irish music from jigs to waltzes, and sometimes are accompanied by a singing balladeer. Those patrons not playing an instrument often provide drinks for the musicians, if they enjoy the lively musical sets. The Plough and the Stars has been voted the best best Irish pub in San Francisco and features live traditional Irish music every night. Their Sunday night seisiún is open to the public and free of charge.
[ MAP H-8 ]

977 - The End of the Line for Beer Town

2009-04-13T18:32:00.000-07:00

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The End of the Line for Beer Town
In the 1870s a five-block stretch of Fulton Avenue in the Inner Richmond District, across from Golden Gate Park, was known as Beer Town. The dozens of saloons, along what was then called D Street, serviced the patrons of the adjacent Bay District Race Track. One of the most popular 'resorts' in Beer Town was Colonel Dickey's Road House which was famous for serving mint juleps and gin fizzes any time of day or night. Beer Town and the racetrack was serviced by the Geary Street, Park and Ocean Railroad which ran down D Street.

In 1894 the fortunes of Beer Town was raised by the Midwinter Exposition held in Golden Gate Park. Soon demand for drinking establishments grew and by the middle of that year, Seventh Street alone had seven saloons side-by-side in one half-block. When the Exposition closed and the racetrack folded, Beer Town didn't miss a beat. The old racetrack was converted to an Army base, Camp Merritt holding 7,000 soldiers. The number of saloons swelled to 44 and were accompanied by a number of brothels. Camp Merritt closed in 1898 and still Beer Town thrived due to the popular nearby amusement park, the Chutes.

Even the earthquake of 1906 and an angry neighborhood improvement committee failed to shut down the saloons and the brothels. What eventually caused the demise of Beer Town was an extended rail strike and the closing of the Chutes. By 1910 only five saloons remained and the surrounding Richmond District was fast being converted into a residential area. The final drinking establishment, the Jockey Club was torn down in 1914. Today, the only remnant of Beer Town is this train waiting shelter located at Futon and Seventh Street on the edge of Golden Gate Park.
[ MAP I-8 ]

976 - Safeguarding Two Coasts, The Point Montara Lighthouse

2009-04-12T18:09:00.000-07:00

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Safeguarding Two Coasts, the Point Montara Lighthouse
By the mid-1800s, nearly 90 ships had wrecked themselves on the rocky shores off Point Montara, 25 miles south of San Francisco. Two wrecks, in 1868 and 1872, were so tragic that Congress finally decided to take action by commissioning a light station. The first light at Point Montara was a simple red lantern hung on a post in 1900. A dozen years later a skeleton tower was erected here and finally in 1928 this 30-foot cast iron lighthouse was installed.

Last year a startling discovery was made about this lighthouse. It was uncovered that the lighthouse was much older than was previously know. It was revealed that this lighthouse had been built in 1881 and first erected on Wellfleet Harbor in Cape Cod, Massachusetts, where it served until in 1922. It was then decommissioned and transported 3,000 miles to San Francisco where it was put back into service at Point Montara. To date, the Point Montara Lighthouse is the only known lighthouse to have stood watch on two oceans.
[ MAP O-10 ]

975 - St. Peter and Paul Church, Washington Square

2009-04-05T18:10:00.000-07:00

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St. Peter and Paul Church, Washington Square
St. Peter and Paul is sometimes called 'The Italian Cathedral of the West.' The church is administered by the Salesians of St. John Bosco, who were originally sent to San Francisco to minister specifically to the Italian immigrant population in 1884. Their first church at the corner of Filbert and Grant was destroyed in the 1906 earthquake and fire.

This Romanesque church with its 191-foot spires was designed by Charles Fantoni in 1913 and dedicated in 1924. This church is considered one of the most beautiful in the city. The high altar is made from Carrera marble and weighs 40 tons. The stained glass rose window is 14 feet in diameter. Masses at St. Peter and Paul are held in English, Italian, Latin and Chinese.
[ MAP E-14 ]

974 - Barbary Coast Pirates

2009-04-02T16:09:00.000-07:00

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Barbary Coast Pirates
In the 1860s, before the seawall was built, the northern coast of San Francisco's was a jumble of docks, piers, and ships, all jammed together. This tangle of unmapped wharves was home to 'Liverpool' Wilcox and his pirate gang of 24 thieves. Under cover of dark, Liverpool and his gang would silently pole under the the wharfs in their flat-bottomed punts, climb aboard ships and steal anything they could carry over the side. Liverpool's gang made their headquarters on two old barges that supported the abandoned Navy transport Aquila. A wharf had been built over the barges, completely hiding the pirate's lair.

Records show an average of one murder and a dozen robberies and assaults a night in the maze-like dock area. The criminals would simply vanish through a secret set of trap doors and rat holes on the wharf. Despite three nearby harbor police stations, officers rarely arrested anyone in the acres of piers and piles as they lacked the boats to chase the pirates.

Eventually the honest workboat owners joined forces and, after spotting some criminals absconding in their boats, chased the pirates into the Pacific Mail Docks near Mission Rock. Rather than enter the area, the police surrounded the area for three days until the starved gang gave themselves up and were arrested. In 1870 another large pirate camp was discovered and raided and by 1890 the last of the pirates had left the wharf area.
[ MAP D-14 ]

973 - Shopping for History at the Tanforan Mall

2009-04-01T18:05:00.000-07:00

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Shopping for History at the Tanforan Mall
There is probably nothing more antithetical to San Francisco than the sprawling, homogenized shopping mall. In fact, the city has only has only one traditional mall which is located just inside the southern city limits. The mall shown above, the Shops at Tanforan, is located a few miles south of San Francisco in the city of San Bruno, and while it looks like any other urban shopping mall, this one rests upon a lot of the Bay Area's history.

ANTHROPOLOGIE:
The area the mall sits upon was once inhabited by indigenous Ohlone natives, a tribe distinct from the Miwoks a few miles North. In 1827 the land became a Spanish Rancho owned by Jose Antonio Sanchez who named 64 acres after his granddaughter's husband, Torribo Tanforan.

FINISH LINE:
In 1899, the Tanforans sold the land to a developer who turned it into a horse racetrack. Weathly San Franciscans like Adolph Spreckles, Leland Stanford, and George Hearst owned and ran horses here. The most famous horse to call Tanforan home was Seabiscuit, whose statue sits in front of the mall today.

OLD NAVY:
After 1910, Tanforan became an airfield with planes taking off and landing from the racetrack infield. In 1911 pilot Eugene Ely made history when he took off from Tanforan and landed on the deck of a specially-outfitted Navy ship in the Bay. He then took off and returned to Tanforan, marking the first time a plane had ever landed on or taken off from a ship.

FOOT LOCKER:
In 1917 Tanforan was converted to a military training center for World War I. But the war was over within a year and the base returned to private control as an airfield and a para-mutual racetrack.

THE LIMITED:
In 1942, the Navy purchased Tanforan and it became an Assembly Center for people of Japanese ancestry who were interned under federal order. Around 8,000 people stayed at Tanforan on the way to Relocation Camps. These families were housed in the horse stalls of the stables.

GUESS:
The last of the buildings from the internment camp and the racetrack burned down in 1964 and in 1971 Tanforan became “Only Enclosed Mall of the San Francisco Peninsula.” Years later the mall was renovated and a BART station added. Who knows what the future will bring to Tanforan.

[ MAP M-10 ]

972 - Guide Dog Training, San Rafael

2009-03-31T18:01:00.000-07:00

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Guide Dog Training, San Rafael
On any given day you may see dozens of guide dogs being trained on the streets of San Rafael. That city is home to the national headquarters of Guide Dogs for the Blind. The program currently has over 2,000 guide dog teams in service, their campus houses about 150 breeding dogs and whelps about 850 puppies annually. The organization is assisted by over 1,400 local volunteers who help raise and socialize the puppies in their homes, prior to training. The dogs are primarily Labrador Retrievers, but also include some Golden Retrievers, German Shepherds, and Retriever crossbreeds.

Not all the dogs go into service assisting the blind, some enter search and rescue programs while others are sent to groups like 'Dogs for Diabetics.' Those dogs who don't don't become service dogs are quickly adopted from a waiting list of local residents looking for a well-behaved, well-trained family pet. This helps explain why nearly every car and SUV in Marin County seems to have a happy Retriever sitting in it.

Another well-known Marin dog program is Pen Pals, a dog training group administered by the Marin Humane Society and undertaken by inmates at San Quentin. In the program, each dog is cared for and trained by two inmates for a four week period. The successful program allows specially selected inmates how to teach fundamental commands and help the dogs overcome special problems before they return to MHS to enter the adoption cycle.
[ MAP I-10 ]

971 - Nile Cafe Hookah Bar, Jones Street

2009-03-30T18:06:00.000-07:00

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Nile Cafe Hookah Bar, Jones Street
While it is against the law to smoke in most bars in San Francisco, the city has a few hookah bars that actually encourage smoking. One such bar, the Nile Cafe, is a small lounge in the heart of the Tenderloin that offers Turkish coffees, cardamom tea, and a chance to relax with friends while puffing on a hookah. The Nile offers three dozen blended tobacco options to choose from, including Apple Cinnamon, Citrus Mint, and White Peach.

The cafe is decorated with satin pillows, bokara rugs and large brass tables that, along with the Arab music, make you feel like you're in a Marrakesh souk. The Nile is BYOB and the friendly staff will provide glasses for those customers wishing to drink alcohol. The cafe also has an outside patio area complete with censers to enjoy, if the night isn't too cool. So if you're looking for something different to do at night you might want to take off your shoes, lay down on a cushion, relax and enjoy the Nile Cafe.
[ MAP G-14 ]

970 - Friday Night Skaters, Ferry Building

2009-03-29T16:36:00.000-07:00

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Friday Night Skaters, Ferry Building
For the past 30 years, an informal group of rollers skaters have assembled along San Francisco's Embarcadero to participate in a mass skate through the city's night streets. The group, which can range from dozens to hundreds, sets off from the Ferry Building at 9:00 every Friday for a moonlight tour of the city. Often dressed in wacky outfits and armed with whistles, glow sticks and their own mobile sound system, the skaters begin a 12-mile tour of San Francisco.

The night skaters are led by David Miles, the Coordinator of the Golden Gate Park Skate Patrol, who lays out the safety rules and keeps everyone organized. Miles (middle photo, in red) leads the skaters past some San Francisco's most beautiful sights, from Aquatic Park into the Marina District, to the Palace of Fine Arts, through the Broadway Tunnel, then into Chinatown, down Market Street and finally back to the Embarcadero. In 1996, the event recorded its highest participation with over 700 skaters. Those interested in the free Friday Night Skate can check out more details here.
[ MAP F-16 ]

969 - 'Re-Righting' History in San Francisco

2009-03-26T12:17:00.000-07:00

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'Re-Righting' History in San Francisco
In 1983 the San Francisco's famed Court of Historical Review and Appeals determined that the Martini, was in fact invented in San Francisco and not New York City, as some claim. Other landmark rulings by the court hold that Abner Doubleday did not invent baseball, Mark Twain never actually said, "The coldest winter I ever spent was a summer in San Francisco" and the U.S. government really does own Alcatraz.

The Court of Historical Review and Appeals began in 1973 when San Francisco civic leaders asked Judge Harry Low to decided a point of city history dating back to 1905. The hearing attracted a lot of attention and it was decided to continue the unique court. Although it is a mock court, a number of notable attorneys and civic figures have argued cases and appeared as "witnesses", sometimes in character as historical figures. The court's judgment is symbolic and has no legal authority but the court has been presided over by a number of actual or retired judges, including U.S. district court judges. The court's colorful proceedings are often reported nationally.

Other cases tried by the unusual judicial body have shown that San Francisco's Ernest Thayer is the real author of 'Casey at the Bat', both fortune cookies and chop suey were invented in San Francisco, Shoeless Joe Jackson was not guilty in the 1919 Black Sox scandal, the legend of Cinderella originated in Italy, Elvis Presley is truly dead, and that sadly, the piano accordion the official musical instrument of San Francisco.
[ MAP F-16 ]

968 - Surfing the Red Triangle

2009-03-25T18:07:00.000-07:00

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Surfing the Red Triangle
The Red Triangle is the name given to a 90-mile stretch of coastal area from the Golden Gate down to Monterey and extending to the Farallon Islands. Within its relatively small boundaries more than half of the world's Great White Shark attacks on humans have taken place. In a PBS feature on the Red Triangle it was described as "the shark-attack capital of the world." The Red Triangle is home to tens of thousands of elephant seals, sea lions, and sea otters, staples of a shark's diet. So swimmers and surfers in their wet suits are easily mistaken for seals since sharks have bad eyesight.

Over recent years, authorities have tracked a significant increase in the number of shark attacks but despite the danger, only one in ten shark attacks on humans are fatal. Sharks tend to taste-test their prey and generally spit out bone-filled swimmers and surfers. Surf boards are subject to tasting as well. Despite film depictions, Great whites are not always solitary predators, they often hunt and feed together. Additionally, just like whales, Great White Sharks migrate every year and predictably return to the same waters to feed, making October to January the most dangerous time for local surfers - just in time for the annual Mavericks surf competition.
[ MAP N-9 ]

967 - Clean Up Volunteers, Ocean Beach

2009-03-24T20:45:00.000-07:00

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Clean Up Volunteers, Ocean Beach
San Francisco often tops the list of cities with the most volunteer hours by population. So in 2007, when the tanker Cosco Busan spilled 58,000 gallons of oil into the San Francisco Bay, thousands of locals appeared on area beaches to help in the clean up effort. Those people were dismayed to find that the public agencies refused their help until the volunteers had taken a minimum of 24 hours of classroom training and received OSHA certification. Instead, they directed volunteers to clean non-contaminated beaches.

This delay and red tape during an unfolding environmental disaster outraged many and after significant pressure from would-be volunteers, OSHA reduced the requirement to a four-hour course and certification. Eventually volunteers were able to assist in the shoreline cleanup. They also collected and cleaned over 1,000 oil-soaked seabirds and a number of marine mammels. Pictured above are San Franciscans taking part in last Saturday's volunteer clean-up of Ocean Beach.
[ MAP I-2 ]

966 - San Francisco Museum of Craft + Design, Sutter Street*

2009-03-23T23:00:00.000-07:00

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San Francisco Museum of Craft + Design, Sutter Street
One of the newer and lesser known museums in the city is the San Francisco Museum of Craft + Design. Opened in 2004, the museum focuses on commercial, rather than fine arts. The SFMC+D's stated goal is to encourage the appreciation and the understanding of craft and design, as well as to acknowledge their strong connections to each other. The museum has featured exhibits ranging from the work of iconic, Mid-Century designer Raymond Loewy to a retrospective on wine labels.

Currently the museum is exhibiting San Francisco Graphic Design, featuring the work of a number of local designers who underscore San Francisco's continuum of design creativity. As a graphic designer, I really enjoyed this small museum which is almost hidden away in its courtyard behind an ornate wrought iron gate. The SFMC+D is located about a block and half northeast of Union Square and open every day except Monday.

MORE MUSEUM PHOTOS

[ MAP G-14 ]

965 - Sikh Gurdwara Sahib, El Sobrante

2009-03-22T14:01:00.000-07:00

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Sikh Gurdwara Sahib, El Sobrante
The Bay Area was one of the first areas to host Indian immigration in the United States. While that community has seen major population growth over the last 30 years, the history of Bay Area Sikhs dates back to the 1800s when many arrived as Gold Rush laborers. Unlike other foreign arrivals, the Sikh community left San Francisco and settled mostly in the suburbs of the East Bay and the South Bay. In rural Yuba City, California's prune capital, nearly 10% of the community is Sikh with roots in the Punjab province of India.

The 18-year old El Sobrante Gurdwara Sahib shown above is equipped to accommodate up to eight hundred people and is one of three Sikh temples in the Bay Area. The Gurdwara welcomes people of all colors and creeds and there is no appointment needed to visit. Visitors need only to cover their head with a piece of cloth, remove their shoes, and wash their feet. The temple is open from 5 am to 9 pm and visitors are encouraged to participate in Langar, the collective eating of free vegetarian food and tea.
[ MAP H-13 ]

964 - Mini Series, Alcatraz, Day 5 of 5

2009-03-19T21:59:00.000-07:00

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Mini Series, Alcatraz, Day 5 of 5
In 1963 Attorney General Robert Kennedy announced plans to close down the federal prison at Alcatraz. Among the reasons was the cost of housing prisoners there and the damage that the Bay's salt water was causing to the prison's concrete walls. The last inmates left in March of that year. Click here for newsreel footage.

For years Alcatraz sat empty until in 1969 when a group of Native Americans seized the deserted island, citing an old treaty which allowed them use of unused federal land. The siege garnered much news coverage and focused attention on Native American rights. The San Francisco band, Creedence Clearwater Revival even donated a boat for the group on the island to use. The occupation lasted for two years before Alcatraz's inhospitable weather forced the Native Americans to leave.

After the siege, there were many ideas put forth about what to do with Alcatraz. One of the most outlandish was a proposal for a $150 million Las Vegas-style hotel and casino. However in 1972 the island was incorporated into the larger Golden Gate National Recreational Area, and control of Alcatraz passed to the National Park Service which began organized tours of the old prison.

Today, visitors to Alcatraz can see lush gardens and a wide assortment of native plants on the island. In addition, there are huge groups of wild sea birds and mammals living there. In a Bay Area with a population of seven million people, the Cormorants, Snowy Egrets, Gulls, and Black Oyster Catchers nest happily and undisturbed on Alcatraz Island.

MORE POST PRISON ALCATRAZ PHOTOS

[ MAP B-13 ]

963 - Mini Series, Alcatraz, Day 4 of 5

2009-03-18T21:58:00.000-07:00

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Mini Series, Alcatraz, Day 4 of 5
When an inmate arrived at Alcatraz he was issued a blue woolen coat, blue woolen trousers, and two blue woolen shirts. This was the holiday and Sunday uniform. He also received two pair of brown shoes, work and dress. He was issued underwear, six pairs of socks, a blue cap, a blue handkerchief, and two coveralls. The blue-gray checkered coveralls became his daily uniform. He was then taken to his tiled cell which measured 5' x 9' 7' and contained a steel bed, mattress, foldout table, two shelves, a toilet and a sin.

Shaving was supervised, three times week and the prison's 'Rule of Silence' meant that meals were eaten in silence. The once-a-week showers were taken under strict supervision in an open shower room with no walls. Visitors were permitted once a month but only seen from behind glass. Gifts from the outside were forbidden but inmates with good behavior were allowed to write one letter a week to relatives. The ultimate privilege was time in the recreation yard.

Inmates worked an eight-hour day in the prison's industrial shops, five days a week. Movies were played twice a month and selected radio shows were piped into earphones in the cells.Free time was from 6 to 9:30 pm. The inmates were allowed to read, write, or pursue a hobby such as painting during those hours.

Inmates who did not follow the rules had chilled air blasted into their cells from high vents. Corporal punishment was also administered to inmates who were shackled to the wall. The ultimate punishment was extended banishment to the isolation of 'The Hole', a freezing cell where the inmate was stripped and left in total darkness.

Prisoners who went mad were moved to the psychiatric ward were the floors were also tiled and the toilets were simply holes in the floor. Drugs were not used as treatment in Alcatraz so unruly behavior there was treated with frigid air. Due to the length of most sentences Alcatraz eventually found it had a large population of seniors as inmates and no plan to care for them. The aging population was one of the factors that led to the closing of the prison.

MORE LIFE IN ALCATRAZ PHOTOS

[ MAP B-13 ]

962 - Mini Series, Alcatraz, Day 3 of 5

2009-03-17T21:57:00.000-07:00

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Mini Series, Alcatraz, Day 3 of 5
On Sunday, August 21, 1934 a specially modified train loaded with the nation's most dangerous criminals arrived in the bayside town of Tiburon in Marin County. At the dockside the train was not unloaded but instead the cars were rolled onto a barge that steamed to Alcatraz. When they arrived at the 20-acre island, the prisoners found a newly established federal prison that had been conceived of and built in the wake of John Dillinger's escape from an Ohio jail. Alcatraz, it was decided, would have no possibility of escape. The prison in the middle of the frigid bay, featured one guard for every two and a half prisoners, and was surrounded by a 200 yard wide 'keep out' zone.

Among Alcatraz's most notable residents were Al 'Scarface' Capone, Alvin 'Creepy' Karpis, George 'Machine Gun' Kelly, Basil 'The Owl' Banghart, Arthur 'Doc' Baker, George 'Bugs' Moran, and Robert 'The Birdman of Alcatraz' Stroud. But not all inmates were famous enough for nicknames. One prisoner, Morton Sobell was serving 30 years for helping Ethel and Julius Rosenberg and another, Cecil Wright, had robbed an Illinois drugstore and taken $2.45 in postage stamps which earned him a federal sentence. Before it closed, over 1,500 men would do time at Alcatraz.

MORE ALCATRAZ PRISON PHOTOS
[ MAP B-13 ]

961 - Mini Series, Alcatraz, Day 2 of 5

2009-03-16T21:57:00.000-07:00

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Mini Series, Alcatraz, Day 2 of 5
Even before it was a federal prison, 'The Rock' was an inhospitable place. The natives of the area avoided the barren island and the first to survey the Bay, Captain Juan Manuel de Ayala in 1775, did not even bother to name it. Fifty years later, a second survey team mistakenly gave Ayala's name for the current Yerba Buena Island, Isla de Alcatraces, instead to this ugly rocky island. The Spanish and the Mexicans also ignored Alcatraz. Finally U.S. Army Engineers built a lighthouse on it in 1852, but could find no other use for the island.

It first was used as a prison by the U.S. Army during the Civil War. It housed Confederate privateers and Democratic orators who criticized the Republican's administration of the war. Later it held subdued Native Americans from Arizona, Phillipine war deserters, and City of San Francisco prisoners, following the 1906 earthquake. By 1914 it was known as 'Uncle Sam's Devil's Island' but its true fame as a federal prison was still twenty years away.

TRIVIA QUESTION (or, how to win a bar wager): It is widely known fact that there never was a PROVEN successful escape by a prisoner from Alcatraz Island. But could this possibly be wrong? Was there a documented successful escape? ANSWER

MORE EARLY ALCATRAZ PHOTOS

[ MAP B-13 ]

960 - Mini Series, Alcatraz, Day 1 of 5

2009-03-15T21:52:00.000-07:00

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Mini Series, Alcatraz, Day 1 of 5
This week we'll spend looking at one of the most popular attractions in San Francisco, Alcatraz Island. Every year nearly one and a half million people visit the island by ferry from San Francisco's wharf. The attraction is popular for good reason, the tour is very interesting and the views, beautiful. Just like the inmates from 60 years ago, new arrivals are met on Alcatraz by a uniformed federal officer who tells you what to expect during your stay. Only these officers are friendly Nation Park Rangers who give a brief history of the island, it's layout, and suggestions on how best to enjoy your visit.

Alcatraz offers a short film presentation and self-led audio tour to visitors, both of which are free, very interesting, and highly recommended. The audio tour concludes at the island's gift shop and snack bar. But if you choose to pass on the audio tour, you are free to wander around the island on your own schedule. Visitors can return on any of the ferries that they wish, the boats leave periodically throughout the day. Some tour options allow you to add an extended ferry cruise around the San Francisco Bay.

MORE ARRIVAL ON ALCATRAZ PHOTOS
[ MAP B-13 ]

959 - End of an Era, The Tonga Room

2009-03-12T21:37:00.000-07:00

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End of an Era, The Tonga Room

NOTE: FogBay is currently featured on the 'Been There' travel section for the British Guardian newspaper.

Many were sadden by the recent news that the Tonga Room and Hurricane Bar may be about to shut down. The popular retro nightclub may be closed as part of the Fairmont Hotel's condo conversion. The Tonga Room dates back to 1945 when Mel Melvin, MGM's top set director was hired to transform the hotel's indoor swimming pool into a tiki bar. The kitschy restaurant has entertained locals and visitors for decades and every San Franciscan has a story that begins, "One night at the Tonga Room...".

Along with pupu platters and rum drinks served in coconuts, the Tonga room features a lagoon, floating band stage, and periodic rainstorms, complete with thunder and lightning. Final word on the fate of the Tonga Room is pending and there is a group lobbying to have the entire Tonga Room relocated. But you might want to head down to the Tonga Room for one last Mai Tai before it's too late.
[ MAP G-15 ]

958 - Covered Road, Near Salinas

2009-03-11T21:23:00.000-07:00

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Covered Road, Near Salinas
In 1939 a local writer published a booked based upon a series of articles he had written for the San Francisco Chronicle. Those articles highlighted the struggles of migrant farm laborers. One year later that book, The Grapes of Wrath received the Pulitzer Prize. The author was of course John Steinbeck who had grown up in Salinas, about 80 miles south of San Francisco.

As a young man Steinbeck had spent six years at Stanford University, taking only classes that appealed to him and with no interest in earning a degree. Afterwards he traveled the country before returning to the Northern California where he wrote a number of books including Of Mice and Men and later Cannery Row.

Steinbeck's work led to a political backlash against the him. He was seen as too liberal and some counties school boards even banned his books. However in 1962, Steinbeck won the Nobel prize for literature for his “realistic and imaginative writing, combining as it does sympathetic humor and keen social perception.” Two years later he was awarded the United States Medal of Freedom by President Lyndon B. Johnson. Steinbeck died in 1968 and his ashes were interred in his hometown of Salinas.
[ OFF MAP ]

957 - The Forgotten Legacy of Fort Winfield Scott

2009-03-10T22:13:00.000-07:00

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The Forgotten Legacy of Fort Winfield Scott
Most locals have never heard of Fort Winfield Scott but that is the official name of the military installation generally known as the Presidio of San Francisco. General Winfield Scott was a hero of the Mexican War who commanded the Union Army at the beginning of the Civil War. To honor him, the brick fortress built in 1882 on the Golden Gate was named Fort Winfield Scott. However four years later the fort was downgraded to a sub-post of the Presidio and the name stopped being commonly used. Instead people began to refer to it as Fort Point.

Twenty six years later, in 1912, the name Fort Winfield Scott was revived again. This time as an independent coast artillery post in the northwest quarter of the Presidio. The post contained a number of cannon batteries, buildings, and a large parade ground. But in 1946 this new Fort Winfield Scott was also reclassified as a sub-post and again the name stopped being used. Today almost the only evidence that two Fort Winfield Scotts ever existed in San Francisco is this artillery post entrance on Kobbe Avenue.

TRIVIA QUESTION: What were the two earlier names of fortress located at Fort Winfield Scott/Fort Point? TRIVIA ANSWER
[ MAP E-7 ]

956 - At Anchor in San Francisco

2009-03-09T08:09:00.000-07:00

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At Anchor in San Francisco
For a sailor arriving in San Francisco during the 1800s there was a limitless selection of saloons along the waterfront in which to spend their sea pay. East Street featured the Balboa, the Foam, the Bowhead, and the Grizzly Bear, which had an actual grizzly bear tethered to the front door. On Pacific Street near Kearney was the Cowboy's Rest, run by Maggie Kelly, who was famous for acting as the saloon's bouncer. She was also known for spirited romantic life. She found it necessary to shoot one husband and one boyfriend, as well as clubbing an number of others. None of which ever pressed charges.

Probably the most notorious wharf-side saloon was The Whale, also on Pacific Street. The Whale was run by Johnny McNear who turned it into a hangout for all manner of criminals. His regulars included the pirate, Cod Wilcox who ended his life in San Quentin and Tip Thornton, a man well-known for cutting off at least a dozen ears and noses from those who crossed him.

Those with more money, such as the ship's captains, would patronize higher quality waterfront saloons such as Denny's Bar. There, local politicians would buy the house a round in order to deliver a campaign speech. The Martin and Horton Saloon was where you'd find many of San Francisco's most colorful characters including two street preachers known as Old Orthodox and Hallelujah Cox. Also there was their arch-enemy, Crisis Hopkins, a free-thinker who would follow the preachers all day and heckle them.

The Martin and Horton Saloon was also home to Willie Coombs who dressed in Continental uniform and thought he was George Washington, and a shy man named Charles E. Bolton who was later found out to be the highwayman, Black Bart. The saloon was also a hangout of a healer dressed in a robe and ostrich feathers known as the King of Pain. The King of Pain made a fortune selling aconite liniment to cure all ailments, then lost his fortune gambling. The great earthquake and fire of 1906 burned down the waterfront saloons of San Francisco and closed that colorful chapter of the city's history.
[ MAP D-13 ]

955 - Not Up To Code, Chinatown Alleyway

2009-03-08T13:33:00.000-07:00

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Not Up To Code, Chinatown Alleyway
San Francisco published its first telephone directory in 1878, it contained only 173 business numbers. But residential phones quickly became popular and by 1895 there were so many numbers that phone number prefixes had to be introduced. In addition, there were a number of different local exchanges such as central, private, special, temporary, and public. In 1909, the Chinese Telephone Exchange was added.

On January 25, 1915, the first transcontinental call was made from a 68 year old Alexander Graham Bell in New York to his associate, Thomas Watson at the San Francisco World's Fair. Bell began the call with, "Hoy, hoy, Mr. Watson! Are you there?" By 1948, San Francisco had more telephones per capita than any city in the world, nearly 48 for every 100 residents. Today, the Bay Area has nine different area codes including 415, which services the counties of both San Francisco and Marin.

San Francisco Telephone Prefixes 1895-1966
[ MAP F-15 ]

954 - Finding Sanctuary at the Golden Gate

2009-03-05T10:11:00.000-08:00

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Finding Sanctuary at the Golden Gate
Just outside the Golden Gate sits the 1,380 square mile Gulf of the Farallones National Marine Sanctuary, the largest concentration of breeding seabirds in the contiguous U.S. As a national sanctuary, inside its boundaries there can be no oil or gas exploration and development; no discharging or depositing of any substance; no flights below 1,000 feet; and no personal motorized watercraft, among other regulations. The Gulf of the Farallones NMS protects and provides safe habitats to all types marine life, from the White Shark to the Tufted Puffin, and including 26 endanger species known to inhabit its waters.

There are eleven National Sanctuaries in the continental U.S. and three of them are located in the San Francisco Bay Area. Along with conservation, the NMS provides education, recreation, exploration, science, and the preservation of maritime culture. The visitor center for the Gulf of the Farallones NMS (click for photos) is located on Crissy Field and is open to the public. Better yet, you can volunteer and become a NMS team member, helping to protect the ocean outside the Bay Area.
[ MAP A-6 ]

953 - Babbage's Difference Engine, Computer History Museum

2009-03-04T10:47:00.000-08:00

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Babbage's Difference Engine, Computer History Museum
Inside the Computer History Museum is one of the most incredible inventions ever conceived, Babbage's Difference Engine. The 1849 device adds, subtracts, multiplies and divides mechanically by turning a crank handle. Eleven feet in length, five tons in weight, and constructed from 8,000 parts, the mechanical device is accurate to 31 digits. Charles Babbage designed the device to eliminate human error from calculations but did not live to see the construction of this version which became, in essence, the world's first computer.

Babbage's Engine is just one of the many facsinating inventions you'll find in Mountain View's Computer History Museum. The collection also includes IBM's Deep Blue, the chess-playing computer that defeated Garry Kasparov as well as the first Macintosh computer. The museum's Visible Storage exhibit is one of the world's largest collections of computing artifacts and contains thousands of computing devices from tiny abacuses to room-sized Cray supercomputers, from Minuteman Missile guidance systems to console video games. The museum is located in the heart of Silicon Valley and free to the public.

MORE MUSEUM PHOTOS

EVEN MORE MUSEUM PHOTOS

[ MAP R-15 ]

952 - Where it All Began, Mountain Lake

2009-03-03T16:22:00.000-08:00

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Where it All Began, Mountain Lake
On March 27th, 1776 Captain Juan Bautista de Anza and his advance party of soldiers ended their nine-month, 900-mile trek from Mexico here at Mountain Lake where they became the first non-natives to walk the San Francisco Bay. Anza and his men chose this spot to rest because it was one of the few natural lakes in the area and a source of fresh water.

The Spaniards camped here for two days and laid the groundwork for a settlement that would grow into the city of San Francisco. Three months later, Anza's main party of 193 settlers arrived and staked out the Presidio, half a mile away. For the next 46 years this would be the northernmost outpost of Spain's empire on the Pacific Coast.

Many locals have not seen Mountain Lake although they have certainly driven by the historic spot. The lake is located just off Park Presidio Boulevard at Lake Street, in the Inner Richmond District. Mountain Lake sits on the southern edge of the Presidio Golf Course, near the MacArthur Tunnel, and features hiking trails as well as a children's playground.

TRIVIA QUESTION: What unusual thing was discovered in Mountain Lake in 1996?
ANSWER

[ MAP G-7 ]

951 - The Bunny Ranch, Carson City

2009-03-02T17:26:00.000-08:00

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The Bunny Ranch, Carson City
Above is a legal brothel outside Carson City, a few hours east of San Francisco (and to answer your question, no I didn't). But this photo gives me a chance to talk about Belle Cora, San Francisco's most famous Madam.

Belle was the innocent daughter of a prominent Baltimore minister who cast her out when she fell to the wiles of a worldly suitor and became pregnant. With no options she turned to a life of sin to support her child. At least that was her story - in reality Clara Belle Ryan was born to non-ministerial parents and ran off to New Orleans where she met and married a Natchez gambler named Charles Cora. The two decided to try their luck in Gold Rush San Francisco, arriving December 28, 1849 aboard the side-wheeler California.

After making a small fortune gambling throughout the Gold Country the couple set up a brothel on Pike Street (now Waverly Place). The opulent building was described as rivaling the finest mansions in San Francisco. Belle sent out engraved and embossed invitations to to all the principal gentlemen of the city, including the mayor, aldermen, judges, members of legislature, and even clergy. Soon Belle's brothel was the most popular in the city, due in no small part to its exotic French girls.

While San Francisco's gentlemen may have appreciated Belle's charms, their wives did not. During a 1855 play at the American Theatre, the wife of U.S. Marshall, General William Richardson demanded that the Coras be ejected from theater's balcony. When the manager refused, the Richardsons left instead. Days later, Charles Cora and Richardson met on the street, exchanged angry words, and Cora shot the U.S. Marshall, killing him.

In the middle of the trial, Cora and another murderer, James Casey were dragged from their cells and hanged by a mob of vigilantes. Belle was pressed by both her friends and enemies to leave town but she refused. According to popular lore, Belle went into deep mourning, sold her brothel, and donated her fortune to charity. But again Belle's real story was not quite so redeeming. Until her death, Belle Cora defiantly wore her fanciest, gaudiest gowns and rode in her ornate carriage with her troupe of girls through the streets of San Francisco.
[ OFF THE MAP ]

950 - Levi's Flagship Store, Union Square

2009-03-01T14:56:00.000-08:00

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Levi's Flagship Store, Union Square
In 1853 Bavarian immigrant Levi Strauss sailed into San Francisco with bolts of tan canvas that he intended selling for tents and wagon covers. He soon discovered the miners had a more pressing need for rugged pants so he began to create them out of his tough material. Levi's new trousers were a big hit and the people declared them "pert near a miner's best friends." When the tan cloth ran out he substituted blue material and, at the suggestion of a tailor named Jacob Davis, added orange stitching and copper rivets (U.S. patent number 139,121).

By the 1930s cowboys all over the west were wearing Levi Strauss' sturdy and comfortable 'waist overalls'. In the 1940s, Roy Rogers and Gary Cooper wore them in movies and on television, boosting their popularity. Later, a new generation of icons including Marlon Brando, James Dean, and Bob Dylan turned blue jeans into a sign of youth rebellion and eventually a blue jeans became part of Americana.

TRIVIA: Levi Strauss never referred to his trousers as 'denim jeans,' so where come did that term come from? ANSWER

[ MAP G-15 ]

949 - California Academy of Sciences, Golden Gate Park

2009-02-26T08:50:00.000-08:00

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California Academy of Sciences, Golden Gate Park
After $500 million and nearly ten years of remodeling, the California Academy of Sciences reopened last September and immediately became the hottest ticket in town with mile-long lines of people waiting to get in. The 'Smithsonian of the West' is one of the ten largest museums of natural history in the world and now features a four-story rainforest and the world's largest all-digital planetarium, 75 feet wide.

The new ecologically-conscious building was constructed using 90% recyclable materials. The Academy is powered by 60,000 solar cells but features natural lighting in 90% of its occupied space. It also uses recycled water captured from the 2.5-acre Living Roof, which holds 1.2 million native plants. Everything follows a green, sustainable plan from the recycled denim jeans used for the wall insulation to the policy of no plastic water bottles sold at the museum's cafe.

The Academy dates back to 1853 with its first official museum opened in 1874 at the corner of California and Grant. While a lot of the museum is new, many of the old favorite attractions remain, such as the albino alligator, the Foucault pendulum, the playful penguins, the completely redesigned Steinhart Aquarium, and the charmingly retro Africa Hall.

I've purposely tried not to show too much of the exhibits to encourage you to attend for yourself.

MORE ACADEMY PHOTOS

[ MAP J-8 ]

948 - Looking Outward from San Francisco

2009-02-25T12:20:00.000-08:00

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Looking Outward from San Francisco
It's good to know your boundaries. In the peninsula city of San Francisco they might seem obvious but the city's boundaries have changed six times since they were first set down by Mariano Guadalupe Vallejo in 1834. Today the western boundary extends three miles offshore of Point Lobos. However, the Farallon Islands, twenty miles offshore, are officially part of the city of San Francisco.

The eastern boundary is a line 2,500 feet east of the summit of Yerba Buena Island, meaning that Alcatraz Island, Treasure Island, and Yerba Buena Island are all within San Francisco city limits. The northern boundary runs in a northeastern line, tangent to Point Cavallo in the Marin Headlands and the southern-most point of Angel Island.

The southern boundary is the trickiest and historically most often changed. Currently, San Francisco's southern boundary follows 37° 42' 30" North Latitude. Which, in case you don't have a sextant handly, enters from the Pacific in the middle of the Oympic Country Club. Continuing east, it passes about 500 feet south of Lake Merced, through the San Francisco Golf Club, then just north of the Cow Palace. Finally it continues through the southern tip of Candlestick Point and on out into the Bay.
[ MAP G-3 ]

947 - The Cannery, Fisherman's Wharf

2009-02-24T10:45:00.000-08:00

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The Cannery, Fisherman's Wharf
In 1907 this cannery was built on top of property that had been gutted by the Great Earthquake and Fire the year before. The cannery was owned by the California Fruit Cannery Association, or Calpak, a company that eventually changed its name to Del Monte. Perfectly situated on a rail line and the waterfront, by 1909 it was the largest fruit and vegetable cannery in the world. The canning operations here continued for 30 years until Depression-era economics forced its shutdown.

For three decades the old canning plant sat empty and was slated to be torn down when was purchased by Leonard Martin in 1963. Martin's vision was to turn it into "a place for people to detach themselves from everyday hustle and bustle, in an environment reminiscent of the romantic marketplaces of Europe." The three-story building was remodeled to house shops, restaurants, galleries, and museums, while still preserving the old architecture. Opened in 1966, the Cannery along with Ghirardelli Square, spurred a national movement to recycle older buildings and influenced tax legislation to preserve them.

TRIVIA QUESTION: What was the primary produce item canned here?
TRIVIA ANSWER

MORE CANNERY PHOTOS

[ MAP D-13 ]

946 - Funeral Procession, North Beach

2009-02-23T10:45:00.000-08:00

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Funeral Procession, North Beach
It is a common sight in North Beach and Chinatown to see a funeral procession led by the Green Street Mortuary Band and followed by the mourners in their cars. The lead vehicle, a black convertible, always displays a huge portrait of the deceased propped up on the seat back for all to see.

This tradition of displaying the departed leads us to consider the story of the legendary bandit Joaquin Murieta, the Robin Hood of El Dorado. Like all legends the facts of Murieta's story are unclear, from the spelling of his name to the place of his birth. I will go with the account by early 1900s historian Herbert Asbury.

In 1849 the 17-year old Joaquin Murieta and his wife Rosita arrived in San Francisco from Mexico and soon staked a rich gold claim in Stanislaus County. White miners, angered by his quick success stole his claim, raped his wife, killed Murieta's brother, then viciously beat and left Joaquin for dead. Over the next three years Murieta engaged in a campaign of vengeance against those who mistreated Mexican and Chilean miners.

Murieta, along with a band of men, plundered stagecoaches, raided mining camps, killed those who had attacked him, and became known as a bandit king. In reality almost every unsolved crime that took place in the Gold Country was ascribed to Murieta and his band. Their legend grew beyond what one gang could have possibly accomplished. In addition stories of the Murieta's giving money to the poor began to arise.

No matter the real story, in 1853 California legislators posted a $5000 reward for Murieta and Governor Bigler approved the hiring of Captain Harry Love and a posse to hunt down the bandit. After only one month on hunting, Love and his men came upon a group of Mexicans and killed their leader. Despite the fact that none of the men had ever seen him, they declared that they had killed Joaquin Murieta. They cut off the man's head, put it in a bottle of alcohol, and returned to San Francisco with their trophy.

However the newspaper, Alta California pointed out the head did not bear Murieta's well-known facial scar. An number of other people came forward to assert that the head was not that of Murieta including a woman who claimed to be his wife, Rosita. She insisted that he was still at large in the Sierras. Despite this, the bottled head was displayed for decades drawing thousands of the curious. Eventually the head ended up in the San Francisco Museum of Horrors on Market Street until it was lost in the earthquake of 1906. Today Murieta's legend lives on still in stories, songs, poems, and movies.
[ MAP E-15 ]

945 - Stanford University, Palo Alto

2009-02-22T11:01:00.000-08:00

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Stanford University, Palo Alto
Leland Stanford began his career as a Sacramento grocer. When one of his customers went bankrupt Stanford accepted quartz mine stock in lieu of payment. That stock made several hundred thousand dollars profit and Stanford parlayed that money into one of the largest estates in the West, first as president of Western Union Telegraph and then as one of the 'Big Four' railroad monopoly. In 1884, while traveling with his family in Florence, Stanford's only child Leland, Jr. died of typhoid. Grief-stricken Stanford and his wife, Jane returned to California and began to plan a University to honor their son's memory. The couple purchased a 7,200-acre horse farm in Palo Alto as its home.

In 1893 Leland Stanford, then a United States Senator, died in his sleep. His iron-willed wife, Jane made the new university the focus of her life. Today the Leland Stanford Junior University is considered one of the finest schools in the world. Stanford has produced presidents, prime ministers, supreme court justices, 16 Nobel laureates, four Pulitzer Prize winners, 23 MacArthur Fellows, 19 recipients of the National Medal of Science, and three Presidential Medal of Freedom winners. Pictured above is the university's Herbert Hoover Tower and the Stanford Arch.
[ MAP Q-14 ]

944 - Lucky to be Living in San Francicso

2009-02-19T17:30:00.000-08:00

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Lucky to be Living in San Francicso
In 1886 Elias 'Lucky' Baldwin was the owner of a modest livery stable in San Francisco when he decided to take a long hunting trip. Before leaving Baldwin instructed his broker to sell his languishing shares of Hale & Norcross silver mine stock while he was gone. However he forgot to leave the key to the safe that held the stock so the broker was unable to fulfill his wishes. Upon his return Baldwin found out that in his absence the mine had hit a new lode and that the stock was worth 1000 times its previous value.

Lucky Baldwin used his new millions to build the luxurious 400-room Baldwin Hotel on Market Street, Baldwin's Academy of Music, an 8,000-acre resort on Lake Tahoe, and help establish the Pacific Stock Exchange. Baldwin's later investments also proved fortunate and he continued to increase his wealth. On the romantic front, he married four times and had numerous scandalous affairs. His famous luck favored him once again when, during a paternity suit, the sister of the woman in question snuck up behind in the courtroom, placed a revolver to the back of Baldwin's head, and fired. But in pulling the trigger she jerked the gun, sending the bullet whizzing over his head.

Baldwin luckily survived two other incidents involving gunplay and went on to purchase 56,000 acres of land in Southern California's San Gabriel Valley. It was there that Baldwin built a horse racetrack and named it Santa Anita, after his favorite daughter. Baldwin died in San Francisco in 1909 at the age of 81 but that didn't stop his good luck. After his death geologists discovered oil beneath his San Gabriel Ranch, that find increased his estate by another $35 million.
[ MAP D-7 ]

943 - 450 Sutter, Downtown

2009-02-18T18:03:00.000-08:00

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450 Sutter, Downtown
450 Sutter, a 26-story historical landmark near Union Square, was the tallest building in San Francisco when it was erected in 1929. The neo-Mayan, art deco skyscraper was created by San Francisco's famous architect Timothy L. Pflueger, the designer of the Pacific Stock Exchange, Union Square Plaza, the Castro Theater, and the original California Academy of Sciences. 450 Sutter was the first West Coast skyscraper designed to withstand an earthquake and the first building where all of the suites were finished to the specification of the tenants, a revolutionary idea at that time.

The ornate lobby is popular with walking tours and featured in many architectural books because its rare Napoleon Grande Melange marble walls, elaborate bronze-finished Mayan ceiling, and exotic bas-relief carvings. The city recently renamed a small street behind the building to 'Timothy Pflueger Place' to honor its architect. Today the building is San Francisco's premier location for dentists and doctors, earning it the well-known nickname, '450 Suffer.'
[ MAP G-14 ]

942 - Rainy Day in San Francisco

2009-02-17T14:43:00.000-08:00

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Rain Day in San Francisco
If you live in the Bay Area you know that it has been raining a lot lately. Between November and March San Francisco averages ten rainy days per month. These 50 winter days produce nearly 85% of the City's 20.5 inches annual rainfall. Conversely the five summer months of May through September will total only three-quarters of an inch. So statistically, we can expect about 14 more days of rain over the next month and a half, and then dry skies until October.

Despite these drastic changes in precipitation, San Francisco's moderate temperature doesn't change all that much throughout the year. Winter highs are between 55-60° and lows 45-50°. In the summer, highs are between 60-70° and the lows 50-55°. So cheer up, soon enough you'll be dining al fresco and enjoying San Francisco's real source of moisture, the cool summer fog.
[ MAP I-8 ]

941 - Takara Sake Brewery, Berkeley*

2009-02-16T17:24:00.000-08:00

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Takara Sake Brewery, Berkeley
Takara (treasure) Sake is a Kyoto-based company that was founded in 1842, expanded to America, and today is U.S.'s largest Sake producer. Their large brewery in Berkeley was opened in 1982 and features a tasting room as well as Sake Museum. Along with Sake, Takara produces plum wine, Shochu -a distilled spirit, Mirin - a cooking Sake, and a rice Vodka. California is home to four of America's six Sake breweries (four are in the Bay Area) and with good reason, in 2000 it was determined that 60 per cent of the country's Sake consumption takes place in San Francisco and Los Angeles. Kanpai!

MORE PHOTOS OF THE TAKARA BREWERY

[ MAP J-1 ]

940 - The First Chinese in San Francisco

2009-02-12T10:57:00.000-08:00

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The First Chinese in San Francisco
Due to the loss of records during the 1906 fire it is unclear when the first Chinese arrivals set foot in San Francisco. A surviving newspaper from 1848 confirms there were at least few Chinese living in San Francisco prior to the Gold Rush. We know the Eagle, a ship arriving in April of 1847, brought Chung Ming, a Cantonese merchant, and two other Chinese travelers. However an earlier, unsubstantiated story has a Chinese cabin boy arriving in 1838 aboard the trading ship, Bolivar.

But the oldest and most intriguing possibility of Chinese arrival in the Bay Area dates back to the fifth century. In 499 A.D, a Buddhist missionary named Hui Shan reported to the emperor's court that he had visited the legendary land of Fusan, seven thousand miles east of Japan. Another Chinese mariner, Hee-Li, blown off course arrived in Fusan and described of a shoreline matching that of San Francisco and Monterey.

Proponents of the theory that California was the Fusan of Chinese literature are supported by the recent finding of ancient Chinese stone anchors along the California coast. If true, that means Chinese sailors visited North American nearly a thousand years before Columbus.
[ MAP F-14 ]

939 - Abandoned Naval Runways, Alameda Island

2009-02-11T08:36:00.000-08:00

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Abandoned Naval Runways, Alameda Island
In 1917 an amusement park called Neptune Beach was Built in Alameda. The 120-acre park was billed as 'the Coney Island of the West.' The beach featured white Monterey sand brought in from southern beaches. The wildly popular Neptune Beach also featured huge salt water swimming pools, midway rides, concessions, band concerts, beauty contests, fireworks, a scenic railway, merry-go-round, ballroom, and a shooting gallery. In the '20s admission was ten cents for adults and a nickel for kids. On July 4th, 1920, the crowd at the beach reached 40,000.

The park hosted swimming exhibitions featuring celebrities like Olympian and Tarzan actor, Johnny Weismuller and Jack LaLanne. Max Baer used Neptune Beach as a training location, and 'Aerial' Thompson would thrill the crowd by riding a bicycle 175-feet on a high wire. Stunt rider Putt Mossman's 'Leap for Life' was a screaming 60 mph leap into a pool, motorcycle and all. Midway game winners would receive yellow canaries as prizes or maybe a Neptune Beach invention, the Kewpie doll. Neptune Beach was also the first place to sell snow cones and the popsicles.

The park remained popular during the depression but when the Alameda Naval Air Station was constructed in the 1930s, the huge influx of sailors caused mothers keep their daughters away and the park began to lose money. A month before it closed in 1939 the park put on a 'Jumbo Circus and Thrill Show' featuring 187 performers, animal acts and the world-famous elephant, Jumbo. In October, the parks assets were auction off and the buildings torn down to make room for the US Marine Training Center. In 1967 most of the original Neptune Beach property was turned into the Alemeda Memorial State Park, which it remains today.

[ MAP K-12 ]

938 - Tsunami Preparedness, Ocean Beach

2009-02-10T10:37:00.000-08:00

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Tsunami Preparedness, Ocean Beach
Following the great Sumatra quake and tsunami of 2004 most coastal cities re-examined their own risk and response plans to a similar emergence. How likely is it that a tsunami could hit San Francisco? Geophysicists have evidence that a 9.2 earthquake occurred along the Cascadia subduction zone, off our coast about 300 years ago. Another similar quake would result in a 15.7-foot tsunami surge wave on San Francisco's shore, nearly the same height as the Sumatra tsunami. That swell would travel five city blocks inland and flood even farther.

In addition to the danger from earthquakes, local Tiburon resident Rusty Schweickart, the retired Apollo 9 lunar module commander, estimates that a specific asteroid, 2004MN4 has a 10,000 to 1 chance of hitting the earth in 2036. That event would result in a 55-foot tsumani wave here on our coast and would be "far more devastating than anything known in history."

To help warn us in the event of any tsunami the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration is installing a real-time reporting system made up of a series of ocean floor acoustic devices and sensored buoys with telemetry uplinks to satellites. So you see, there's nothing to worry about, an underfunded federal department is working for your safety. Until then, we still have these signs.
[ MAP I-2 ]

937 - Hiller Aviation Museum

2009-02-09T10:38:00.000-08:00

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Hiller Aviation Museum
The 11-year old Hiller Aviation Museum sits just a few miles south of SFO airport on Highway 101. The non-profit educational institution was founded by helicopter pioneer Stanley Hiller, Jr. and is dedicated to 'The Dream of Flight.'

The 53,000 square foot museum features more than 50 aircraft exhibits including the 1869 Avitor (above middle photo), a huge 45-foot, 1-hp steam-engined, 'aeroplane' that flew over San Francisco before the Wright Brothers learned to walk. Also in the collection is a Boeing Condor spyplane and a Curtiss Pusher, the first plane ever to land on a ship. That feat took place in San Francisco Bay in 1911.

The museum also features a number of hands-on learning exhibits including computer flight simulators and a chance to climb into a Blue Angels training cockpit. Along with a library, theater, and aircraft restoration workshop the museum offers field trips and even free flight for children from 8 to 17 years of age.

MORE MUSEUM PHOTOS

[ MAP P-13 ]

936 - Fortunate Parking, North Beach

2009-02-08T10:33:00.001-08:00

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Fortunate Parking, North Beach
Finding parking in San Francisco is often a matter of good fortune and can also sometimes cost a fortune. To help with this, some drivers have tongue-in-cheek good luck totems on their dashboards while others have their own humorous incantations, "Parking Goddess full of grace help me find a parking space."

The North Beach Parking Lot on Vallejo Street in Chinatown takes parking fortune one step further. Every one of their hundreds of parking spaces has its own unique fortune. Much like a fortune cookie, you'll never know what yours will be when you enter the garage. Mine said, 'You'll blog this' - wow, uncanny!

MORE PARKING FORTUNES

[ MAP E-14 ]

935 - Contemplative Afternoon in Big Sur

2009-02-05T09:57:00.000-08:00

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Contemplative Afternoon in Big Sur
One of the most beautiful spots in America is legendary Big Sur. Located a couple hours south of San Francisco, the dramatic 90-mile region stretches from Carmel to San Simeon. Along with its stunning coast line, Big Sur contains the Santa Lucia Mountains, Los Padres National Forest and thousands of acres of parkland.

Big Sur is also home to Esalen, the oldest and most famous retreat center for 'inner work.' Started in 1962, Esalen offers workshops on everything from cleansing your chakras to improving your love life to 'Facilitating Deep Process using the Penniston Protocol Alpha/Theta Brainwave Training Technique.' The retreat has featured out-of-the-box speakers such as Aldous Huxley, Hunter S. Thompson, Joseph Campbell, Alan Watts and Fritz Perls.

In the 1960s celebrities, CEOs and musicians all flocked to Esalen for the experience. Soon Esalen became famous as THE place to drop acid, sit naked in a hot tub with a movie star, and contemplate the void. On August 5th, 1969 Charlie Manson dropped in at an Esalen sensitivity retreat, played some guitar, then left. Three days later the Manson Family committed the Sharon Tate murders.

Today Esalen still receives thousands of visitors every year who relax in the natural hot springs, get a massage, enroll in workshops, or simply to stare out at the ocean for hours with their camera – until a park ranger tells them to put on their clothes and move along.
[ OFF MAP ]

934 - Digging it in the Haight

2009-02-04T10:04:00.000-08:00

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Digging it in the Haight
For many the term Hippie is synonymous with San Francisco. The word was derived from 'hipster' and was originally used to describe the ex-beatniks who congregated in San Francisco's Haight-Ashbury district. Soon a younger generation were dropping out of society and joining them. These new hippies created their own generational rebellion with their own music, clothes, language, art, and drugs.

But before the Hippies there were the Diggers, a mid-60s group inspired by a philosophy of social anarchism. The Diggers took their name from a 17th century English movement that sought a society free from any private property. The Diggers began to distribute free food in Golden Gate Park and opened free stores where people could get clothes, books, and housewares without charge. The group coined the phrases, 'Today is the first day of the rest of your life' and 'Do your own thing.' They even declared the Haight District, the Great Un-Society as opposed to LBJ's Great Society.

The Diggers also famously erected a giant empty wooden frame, the Free Frame of Reference, as a way to encourage people to see things differently. The Diggers greatly shaped the following Hippie movement and its philosophy of communal sharing. The Diggers' spirit lives on in events like the Really, Really Free Market, an event held on the last Saturday of every month in the Mission where everything is free - no trade, no barter, no money.
[ MAP J-9 ]

933 - Russian Outpost -Fort Ross, Sonoma Coast

2009-02-03T15:35:00.000-08:00

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Russian Outpost - Fort Ross, Sonoma Coast
Decades before the Gold Rush, when San Francisco wasn't much more than a few shacks, this fort was established on the Sonoma Coast, about 40 miles north of the city. In 1812, 25 Russians and 80 Alaskan Alutiiq natives built the fort to support Russian fur trappers and wheat farmers in the area. It was named Fort Ross after 'Rossiia', Imperial Russia. The site was chosen for its natural harbor and its ability to protect the Russian farmers, trappers, blacksmiths, and ship builders from the Spanish-occupied territory to the south. In fact, the first ship built in California, Rumiantsev was built here.

While Fort Ross was never attacked, the colony only stayed 30 years. Over-harvesting of seals put an end to its main source of income and in 1841 the Russian company sold the fort to John Sutter (yup, that John Sutter, apparently the Forrest Gump of 1800s California). In 1906 the State of California purchased the site and established it as one of the oldest in the state park system. Along with Fort Ross the 3,386-acre park also features an old Russian cemetery, a visitors center, camping, trails, diving, fishing, and abalone collecting.

MORE FORT ROSS PHOTOS

[ MAP A-2 ]

932 - Southern Pacific Hospital, Fell Street

2009-02-02T09:58:00.000-08:00

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Southern Pacific Hospital, Fell Street
Ever since gold was discovered in 1849, city pioneers dreamed of a railway from the Mississippi River to San Francisco. The construction of that railroad fell to a railroad visionary named Theodore Judah and four obscure Sacramento merchants, Crocker, Hopkins, Huntington, and Stanford. Those men who would become known as the 'Big Four' and build the Central Pacific Railroad (later Southern Pacific Railroad). The railroad became a transportation monopoly and controlled nearly every business in California, making the Big Four fabulously wealthy.

Today the Southern Pacific is still in business and while it does not have the power it once did, the company is still one of the largest owners of land in California. This is due to its vast agricultural land grants, a legacy that dates back to the day of the Big Four. Pictured above is the former Southern Pacific Hospital in San Francisco, now a retirement facility.
[ MAP I-9 ]

931 - Monument, Donner Lake

2009-02-01T17:27:00.000-08:00

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Monument, Donner Lake
This monument at Donner Pass in the Sierras commemorates the spirit of all the pioneers who made the hazardous overland trek to California as well as those who perished in the famously, ill-fated Donner Party. The massive monument sits at Donner Lake near the summit, about two and a half hours East of San Francisco.

The Donner Party was actually part of a group of 500 wagons heading West in 1846. The 87-member Donner Party broke off from the larger group in hopes of finding the 'Hastings Cut-Off' which promised to save them 400 miles. Instead they found that the shortcut was practically impassable by wagon and they lost weeks. When they finally rejoined the main trail they decided to cross the Sierras despite the threat of snow.

As they entered the Sierras they encountered the worst snow in thirty years, as much as 23-feet deep. On October 31, a broken wagon axle forced them to stop by Truckee Lake (now Donner Lake). Another huge overnight snowstorm stranded them at the lake for the winter. Having traveled 2,500 in seven months they were one day late crossing the Sierras and only 150 miles from the safety of Fort Sutter.

In the end, the last of the survivors would not be rescued from this location for five months. During that time some of the stranded pioneers had resorted to cannibalism in order to survive. 41 of the 87 Donner party died here. Still today their descendants occasionally meet here at Donner Lake to remember those lost in the winter of 1846

[ OFF MAP ]

930 - Who's Your Mummy? The Rosicrucian Egyptian Museum

2009-01-29T21:57:00.000-08:00

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Who's Your Mummy? The Rosicrucian Egyptian Museum
In 1972 the Nieman-Marcus holiday catalog offered his-and-hers ancient Egyptian sarcophagi. They were guaranteed to be at least 4,000 years old and touted as perfect for the "people who have everything." At that time the Rosicrucian Egyptian Museum was assembling what is now the largest collection of Egyptian artifacts in Western North America and purchased the items. When the boxes were being unpacked in San Jose, stunned workers discovered that inside one of the coffins was a mummy.

Originally investigation determined this mummy be that of a high priest named Usermontu. However recently evidence has been uncovered that indicates that he may, in fact, be one of the missing Ramses pharaohs. Who ever he is, he joins the museum's five other mummies on display. Currently there are more than 4,000 ancient artifacts at the museum including a 1.5 million year old stone hand axe. Another popular feature of the museum is the multi-level, walk through stone tomb. The museum also offers lectures, special programs, as well as a plantarium.

MORE EGYPTIAN MUSEUM PHOTOS

[ MAP S-17 ]

929 - The Hobart Building, Market Street

2009-01-28T17:25:00.000-08:00

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The Hobart Building, Market Street
One of the more unusual landmarks on Market Street is the Hobart Building, designed by San Francisco's most influential architect, Willis Polk in 1914. The building's idiosyncratic shape is a seven-story oval tower atop a 14-story angled base. Even more controversial at the time was the fact that the entire building was completed in just eleven months. When it was done it was the second-tallest building in San Francisco. Since its construction, the adjacent buildings have been torn down revealing the odd diagonally-sided base.

W.S. Hobart who built the building was a gold and timber baron who a vision of creating a new kind California. In the 1870s he spent a two million dollars to build the lumber town of Hobart Mills just north of Lake Tahoe. Hobart saw the town as a family community not just a bachelor camp for miners and loggers. At its peak the town had a population of 1500, all living in well kept houses on the neat streets. Saloons were banned in Hobart Mills, as were liquor sales. Hobart Mills was so well behaved, that for the first decade, the townspeople found no need for a Constable or a Justice of the Peace.

Hobart died in the early 1900s and Hobart Mills prospered for 60 years until 1936 when the nearby virgin pine timber ran out. Without the trees the town shut down, the buildings were dismantled, and the families left. Eventually the ten of thousands of acres of the Hobart forests were sold to the US Forest Service. Today, not much remains of Hobart's vision of a new California except for the Hobart Building on Market Street.
[ MAP F-15 ]

928 - The Googleplex, Mountain View

2009-01-27T21:05:00.000-08:00

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The Googleplex, Mountain View
Today everyone is thinking about their jobs, how not to lose them, or where to work next. So lets take a look at Google, which over a number of years, has been voted the country's "Best Company to Work For" and see what makes it so special. The 26-acre Google Campus, or Googleplex, is made up of four core buildings with more than a half million square feet and 6,500 U.S. employees. The Googleplex has the feel of an exclusive college campus but is harder to get into - Google gets 1,300 resumes a day.

Once in, Google offers many perks to its employees, the Googleplex features 11 free gourmet cafeterias; on-site activities as varied as indoor rock climbing, beach volleyball, and swimming; roller hockey twice a week in the parking lot; massage chairs; annual ski and scuba trips; oh, and your dog is welcome at work.

But the perks don't end at food and recreation, Google employees get $1,000 toward the purchase of a hybrid or electric car, free shuttle service, an on-site doctor, financial planning classes, adoption services, personal free employee concierge service, up to $12K in tuition reimbursement, and free on-site haircuts.

In October of last year, citing changing economic conditions, Google announced it was scaling back the free gourmet food options available in its free cafeterias. The growth and impact of Google ($96.5 billion market cap) is amazing for a company barely ten years old. Co-founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin incorporated Google in 1998 using a series of inexpensive, interconnected PCs to process the many search requests. The original Google production server is shown here.

TRIVIA QUESTION:
Before it was 'Google', what was their first search engine nicknamed?

TRIVIA ANSWER

[ MAP R-15 ]

927 - The Black Cat Cafe, Montgomery Street

2009-01-26T20:08:00.000-08:00

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The Black Cat Cafe, Montgomery Street
At this location, one block from the Transamerica Pyramid, the Black Cat Cafe opened in 1933. From the beginning it attracted a bohemian clientele of both straight and gay writers, artists and musicians. Artists Maynard Dixon and Ed Corbett would hangout here as did writers John Steinbeck and William Saroyan. The Cat even provided the backdrop for part of Jack Kerouac’s On the Road. In the 1950s the Cat began to feature female impersonators and poet Allen Ginsburg described it as a honky-tonk “everyone” went to: “All the gay screaming queens would come, the heterosexual gray flannel suit types, the longshoremen. All the poets went there.”

But soon the police began to repeatedly raid the bar and the city's Department of Alcoholic Beverage Control threatened to shut it down for being an openly gay hangout. Owner Sol Stuman appealed to the California Supreme Court and in a landmark decision the court ruled that an establishment could not be closed down simply because homosexuals were the usual customers. While this ruling did not end harassment of gay bars and patrons, the ruling broke the barriers that prevented overtly gay bars from existing freely.

The Cat continued to operate until 1963 and when it finally closed, the attorney for the club said, “That place is like an institution. This is like closing the cable cars or the Golden Gate Bridge.” TRIVIA: The Black Cat was not San Francisco's first openly gay bar, that distinction went to The Dash which opened at Pacific and Kearney in 1908.
[ MAP E-15 ]

926 - The Bounty of Bolinas Beach

2009-01-25T21:33:00.000-08:00

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The Bounty of Bolinas Beach
In 1934 Bolinas in Marin County was much as it is today, a sleepy little seaside community that's happy to keep to itself. But in March of that year a discovery was made that changed everything. A local came across a gooey, platter-sized object on the beach. It looked like a gray sponge but smelled awful. After some debate it was suggested the object might be ambergris, undigested food from a sperm whale and an integral part perfume making. At that time the rare substance was valued at $100 an ounce. A sample of the find was sent off to the Smith-Emory Lab in San Francisco and the result came back, 'pure ambergris!'

When word reached Bolinas all hell broke loose. The town declared a school holiday and the entire population of 400 was out on the beach with rakes and sacks collecting as much of the valuable, stinky substance as they could find. The seven-member Pepper family collected a valued $25K on the first day and a local sailor discovered a single 90-pound piece. Soon the small town was overrun by ambergris hunters and twelve policeman from nearby San Rafael had to be brought in to maintain the piece with shotguns. By the end of the week an estimated $16 million worth of ambergris had been collected.

While plans were being made on how to spend the largess; mortgages paid off, early retirement, studies in Europe, the bad news came in. Experts in New York claimed it was not ambergris at all but instead some sort of vegetable substance. The Marin Department of Public Works identified the material as waste from offshore shipping. Optimistic locals sent samples off to Japan and France hoping for happier results, but finally it was pointed out that amount of ambergris would have to come from hundreds of sick whales. In the end, the only money made was a few dollars that came by selling off chunks as souvenirs. By April Bolinas had returned to being just a sleepy little seaside community, wiser, if not richer.
[ MAP J-7 ]

925 - Watching Sourdough Being Made

2009-01-22T10:03:00.000-08:00

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Watching Sourdough Being Made
In the 1840s miners and pioneers brought sourdough over the Sierras to San Francisco. The starter was so valuable that it was often taken to bed with them to keep it warm and assure its survival through the long, cold winters. Due to this, early prospectors were given the nickname 'Sourdoughs.' Once in the Bay Area the dough met with a local foggy airborne bacteria, now called 'Lactobacillus Sanfrancisco,' to create a uniquely sour, sourdough loaf that was different from any other. The result was so popular that this extraordinary starter was often given as a prized part of a bride’s dowry.

By 1849 there were 70 sourdough bakeries in San Francisco but it was Isidore Boudin who combined the local dough with French baking traditions to create the golden loaf that we know today. His tangy loaves were crispy-chewy on the outside, light and full of holes on the inside. Following the 1906 earthquake, Boudin avoided disaster when he stashed some of the original mother dough in a moist bucket and carried it away from the raging fire. Today Boudin's bakes 25,000 loaves of sourdough a day and every one can still be traced back to that original starter of 1849.
[ MAP D-14 ]

924 - Harry Bridges Plaza, The Embarcadero

2009-01-21T14:01:00.000-08:00

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Harry Bridges Plaza, The Embarcadero
Every day thousands of commuters exit the Ferry Building and cross Harry Bridges Plaza on their way to downtown San Francisco. The plaza is unique because in his day Bridges was one of the most hated men by the city's powerful elite.

The Australian-born, Bridges arrived in San Francisco on a ship in 1922. Working as a longshoreman he was appalled by the dock's working conditions and its corruption. Bridges rebuilt the local International Longshoremen's Association and along with the city's other marine laborers called a general strike in 1934 to shut down the city's shipping industry. Local shipowners offered Bridges a $50,000 bribe to call off the strike but he refused.

On July 3rd, a day that would later be called 'Bloody Thursday,' the owners attempted to break the strike and a pitched battle with ensued between union members wielding bricks, boards, and sticks and policeman with guns. Scores of strikers were wounded by gunfire during the battle and two were killed.

The strike was only settled by the intervention of FDR. The union's victory landed Bridges on the cover of TIME magazine, despite this there were attempts in the 1950s to brand him a communist. That case that was finally settled in Bridge's favor by the Supreme Court.

In 1958 Bridges and his fiance, Noriko Sawada actively fought the nation's anti-miscegenation laws by specifically traveling to Reno to challenge the state's law banning marriage between a white person and any person of the "yellow race." The couple sought and received a court order which allowed them to marry and which led to the 1959 repeal of all anti-miscegenation laws in Nevada.

As Harry Bridges grew in public stature he was eventually named to the San Francisco Port's board of directors by Mayor Joseph Alioto in 1970. Bridges died in 1990 and in 2001 on his 100th birthday the city named this plaza in his honor.
[ MAP F-15 ]

923 - Hangar One, Moffett Field

2009-01-20T17:16:00.000-08:00

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Hangar One, Moffett Field
Driving south of San Francisco on Highway 101 it's hard to miss the enormous Hangar One at Moffett Field. One of the largest unsupported structures in the world, its interior can hold 10 football fields and it is so tall that fog sometimes forms near the ceiling. Hangar One was built to accommodate the lighter-than-air blimps and dirigibles of the 1930s and it became the home of the world's largest airship, the 785-foot USS Macon.

Filled with helium, rather than the hydrogen that caused the Hindenburg to explode, the Macon carried a crew of 100 as well as five Sparrowhawk fighter planes in its belly. In 1935 during its 45th flight the airship ran into a storm off Carmel and was driven into the ocean killing two of its crewmen. Its submerged wreckage was not discovered until 1991.

After the Macon crash the lighter-than-air program ended and Moffett Field became a training center for the Army Air Corps. After WWII the airfield became a NASA station and in 1994, home for the NASA/Ames Research Center. Today, Hangar One is closed but the Moffett Field Museum next to the giant structure is open for the public to visit. One private company at Moffett Field offers airborne tours of the Bay Area via the blimp shown above.
[ MAP Q-12 ]

922 - At Home in the Tenderloin

2009-01-19T10:00:00.000-08:00

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At Home in the Tenderloin
As you travel through the Tenderloin it's easy to see the neighborhood as a unorganized collection of poor people living in a hopeless situation. Prior to the 1980s that certainly was true, the Tenderloin's forty blocks experienced 40% of the city's drug overdoses and there was no community or no social structure. But in 1980 one event changed that. That year Ramada, Hilton, and Holiday Inn all announced plans to build large tourist hotels in the neighborhood. The area's residents soon discovered they were being forcibly evicted from their apartments and residence hotels.

Without any place to go and with no political clout, the neighborhood formed a grassroots coalition to fight the forced gentrification. Years of protests and political activism finally led to a compromise where no residence hotel was allowed to be converted into tourist use and the hotel corporations agreed to subsidize low-cost housing and fund community projects. While far from a total victory, the concessions were unprecedented nationally and marked a sea change for the Tenderloin.

The results from the 1980s hotel fight was the creation of a number of Tenderloin housing and political groups looking out for the neighborhood. This has led to benefits such as the Heart of the City Farmer's Market which allows residents a chance to buy fresh fruits and vegetables, the construction of two parks, an arts and workshop space, a community center, and even a neighborhood theater. While these changes have yet to solve the area's many overwhelming problems, there is today hope that the Tenderloin might see a better day.
[ MAP H-13 ]

921 - PEZ Museum, Burlingame

2009-01-18T15:23:00.000-08:00

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PEZ Museum, Burlingame
The world's only PEZ museum is located south of San Francisco in the town of Burlingame. Started over a decade ago, the museum now features every one of the more than 600 PEZ dispensers ever manufactured as well as other PEZ memorabilia. The owners, Gary and Nancy Doss originally started out selling computers out of this storefront but the PEZ sales overtook the demand for computers. The museum's awning still says 'Computer Spectrum'.

While the PEZ mints date back to 1927, they only gained wide popularity after switching from peppermint to fruit flavors and introducing their unique dispensers. Gary's museum tours point out the first dispensers (no heads, 1950), the first cartoon dispenser (Mickey Mouse, 1952), and the most valuable dispenser (Make-A-Face, 1973) which was immediately pulled off shelves for presenting a choking hazard with its tiny removable plastic parts.
[ MAP O-11 ]

920 - The Secret History of San Francisco's Cable Cars

2009-01-15T14:08:00.000-08:00

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The Secret History of San Francisco's Cable Cars
Maybe you're a local who rides cable cars all the time, but how well do you really know these symbols of San Francisco?

Here are nine cable car trivia questions. Get at least four correct and you can call yourself an honorary conductor, three to one correct gets you honorary gripman status, zero correct and you're a not-so-honored tourist from Des Moines.

1. In 1968 why was the President's daughter kicked off a cable car?
ANSWER

2. What did Andrew Hallidie do before developing the cable car?
ANSWER

3. From what street did the first cable car descend?
ANSWER

4. What unusual thing did the gripman do prior to that first cable car descent?
ANSWER

5. Who was Benjamin Brooks?
ANSWER

6. In 1963, a 19-year old Berkeley coed riding a cable car defied an ordinance and ended 92 years of sexual discrimination. What was her act?
ANSWER

7. What were cable cars used for following the 1906 earthquake?
ANSWER

8. Why did a court order San Francisco to pay cable car rider Gloria Sykes $50,000 in 1964?
ANSWER

9. Who was San Francisco's first African-American female cable car conductor?
ANSWER

[ MAP G-14 ]

919 - Relaxing with a Sandwich after a Morning of Photography

2009-01-14T09:18:00.000-08:00

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Relaxing with a Sandwich after a Morning of Photography
I always joke with my friends that they'll know I'm out of FogBay ideas when, like a kid with his first camera, I start taking photos of my feet. Don't worry, this post is about waiting for your ship to come in.

Gold Rush San Francisco was filled with thousands of men but practically no women at all. When word of this situation reached the East Coast one woman vowed to change things. Eliza Farnham, a New York feminist and former Sing Sing matron decided to fill a ship with moral women to bring 'feminine civility' to the rowdy bachelor town.

Farnham chartered the sailing ship Angelique and advertised in the papers for respectable young women willing to move to San Francisco. Hundreds of single women expressed interest in the move but only three met Farnham's high moral standards. Things got worse for Eliza Farnham when, during the trip, the Angelique's captain decided he'd had enough of her annoying interference and left her behind in the Chilean port city of Valparaiso.

The few women who did make it to San Francisco would find that there were some advantages here afterall. California was first state to allow a married woman to maintain ownership of her own property, whether acquired before marriage or during. This right was guaranteed in the state's 1849 constitution and was unheard of in the rest of the country. Years later California would also give women the right to vote a decade before the rest of the nation.
[ MAP E-6 ]

918 - Giant Toads, Chinatown Grocery Store

2009-01-13T12:27:00.000-08:00

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Giant Toads, Chinatown Grocery Store
A common Chinese greeting is "Have you eaten yet?" which underscores the importance of food as a cultural symbol. With Chinese New Year less than two weeks away meal preparations are in full swing. These huge softball-size toads were for sale along with turtles and even armadillos in a Chinatown grocery. During the celebration many foods take on meanings; wealth is symbolized by bamboo shoots, seaweed, egg rolls, oranges, and a whole fish among others. Long life is seen in long-grain rice, peanuts, noodles, and Chinese garlic chives.

This new year, number 4707, will be the Year of the Ox. The celebration will start at the beginning of first lunar new moon, January 26, and end on the full moon fifteen days later. About a week before the festival, a new paper Kitchen God is hung near the family stove. Often his mouth is smeared with honey to sweeten his annual report on the family's behavior to the Jade Emperor. In addition, kitchens are scrubbed to clean out old misfortune, but this must be completed prior to New Year's Day to avoid sweeping away the New Year's luck.
[ MAP F-15 ]

917 - Dashiell Hammett Place, Nob Hill

2009-01-12T12:25:00.000-08:00

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Dashiell Hammett Place, Nob Hill
In 1988 the San Francisco supervisors renamed a dozen streets after famous local writers and artists. One of those, Monroe Street, became Dashiell Hammett Place to honor the hard-boiled mystery writer who lived here during the 1920s at number 20, apartment 9. Hammett who wrote detective stories featuring Sam Spade and Nick and Nora Charles had worked as a Pinkerton detective before turning to novel writing.

During the time that he resided here Hammett was married to Josephine Dolan, and had two daughters. However his family lived in Marin County because Hammett had developed tuberculosis and wanted to avoid exposing them. The time apart from his family put stress on and eventually ended his marriage. In 1931, Hammett began a thirty-year affair with playwright Lillian Hellman.

For those interested, there is a Dashiell Hammett walking tour through San Francisco that visits a number of real and fictional locales from the Maltese Falcon, The Thin Man and other novels. A special thank you goes out to FogBay reader, Donna H. for e-mailing and suggesting this post.
[ MAP F-14 ]

916 - Morning in the Washoe Valley

2009-01-11T20:54:00.000-08:00

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Morning in the Washoe Valley
Today we leave the Bay Area for the Washoe Valley near the Sierras to tell the story of One-Eyed Charlie Parkhurst. Charlie was a stagecoach driver in the mid 1800s who drove a team of six horses over these hard grounds to San Francisco. Although only five-foot-six Charlie was famous for his horse driving skills, hauling passengers all over Nevada and California. In one famous story, Charlie drove his team over a rickety bridge above the swollen Tuolumne River during a huge rainstorm just seconds before the bridge collapsed.

Charlie was always a character, wearing embroidered gauntlets, chewing tobacco and smoking cigars. When a horse accidentally kicked out an eye Charlie simply added an eyepatch and continued his stage runs to Oakland, San Francisco, San Jose and Santa Cruz. In 1858 rheumatism forced Charlie into saloon ownership and eventually cattle and chicken farming. Finally in 1876 Charlie died of cancer alone in his cabin, three days after Christmas. While the undertakers were preparing his body they made a discovery, Charlie Parkhurst was a woman.

Charlie's story reported in the San Francisco Chronicle led to documents showing that she'd had been born in New Hampshire in 1812 and been given the name Charlotte. She'd run away from an orphanage there then disguised herself as a boy to work for a stable owner. When her employer moved to California she followed him there and continued to live as a man.

A bronze plaque erected in the town of Soquel, declares that Charlie had voted in 1868, making her the first woman cast a ballot in a presidential election. Today Charlie rests in the Old Pioneer Cemetery in Watsonville under a stone that reads, 'Charley (sic) Darkey Parkhurst, noted whip of the Gold Rush.'
[ OFF MAP ]

915 - Bandshell in the Fog, Golden Gate Park

2009-01-08T12:12:00.000-08:00

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Bandshell in the Fog, Golden Gate Park
The Golden Gate Park Band has been playing free public concerts on Sundays in Golden Gate Park continuously since September of 1882. Originally the band had 12 members and performed in a wooden bandstand like the one above. By 1900 the concerts were so popular that the large stone Temple of Music was built to accommodate the huge crowds. That giant stone stage still stands outside the de Young Museum.

Today the public concert season begins in late April and continue to the season finale in October. The band plays a great variety of music including classic band favorites, opera, marches, Broadway show tunes, orchestral transcriptions, novelty tunes, folk music, and big band swing. The free public concerts begin at 1:00 in the afternoon on Sundays.
[ MAP I-8 ]

914 - Neighborhood Bar, Mission District

2009-01-07T12:09:00.000-08:00

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Neighborhood Bar, Mission District
The Mission District is the oldest neighborhood in San Francisco. A church founded here in 1776 by the Spanish was named after the fresh-water lagoon. Laguna de los Dolores was so named because it was discovered on the Friday before Palm Sunday, the Friday of Sorrows. Mission Delores prospered until Mexico's independence from Spain in 1821 when it lost its funding and all contact with religious authority.

The abandoned mission and its buildings were neglected for nearly thirty years until the Gold Rush caused a property boom in San Francisco. During the late 1800s the Mission's good weather turned it into the district of choice for the middle class. Severely damaged by the 1906 fire, the Mission became home to the city's Italian and Irish laborers. These newcomers developed a unique way of speaking with a specific accent heard only in 'The Mish,' as the area was then called.

During the 1950s Latino agricultural workers from Mexico and Central America began to arrive in large numbers. During the '60s and '70s the popular 'La Raza' movement proudly established its own identity by promoting cultural heritage and arts programs in the district. Today the Mission District is more than 50 percent Latino.

But things are still changing, since the 1980s the Mission has seen a large immigration of young Bohemians and artists as well as a big influx from the Lesbian community. So once again the Mission District prepares to evolve and accommodate the needs of its new residents.
[ MAP K-12 ]

913 - Inside an Antique Streetcar

2009-01-06T12:07:00.000-08:00

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Inside an Antique Streetcar
In San Francisco, cable cars get most of the attention when it comes to public rail transportation. But the city's antique streetcars offer as much nostalgic fun and convenience as their more famous cousins. The city has a fleet of ninety historic streetcars (also called trolleys and trams) many of which are in active service carrying 40,000 riders a day.

The core of Muni’s vintage streetcar collection are six San Francisco streetcars built between 1895 and 1924, including a couple open-top streetcars. In addition there is a collection of antique streetcars from other American cities such as New Orleans, Philadelphia, St. Louis, Brooklyn, Kansas City, Louisville, and Baltimore. The fleet also includes international streetcars from Australia, Belgium, England, Germany, Japan, Portugal, and Russia.
[ MAP F-16 ]

912 - Chinatown's Paper Sons

2009-01-05T11:37:00.000-08:00

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Chinatown's Paper Sons
The Great 1906 Earthquake actually helped one group of San Franciscans. The fire that followed destroyed the city's City Hall and along with it all the birth records for the western United States. Many Chinese saw this as a chance to get around the discriminatory anti-Chinese immigration laws. Soon afterwards thousands of immigrant Chinese petitioned for citizenship claiming their birth records had been burned up.

Some of these new citizens returned to China where they claimed their wives had borne them sons during their visits. These boys were actually non-related children whose families paid for their opportunity to come to America. Today it is estimated that 60 percent of Chinatown's residents inherited fictitious surnames during rush to bring in 'paper sons.'
[ MAP F-15 ]

911- Maxfield's Bar and Restaurant, The Palace Hotel

2009-01-04T08:43:00.000-08:00

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Maxfield's Bar and Restaurant, The Palace Hotel
The 755-room Palace Hotel was built by William Chapman Ralston and William Sharon in 1875. At the time of its construction "Grande Dame of the West" was reputedly the largest, most luxurious and costly hotel in the world. The magnificent hotel featured unheard of opulence such as 14-foot ceilings, a pneumatic tube system throughout the hotel, and air-conditioning, fireplaces and bay windows in each room. The Palace also featured engineering marvels called 'rising rooms' (hydraulic elevators).

Despite a state-of-the-art defense against earthquakes and fire, including 760,000-gallon water reservoir, the Palace was damaged during the 1906 earthquake and fire. It reopened three years later and The Pied Piper, Maxfield Parrish's 16-foot mural behind the hotel's bar was commissioned for that second opening. Today the painting's appraised value is half of the hotel's original $5 million construction cost.

Maxfield's and the Palace Hotel have entertained over a dozen presidents as well as untold business moguls and celebrities including actress Sarah Bernhard who arrived with a pet baby tiger. In 1891 King David Kalakaua of Hawaii died in the Palace and in 1945 the hotel hosted dignitaries from all over the world as it catered the banquet honoring the opening session of the United Nations, held in San Francisco.
[ MAP G-15 ]

910 - Riding into a New Year, Market Street

2008-12-18T09:30:00.000-08:00

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Riding into a New Year, Market Street
The first transcontinental automobile trip began here at the base of Market Street in San Francisco on May 23, 1903. Dr. H. Nelson Jackson and Sewell Crocker set off here on a gentleman's wager to see if they could reach New York City in less than 90 days despite the fact that there were virtually no roads in the rugged West. They often had to push their car up over rocky terrain and through mudholes as well as endure breakdowns and delays while waiting for parts to arrive.

Despite all this they made the trip in only 64 days. Jackson and Crocker were hailed as heroes and inspired a generation of automobile enthusiasts. Their much-publicized journey caused people to think about the possibilities of long-distance auto travel, and consider cars as an alternative to railroads. It was this new attitude that led to the construction of many more paved roads and inspired a young engineer named Henry Ford to design a cheap automobile for the masses.

The actual 1903 Winton Touring Car that made the trip.

[ MAP F-16 ]

909 - Battery Townsley at Fort Cronkhite, Marin Headlands

2008-12-17T15:46:00.000-08:00

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Battery Townsley at Fort Cronkhite, Marin Headlands
In October of last year Battery Townsley (top photo), an underground fort was refurbished and opened to the public. The World War II battery was built in 1940 to house two 16-inch guns that could fire a one-ton shell a distance of 25 miles. Battery Townsley was part of a harbor defense system included underwater minefields, anti-aircraft positions, and a number of other big gun batteries. The 'eyes' of the battery were a series of tiny observation bunkers (bottom photo) placed on the cliffs overlooking the Pacific. During World War II, over one hundred soldiers lived in the battery around the clock and were trained to be ready for action within 5-minutes.

Due to high security, civilians living in San Francisco knew that there were batteries nearby but their exact locations were not revealed. In fact Battery Townsley was kept such a secret that the descendants of the man who it was named after didn't even know about it until decades after the war ended. In the 1950s, the guns were scrapped and the battery was turned into for living quarters for soldiers. During the Cold War it was used as an underground testing facility.

Battery Townsley is now managed by the U.S. Parks Service and is open to the public every second Sunday of the month, from 12 noon to 4 PM.
[ MAP K-9 ]

908 - The Last Light of Day on the Transamerica Pyramid

2008-12-16T09:54:00.000-08:00

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The Last Light of Day on the Transamerica Pyramid
For many, the Transamerica Pyramid is the symbol of San Francisco business. But the block on which she sits was a site for commerce well before the Pyramid was completed in 1972. In 1849 when this spot was still waterfront, the abandoned ship Niantic was converted here into city's first multi-use building featuring stores, offices and warehouses. Inside the old ship you could buy goods from all the arriving ships from Panamanian bananas and Asian brocades to monkeys, parrots, and other unusual animals. In 1852 when the ship the burned to the ground the Niantic Hotel, San Francisco's finest, was erected on top of its burnt hull.

Also built here in 1852 was the huge four-story Montgomery Block, the largest and most expensive building on the Pacific Coast. The building, the first fireproof and earthquake resistant one in San Francisco, was designed to resemble ancient Roman baths and was the city's most prestigious address. It was saved from the 1906 fire by a fierce tenant named Oliver Perry Stidger who stood his ground with a pistol and declared he would shoot any man who came to blow up the building in order to halt the flames.

Over the years the 'Monkey Block', as it was referred to by locals, became home to many writers and artists such as Mark Twain, Bret Harte, George Sterling, Lola Montez, Dr. Sun Yat-sen, Lotta Crabtree, Frank Norris, Ambrose Bierce, and Jack London. Before it was demolished in 1959, its historic importance as a bohemian center of the city was recognized as "the most famous literary and artistic structure in the West."
[ MAP E-15 ]

907 - Walter U. Lum Place, Chinatown

2008-12-15T10:56:00.000-08:00

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Walter U. Lum Place, Chinatown
The west side of Portsmouth Square is bounded by Walter U. Lum Place, the first street in America named for a Chinese person. Lum was an early civil rights leader, fighting for the rights of Chinese-Americans. In 1904 he founded the Native Sons of the Golden State (later the Chinese-American Citizens Alliance) and for 35 years was the managing editor for the organization's newspaper, Chinese Times. That paper is the oldest Chinese-language daily in the U.S. Walter Lum died in 1961 and today the street that bears his name is home to another civil rights organization, Chinese for Affirmative Action. The CAA is housed in a building that was once the communications center for Sun Yat-sen and the Chinese Revolutionaries of 1910.
[ MAP F-15 ]

906 - Uninvited Guests, Grand Hyatt Union Square

2008-12-14T09:09:00.000-08:00

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Uninvited Guests, Grand Hyatt Union Square
This wedding scene from last Saturday evening provides a nice segue to discuss Aimee Crocker. She was her age's most notorious free spirit, a heiress who inherited millions, married five times, and, in her later years, often wore Kaa, twelve-foot pet boa constrictor around her neck.

In 1873, when she was just ten, Aimee Crocker demanded that her wealthy mother buy her an elaborate Chinese bed that she found in San Francisco's Chinatown. Years later, Aimee would credit that ornate bed with drawing her imagination across the Pacific to the exotic East. As a young girl she traveled to the East with an inattentive chaperone and engaged in love affairs with a Japanese lord, a Chinese merchant, and a Borneo chieftain.

Her displeased mother shipped her off to Europe to be educated. But once in there she fell in love with a German prince and later a bullfighter from Madrid. Aimee then returned to San Francisco, was married and divorced in short order. She next hired a 70-foot schooner and took off for a South Seas adventure where she horrified the missionaries in Hawaii with her sexual escapades. King Kalakaua however was charmed by the lively young heiress and gave her an entire island where she was named princess of its 300 inhabitants.

Another marriage came and went as did several more lovers. Aimee traveled the globe and amused herself in various ways such as hunting big game from a maharaja's Indian palace or, on a dare, spending three weeks in a Turkish Harem. On her 62nd birthday she married a Russian prince (her second) in Paris but later divorced him as well. She eventually returned to America, wrote her memoir And I'd Do It Again, and sometimes danced veiled in a supper club. She died at the Hotel Savoy in New York City, unmarried and happy at 78 years of age.
[ MAP F-14 ]

905 - Belden Place, Downtown

2008-12-11T19:21:00.000-08:00

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Belden Place, Downtown
If you're looking for a romantic place in San Francisco to pop the question or even get engaged, you might consider Belden Place. In 1990 two restaurateurs, Eric Klein and Olivier Azanco, transformed this service alley near downtown into a charming al fresco dining spot. Today Belden Place boasts a eight wonderful European-style restaurants and outdoor seating for over 300.

During the day the restaurants are busy providing business lunches to their nearby Financial District customers. But at night, Belden Place turns into a lively yet romantic dining experience under a canopy of stars, reminiscent of sidewalk cafes of Paris.

Belden Place is located near San Francisco's French Quarter, home of the city's original French settlers, a group of approximately 3,000 who arrived in 1851, sponsored by the French government. Every year, the area hosts a boisterous Bastille Day celebration, the nation's largest, and nearby Bush Street is temporarily re-named Rue de Buisson.
[ MAP F-14 ]

904 - Lost Gold Under the Golden Gate

2008-12-10T16:29:00.000-08:00

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Lost Gold Under the Golden Gate
In the early morning dark of February 22nd, 1901 the 3,548-ton steamship City of Rio de Janeiro sat anchored just outside the Golden Gate. The ship, arriving from the Orient with 212 passengers and crew, was two days behind schedule and anxious to dock in San Francisco. A local bar pilot ship pulled along side the huge vessel and Pilot Frederick Jordan climbed aboard the Rio to guide it through the treacherous waters of the Bay. At 4 a.m. the ship raised anchor and steamed into the dense fog toward the Golden Gate.

About an hour later the fishing boat Newcomer was leading a line of about a dozen other boats out from Fisherman's Wharf when crewman Antonio Silva spotted three men clinging to a raft in the dense fog. Soon the Italian fishermen were pulling dozens of shipwrecked people from the icy waters. The Rio had struck rocks off Fort Point and gone down in three minutes, so fast that only one of the eleven lifeboats was launched. Most of the passengers were still below deck when the ship sank. In the end it was San Francisco's worst maritime disaster with 132 passengers and crew lost and only 80 souls rescued by the fishing fleet.

Sixteen months later the ship's pilot house washed up on shore with the remains of its captain William Ward, still wearing his uniform, inside. Despite many attempts and dives, the rest of hulk was never found. The ship carried 650 bales of valuable imported silk as well as a store of gold bullion valued at around $16 million today. For years salvage crews attempted to locate the wreck and recover the valuable cargo but without any luck. Theories exist that the Rio was swept back out to sea or settled into a bottomless cave beneath Fort Point where it rests today.
[ MAP D-6 ]

903 - Mini Series, The Mission Murals, Day 2 of 2

2008-12-09T09:05:00.000-08:00

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Mini Series, The Mission Murals, Day 2 of 2
Today we'll look at the murals of Clarion Alley, between Mission and Valencia at 18th Street. In 1992 an artist collective called CAMP converted this alley into public artwork space. Clarion Alley's murals are more in the mode of graffiti art and feature many pop, urban, and comic-strip references. When several structures were demolished here in 2001, CAMP was very active in saving the alley and creating art on the new structures.

For those interested, there are many other locations to find murals throughout San Francisco. Here are just a few: the Mission District Carnaval Mural at Harrison at 19th Street, the 24th Street Mini-Park between between York and Bryant, the 24th Street BART Station at Mission, and the San Francisco Women's Building at 18th Street at Lapidge Street. May is Mural Awareness month in San Francisco and many tours and exhibits are available during the month.

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EVEN MORE CLARION ALLEY MURALS

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902 - Mini Series, The Mission Murals, Day 1 of 2

2008-12-08T09:00:00.000-08:00

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Mini Series, The Mission Murals, Day 1 of 2
You can't live in San Francisco very long without becoming aware of its more than 700 public murals. These works of art decorate outdoor walls, garage doors, and fences all over the city but primarily in the Mission District. This tradition dates back to the 1930s and over the next two days we'll visit two of the best known locations for murals. First up, Balmy Alley.

Balmy Alley a single block long, is located west of Harrison at 24th Street and has been painted by artists since 1971. Balmy Alley features more than 30 colorful murals, diverse in both style and subject matter. The panoply here covers various political and social messages especially those highlighting the issues of the Latino community. Balmy Alley is located one block from the Precita Eyes Mural Arts and Visitors Center which offers three different guided mural tours on Saturday and Sunday.

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EVEN MORE BALMY ALLEY MURALS

[ MAP J-14 ]