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The Exposition City-San Francisco. Color reproduction of a 1915 lithograph published by
Pingtree-Truang Co., San Francisco. |
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View of Montgomery Street. Permanent collection
of The Society of California Pioneers. |
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The Streets of San Francisco
January 23 - August 29, 2008
Paris
has its boulevards; New York has its avenues; San Francisco has its
streets. For a century and a half, the Streets of San Francisco have
been celebrated in literature, song, and myth. They have also inspired
a spate of films and television series where intrigue is played out on
the hills and every other car chase ends with an explosion or abrupt
plunge into the Bay. But who were the men - and, on occasion, women -
whose names are perpetuated in asphalt and concrete? The identity of
these individuals, from explorers and pioneers to politicians and
hookers, is the subject of the exhibition The Streets of San Francisco.
The Streets of San Francisco
incorporates maps, photographs, prints, and artifacts that recall San
Francisco's transformation from mission outpost to instant metropolis.
Under the alcalde Francisco Guerrero, the eastern side of the town that
now constitutes the financial district was laid out by Jean-Jacques
Vioget in a grid-like pattern that he borrowed from plan of New York.
It was Jasper O'Farrell who extended this plan up to Western (now Van
Ness) Avenue, superimposing a grid on to the entire eastern half of the
San Francisco peninsula bisected by the diagonal that is Market Street.
O'Farrell's plan ignored the physical contours of the landscape and
wherever needed the landscape was remade in order to conform to the
plan. The names of certain Spanish-named landmarks - Alcatraz, the
Embarcadero, and "Los Pechos," translated as "Twin Peaks" - were also
retained .
"The first
consideration in selecting a street name," stated a 1909 City
commission report," should be use. It should not be difficult to
pronounce or spell, nor should it be very long." The report goes on to
say that "the names of persons are the best street names, especially
those of historic or patriotic significance," singling out "local
pioneers" as particularly worthy of commemoration. The report may have
had in mind pioneers like Brannan, Frémont, Larkin, O'Farrell, Sloat,
Stockton, Sutter, and Vallejo, who were all honored with major
thoroughfares. Many Spanish explorers like Alemany, Anza, Arguello,
Balboa, Cabrillo, Castro, Guerrero, Ortega, Portola, Serra, Ulloa, and
Valencia, were similarly commemorated in the southern and western
districts of the city. There were presidents, business leaders, and
literary figures, but a scant number of streets named after trees,
perhaps due to the relative absence of maples, sycamores, and elms
within the city limits. There were neighborhoods laid out with streets
honoring other American states and California cities, and a rather
confusing network of numbered streets and avenues in separate parts of
town. Women were accorded few streets names, but surprisingly rather a
lot of alleys.
The exhibition also incorporates a number of buildings, monuments, and public spaces
bearing such names as Crocker, Fair, Flood, Hopkins, Huntington, Russ,
Spreckels, and Stanford, all of whom made significant contributions to
the history and the life of the city. The Streets of San Francisco will appeal to all lovers of the City, from those who know it well to those who'd like to know it better.
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