This seven-minute film taken from the front of a San Francisco streetcar going the length of Market Street toward the Ferry Building is said to have been shot four days before the earthquake and fire of 1906, and to have survived because it was sent by train to New York for processing before the quake. Virtually all of the buildings shown (except the Ferry Building itself) were destroyed in the quake.

The street scene is lively and chaotic, and many details are fascinating.

This image of the presidio in 1887 comes from the public library’s historical photographs collection. Of interest are the small trees (today a large grove or forest) that punctuate the landscape. It is easy from this photo to picture how spare the sandy Pacific reaches of the city once were. The photograph is attributed to the U.S.Army Signal Corps; on the back is written the following:

PRESIDIO OF SAN FRANCISCO, 1887. This photograph was taken facing west and shows the Presidio Boulevard approach to the Post. The trees, planted in 1882 when Major General Irwin McDowell was Commander of the Western Department, today cover the hillsides.

This 1914 video shows opium paraphernalia being burnt in what is now the Civic Center area. At the time the area had not yet been rebuilt following the ’06 earthquake (because voters would not pass bonds for funding the project because of the corruption of city leaders), but here you can see the new city hall under construction.

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via bluehour on the Asian Art Museum blog

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David Newman administs a Flickr pool called San FranGone: The City as It Was. Here you can find photos, postcards (such as the mid-a960s cable car above), and maps ranging from the nineteenth century to fairly recently. Newsom says:

Please post your image in this group if:

You can’t go there anymore (i.e. Playland-at-the-Beach)

If the person, place or thing has changed significantly since the image was made (i.e. SF Bay with ferries, before the bridges were built)

This sheet music cover dates from 1917.

Hanging out on Haight and Masonic during the Summer of Drugs Love:

My publishing company used to occupy the entire first floor of the tower portion of the Call Building, the tallest building, I think, to survive the earthquake.

The pool has some limitations. A few posters somewhat overwhelm the rest, and there are quite a few more pictures of someone named Leo than I really need. While the pool is fun to browse, it is very difficult to find anything in particular. I think the pool should be subdivided by decade, subject, or neighborhood.

For more click on the screenshot below.

By 1938 the essential outlines of the city were filled in and established. Some names have changed — I didn’t know that Fort Point was called Fort Winfield Scott. The location of Funston Park was called Lobos Square. USF was the San Francisco College of Women. There were “bear cages” in the park, as well as “elk and deer corrals.” And so on.

A large (5800 x 4358 px) image of the map is here.

Fort Point, at the south end of the Golden Gate Bridge, figures prominently in the Hitchcock film Vertigo. It is here where Kim Novak plunges off the fort into the water and is saved by Jimmy Stewart.

The story is told — I don’t know if it is true or not, although it sounds plausible — that Novak and Hitchcock squabbled throughout the filming of the movie. Novak, it is said, constantly complained that her wardrobe was not glamorous enough.

In the filming of this scene Hitchcock exacted his reverge. Claiming to be dissatisfied with the first couple of dozen takes, he made Novak enter the chilly water 25 times.

Eadweard Muybridge produced two panoramas of the city. This one, made in January 1877 (the same year he produced photographic evidence that a trotting horse may lift all four hooves off the ground), was shot from the Mark Hopkins Mansion at California and Mason. Muybridge used 13 different cameras to make the image. At America Hurrah you can click the panorama thumbnails to see larger versions.