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Big golden-hearted city | page 1, 2, 3
Life at the top At the same time that the Italian community was putting together North Beach, some of the men who had made their fortunes during the gold rush were building their great mansions, and the greatest of them were built on Nob Hill. The word "nob" is a contraction of nabob, an Indian word that means prince and that's who moved up here -- the princes of industry. Nob Hill is the highest of San Francisco's hills, but it was so difficult to get up that no one wanted to live there -- until 1873 when the cable car was invented and the California railroad barons agreed to build their homes on the hill and their own cable car line down California Street to their offices on Market Street. The real fortunes were not made by the gold miners but by the people who lent them money or sold them goods. These people, like Leland Stanford, a grocer, and Charles Crocker, a dry goods salesman, also built their mansions on Nob Hill.
One exception among this group was Bonanza Jim Fair, who made his fortune with the world's largest silver strike. Bonanza Jim planned to join his fellow millionaires on Nob Hill, but died before his dream house could be built. His daughters inherited the property and began construction of a hotel. But just before it was scheduled to open, it was gutted by the fire that followed the 1906 earthquake. Reconstruction on the hotel began as soon as the fires were out and it opened with a fantastic party just one year to the day after the quake. The Fairmont Hotel quickly became the social center for San Francisco's high society. The Mexicans and the murals The first Europeans to build anything in San Francisco were the Spanish. Starting in 1769, they began building a chain of missions between San Diego and San Francisco. The Mission Dolores was built in 1776 and is still standing; it's San Francisco's oldest building. The ceilings are covered with ancient Native American designs that were painted on with vegetable dyes. The decorative altar came up from Mexico in 1796. The original bells were cast in the 1790s and hang above the entrance area. When Mexico won its independence from Spain, the area of California that stretched from San Francisco to San Diego became part of Mexico. It was taken over by the United States in 1849. During the early years of the 20th century, almost 10 percent of the population of Mexico migrated to the United States, with hundreds of thousands of those immigrants settling in California. One result is a distinct Hispanic influence throughout San Francisco. The most dramatic visual manifestations of the Mexican community are the street murals. There are more than 100 of them in the Mission District alone. Many are the work of the Precita Eyes Mural Arts Center, which was set up by Susan Cervantes in 1977 to encourage, train and support artists who wanted to paint murals. You can stop into the center and pick up a map that will guide you to the murals or you can sign up for a walking tour. The Precita Eyes Mural Arts Visitors Center is at 2981 24th St., San Francisco, CA 94110; the telephone number is (415) 285-2287. The Chinese community The Spanish were the first Europeans to settle in the area and the Chinese were the first Asians. At the time of the gold rush in 1848, China was in total chaos. The Manchu dynasty was falling apart. There was widespread starvation and the peasants were in rebellion. Thousands of Chinese went in search of their golden opportunity, which they believed was in the hills surrounding San Francisco. The earliest Chinese workers to arrive in the mines were known as "coolies," a word that comes from the Chinese "ku li," meaning "bitter strength." They did the toughest jobs for the least money and set up their own community in San Francisco. When the gold rush came to an end, the silver rush started and they were back in the mines again. And when the silver petered out, they went to work building the railroads, always at half the pay of whites. At one point nine of 10 workers on the Central Pacific Railroad were Chinese. Many Chinese also worked in the vineyards and made an outstanding contribution to Northern California's winemaking. Today San Francisco's Chinatown is the oldest and one of the largest Chinese communities outside Asia. The population is estimated at about 100,000 and the community represents a powerful political and economic force in the city.
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