USA > California > San Francisco County > San Francisco > San Francisco, a history of the Pacific coast metropolis, Volume I > Part 56
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While this strong predilection for economy existed throughout the greater part of the Sixties and operated to prevent improvements by the municipal authorities, it by no means put a stop to individual effort to make provision for the wants of the growing community. It was not until the opening years of the Seventies that the supervisors began to concern themselves about the matter of an ample water supply; but the prevision which the city authorities lacked was made good by the fore- thought of men who very early saw opportunities for profit in selling the indispen- sable fluid to the inhabitants of a growing community. The Spring Valley Water Company, as already related, in 1858 purchased a considerable tract of land in San Mateo county in a secluded and well forested region, and accumulated the waters of Pilarcitos creek and its tributaries, and also those of Upper San Mateo creek in a reservoir, the contents of which were conducted through tunnel, flume and pipe a distance of thirty-two miles to its Lake Honda reservoir and a reservoir on Market street which was subsequently destroyed by cutting through that thorough- fare. Lake Honda reservoir was located near the Almshouse tract, and had an ele- vation of 365 feet, and the Market street reservoir was near to where it was inter- sected by Buchanan street. The water was turned into these reservoirs during the winter 1862-63, and pipes distributed it in the North Mission and Hayes valley districts and part of the Western addition, and in the principal business parts of the City. In the fall of 1864 the foundation of the main dam of Pilarcitos was started and in the subsequent year a new Pilarcitos conduit line was conducted into San Francisco. In the latter part of the Sixties the San Andreas dam and its independent pipe line added to the supply of the City.
In 1871 an investigation of the water supply of the City was made with a view to municipal control. The scant precipitation of the rainfall seasons of 1869-70 and 1870-71 had caused some apprehension respecting the sufficiency of the supply of water and on the 10th of April, 1871, the board of supervisors appointed a special committee consisting of General B. S. Alexander, U. S. A., and Professor George Davidson of the United States Coast Survey to investigate and make a report which they did in December of the same year. They reported that "the water supplies of the peninsula within reasonable distance are amply sufficient to furnish an abundant supply of pure, fresh water to provide for the wants of San Francisco for at least fifty years," and they also recommended that the City should own and have absolute control of its water supply.
At this time the daily consumption of water in the City was only a little more than 6,000,000 gallons. The population was a trifle in excess of 150,000, and the computation on which the estimate of future needs was based was evidently made under the apprehension that the per capita consumption would not be greatly en- larged. In a very few years after 1871, it became necessary to go beyond the peninsula to augment the supply, and it was clearly seen that the increasing de- mands of the City would oblige it to develop additional sources in the remote Sierra.
The City's Water Supply
Municipal Water Supply Desired
Consumption of Water
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There were few people in San Francisco in 1865 when the Mountain Lake Water Works were absorbed by the Spring Valley Company who anticipated such a neces- sity arising, nor in that year was it foreseen that the failure to acquire a municipal water system would lead to endless litigation. Two years later, however, the com- petitive advantage disappeared and evidence of dissatisfaction was abundant. In 1867 suits were brought against the water company, and there has been an inter- mittent attempt ever since to acquire the Spring valley system or to create a rival supply.
The sentiment of the Sixties in San Francisco was decidedly individualistic. There was a profound distrust of collective management which militated against public improvement. "Don't run into debt," was a maxim and it was urged that the plan of sweeping before one's own front door was the ideal one to follow if financial difficulties were to be avoided. Extreme reluctance was manifested to carry out any project at the general expense which would directly or indirectly benefit private individuals. Considering the circumstances under which the realty of the City had been acquired by its owners it is not surprising that the system of opening streets at private charge should have been adopted, and that in conse- quence needed facilities were slowly provided and that the general result was a ragged and unsymmetrical development. But notwithstanding these drawbacks there was a constant improvement of the facilities for getting about and in the appearance of sidewalks and street pavements, although the latter result was ham- pered by considerations of economy, and the aversion for regulative measures which would interfere with the right of the individual to do as he pleased with his own property.
Critics arose very early to protest against the utter disregard of the esthetic, and of the convenience of the future inhabitants of the City in laying out the City on a strictly rectangular plan, but they made little or no impression on the public mind. When the desire for improvement manifested itself it did not take the form of changing lines, but of widening streets, but comparatively few movements of that kind were inaugurated, and only one was carried out during the Sixties. The nec- essary permission to increase the width of Kearny street was obtained from the legislature of 1865-66, and the legal methods of assessing the beneficiaries and compensating the injured property holders were prescribed. The advantages to be derived from this improvement were so obvious that the project met with a minimum of opposition, and when it was effected it was regarded with great satisfaction and complacently quoted as an instance of the "go aheadativeness" of the people of San Francisco.
Another project authorized by the legislature at the session of 1867-68 which provided for the modification of the grade of Second and other streets was not so well accepted by the community. The object was to extend the business district southward by cutting through Rincon hill, which at this time, and until the invention of the cable system of propelling street cars was devised, was a favored residence district. The plan was prematurely put forward, a fact attested by the result which was to simply scarify the hill, and make it unfit for habitation without accom- plishing the object aimed at of extending the business district in a southerly direc- tion. Those who conceived the project peered a long way into the future, but did not reckon sufficiently with the disposition to move along the line of least resist- ance. Nearly half a century was permitted to elapse before steps were taken that
Proposal to Raze Rincon Hill
Opposition to Crea- tion of Debt
Widening of Kearny Street
THOMAS STARR KING CHURCH ON GEARY STREET BETWEEN GRANT AVENUE AND STOCKTON STREET Dedicated in 1864
ILLLL
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SAINT IGNATIUS COLLEGE, ON MARKET STREET BETWEEN FOURTH AND FIFTH STREETS, AS IT APPEARED IN 1863 The site of the college is now occupied by a large department store building
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promise to realize the idea of converting the Rincon hill region into a suitable quarter for business purposes.
The legislature which authorized the Rincon hill invasion passed an act which confirmed an ordinance of the board of supervisors, the object of which was to quiet outside land titles, and also to survey and dispose of the salt marsh and tide lands belonging to the state within the City and county of San Francisco. The effect of this last named act was to dispose of the state's reversionary interest, after the previous grants to the City for ninety-nine years, to the tide and marsh lands in the City of San Francisco. Two sales of these lands made before 1870 realized $813,000 of which $200,000 was appropriated to the State University. The remainder of the lands were sold for a sum which increased the total amount received by the educational institution to something over $1,500,000.
The ordinance to quiet outside land titles has peculiar interest, because it rep- resented a bit of bargaining by which the City managed to save out of the lands it had so easily parted with at an earlier period the tract which has since been converted into Golden Gate park. Up to the time of the passage of this ordinance, which was numbered 800, and was frequently referred to by those numerals, there was little or no attention given to the subject of public breathing places. There were some who protested that the City was behind the times and gave no considera- tion to the future, but the public generally exhibited indifference. The few gifted with forethought, when the question of determining the titles to the disputed out- side lands came up, began to work up sentiment in favor of a park.
In 1864 Justice Field decided in favor of the City's claim to four square leagues, and on March 8, 1866, congress approved the decree. The City had disposed of all its title within the pueblo limits up to the charter line of 1851 by the Van Ness ordinance, and the act of congress therefore related practically only to the territory outside of the early boundary which was Divisadero street on the west, and Twenty- second and what is known as Napa street running to the bay on the south. The land outside the western boundary of 1851 was all claimed by squatters, or settlers as they called themselves, and their number included several persons very active in state and municipal politics whose influence was sufficient to prevent the munici- pality from profiting by the decision of the federal court and the act of congress which conferred ownership of the outside lands on the City.
In this posture of affairs the desire to obtain a public park was made use of to effect a settlement. The claimants of the outside lands were convened, and they were asked how much of the land claimed by them they would be willing to sur- render in exchange for a clear title from the City. The offers ranged from ten per cent to twenty-five per cent of their holdings. The committee appointed under the ordinance made an appraisement of the value of the claimed lands and fixed it at $12,087,306, and estimated that of the remainder for park and public purposes at $1,300,000. In the latter were embraced 1,013 acres for Golden Gate park valued at $801,593; Buena Vista park, 36 acres at $88,250; cemetery of 200 acres, $127,465; Mountain Lakes, 19 acres, $19,930; public square, 15 acres, $12,025; school lots, 68 acres, $115,077. An assessment of ten per cent was levied on the whole, which sufficed to pay 90 per cent of the appraised value of the part taken for public use, thus satisfactorily disposing of what had long been a vexed question, and clearing away the impediments to the growth of the City westward. The legis-
Salt, Marsh and Tide Lands
Outside Land Titles
Securing Land for a Park
A Dreary Waste of Sand
,
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lature on March 14, 1870, approved the settlement thus made by passing a suitable act which duly provided for the creation of Golden Gate park.
The land for the new park was not selected with reference to its fitness for the purpose, but it was the best that could be obtained owing to the greediness of the claimants who were not by any means the sort of persons implied by the contemp- tuous term "squatter," but were rich and influential citizens. Had a decent liberality prevailed in the settlement in 1870, the park would have extended from Divisadero street to the ocean, not merely as a pan handle, but for the entire width from Fulton street on the north to Frederick street on the south. As it was the people were apparently gratified to get any recognition at all and proceeded to make the best of their bargain. The land between Stanyan street, the eastern boundary, and the Pacific was a dreary sand waste, of whose unpromising aspect the present gen- eration can hardly form a conception, but persistent effort, and a tolerably liberal expenditure of public money, and some few gifts from individuals have made it one of the most attractive people's pleasure grounds in America.
Woodward's Gardens
The people did not begin to derive any benefit from the park thus acquired until the decade Seventy was well advanced. Throughout the greater portion of the Sixties, and well down toward the close of the decade 1880-90 the desire for open air recreation was ministered to by the enterprise of a man named Woodward, whose gardens, laid out on a more generous scale than those of Russ soon became the resort of the pleasure seeker on Sundays and holidays. The proprietor was under no illusions concerning the public taste. He recognized that the common folk, and they were all common in the Sixties, when they took an outing were in quest of amusement, and were not seeking fresh air. There was no lack of the latter in the denser parts of the City at any time in the Sixties, and except in the Chinese quarter there was not even a remote approach to congestion. Hence the term garden must be liberally interpreted. Not that there were no flowers, for there were a few, and there was some green grass which clothed terraces carefully guarded from encroachment. The real feature of the place was its attempt to provide as many and as varied forms of amusement as possible. There was a menagerie and an aquarium; an art gallery and a museum; there were swings and other provisions for the pleasure of the children, and regular performances were given in a pavilion and the visitor was afforded every opportunity to refresh the inner man with liquids and solids in a restaurant. An entrance fee of 25 cents for adults was charged, but the big crowds on Sundays to witness balloon ascensions and to enjoy the other attractions of the gardens show that the people did not begrudge the price.
Active Building Operations
The public improvements of a city are not difficult to recount for they are usually recorded, but it is a far different matter to attempt to deal with the ac- complishments of private persons, who, despite the liberty of action enjoyed in a community in which little or no restraint is placed on the exercise of individual taste, manage to do things pretty much alike. The influx of people which followed the outbreak of the Civil war was followed by an era of active building, but there was nothing statistically startling or architecturally exceptional during the decade. The Russ, the Lick house and the Occidental hotel were added during this period and deserved the reputation which the people bestowed upon them, for they were fully abreast in most particulars of the best hostelries of the largest Eastern cities. The Lick house, which took its name from its builder and owner, was erected in 1862. It contained a banquet hall designed and executed chiefly by Lick himself,
Boundaries of the New Park
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who was an expert worker in wood. It was spacious, and the decorations made it a notable room, surpassed in size and appearance by very few other dining places in the United States. Lick, who was one of the earliest pioneers of California, has the distinction of having been the most liberal citizen of San Francisco, his bene- factions to science and the people generally earning for him a world wide repu- tation.
While it would be uninteresting to describe in detail the progress of the City as exemplified by its building operations, there are some facts which are worth noting because they mark changing conditions. In 1861 Judge H. C. Hastings put up a number of four room houses in the southern part of the City which he rented at $10 a month. They were not very pretentious affairs, but proved an excellent investment for the owner, who found no difficulty in renting them. This bit of enterprise was later regarded as important as it gave an impetus to the con- struction of small cottages by individual owners who profited by the example set by Hastings. In the year following an act was passed by the legislature under which all the savings and loan societies were organized. Their operations were already very considerable but from this time forward they greatly promoted thrift and the spirit of home building which they encouraged by a judicious loan system.
Investments in real estate were popular in San Francisco from the days of the military occupation. The sale of water front lots, which took place June 29, 1847, was preceded by an advertisement signed by General Kearny and Alcalde Edwin Bryant, in which it was announced that "the town itself is no doubt destined to become the commercial emporium of the western side of the North American con- tinent." There was unwavering faith in the accuracy of this forecast, and a decided disposition to profit by securing land in a place so advantageously located. Many succeeded in procuring more than their share in the period when the chief object of the authorities seemed to be to get rid of all the land under their control, and much dissatisfaction was ocasioned by irregularities of procedure and the disap- pointment of those who were not as apt in grabbing as others. But these troubles finally ended and before the close of the Sixties the real estate business was estab- lished on a basis which indicated absolute confidence in the future of the City, although the variations in the volume of transactions at different times were con- siderable. In the movements of real estate toward the close of the decade can be traced the influence of excessive mining stock speculation. In 1867 the sales amounted to $17,000,000; two years later they were $30,000,000 and in 1873 they had dropped to $12,000,000. The propensity of fortunate speculators to invest some of their profits in real estate was very marked, and it was shared by men who had made money in legitimate mining operations. A large part of the buying be- tween 1867 and the year when the maximum sales for this particular period was attained was by men of this class who looked upon San Francisco real estate as the very best sort of a nest egg.
The fluctuations in values during this period were not excessive. The dullness of the market scarcely had the effect of compelling sacrifices; its chief characteristic was lack of movement. Men bought as a rule to hold, and when times became dull they were content to wait. There was much buying by persons who contemplated a future rise in values which they did not intend to help bringing about by making improvements, but it was not sufficient to retard the advancement of the City in those directions to which the topography offered no serious obstacles.
Home Building
Real Estate Investments
Slight Fluctuations in Values
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Before the close of the Sixties nearly all traces of the Spanish occupation had been effaced. There was still an isolated adobe but the low walled houses with their red curved tiles which a few years earlier had marked the Mission Dolores as a place to visit had practically disappeared. Instead of the Mission being a single strect with amply spaced houses, in the rear of which cattle grazed in meadows, it had become an indeterminate sort of place practically connected with the more densely inhabited part of the City. There was still plenty of meadow land, but houses were being erected on many streets which were rapidly taking on the shape of thoroughfares, and the term "the Mission" no longer specifically de- scribed the place where the Indians once worshiped in the church which still sur- vives, and the corral formerly visited by the amusement lovers of pioneer days to witness bear baiting and bull fights.
Real Estate Values in 1870-71
Some idea of the development of the City since the Sixties may be formed from a survey of real estate values in 1870-71. On streets like Mission, Howard and Folsom, which were 811/2 feet wide, lots 80 to 90 feet deep between Fourth and Seventh streets sold at from $125 to $200 a front foot, and similar lots beyond Seventh and as far as Fourteenth at from $75 to $100. Further southerly to Twen- tieth street from $60 to $75, and on Valencia from $80 to $90. Van Ness avenue property at this time was rated at from $120 to $150 a front foot. In the Hayes and Berdman tracts where the streets were 69 feet wide and the lots 120 feet deep, the price per front foot ranged from $60 to $100. On Stevenson, Jessie, Minna, Natoma and like streets, which were only 38 feet wide, and the lots on which were only 70 to 80 feet deep, between Fourth and Seventh streets the value of a front foot was $50 to $60, and west of Seventh to Tenth, about $40. These figures are derived from a pamphlet the writer of which sought to establish that Oakland prop- erty was a far more desirable investment, as lots on the best streets could be bought as low as from $27.50 to $45 a front foot. They by no means understated the values of San Francisco real estate, and are corroborated by records of actual sales. There is a careful statement embodied in it which tells the reader that in discussing "San Francisco values certain favored localities where even residence property is held as high as $300 a front foot, are not included."
Market Street in 1870
In 1870 the future of Market street was clearly realized. At that time the single ferry slip located in the City at which the boats from Oakland landed and departed was at the foot of Pacific street, but it was urged that it should be placed "as near to the foot of Market as possible, because from that point alone the street car lines can be made to radiate to any part of the City." The location of the ferry at the foot of Pacific street was not the only cause of dissatisfaction. It was urged that while provision had been made for the safety of passengers there was an absolute disregard of comfort and it was roundly declared that the surroundings were un- worthy of "the civilization of 1870." The inaction of the Harbor Commission was attributed to a desire to conform to the wishes of "the Railroad" whose managers interfered with proposed improvements because they did not regard the foot of Pacific street as the permanent location of the ferry slip, and had decided that it should be at the foot of Market street where it would better suit their convenience.
Early Street Car Conveniences
In 1870 there was no car line traversing lower Market street. The City Rail- road Company which operated as far as the Mission district at that date still had its starting point at the corner of New Montgomery and Market streets. The San Francisco and Market street line had commenced operations as early as July 4,
Mission Loses Its Distinctive- ness
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1860. Its cars were dispatched from near the same downtown point and ran as far as the Mission Dolores. The Howard street line and one on Folsom street were started in the latter part of 1862. Before the decade had half run its course the omnibus had been practically discarded as a mode of conveyance in what may be called the down town part of the City. The Market street sand hills had been cut through from Kearny street with the assistance of the steam paddy as early as 1862, and street cars were running to Hayes Park at Laguna and Hayes street. The Omnibus Line in that year was operating cars between North Beach and South Park. The cars on this line were drawn by two horses and the fare charged was ten cents or four tickets for a quarter of a dollar. When the City Railroad Com- pany introduced the one horse car, and dispensed with the services of a conductor, requiring passengers to deposit their fares in a box under the eyes of the driver, no one thought of protesting against the innovation. The desire to secure accom- modations was so eager that no part of the community thought of dictating terms. The attitude of the people towards the railroad companies was one of thankfulness, and the suggestion that they should pay for the privilege of using the streets would have been scouted as ridiculous. Franchises had no present nor prospective value so far as appearances went; and if those who developed these early facilities for getting about ever thought that they had secured concessions which would prove a source of great future gain to them they carefully concealed the fact. Summing up the street car situation at the opening of the Seventies it may be said that at that time the citizen who cared to make use of such means of getting about could ride from the northern to the southern part of the City, and could reach points on Rincon hill and in the Mission district, and could get as far west as Lone Moun- tain, where the journey could be continued to the Cliff house by Concord "busses" if one desired to visit that resort. The transfer system was not thoroughly de- veloped at the time, but there were arrangements by which a passenger for a single fare might ride from Lone Mountain to the Portrero or to Woodward's Gardens in the Mission.
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