Following in my own footsteps, part four (For Digital Revolution)

These are updates of early 1980s slide pictures that I took around San Francisco, that I had converted into digital at Digital Revolution on 9^th Street, San Francisco. They weren’t always so easy to do comparisons on, as I couldn’t remember where I took some of the original pictures from. I updated them yesterday on a misty at times Sunday, and I’ll post some more that Digital Revolution converted in a the future, as soon as I enlighten myself on where the locations of my slides were taken. (Thumbnail images)

We’ll start out in Chinatown. Obviously, this slide was in Chinatown, but that wasn’t much help because sometimes Chinatown seems bigger to me than Hong Kong, which is true because I’ve never been to Hong Kong. It was at Commercial Street coming into Kearny, about half a block away from Portsmouth Square. I think this one was 1983.

I’m not sure why I took this picture of an alley in 1983, except I think I remember liking the view of one of the Bay Bridge towers from the alley. I remembered it was near Levi Plaza when I Google Maps searched for it; it’s in the middle of the Battery, Front, Union, Green Streets block, and named John Maher Street. They’ve spruced up the alley quite a bit, which means it was important to somebody other than me, but the view of the Bay Bridge is gone now.

This one made me a little nervous, I was worried that I couldn’t go out on that ledge anymore without falling to my death! Just kidding, I wouldn’t have gone out on the ledge in 1984! This was taken from the fire escape of the O’Farrell-Mason Garage. What I was actually nervous about was that the spot wasn’t there anymore, I haven’t been there in over forty years! Progress has blocked out the view of one of my favorite San Francisco buildings now, the dome shape Humboldt Building.

Other than a change in the cars and trees, time hasn’t altered the view down Clay Street from Powell much.

Of course, the first thing you’ll notice in this set, I’m mean after the St. Francis Lutheran Church, is that Napolitana Pizza is now Casa Mexicana Restaurant. This was taken from the 1934 #228 open air Streetcar from Blackpool, England, heading back to the Transbay Terminal at what may have been the first Trolley Festival in San Francisco in 1983. This was at Market and Church Streets. The festival features vintage streetcars running along Market Street. I’ve also included a slide picture of the streetcar I took that day, and Market Street Railway still runs it along Market Street occasionally, but you have to stand in line to ride it.