Sometime, very early in the 80s, I bought a little plastic case containing matchbooks from a large number of restaurants and nightclubs around San Francisco. I probably didn’t pay a fortune for it, maybe as much as ten dollars, but I don’t think I’d sell it today, not even for twice what I paid for it. I think I remember buying it at a gift shop in Fisherman’s Wharf. I don’t pay much attention to it, and the plastic case the collection came in is on the verge of disintegrating now, but the matchbooks are still in fine condition, although it’s unlikely that they’d spark anymore. Most of the restaurants are closed now, but some of them are still in business, and a few of them are promising to reopen someday. So, to make a short story long, I took pictures of the front and back of some of the matchbooks that I’ll post along with some pictures of the restaurants, or the locations of where they were. (Thumbnail images)
We’ll start up on Telegraph Hill and Julius Castle, the favorite restaurant of Samuel Spade of Maltese Falcon fame. The restaurant is scheduled to reopen soon.
Just south of Julius castle on Montgomery Street, half way down the Filbert Steps, is the Shadows. Shadows went out of business in the early 1990s, and look at that great menu cover! (vintagemenuart.com and Flickr)
Let’s head down to Fisherman’s Wharf. Alioto’s and # 9 Fishermen’s Wharf Restaurants, they went together like fish and white wine. Alioto’s is gone now, and it’s unlikely that the Grotto will ever reopen. What a pretty couple they made.
Aw, the magic of Fisherman’s Wharf to me was mostly #9 Fishermen’s Grotto at dusk. (Peter Stratmoen)
Alioto’s and #9 Fishermen’s Grotto in 1949: (opensfhistory.org)
And a twilight photograph from an old souvenir book that I’ll never be able to duplicate again.
In May of 2025, I did an update of a Vintage Roadside photo looking north past the intersection of Jefferson and Taylor Streets. Over Labor Day weekend, I updated that update; note the gap where Alioto’s used to be.
Tarantino’s Restaurant, seen here in 1960, will never reopen either. (opensfhistory.org)
On that somber note, we’ll head over to the Buena Vista Cafe, alive and still kicking. My update of the matchbook cover I have, and and an ebay.com poster of it, doesn’t quite add up, but it’s not bad.
We’ll hitch a ride on MUNI #30 down Columbus Avenue, and get off at Bimbo’s 365, one of San Francisco’s oldest nightclubs. I’ll bet that matchbook may be a collector’s item someday. (San Francisco Digital Library Archives)
Heading into Downtown San Francisco, and a stop at 65 Post Street, where the Old Poodle Dog Restaurant used to be. In 1957, four holdup men held the diners in the restaurant hostage during a holdup, while police surrounded the building. The bad guys got away, but two of them were later caught. The vintage photo is from Hannah Clayborn’s book ‘Historic Photos of San Francisco Crime’.
We’ve moved down to the Embarcadero to try to locate where Earthquake McGoon’s was when I bought my matchbook covers. It used to be at 630 Clay Street, as seen in the vintage photo of the Turk Murphy Jazz Band from the Stanford University Library but had moved to 128 Embarcadero by the 1980s. (ebay.com) There is no longer a 128 Embarcadero, and AI says that would have been located across the Embarcadero from the YMCA Building. I don’t always trust AI, but if so, that would be about where the bottom photo I took is.
Heading north a block and a half, and we’ve come to where Sinbad’s Restaurant was. The first photo is looking toward the Sindbad’s sign in an update of a 1987 picture I took of my sister and nieces. The Embarcadero Freeway is on the left in the older photo. The second picture is Supervisor Dianne Feinstein with the owners of Sinbad’s when it opened in 1975. (San Francisco Library Digital Library Archives) Sinbad’s Restaurant closed in 2016, an was demolished for the new Ferryboat Terminal in the bottom picture.
We’ll double back to Union Square and Maiden Lane. The only vintage picture I could find of the Iron Horse Restaurant in Maiden Lane was a 1990s photo from the San Francisco Remembered Facebook page. This was where Joe DiMaggio and Marilyn Monroe had their wedding reception in 1994. The Iron Horse is still open today.
Now we’re at Geary Street and Van Ness. Ah, the legendary Tommy’s Joynt, Johnny Carson’s favorite, as well as many other celebrities. (SF Library Digital Library Archives)
We’ll head west to the Pacific Ocean for the deliberate finale. I still believe that the Cliff House Restaurant will be open again someday, just like I believe that the San Francisco Giants will be in the Playoffs again someday. I was never completely happy with the New Millennium remodeling, but like baseball again, any team in the World Series is better than no World Series at all, and any Cliff House is better than no Cliff House.
The Cliff House in the 1950s: I’ve lost the source of the vintage picture, my apologies.
An untrue blue view (kind of stumbles along) of the Cliff House, and an update I did from Sutro Heights in 2018: (Everyday Life in the Western United States)
By the time the Cliff House closed for remodeling in 2003 it had three great Gift Shops. The one on hand after the 2004 reopening wasn’t too bad, but not the same. I’ve lost the source for this vintage photo too.
I’ve never had an unhappy visit to the Cliff House, but the dismal visit I took in January of 2025 was the least happiest. The vintage 1960s picture from ebay.com is of the Cliff House I loved the best.
San Francisco Film Locations Then & Now 