San Francisco Film Locations Then & Now

A thoughtful gift from a client; thanks, Kathy F.

“Nipping the fender.” Charles’s Smallwood’s book ‘The White Front Cars of San Francisco’ is a wonderful source of vintage pictures of San Francisco, but this image here had me doing my homework! When I first saw it years ago, I thought it was a terrific period picture of San Francisco from the 1940’s, and I always wanted to see if the location had changed or still existed since 1943. The trouble was, Smallwood, who was usually an excellent locator, and often identified where the photos in his book were taken, was off here; 26^th and Army, (Now Cesar Chavez Street) do not intersect, nor did they in 1943. From an old map located in his book, I was able to determine that the Number 30 Line ran down portions of both Army and 26^th in 1943. I perused portions of Cesar Chavez on Google Maps, but much of this area is industrialized now, and the site may have been demolished when Highway 101, cut across Army when it was created.. I went back to 26^th on Google Maps to follow the route #30 took and only had to go one block to South Van Ness and 26^th, which is where the picture was taken. The intersection looks remarkably the same today including a small grocery store on the same corner.

“Have an accident?”

“No thanks, we’ve already had one!”

I knew I was going to use that one sooner or later! This dramatic streetcar accident took place on Fillmore between Green and Union Streets in November of 1921. I couldn’t learn if anyone was hurt, but I’ll bet phone service was out for quite awhile, although they’ve replaced the telephone pole since then. (Charles Smallwood)

The Butcher Town Bridge opens in 1933: Renamed the Lefty O’Doul Bridge, it now sits next to AT&T Park, and has been seen in a number of movies including ‘Fog Over Frisco’ with Bette Davis (1934), ‘The Enforcer’ with Clint Eastwood’ (1976) and ‘A View to a Kill’ Roger Moore’s last role as James Bond. (1985)

Eighty years later I would have ran over him! A worker puts on some finishing touches to the Bay Bridge before it opened in 1936 near where I was driving. A billboard and concrete addition to the Clock Tower Building in the background since the vintage picture was taken has blocked out most of the view of the tower, which can be seen below the street signs, from this spot today. Twin Peaks can be seen to the right of the Tower Building in both pictures. A long gone entrance to the bridge can be seen on the left.

Soldiers watch a ship pass through the Golden Gate as work on the Golden Gate Bridge begins in 1933.

“Come on, who’s next? I’ll fight anybody who says anything bad about my hat!”

(The Cliff House Project website)  “There are eight million stories in the half naked city; this has been one of them.”

This 1930’s picture might not have been as relaxed as it looks; that’s a long way down to the Pacific Ocean!

Wow, a “Pushmi-pullyu”!

The cable car turntable at Powell and Market Streets: (Fred Lyon)  “Far East meets West.”

The Japanese Tea Garden from the 1894 Midwinter Fair in Golden Gate Park; one of the surviving attractions from that fair.  “Sneaking Sister Sally through the Alley.”

Spofford Alley, Chinatown, in the 1950’s (Jimmie-Shein)

Ah, the end of another tax season, and I’m glad that’s over! Now I can get back to the more important things! I’d like to thank all of the people who helped make it happen by name, but there’s too many of them, and some of them haven’t paid me yet! A special thanks to Will, whose computer skills got me through, Amber, who took over my desk when she was in, and also ate up every tasty thing in the office that I didn’t keep behind barbed wire, and Jaime, who left me all too soon for Steph Curry.

Playland-at-the Beach from Point Lobos Avenue:

Just up the road where Point Lobos turns east was the strip of shops that ran between the Cliff House and the Sutro Bath House.

Long before the Autopia at Disneyland was the Red Bug Raceway that ran on a wooden track behind Topsys’s Roost. Below, is where the course once was. (James R. Smith’s San Francisco’s Playland at the Beach – The Early Years)

Where the It’s It Ice Cream Sandwiches at Playland, (Still just as good today) were invented:

Back downtown for a photo from the Cushman Collection of Montgomery Street in the 1960’s:

The cable car turntable at Powell and Market Streets:

Looking down Powell Street from Nob Hill

Another from the Cushman Collection of colorful Chinatown in the 1950’s:

We’ll begin on the old Cantilever Bridge portion of the Bay Bridge. Danny was with me on this visit in 2013, just before the eastern section here closed forever.

A quick stop on Treasure Island at the China Clipper Lagoon, during the 1939 – 1940 World’s Fair:

Never mind the tour buses that take you to the Golden Gate Bridge or to the top of Twin Peaks, I’ll take you to Treasure Island where the cleverest outhouse humor is.

Next stop, the Farmers Market at the Ferry Building, which used to be at Duboce and Market Streets: “No Dogs Allowed”!!!

I’ve heard that girls love a man in uniform, so, we’ll visit the historic Liberty Ship, the Jeremiah O’Brien.

City Hall; that’s always a good place to stop in and tell the big shots what they’re doing right, and what they’re doing wrong…….. One of these days, I will! The Pioneer Monument Statue was moved half a block north from this 1915 picture when the new San Francisco Main Library was built.

Looking back down Sacramento Street towards Nob Hill from Franklin Street in 1915: The Old First Church at the bottom of the hill, built in 1911, is still there: Let’s see, we’re still heading west, aren’t we? Like the Beatles, I’ll follow the sun.

Dazed earthquake survivors watching the destruction of San Francisco from Alamo Square, where the “Painted Ladies” are, in April of 1906: Lots of nice grass around here……. “Danny!”

We end up at Ocean Beach; two old dogs at the Cliff House. That’s me and Danny in 1999, and in 2013. Danny wasn’t always that much impressed by the Cliff House, but he loved peeing in the Pacific Ocean. I lost Danny on September 9th 2015, and Ocean Beach has  been a little lonelier since. See the link below.

https://sfinfilm.com/2015/09/26/danny-at-ocean-beach/

Bill Cosby and Robert Culp at the Coit Tower parking lot in a 1968 episode of ‘I Spy’:

At the same location in another episode while ‘I Spy’ was filming in San Francisco, Robert Culp is brainwashed by an enemy agent and ordered to kill himself by jumping from the top of Coit Tower.

Culp is talked out of jumping at the top of the tower by his co-operative and friend, Bill Cosby. Cosby is in the news a lot lately, and he should be, but this was a groundbreaking role for an African American on television at the time, and the camaraderie between the two stars is still fun to watch today.

Valentina Cortese enjoys a moment with her pretend offspring (I have a couple of those myself) in her back yard, which is actually Pioneer Park behind Coit Tower, in the 1951 film ‘The House on Telegraph Hill’. Fifteen years earlier William Powell and Myrna Loy used the same location for the back yard of their home in the 1936 film ‘After the Thin Man’.

James Stewart follows Kim Novak on the road to Fort Point where she will jump into the Bay, in the 1958 classic, ‘Vertigo’. See the You Tube link below.

Lee Remick catches a taxi at Jefferson and Taylor Streets in Fisherman’s Wharf  that will take her to Candlestick Park to deliver ransom money to Ross Martin, in the 1962 film ‘Experiment in Terror’. I’ve posted the following link before, but it’s a neat clip of the movie in a nutshell, and set to the soundtrack of the opening credits.

In my opinion, the best television show set in San Francisco was ‘The Lineup’, also known as ‘San Francisco Beat’, that ran during the 1950’s Only a few grainy episodes are available, that I’ve been able to find, like this one with a scene filmed at Fleishhacker’s Pool. The pool and old Pool House can be seen behind the actors, as well as the diving structure at the far north end of the pool.  The Pool House can be seen on the right in this photo of the pool taken from the diving platform. The Pool House was burned down in December of 2012 by homeless people occupying it, and only the front entrance seen below is left.  ‘A View to a Kill’ made in 1985, is considered one of the worst entries in the James Bond Series, but the fight scene on the Golden Gate Bridge at the end is still a grabber! Check out the You Tube link here.

If the current rendering of what the new Trans Bay Terminal will look like is as accurate as this 1930’s drawing of the terminal that opened here in 1939 was, it’s going to be quite a building!  (Toll Bridge Authority Authority, Alioto Collection)

This 2014 rendition of a proposal to move the Warriors Basketball team back to San Francisco and a new arena to be built south of the Bay Bridge makes a nice comparison to the San Francisco Chamber of Commerce photo of the 1950’s skyline of the City from the Epilogue Chapter of William Bronson’s book ‘The Earth Shook, The Sky Burned’.

A 1960’s drawing of what the Powell Street BART and Muni Metro Terminal beneath Hallidie Plaza will look like:

A 1968 drawing of a double decked Golden Gate Bridge proposal: That’s an all very fine plan, but when the cars get to the edge, they’re going to fall into the Bay! Ta-da-boom!

Speaking of which; you can buy stock in 3M, Apple, or even Facebook, but I own a share of the Golden Gate Bridge!

1^st and Market in the 1930’s, and on a drizzling Sunday yesterday: Not as busy, but a lot quieter. They didn’t need Xanax back in those days; they had a cocktail lounge on every corner. (San Francisco Main Library History Room)

1^st and Mission, looks like the late 1970’s or early 1980’s: The streetcar is turning into the old Trans Bay Terminal Building that closed in 2010.

The Stock Exchange Building at Pine and Sansome, in 1960, not the end of the Century like the street sign reads. (Bad joke!) It’s now the Pacific Coast Stock Exchange. (Phil Palmer)

I may have posted this one of Post and Stockton at Union Square before, but I couldn’t find it in the archives so I’m posting it again. Anyway, it satisfies the curiosity that all human beings have as to what people looked like in crosswalks in the 1950’s as compared to today.

The St. Francis Hotel from Stockton and Geary about a hundred years ago, and last Christmas: The construction is for the Muni Metro extension that will run underneath Chinatown to Fisherman’s Wharf.

Ah, where are they now! Another Shorpy masterpiece, Showgirls at the old El Capitan Theater on Mission Street between 19^th and 20^th in 1932: The building with the arched window those cuties are in front of is now the Gas Head Tavern. The exterior façade of the El Capitan Theater is still there today.

In front of the old Hall of Justice Building, once bail bond central: The old picture, kind of, exemplifies the activity of the area to me. On the right, the attorney, in the middle, the defendant, and on the left, a worried wife:

Wife: “What do you think he’ll get from the judge?”

Attorney: “Maybe not much, but we’d have had a better chance if he’d have wore a tie!”

That’s the Columbus Tower Building with the dome on top in the center of both pictures. The old Hall of Justice Building was demolished for the Hilton Hotel at the end of the 1960’s. (Phil Palmer)

The 344th Anti-Aircraft Artillery Battalion in front of the Veterans Building in San Leandro during World War Two: (Olga Rosaaen)  Pelton Plaza Center on East 14th Street in San Leandro: (The San Leandro Museum)  San Leandro City Hall on East 14th Street in the 1940’s: (The San Leandro Museum) The Terrace Club on the San Leandro portion of Foothill Blvd. was a popular dining and dancing spot in the 1950’s and 1960’s.   The hardware store on the corner of B Street and Watkins in Hayward looks like a hardware store should look, and is still in business today.   The Veteran’s Building on Main Street in Hayward, built in the 1930’s: The artillery piece on the right is still there.  Foothill Blvd in Hayward looking south from Russell way in what looks like the early 50’s. Smith’s was where the Copymat business is today. Copymat has moved one block south to B Street and Foothill since I took this picture last summer. Opening day of the Foothill Strip, Hayward in 1949: When the Southland Shopping Mall opened in the 1960’s this area dried up as the major shopping district of Hayward.   The Southland Shopping Mall in the 1970’s and today:   Look at how bustling this spot on Telegraph Avenue in Oakland once was! With the restoration of the Fox Oakland Theater on the left, this area’s coming back to life again. (Images of America Series)  1933 – The old Fox Theater on Telegraph Avenue in Oakland. ‘Meet the Baron’; my three favorite Hollywood Stars, Moe, Larry, and Curly, got their start in this film. The old Rialto Theater at 2723 San Pablo Ave. in Oakland near Emeryville in the 1940’s. I don’t know who these guys were, but they had a great sense of humor! (Images of America Series) This one is a little farther south than my usually beat. That’s Carole Lombard and Clark Gable on the porch of their Encino Ranch home near Hollywood. I had a chance to find the house about fifteen years ago and took the bottom picture. Development has completely enclosed their ranch house, seen in these 1939 pictures, with some of the most expensive homes in California. The brick porch Carole and Clark are sitting on can be seen from the side to their left in the bottom photo.