San Francisco history

SF History: Sex WORK In The City
COYOTE (Call Off Your Tired Old Ethics) was founded in San Francisco in 1973 by Margo St. James, a sex worker, who also co-founded St. James Infirmary Clinic in the Tenderloin. COYOTE’s main goals were decriminalization (as opposed to legalization) of sex work, pimping, and pandering, as well as the elimination of social stigma concerning sex work as an occupation. Its work is considered part of the larger sex worker movement for legal and human rights.

Where The Bodies Are Buried: San Francisco’s Former Cemeteries
It has been over 100 years since anyone was buried in San Francisco. In 1902, it became illegal to bury new bodies in the city, and by 1921, bodies were being moved to new land in Colma. By 1941 nearly all the cemeteries were gone, and largely forgotten.

The 2023 SF Wine Passport is Here!
Step into a world of adventure with the 2023 SF Wine Passport! There’s no better way to explore San Francisco than to literally drink it in. You get 2-for-1 glasses of wine at 23 of SF’s finest locally owned bars and restaurants for only $39.95! It honestly doesn’t get much better than that. And after the

A Glimpse at an Unrecognizable San Francisco During the Gold Rush
Let’s take it back to San Francisco during the California Gold Rush of 1848. The discovery of gold marked a turning point for the Bay Area, ushering in a new era of industrialization. This was of course, at the expense of the native Ohlone people, who had been suffering enslavement

10 Fun Facts About San Francisco You May Not Know
You think you know a lot about San Francisco? Well let’s see how many of these fun facts you already had stored in your noggin. You’re about to be so much better at SF trivia. 1. Alcatraz was the only federal prison to offer hot-water showers, supposedly to dissuade prisoners

The Real & Imagined History of Mario’s Bohemian Cigar Store Cafe
There are no cigars there. Not anymore, at Mario’s Bohemian Cigar Cafe Store. North Beach, that righteous, riotous and literarily relevant San Francisco neighborhood of great charm has long become a tourist destination. Arguably, it is now a neighborhood primarily cultivated and sustained through tourism. It’s where all the sailors

The Bay Area’s Lost Statue Of Liberty
I was snooping around old newspaper clippings the other day, looking to see what San Francisco was like 100 years ago, and found a super interesting article. Did you know that Treasure Island (Yerba Buena) almost had its own 700-foot Statue of Liberty?! The local paper, San Francisco CALL, reports

A Look at Before and After The Embarcadero Freeway Came Down
Current mood: extremely thankful for how the Embarcadero looks today versus how it did in the past. While no doubt useful, the elevated double-decker Embarcadero Freeway (also known as California State Route 480) was hardly aesthetically pleasing compared to the Embarcadero of today. After the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake severely

Here’s What It Looks Like Under Those Brick Circles In the Street
Those mysterious brick circles you see on streets? They are cisterns — a form of ancient technology adopted after the 1906 earthquake to aid firefighting. We all know about the fires that ravaged the city after the 1906 earthquake, made worse due to the rupture of water and sewage lines.