City Hall
San Francisco's first City Hall was at Kearny/Pacific, starting in 1850. In 1852, the city purchased the Jenny Lind Theater at Kearney/Washington for use as a new City Hall. Left: the Jenny Lind Theater in the 1850s, on the east side of Portsmouth Square (Kearny/Washington). Right: City Hall (formerly Jenny Lind Theater) in 1866, next to Hall of Justice (formerly the El Dorado).
The large triangle bounded by Larkin/McAllister/Market, today the site of the Asian Art Museum and new Library, was Yerba Buena Cemetery on Eddy's 1849 map ("Yerba Buena Park" on Gensoul's 1863 map). Construction on a new City Hall at the site began in 1872 and continued for decades. It was finally completed in 1897, at a total cost of $6,000,000. Watkins stereoview 1614 (click here for crosseyed viewing) shows the laying of the cornerstone on 2/22/1872, looking northeast.
Left: 1886 Sanborn (V. 2 sheet 45) shows the position of the building
on the trianglular site bounded by McAllister/Larkin/Park Avenue.
It notes the empty space beween Market and the dome
as "commonly called the Sand Lot".
Twenty years later, 1905 Sanborn (V. 1 sheet 94)
shows extensions of the building toward McAllister,
Park Avenue renamed City Hall Avenue,
and the Sand Lot space called City Hall Square,
displaying the Lick Monument.
Center: view from Market street in Glover's 1895 Illustrated Directory.
Right: 1905 photo looking west up McAllister, past the Hall of Records.
City Hall was badly damaged by the 1906 earthquake and fire but not demolished until 1909. The postcard at center was written on 5/07/1906, about three weeks after the earthquake. The color postcard at right must be somewhat later, as it shows stacks of pipe for post-quake construction. City Hall postcards shows many more postcards.
Construction on the current City Hall at Fulton/Van Ness began in 1913 and finished in late 1915. Left: 3/15/1914. Right: ca. 1930.
