47 Fun Facts About San Francisco

What colour is the Golden Gate Bridge painted?

International Orange was chosen by consulting architect Irving Morrow; the vermilion shade stands out against fog and complements the Marin headlands.

On the Golden Gate Bridge's opening day in 1937, who alone could cross?

Pedestrians had the new bridge to themselves on 27 May 1937; the next day President Roosevelt signalled from Washington that it was open to cars.

Who served as chief engineer of the Golden Gate Bridge?

Joseph Strauss was the Golden Gate Bridge's chief engineer and its leading promoter; Charles Ellis and Leon Moisseiff did much of the detailed structural design under him.

Why did Alcatraz's federal prison close in 1963?

High running costs: everything, even fresh water, had to reach the island by boat, and the salt-worn buildings needed millions of dollars of repairs.

Which famous gangster was held at Alcatraz?

Al Capone was moved to Alcatraz in 1934 amid reports that he was getting special treatment in his Atlanta prison; on the Rock he played banjo in the inmates' band.

In 1969, Alcatraz was occupied for 19 months by protesters from which group?

Native Americans organised as Indians of All Tribes held the island from 20 November 1969 to 11 June 1971, claiming it under the 1868 Treaty of Fort Laramie.

San Francisco is home to the world's last manually operated version of which transit vehicle?

A gripman on each San Francisco cable car clamps onto the moving underground cable by hand; three lines survive from a network that began on Clay Street in 1873.

Which singer made 'I Left My Heart in San Francisco' his signature song in 1962?

Tony Bennett first sang it at San Francisco's Fairmont Hotel in December 1961; when the record came out the next year, it was only the B-side.

Which San Francisco street has a block of eight hairpin turns?

Lombard Street got its switchbacks in the 1920s because the hill was too steep for the cars of the day to drive straight down; the block is one-way, downhill only.

The colourful Victorian houses known as the 'Painted Ladies' stand across from which park?

Alamo Square's sloping lawn faces the famous Steiner Street row; the name 'Painted Ladies' is newer than it sounds, coming from a 1978 book about the city's brightly repainted Victorians.

Which fault ruptured for nearly 300 miles in the 1906 San Francisco earthquake?

The San Andreas Fault slipped along 296 miles of northern California; the fires that broke out afterwards burned for days and, with the shaking, destroyed most of the city.

The 1989 earthquake that struck just before a World Series game is named for which peak?

Loma Prieta, a peak in the Santa Cruz Mountains, stood near the epicentre; with so many people already home to watch the game, rush-hour roads were unusually empty, which kept the death toll down.

San Francisco takes its name from which saint?

Francis of Assisi founded the Franciscan order, and it was Franciscan friars who set up Mission San Francisco de Asís here in 1776 and named it for him.

San Francisco was founded by settlers from where in 1776?

Settlers from New Spain on the Anza expedition founded the Presidio at the Golden Gate and Mission Dolores a few miles away in 1776.

The California Gold Rush began in 1848 when gold was found at a sawmill owned by whom?

John Sutter was ruined by the discovery: his workers left to hunt for gold, and squatters overran his land and made off with his crops and cattle.

What nickname was given to the gold-seekers who flooded into California during the Gold Rush?

Forty-niners took their name from 1849, the peak year of Gold Rush immigration, when San Francisco grew from a village of about 1,000 people to a boom town of 25,000.

Which bread is San Francisco's signature loaf?

Sourdough arrived with the bakers of the Gold Rush; Boudin, founded in 1849, says it still raises every loaf from the mother dough it began with a miner's starter.

Coit Tower overlooks the bay from which San Francisco neighbourhood?

Coit Tower crowns Telegraph Hill; Lillie Hitchcock Coit's 1929 bequest paid for it, and despite the legend it was not designed to look like a fire-hose nozzle.

The Palace of Fine Arts was built for which 1915 world's fair?

Bernard Maybeck designed the Palace of Fine Arts for the 1915 Panama-Pacific International Exposition, which celebrated the Panama Canal's opening; its rotunda beside a lagoon was rebuilt in concrete in the 1960s.

The Haight-Ashbury neighbourhood became the centre of which 1960s movement?

The hippie counterculture drew such crowds to the Haight in 1967 that by October residents staged a mock funeral, 'The Death of the Hippie', to tell would-be newcomers to stay home.

The famous burst of 1960s idealism centred on the Haight is known as what?

The Summer of Love drew as many as 100,000 young people to the Haight in 1967; its anthem, 'San Francisco (Be Sure to Wear Flowers in Your Hair)', was written to promote the Monterey Pop Festival.

Pier 39 at Fisherman's Wharf is famous for a colony of which animals?

Sea lions took over the marina's docks at Pier 39 by January 1990; on the advice of the Marine Mammal Center the pier let them stay, and the boats made way.

Which organisation's founding charter was signed in San Francisco in June 1945?

The United Nations Charter was signed in San Francisco by 50 countries; Poland, which had no delegation at the talks, signed later and still counts as a founding member.

Which San Francisco supervisor, elected in 1977, was one of America's first openly gay elected officials?

Harvey Milk served less than a year: in November 1978 he and Mayor George Moscone were shot dead at City Hall by Dan White, a former fellow supervisor.

Which quarterback led San Francisco to four Super Bowl wins between the 1981 and 1989 seasons?

Joe Montana was only a third-round draft pick in 1979, yet he won all four Super Bowls he started and was named the game's MVP in three of them.

The San Francisco Giants moved to the city in 1958 from where?

New York had been the Giants' home since the 1880s; owner Horace Stoneham was planning a move to Minnesota until the Dodgers' owner talked him into heading for California too, keeping their rivalry alive.

Which manager led the Giants to World Series titles in 2010, 2012 and 2014?

Bruce Bochy's 2012 team won six straight games when one loss would have ended its season, coming back against the Reds and then the Cardinals before sweeping Detroit.

The Golden State Warriors moved to the Bay Area in 1962 from which city?

Philadelphia lost the Warriors in 1962, when Franklin Mieuli bought control and moved them west; renamed Golden State in 1971, they played across the bay until returning to San Francisco in 2019.

Which boxed dinner mix was advertised for decades as 'The San Francisco Treat'?

Rice-A-Roni, a rice-and-vermicelli mix launched in 1958 by the DeDomenico family's Golden Grain company in San Francisco, came from an Armenian pilaf recipe shared by immigrant Pailadzo Captanian.

Which sitcom about a widowed father raising three daughters was set in San Francisco?

Full House was taped on studio sets in the Los Angeles area; apart from its opening credits, only one episode, in the final season, was actually shot in San Francisco.

Which San Francisco chocolate maker, founded in 1852, gave its name to a square?

Ghirardelli was founded by Domingo Ghirardelli, an Italian confectioner who came for the Gold Rush, tried prospecting, and ended up selling supplies and sweets to the miners instead.

John C. Frémont named the Golden Gate in 1846 after the Golden Horn, the harbour of which city?

Istanbul's Golden Horn, the harbour of ancient Byzantium, gave Frémont the idea for the name Chrysopylae, or Golden Gate, which he chose before any gold had been found in California.

The Bay Bridge crosses San Francisco Bay to which neighbouring city?

Oakland is linked to San Francisco by a bridge that opened in November 1936, six months before the Golden Gate; part of its upper deck collapsed in the 1989 earthquake.

San Francisco is unusual in California for being a consolidated city and what?

County: San Francisco has been a combined city and county since 1856, so a single Board of Supervisors does the work of both a city council and a county board.

Which San Francisco hill, crowned by Grace Cathedral, was home to the Big Four railroad barons?

Nob Hill's mansions burned after the 1906 earthquake; the Crocker family then gave their ruined block to the Episcopal diocese, which built Grace Cathedral on it.

In 1994 the Presidio of San Francisco became part of which National Park Service unit?

The Army handed the Presidio to the National Park Service on 1 October 1994 as part of the Golden Gate National Recreation Area; the Presidio Trust, created in 1996, manages most of its interior.

Union Square in San Francisco is best known as which kind of area?

Shopping and hotels made Union Square famous, but its name dates from 1860, when mass meetings were held there in support of the Union as the Civil War loomed.

Coit Tower's 1934 murals are painted in which artistic style?

American Social Realism suited the brief: the murals were the pilot project of the Public Works of Art Project, the first New Deal programme to put jobless artists to work.

Which pair of structures, built in 1903 and 1908 for irrigation, stands at the ocean end of a San Francisco park?

Two windmills, the Dutch Windmill of 1903 and the Murphy Windmill of 1908, once pumped well water to irrigate the park's sandy western end; both were restored after decades of neglect.

Which 1964 bridge took the world's longest suspension span record from the Golden Gate?

The Verrazzano-Narrows Bridge beat the Golden Gate's 4,200-foot main span by just 60 feet; its own name was officially misspelled, with a single 'z', until 2018.

The Painted Ladies row at 710-720 Steiner Street is also nicknamed what?

Postcard Row appears again and again in pictures of the city: the houses, put up by a single developer in the 1890s, are a favourite foreground for the downtown skyline.

Which safety measure saved 19 men who fell while building the Golden Gate Bridge?

A safety net slung under the deck caught 19 men, who called themselves the Halfway to Hell Club; ten others died in 1937 when a falling work platform tore through it.

The de Young Museum and California Academy of Sciences both sit inside which large green space?

Golden Gate Park hosted the 1894 Midwinter Fair, whose art building became the de Young; the Academy of Sciences moved in after the 1906 earthquake destroyed its downtown home.

Which island in San Francisco Bay was built to host the 1939 Golden Gate International Exposition?

Treasure Island was built from dredged bay fill for the fair and was meant to become San Francisco's airport afterwards, but the Navy moved in as war loomed and stayed until 1997.

Which crab is the signature catch sold at Fisherman's Wharf each winter?

Dungeness crab is not named for anywhere in California: the name comes from Dungeness, a village and sand spit on Washington's Strait of Juan de Fuca.

The US Navy suggested painting the Golden Gate Bridge in what scheme, which was rejected?

Black and yellow stripes, the Navy argued, would help passing ships pick out the bridge in fog; the consulting architect's own choice of colour won out instead.

What was the settlement of San Francisco called until it was renamed in 1847?

Yerba Buena, Spanish for 'good herb', was renamed by its American alcalde, Washington Bartlett; the change also kept a rival new town from calling itself Francisca, which became Benicia instead.