Birthplace of a Great City
Perhaps the best and worst historical plaque in San Francisco. Best because it calls out a moment when the the place that was about to become San Francisco was wild, a windy dune overlooking an empty cove, the bay and the contra costa beyond.
Worst because. ... Well, just look at the plaque. It's strangely amateurish, as if it had been molded with Play-Doh. The writing is weirdly off-kilter. "William A. Richardson ... erected its first habitation." Its? Commas and periods are deployed without regard to what they might signify. I will stop being an editor for a minute, starting now.
The location of the plaque is also part of its overall underwhelmingness. It's adjacent to the entrance to the Dick-Young Apartments at 823 Grant Avenue, Chinatown's main street, and is jammed up against the metal rolldown door of a hole-in-the-wall electronics shop. The net effect is to make the plaque, whose right edge as been painted over, virtually invisible unless you're really looking for it.
I wondered about the circumstances of the placement, which aren't described on the plaque itself. I came across some details in the May 20, 1935, number of the San Francisco Public Schools Bulletin. The tablet was to be placed at a ceremony on the centennial of the first Richardson dwelling, June 25, 1935.
With 18 years to go until the Richardson bicentennial, maybe we have time to start a civic movement for a grander plaque.
Here's the transcription:
The Birthplace of a Great City
Here, June 25, 1835, William A. Richardson, founder of Yerba Buena (later San Francisco), erected its first habitation, a tent dwlling, replacing it in October, 1835, by the first wooden house, and on this ground, in 1837, he erected the large adobe building, known as "Casa Grande."
This tablet was placed under the auspices of the Northern Federation of Civic Organizations of San Francisco, this site was confirmed by the California Historical Society.
Submitted by: Dan Brekke
@danbrekke