GENEVA DRIVE-IN THEATRE. Operating from 1950 just “over the line” in Daly City, the site was closed and demolished in the late 1990s.
GETS DISCOUNT STORE. “Government Employees Together” was a membership store open to city, state and federal employees that began in the 1950s in the Lakeshore Plaza Shopping Center on Sloat Boulevard. Long gone.
GHIRARDELLI SQUARE. Reconverted factories formed the nucleus of a popular San Francisco attraction beginning in the early 1960s. With many renovations over the years, the site now includes a private residence club.
GILLON LUMBER COMPANY. One of the longest-surviving businesses in the Richmond District, operating at 4th Avenue and Geary, under a handful of different owners, from 1896 to 2002. Competition from “big box” building supply companies spelled the end for this neighborhood merchant.
GINO’S. A small Financial District restaurant once located at the site of today’s Transamerica Pyramid. Relocated to 7 Spring Street, a small lane off the 500 block of California Street and opposite the Bank of America building, the warm, club-like atmosphere catered to locals for decades. Sadly, it is now gone.
GOODMAN LUMBER COMPANY. A 100,000-square-foot facility operated on Bayshore Boulevard for a half century but closed in 2000. Controversy over the site raged for a decade, and plans for a Home Depot outlet fell through. In 2010, a Lowe’s Home Improvement opened at the site.
GRANADA THEATRE. Operated on Mission Street in the Excelsior District from 1921 until 1982. It later became a video rental store and then a Goodwill store.
GRISON’S. Twin restaurants at Van Ness and Pacific operated by Swiss-born Bob Grison from the 1930s until the 1970s. Today, the nearby House of Prime Rib offers similar food and atmosphere.
GRODINS. Upscale chain of clothing stores in operation from 1955 to 1986.
HALE BROTHER DEPARTMENT STORE. San Francisco–based retail chain that began expanding with branch stores in 1906—including Hale’s Mission Store and another in Oakland. Long gone.
HANG AH TEA ROOM. Small Chinatown restaurant that began introducing dim sum to western palates as far back as 1920.
HERMAN’S DELICATESSEN. Classic old-time delicatessen that operated on Geary near 7th Avenue from the 1940s until the 1980s. To this day, when San Franciscans hear the words “potato salad,” they think of Herman’s.
HIBERNIA BANK. Founded in San Francisco in 1859 and catering to the once-large Irish-American population, the firm was acquired by Security-Pacific Bank in 1988. The Sunset Branch at 22nd Avenue and Noriega will forever be remembered as the site of a 1974 robbery by Patty Hearst and the Symbionese Liberation Army (SLA).
HIPPOPOTAMUS RESTAURANT. Opened by entrepreneur Jack Falvey on Van Ness Avenue in 1950, complete with whimsical hippo characters on the walls, this place was the height of ground beef gourmet (anyone remember the hamburger sundae?) until its closing in 1997.
H. LIEBES. Independent San Francisco–based women’s clothing retail store that was in operation from the 1860s until the 1970s.
I. MAGNIN. Old-line San Francisco clothing chain founded by Mary Ann Magnin. Located on Geary, the firm moved a block west after World War II to a classically remodeled, white marble building overlooking Union Square. It was the epitome of gracious elegance until its demise in 1994.
IRVING THEATRE. Opened in 1926 on Irving Street in the Inner Sunset, it was closed and demolished in 1962—one of the early casualties among neighborhood movie houses.
JACK TAR HOTEL. Opened in 1960 at Van Ness and Geary as an ultramodern hotel where guests were able to check in from the garage via closed-circuit TV system with the front desk. Its exterior aqua-pink-white color combination was muted with a more subdued off-white paint job in 1982 when it was renamed Cathedral Hill Hotel, but a fatal fire one year later marked a downturn in popularity. It closed in 2009 and was demolished in 2014 for construction of a new campus of California Pacific Medical Center.
J.J. NEWBERRY. A dime store chain that had a classic San Francisco location on Mission Street, between 22nd and 23rd Streets, behind a 1945 aqua-and-peach building façade designed for a Masonic lodge. The firm has been defunct since the early 1970s, with the site occupied by other retail firms.
JOHN’S GRILL. Classic San Francisco dining establishment once frequented by detective Sam Spade (he ordered the lamb chops), still in business on Ellis Street, near the back of the Flood Building, since 1907.
JOSEPH MAGNIN. Women’s and girls’ clothing chain founded by the son of Mary Ann Magnin. Joseph’s own son, Cyril, refocused the firm on the younger, trendier customer after World War II, and the chain expanded to thirty-two stores before it was acquired. It was closed in 1984.
L&L CASTLE LANES. Geneva Avenue bowling alley near the Cow Palace that enjoyed popularity in the late 1950s and early 1960s when there were more than a dozen similar locales in San Francisco. Most have now disappeared, reflecting changing public interest in the sport, though a few new smaller venues have opened recently.
LACHMAN BROTHERS. Popular Mission District furniture store at 16th and Mission that served customers from across San Francisco. Its location was marked by a clock, held by an enormous uniformed character with the store’s then-innovative credit-friendly motto: “Give Time.”
LARRABURU FRENCH BREAD. The business was started by two Basque brothers on 3rd Avenue in the Richmond District in 1896. Their product soon became one of San Francisco’s most popular edibles for the next seventy-five-plus years. A tragic accident between a delivery van and a young child in the 1970s revealed that the firm was woefully underinsured, and the eventual settlement bankrupted both the bakery and the insurer.
LECYRANO. Popular French-style restaurant in the 1970s and 1980s on Geary in the Richmond District. Low-key and unassuming, the spot packed in happy diners for nearly fifteen years.
LEGG’S ICE SKATING. Popular business located on 11th Street near Market Street in the downtown area and also on Ocean Avenue in the Ingleside neighborhood.
LEON’S BBQ. Popular restaurant, with an outlet on Sloat Boulevard near the zoo and another in the heart of the Fillmore District, dispensing crowd-pleasing food from the early 1970s, until the passing of owner Leon McHenry in 1999. The restaurant’s bottled sauces are still available in many local grocery stores.
LICK-WILMERDING HIGH SCHOOL. Dating back to a founding in the 1890s, this private college prep school with five hundred students (coeducational since 1972) has been located on Ocean Avenue near Balboa Park since 1955.
LIVINGSTON BROTHERS. Traditional women’s clothing store that operated downtown and then opened a “twig” (smaller than a branch) on Chestnut Street in the Marina District, but the entire chain went out of business in the 1980s.
LUCCA DELICATESSEN. Classic family-owned Italian delicatessen, operating on Chestnut Street in the Marina District since 1929.
MAMA’S AT MACY’S. A spinoff of the popular location on Washington Square in North Beach, the Macy’s location opened in the fall of 1972 and operated until 1986. The restaurant chain’s expansion in the 1970s and 1980s did not last, and Mama’s is back to its original location only, still with a long line of appreciative customers.
MCATEER HIGH SCHOOL. Portola Drive public high school, built in the early 1970s on the site of an old golf driving range. Intended as a replacement for Polytechnic High School, which had just closed, the new school operated until 2002, when it was dissolved. A new school, the Ruth Asawa San Francisco School of the Arts, opened at the McAteer campus in 2005.
MEL’S DRIVE-IN. Opened in 1947 on South Van Ness Avenue, with a later location on Mission Street near Geneva Avenue. The chain was in the 1967 film Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner? and 1973’s American Graffiti. The branch on Geary Boulevard in the Richmond District closed to become a stereo store in the 1970s but has since reemerged as a Mel’s outlet. The Geary location has been threatened with demolition for new housing, but recent news stories indicate that the location has been spared and will continue in operation.
MISSION
DRIVE-IN THEATRE. Technically in Daly City, the Mission Drive-In operated from the 1950s until the early 1980s near Guttenberg and Frankfort Streets. It was demolished, and condominiums now occupy the site.
MOLINARI DELICATESSEN. Dispensing sliced meats, cheeses, salads and other Italian delicacies from its home on Columbus Avenue in North Beach since 1896.
NEW MISSION THEATRE. This classic Mission Street movie theatre opened in 1916 and expanded over the early years to a capacity of more than 2,000 seats. It closed as a movie theatre in the 1980s and was home to a furniture store for the next twenty-five years. There were threats of demolition, but in December 2015, the Alamo Drafthouse–New Mission Cinema opened as a five-plex with a total of 550 seats and is drawing highly favorable reviews.
NIPPON GOLDFISH COMPANY. Founded on Bush Street in the Japantown neighborhood before 1906, it was a vast skylight-covered space with dozens of in-ground marble fish tanks that inspired young and old alike, until urban redevelopment pushed the firm out in the 1960s. Relocated to a standard storefront in the Richmond District, the firm closed many years ago.
NORTHPOINT THEATRE. The last major single-screen theatre to be built in San Francisco (1967) was located at Bay and Powell near Fisherman’s Wharf. Big films and crowds were always there, but the lure began to fade, and it was closed in 1997, with the space staring across the intersection at its vacant neighbor, Caesar’s Restaurant, for decades.
NOTRE DAME DE NAMUR GIRLS’ HIGH SCHOOL. Dolores Street Catholic girls’ high school in operation from 1866 to 1981—still with an active alumnae association. The building is now home to a low-income senior community.
NOTRE DAME DE VICTOIRES GIRLS’ HIGH SCHOOL. Bush Street Catholic girls’ high school closed in the 1970s.
PARK BOWL. Haight Street bowling alley opened in 1950 on the site of an old MUNI car barn; the location closed in 1996 and became a music store.
PARKSIDE THEATRE. Taraval Street movie house opened in 1928, renamed “Fox Parkside” in 1965 and closed in 1976. Today it houses a preschool with the iconic name Parkside School.
PENNEY, J.C. Part of the national department store chain, Penney’s operated for decades at 5th and Market Streets. The store survived the most disruptive part of BART construction in the late 1960s and early 1970s but announced in early 1971 that it was closing its sole San Francisco location.
PETRINI’S. A family-owned grocery store chain from 1935 until 1989 that featured the finest in meat, poultry, seafood, fruits and vegetables.
PLANET HOLLYWOOD. Trendy 1990s restaurant opened by a group of investors that included Arnold Schwarzenegger, located in the old Roos-Atkins building at Market and Stockton Streets. The chain once boasted more than one hundred locations worldwide, but today, only a handful still remain open, with none in San Francisco.
PLAYLAND-AT-THE-BEACH. Classic amusement park that operated 365 days a year along Great Highway at Ocean Beach from 1928 to 1972. On a good day, you can still hear calliope music and detect the faint aromas of the Hot House, popcorn and cotton candy in the salty mists.
PLUM, THE. Moderately priced restaurant that originated in the Liberty House Department Store at Stockton and O’Farrell in 1974 and was later operated by Macy’s following Liberty House’s closure in 1984. Many loyal customers still recall the French onion soup, salade Niçoise and the incredible dessert cart.
POLYTECHNIC HIGH SCHOOL. Beloved Frederick Street public high school that offered a wide range of academic and trade courses to a diverse student body—and had one of the city’s winningest football teams for decades, under Coach Milt Axt. Closed in 1972 and eventually demolished, the active alumni association held a rededication ceremony for the building’s 1914 cornerstone in 2014.
PRESENTATION HIGH SCHOOL. Turk Boulevard Catholic girls’ high school, in operation since 1864, that closed in 1991, with the property being acquired by the adjacent University of San Francisco (USF) for its School of Education.
QUALITY FOODS, INC. Stonestown grocery store, with operations later taken over by Petrini’s.
RED CHIMNEY RESTAURANT. Stonestown restaurant that offered trendy modernity from the 1950s until the early 1980s.
RED ROOF RESTAURANTS. Restaurant–coffee shop chain that included outlets on Ocean Avenue and California Street from the 1950s until the early 1970s.
ROOS-ATKINS. Clothing store chain catering to men and boys. Formed in a 1950s merger between Roos Brothers and Robert S. Atkins, the chain had dozens of stores statewide. A decline began in the 1980s, and the firm reverted to its original name for a short time but was finally closed in the early 1990s.
SABELLA’S. Classic Fisherman’s Wharf seafood business, in operation since 1920, closed in 2007, with its space taken over by an outlet of a nationwide chain restaurant.
SACRED HEART HIGH SCHOOL. Catholic boys’ high school that was the longtime crosstown rival of St. Ignatius. The school went coed in 1987 when it merged with nearby Cathedral High School to form Sacred Heart Cathedral Prep.
SCHLAGE LOCK. Large manufacturer of doorknob and lock sets, located on Bayshore Boulevard in Visitacion Valley and employing thousands of workers since 1926. Closed in 1999, the site remained vacant for well over a decade and was eventually cleared of old structures except for the Spanish Colonial office building, which will remain as a centerpiece in the new housing development of sixteen-hundred-plus homes that will soon be built.
SEALS STADIUM. Mission District sports venue opened in 1931 that housed the minor-league San Francisco Seals and was the first home to the San Francisco Giants, 1958–1960. It was demolished in 1959, as Candlestick Park was ready to open, and the site became a discount store known as White Front for many years. It has since evolved in a multi-business strip mall. The manager of the Office Depot store has thoughtfully placed a large X in the middle of aisle six to indicate the one-time location of home plate.
SEARS, ROEBUCK. National retailer that once had two stores, Mission-Army and Geary-Masonic, which were booming for decades. The Geary store in particular was well known for appliance salesmen in bold plaid sport coats and the smell of popcorn that permeated the entire building. Both locations have been closed for more than twenty years now.
SECURITY-PACIFIC BANK. Known as Security First National Bank, the Los Angeles–based institution traced its origins to Farmers and Merchants Bank, founded in 1870. By the middle of the twentieth century, it was the fifth largest bank in California. It then acquired Pacific National Bank in 1967 and became known as Security-Pacific, and in 1971, it acquired a controlling interest in Bank of Canton. In 1988, the organization completed the acquisition of the remaining interest in Bank of Canton and renamed itself Security Pacific Asian Bank. In the spring of 1992, the bank was acquired by BankAmerica Corporation.
SELIX FORMAL WEAR RENTAL. One of San Francisco’s oldest businesses, visited by virtually every male a couple of times in his life (high school proms and, later, weddings), filed for bankruptcy in early 2015, closing all of its stores.
SKATELAND. Roller rink at Great Highway and Balboa Street, at Ocean Beach, in operation from 1947 to 1972.
SLOANE’S. Founded in New York City in the mid-1800s as an upscale rug and furniture store, W. and J. Sloane expanded to San Francisco in 1875 to furnish the original Palace Hotel. For most of the twentieth century, the company was located in the 200 block of Sutter Street. The firm filed for bankruptcy protection in 1981 and closed in 1985.
STAR BAKERY. Noe Valley bakery that turned out the city’s best Irish soda bread. The line snaked out the door, especially around St. Patrick’s Day.
STAR OF THE SEA ACADEMY. Longtime Richmond District Catholic girls’ school, with comedienne Gracie Allen as one of its best-known graduates. Star of the Sea Parish still maintains a grammar school, but the girls’ high school closed in the 1980s.
ST. BRIGID’S GIRLS’ HIGH SCHOOL. Catholic girls’ high school on Van Ness Avenue that closed down in the 1950s, replaced by a motel.
ST. EDWARD’S CHURCH. One of San Francisco�
��s more modern Catholic churches, built in the 1950s on California Street opposite the Fireman’s Fund Insurance complex, was closed in 1998, with the building sold and demolished for the construction of condominiums.
ST. JOHN’S URSULINE GIRLS’ HIGH SCHOOL. Longtime Catholic girls’ high school on Mission Street near St. Mary’s Park that was in operation until the 1980s. Graduates still gather for an annual springtime luncheon.
ST. PAUL’S GIRLS’ HIGH SCHOOL. Longtime Catholic girls’ high school at 29th and Church Streets in Noe Valley that was established in 1917 and in operation until 1994.
ST. PETER’S ACADEMY. Longtime Mission District Catholic girls’ high school that graduated its final class in 1966—still with an active alumnae association.
ST. PETER’S BOYS’ HIGH SCHOOL. Long-gone Catholic boys’ school affiliated with St. Peter’s Academy.
ST. VINCENT’S GIRLS’ HIGH SCHOOL. Catholic girls’ high school dating back to the 1800s. Located at Gough and Geary since 1938, the school was demolished in 1966 for the new St. Mary’s Cathedral on the site. A replacement school named Cathedral High School was built nearby, opening in 1967. It had a long affiliation with Sacred Heart High School, and in 1987, the two institutions merged to form Sacred Heart Cathedral Prep.
SURF THEATRE. Small neighborhood house on Irving Street in the Outer Sunset, well known for showing foreign, art and classic films. Closed in 1985, the building has long housed a church.
SUTRO BATHS. Adolph Sutro’s incomparable addition to San Francisco’s bygone recreational amenities and to today’s open space. A vast complex of swimming pools and artifacts on display, part of the baths was converted to an ice skating rink and a “Tropic Beach” in the 1930s. By early 1954, the swimming facilities were shut down by the San Francisco Health Department because of maintenance difficulties, leaving only the ice rink and the museum (the “Tropic Beach” that remained as part of the signage until the early 1950s was a short-lived 1930s feature). The business had been shut down, and the artifacts already removed, when the structure was destroyed by a “suspicious” fire in June 1966. Planned housing was never built, and the ruins have been part of the Golden Gate National Recreation Area since the early 1970s.
Growing Up in San Francisco Page 16