San Francisco

Black San Franciscans Have Been Leaving—Could Reparations Bring them Back?

A city commission has issued non-binding advisory recommendations for extensive cash reparations to Black residents and their families who were pushed out of now-valuable property through urban renewal. It's not likely that the local government will implement any of them, so activists are trying to help make housing more affordable.

What Airports Can Tell Us About Histories of Regional Development

by Eric Porter

From the perspective of travelers, airports appear as generic "non-places." But for people who aren't just passing through—entrepreneurs, activists, and especially workers—their particularity makes them sites of struggle that shape the life of a region. Historians have much to learn from them, too. 

The COVID Era is the Latest Episode of Medical Scapegoating of Asian Immigrants

by Catherine Ceniza Choy

From smallpox to COVID, Asian Americans have been blamed and attacked for supposedly causing disease, while their contributions to American health have been ignored. This medical scapegoating and the violence that often follow it demonstrate the need to teach more Asian American history. 

Portrait of the Artist as a Businesswoman: Dorothea Lange’s Lost San Francisco Years

by Jasmin Darznik

Dorothea Lange's early work as a portrait photographer for San Francisco's elite seems at odds with her famous documentary work of the Depression. But that work sharpened her sense of aesthetics and of her own place in the world, foundations of her more famous later period.

San Francisco Schools Will Keep Jefferson, Lincoln and Washington Names

"In this case, officials said the reckoning had gone too far, with parents calling the decision to rename 44 schools embarrassing and 'a caricature of what people think liberals in San Francisco do'.”

The San Francisco School Board vs. Abraham Lincoln (High School)

by Sheldon M. Stern

One might, not unreasonably, expect the school board of a major city like San Francisco to be somewhat more historically literate.

Lawrence Ferlinghetti Obituary

Lawrence Ferlinghetti's influence lasted long past the Beat Generation (of which he was perhaps the last survivor) through his ownership of the landmark independent City Lights bookstore in San Francisco.

The San Francisco School-Renaming Debate Is Not About History

"In fact, the way that the San Francisco school names are being talked about, fretted about, and competed over seems to have little to do with history at all. It has more to do with another realm of public life: celebrity."

Trump’s 1776 Commission and the San Francisco Board of Education Have a Lot in Common

by Max Boot

"It is no surprise that the 1776 Commission did not include a single expert on U.S. history and that the San Francisco school board also refused to consult historians."

The San Francisco School District’s Renaming Debacle Has Been A Historic Travesty

"Our Board of Education chose to ratify each and every finding from the renaming committee — even when historical errors and methodological recklessness was known."

The Country’s Oldest Chinatown is Fighting for its Life in San Francisco

Tourism to San Francisco has fallen by half since the beginning of the coronavirus pandemic, and tourist spending has declined even further, impacting many of Chinatown's businesses as well as its social life. 

With Evictions Looming, Cities Revisit a Housing Experiment From the ’70s (video)

by Retro Report

The looming evictions crisis is prompting housing policy experts to reconsider government programs that would enable the tenants of a building to secure loans to purchase their buildings cooperatively. A video from Retro Report explores how the battle to save the International Hotel in San Francisco for its low-income tenants prefigured today's policy debates.

Historians Brighten Shelter-in-Place with Vintage Photos Pinned to Telephone Poles

OpenSFHistory is utilizing their collection of photographs to connect San Franciscans with their community during quarantine.

S.F. History Museum Highlights America’s First Immigration Restriction: The Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882

by James Thornton Harris

An interview with Tamiko Wong, the executive director of the Chinese Historical Society of America Museum about the exhibit Chinese American: Exclusion/Inclusion.

San Francisco Japanese sister-city cuts its ties over comfort women statue

The mayor of Osaka objects to the statue, which memorializes the Korean women exploited by Japanese soldiers in the thirties and forties.

'One of the largest human experiments in history' was conducted on unsuspecting residents of San Francisco

In 1950 the US military conducted a test to see whether San Francisco's fog could be used to help spread a biological weapon in a "simulated germ-warfare attack."

From Rubble to Riches: The World's Fair That Raised San Francisco From the Ashes

by Hunter Oatman-Stanford

The Panama-Pacific International Exposition showed the world that the city had reached new heights of grandeur, launching the modern incarnation of San Francisco like a phoenix from the ashes.

San Francisco™, Brought to You By Google

by Rebecca Solnit

Credit: Wiki Commons/HNN staff.Originally posted on TomDispatch.com Finally, journalists have started criticizing in earnest the leviathans of Silicon Valley, notably Google, now the world’s third-largest company in market value. The new round of discussion began even before the revelations that the tech giants were routinely sharing our data with the National Security Agency, or maybe merging with it. Simultaneously another set of journalists, apparently unaware that the weather has changed, is still sneering at San Francisco, my hometown, for not lying down and loving Silicon Valley’s looming presence.

San Francisco airport won't be renamed Harvey Milk

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — San Francisco International Airport is not going to be renamed after slain gay rights leader Harvey Milk, after all.Supervisor David Campos says he has abandoned the idea of putting a ballot measure on the city ballot asking voters to approve the name change he proposed in January....

Highlights from the 2013 Annual Meeting of the Organization of American Historians

by David Austin Walsh

Related LinksPast OAH/AHA Annual MeetingsNewsDavid Austin Walsh: Tough Times to Be Lobbying for History on Capitol Hill David Austin Walsh: Turnout Middling at OAH Meeting in San FranciscoDispatches from the OAH Annual MeetingDay 1Day 2Day 3Day 4Videos