1922 Encyclopædia Britannica/San Francisco
SAN FRANCISCO (see 24.144) increased in pop. during 1910-20 from 416,912 to 506,676 or 21.05%, making it the eleventh city in the United States. The metropolitan district, as designated by the U.S. Census Bureau in 1920, included all the communities in the extensive area surrounding San Francisco bay. This area had in 1910 a pop. of 750,000 and in 1920 1,121,631, being the fifth population centre of the United States.
Transportation and Commerce.—The railway service of San Francisco was greatly improved in the decade 1910-20. In 1917 the Southern Pacific spent approximately $1,500,000 on yards and carshops in the city. The other railways correspondingly improved their terminal yards on the bay. Steamer service grew remarkably, in part because of the opening of the Panama Canal. In 1911 the ship tonnage of the port was 5,519,556 entered and 5,545,530 cleared. In 1919 4,617 vessels entered the port and 4,696 cleared, carrying a gross tonnage of 12,261,669. In 1920 the 48 steamship lines operating out of the port had over 250 steamers; 29 lines were in foreign and 19 in coastwise trade. The U.S. Shipping Board in allotting ships gave the port 250,000 tons, including seven ships of 21,000 tons each. The urban railway mileage increased from 289.6 m. of single track in 1910 to 352.88 m. in 1920. The opening of a municipal line in Dec. 1912 caused the retention of a five-cent fare. The number of passengers carried during the fiscal year 1919 was 307,000,000 as against 157,722,720 in 1911. The south-western quarter of the city was brought within 25 minutes of the business district by building a tunnel under Twin Peaks (1917). In 1921 the port of San Francisco had 41 modern piers with a total area of 4,500,000 sq. ft., providing for more than 1,200,000 tons of cargo per month, an increase of 100% over the accommodation available in 1910. The Belt railway, which serves all but three of the piers, had in
1920 54 m. of track. A tunnel under Fort Mason, connecting the Government docks and the Presidio with the Belt line, was completed in 1914. The harbour was self-supporting, paying all maintenance, interest and redemption of bonds. In 1911 the people of the state voted $9,000,000 and in 1914 $10,000,000 in bonds for port development. In 1920 the harbour board approved plans for an extensive combination dock and warehouse, accessible by ship and rail. The freight discharged and landed over the wharves of the port of San Francisco, exclusive of federal and private wharves, increased from 6,866,148 tons in the year 1910-1 to 10,257,612 tons in 1918-9. The foreign trade of the port in the period 1909-19 increased 274%; while the increase for the United States during the same period was 107%. The value of the foreign trade for 1920 was: exports $220,257,771, imports $212,021,768, a total of $432,279,539. The tonnage movement for the same period was: outgoing 7,033,480, incoming 7,183,042, total 14,216,522.
Industries and Finance.—Since 1916 shipbuilding has been the most important industry of San Francisco. In the three-year period 1916-9 there were constructed in the metropolitan district 97 cargo ships of a total of 945,783 tons and 110 naval craft, including three super-dreadnoughts. In 1920 there were completed 68 cargo ships of 607,650 deadweight tons.
In Jan. 1921 the estimated number of factories in the city was 2,500, employing more than 55,000 wage-earners. The principal industries, with the estimated value of their product in 1920, were printing and bookbinding, $20,000,000; fruit and vegetable canning, $15,000,000; slaughtering and meat-packing, $20,000,000; foundry and machine-shop products, $17,500,000; lumber and timber products, $7,500,000.
Bank clearings increased from $2,427,075,543 in 1911 to $8,122,064,916 in 1920, placing San Francisco eighth in the United States in bank clearings. The assessed valuation of property in 1920 on approximately a 50% basis was $819,820,078.
Public Works.—The plans of the city in 1910 to own its own water supply culminated in the Hetch-Hetchy water and power project. The city owns a watershed of 420,000 ac. in the Sierras on the headwaters of the Tuolumne river, 160 m. distant, from which 400,000,000 gal. of water can be secured daily and 250,000 H.P. produced. The work of development was well under way in Jan. 1921. A railway 68 m. long to Hetch-Hetchy valley and the Lake Eleanor dam were already built, over 18 m. of tunnel were under construction and a hydro-electric plant of 4,000 H.P. was in operation. The contract for the Hetch-Hetchy dam was let for $5,400,000. Bonds for $45,000,000 were issued and $8,000,000 spent by March 1921.
Buildings and Parks.—The value of private building operations was $22,873,942 for 1910, $18,626,199 fr 1915, $18,644,343 for 1919, and $32,869,009 for 1920. Among the notable public buildings are those of the Civic Center, located in the heart of the city and surrounded by a plaza. They consist of three main buildings: the city hall, costing $4,000,000; the auditorium, with a seating capacity of 12,000, given by the Panama-Pacific International Exposition and costing $1,275,000; and the public library, costing $ 1,000,000. A state building costing $1,000,000 was in Jan. 1921 in process of construction near the Civic Center. Among recent buildings were the First National Bank, American National Bank, Robert Dollar building, Balfour building, Bank of Italy and the Southern Pacific building. The Exchange building, the building of the California Title Insurance Co., the Crocker building and the Furniture Exchange building were under construction in March 1921. In Jan. there were 34 parks in San Francisco with an area of approximately 2,500 acres. The Golden Gate Park Memorial Museum had been completed. Nine playgrounds were in use and several more under construction. The public library, as part of the Civic Center, was in 1921 housed in a magnificent building; there were also nine branches and 13 deposit stations with a total of 240,000 volumes, with a home circulation of 1,368,685. The Palace of Fine Arts of the Panama-Pacific International Exposition was given after the fair to the San Francisco Art Association; many of the art treasures shown in 1915 remained there. In Feb. 1921 ground was broken in Lincoln Park for a California Palace of the Legion of Honor as a memorial to the Californians who gave their lives in the World War and as a museum of art.
Education.—In 1920 there were 107 public schools, including high schools, with 1,928 teachers and an enrolment of approximately 80,000 pupils. The university of California, at Berkeley, and the Leland Stanford Jr. University, at Palo Alto, each had important teaching departments in San Francisco.
History.—The opening of the Panama Canal was celebrated, Feb.-Dec. 1915, by the Panama-Pacific International Exposition at San Francisco, representing an investment of $50,000,000. The exhibits, numbering about 80,000, were valued at $300,000,000. Thirty-nine foreign nations and 37 states and three territories of the United States were represented at the exposition. The attendance began with 245,000 on opening day, Feb. 6, rose as high as 348,500 on Nov. 2, San Francisco Day, and reached a total of 18,500,000. The architecture was of a highly varied and monumental character. One of the artistic merits of the exposition was its effective colour scheme, while the night illumination was extremely ingenious and impressive. In spite of the World War the foreign exhibits were remarkably complete. Financially as well as artistically the exposition was a success. After presenting to the city of San Francisco the auditorium already noted, the exposition authorities had on hand a final net profit of a little more than $1,000,000. The whole enterprise had been undertaken without Government subsidy; the city and state, however, appropriated $5,000,000, while private contributors added $7,500,000 more. Receipts from concessions were $7,809,565 and from admission fees $4,715,523. The beginning of a new era in world trade, which the exposition celebrated in connection with the opening of the Panama Canal, was delayed by the World War, but with the resumption of normal conditions trade increased. Following the prosecutions begun in 1907, corruption in the city government was largely eliminated, but it reappeared, though on a smaller scale, after 1909. The election under a new primary system in 1911 of a mayor and city government opposed to “graft” brought in an era of reform. In Dec. 1911, by an extension of the city charter, members of the police and fire departments were placed under civil service. A number of other charter amendments were made during the decade 1910-20, but there was no material enlargement in the power of the city.
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