
Photographs Taken of San Francisco Before It Became the Center of the Tech World - napolux
http://humansfromthepast.blogspot.com/2017/01/colorful-photographs-taken-of-san.html
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1_2__3
San Francisco isn't Silicon Valley. It has never been the center of the tech
world, and to whatever extent it's tech-heavy now that's less than 20 years
old. These pictures act like SF was churning out silicon and code starting in
the 1980s (based on the age of the pictures) which isn't even close to true or
accurate.

Even during the last dot com bust it was mostly just marketing companies in sf
- all the tech was south of Menlo Park.

I actually really hate that people try to retcpn SF into this visionary of
technology and futurism. Almost all of that was and remains in the South Bay,
as much as SF startup peeps hate to admit it.

~~~
kozikow
> San Francisco isn't Silicon Valley. It has never been the center of the tech
> world, and to whatever extent it's tech-heavy now that's less than 20 years
> old.

I moved to Mountain View to found a startup a few months ago. When I think
about the "chat over coffee" type of meetings go, I would say that there may
be slightly more of them in San Francisco than South Bay.

It feels like San Francisco starts to outweigh Silicon Valley. I didn't do
precise calculation, but estimation based on my gut feelings would say that
ratio of "Seed stage" startups between SF and South bay is 2/1.

~~~
1_2__3
Long-term companies in the south bay that have no (or virtually no) SF tech
presence. Just off the top of my head: Google/Alphabet, Facebook, Oracle,
Texas Instruments, National Semiconductor, Intel, AMD, Applied Materials,
Apple, Yahoo, Tesla, Palantir, and so on and so on.

Yes there are lots of kids in SF trying to get their website turned into the
next unicorn. That does not make SF the "center of the tech world", it makes
it the "center of the SF tech startup world".

~~~
azinman2
I don't know about the rest, but google has a large office in SF and many,
many people wanting positions in it (even if just a few days a week).

~~~
ng12
Most people who "work" in the SF office commute to MTV 3x/week. It's more of a
coworking space than an office.

~~~
azinman2
There are dedicated teams that are only there, and/or parts of teams that are
full time only there. I was on one, for example, and knew of others.

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bluejekyll
These are beautiful pictures. Thanks for posting.

What I find interesting of them, is how little has changed. This could
practically be taken now, perhaps replacing those kids with some
programmers...

One thing people may not realize, one of the most beutiful areas of SF, the
waterfront by the ferry building, used to have a huge multi-level highway.

Now it's one of the best looking areas of the City.

~~~
exodust
In this photo I don't see overhead power lines for the tram:

[https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-PgZkW7hgkro/WHPMo2nxx7I/AAAAAAAAD...](https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-PgZkW7hgkro/WHPMo2nxx7I/AAAAAAAADpw/bvPqIZrdDI04RQA_B1bloNfkG-
QCHsHOwCLcB/s1600/San%2BFrancisco%252C%2B1940s-50s%2B%25286%2529.jpg)

Does this mean trams only went downhill on this particular road? Or were they
powered some other way? Other photos show overhead wires.

~~~
stormbrew
That'd be a cable car, I think. It's pulled along by a cable embedded in the
middle 'rail', afaik.

~~~
bluejekyll
Yeah, that middle "rail" is the underground cable. I don't recognize the
street, but that doesn't mean much. There were a bunch of cable car lines that
were removed, we now have three left:

[https://www.sfcablecar.com/routes.html](https://www.sfcablecar.com/routes.html)

It looks like most were removed in the 40's, and 50's

[https://www.sfcablecar.com/history.html](https://www.sfcablecar.com/history.html)

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enahs-sf
I love this nostalgia. I find myself watching old movies of San Francisco just
to see how the city has changed. In one of the Dirty Harry movies there's a
great shot that shows the where the ballpark is now as a basically empty
industrial area. Great to see how soma and the rest of the city has evolved
over the years.

~~~
stuckagain
If the evolution of soma interests you, check out the work of this
photographer [https://deyoung.famsf.org/exhibitions/janet-delaney-south-
ma...](https://deyoung.famsf.org/exhibitions/janet-delaney-south-market)

~~~
exodust
The quality of those images is very nice. Smartphones definitely don't come
close to those colours. No doubt the photographers skill also plays a big
role, but that "pigment print" is sublime.

~~~
ghaff
I'm guess Cibachrome prints though you can't fully appreciate online.

Pigment prints are pretty rare these days. A photographer I was at a dinner a
couple of months back favored a Bay area company that prints on metal as an
alternative.

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vram22
I've read in mags like National Geographic (old issues) that in the 50s, 60's
and earlier, Silicon Valley had a lot of orchards with apricots, almonds, etc.
Must have been great to have lived there then.

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aaronbrethorst
Check out SFMOMA's Pritzker Center if you happen to be in or around SF. Really
amazing photography collection.

[http://lens.blogs.nytimes.com/2016/07/05/a-comprehensive-
loo...](http://lens.blogs.nytimes.com/2016/07/05/a-comprehensive-look-at-
california-and-the-west/)

and

[https://www.artsy.net/article/artsy-
editorial-10-photographe...](https://www.artsy.net/article/artsy-
editorial-10-photographers-who-captured-the-changing-face-of-san-francisco)

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Neliquat
I was expecting a snarky post with pics from the 90s, or today, with a point
that tech never really centralized in the bay, just the money. But old
pictures with questionable relevance are also nice.

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backtoyoujim
One of those photos includes a place I rented in the 1990s.

Thank you so much for that.

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kafkaesq
Nice collection. But from the look of these photos, you'd think the person
slapping the title on top was at most... about 21 or so. "1940s? 60s? 90s? It
all looks the same."

BTW, if you're wondering why the Sally Rand Nude Ranch looks out of place --
that's because that scene was from Ft. Worth, Texas, not SF.

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matt_wulfeck
I always marvel at how clean cities used to look before we began churning out
garbage and waste breakneck speeds.

~~~
refurb
Really? Nothing was ever recycled back then (maybe metal and glass). We were
way more wasteful back then.

~~~
awfgylbcxhrey
Tons of stuff that's now sold in blow-molded plastic was in glass or aluminum
back then. Stuff that's now sold in styrene and/or plastic wrap was wrapped in
waxed paper. And, of course, people made and consumed food at home _way_ more
often. So, more of the waste was in the form of of cars dumped down ravines,
and less in the form of shopping bags and granola bar wrappers blowing in the
wind.

Also, from personal observation, I'm inclined to say that a significant amount
of trash these days is due to the rolling trash bins and the hydraulic arms
used to gather them. Many people don't bag their trash, and I always see a
significant increase in 'litter' after trash day.

~~~
digler999
> now sold in blow-molded plastic was in glass or aluminum back then.

and how much "greener" is it to use aluminum, whose cost is mostly due to the
energy required to separate it from its oxide, than to use plastic that is a
natural (yes, it comes from the earth) byproduct of oil production?

> more of the waste was in the form of of cars dumped down ravines,

that can percolate down into the waterways and ground water, versus dump in a
landfill with a 4ft clay liner specifically designed to catch contaminants.

Trash-to-energy is also a thing now. Plasma from an electric arc can (somehow)
incinerate trash without harmful byproducts and actually results in a surplus
of energy [1]. Not to mention methane recovery from landfills that's been a
thing for over a decade [2]

[1] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Waste-to-
energy](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Waste-to-energy)

[2]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Landfill_gas_utilization](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Landfill_gas_utilization)

------
coin
> Center of the Tech World

A bit of a stretch considering there's the rest of the Bay Area

~~~
throwaway91111
Or the suburbs.

It ain't Oakland, though.

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mxfh
Just came across this 20 minute 1955 cinemascope feature on archive.org
earlier today:

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IOpCZTmurgk](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IOpCZTmurgk)

[https://archive.org/details/SanFrancisco1955CinemascopeFilm](https://archive.org/details/SanFrancisco1955CinemascopeFilm)

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golfer
Another nice photo set from that site -- "Composite Then and Now 1906 San
Francisco Earthquake Pictures"

[http://humansfromthepast.blogspot.com/2016/11/composite-
then...](http://humansfromthepast.blogspot.com/2016/11/composite-then-and-now-
photos-of-1906.html)

Puts the destruction of that earthquake in perspective.

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digler999
sorry if stupid question, but how do the trolley cars get enough traction to
travel up/down steep hills ? is there a rubber wheelset ? I can't imagine
metal wheels on rails would have enough friction to climb up or descend
safely.

edit: I see below that someone says there's an underground cable. Is there an
emergency backup (like a rubber foot or something) in case of cable snap?

~~~
cr0sh
> I see below that someone says there's an underground cable. Is there an
> emergency backup (like a rubber foot or something) in case of cable snap?

There is a brake system on the cars, that basically presses down on the rail -
they're made of wood, like they've always been:

[http://www.cablecarmuseum.org/the-
brakes.html](http://www.cablecarmuseum.org/the-brakes.html)

That museum is at the "head" of the lines - it has the motors which drive the
cables, and so in the museum you can learn about how it all works, see the
cables running, all the sheaves and such, and down below the machine room
where they do maintenance.

That said - cable-snaps are probably the rarest of rare things to occur. What
happens first, as the cable runs (and it is always running), it frays (steel
cable - and you don't want one of the "threads" to pierce ya!). As the cable
runs, there is a "switch" sensor mechanism that can tell when the fray passes.
When that happens, they know then they have to change the cable.

At night, then (when no cars are running) they run the cable at a slow speed
(I think it is to keep it lubed and not rust or something), and wait for it to
trigger again, then they slowly run it to find the fray. At that point, they
stop the line (all lines, actually), and splice in a new cable (they have many
reels in the work area), put tension on it, then turn the motor back on and
let it winch the new cable thru (and take in the old cable), until the splice
come back 'round, then they cut out the splice, and splice the ends of the new
cable together.

I can't recall how often this happens, but IIRC, one line or another would
need replacing on a monthly basis (?) - I might be completely wrong.

~~~
digler999
thanks for the info. I wonder if they "braid" the cables? Like I've heard they
do for ski lifts. Supposedly they dont weld/solder them in, they just braid
them very carefully and friction is enough to hold it together!

~~~
cr0sh
> I wonder if they "braid" the cables?

I don't know - maybe I'll look it up when I get home (I purchased this huge
and expensive history book on cable cars from the museum when I last went - it
probably has info in it about that aspect).

My best guess would be that they do; I can't imagine another way (like welding
or soldering) wouldn't cause issues going over the sheaves, possible causing
the cable to jump the pulleys. Plus there'd be potential issues with the cable
pinch system on the car itself should such an area be "hooked" so to speak...

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themark
Hmmm, No pictures of the wonderful parking lots and barren wasteland that
turned into the Mission Bay neighborhood?

~~~
bykovich
I live in Mission Bay and it sucks dick. As a residential neighborhood, I'd
rather have warehouses.

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litso
Really cool picture of the B-Geary street car turning right off of Market St.
en route to the Transbay terminal.

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pcora
Are there recent photos to compare?

~~~
plorkyeran
A lot of them would look exactly the same other than newer cars.

~~~
mschuetz
Yeah, I found that, other than the cars and people, it looked a lot like the
San Francisco I've been to last year.

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jrochkind1
such a beautiful city. All good things will be commandeered by the rich.

