The Palace Variety Theatre

 SE corner of Post & Grant  | map |

Opening: This saloon and variety theatre was running by 1881. It's listed in that year's city directory with an address of "SE cor Post & Dupont" and P.V.T. Mathias & Co. as proprietors. It was a venue in the basement of a four story building. The Carlton Lodgings were on the upper floors.

In the 1882 city directory T.F.A. Oberneyer was listed as proprietor. On a list of amusement venues in an 1882 Guide Book and Street Manual they mistakenly list it as being at Post and Kearny. In the 1887 directory the address is given as the SE corner of Post and Dupont.

"Palace Varieties" is shown in this detail from image 23 of the 1887 Sanborn Real Estate Survey Map.  That's Morton St. on the left, now called Maiden Lane. Grant, earlier known as Dupont, is across the top. On the right it's Post St. 

On the Post side the they show "Stage and Scenery Under" - meaning under the sidewalk. Under the Grant sidewalk they have storage. Thanks to Art Siegel for locating the map in the Library of Congress collection. Irving Hall, seen just to the east of the Palace, was a new name for the building that opened in 1862 as Dashaway Hall.

Art researched the Palace and notes: "I found a number of newspaper mentions of the venue, all pretty much crime reports, and referring to it as a dive, which was coming into usage as a term for basement establishments that one could dive into. An amusing article in the April 4, 1892 San Francisco Call was written by an intrepid reporter who was 'shocked, shocked' to find these 'theaters' in our fair city, names them all, in particular:

"CRIME HATCHERIES. Life in San Francisco's Dens of Depravity. PLACES WHERE VICE RUNS RIOT. Jack Hallinan's Notorious Cremorne Theater. A PLACE THAT SHOULD BE CLOSED. Other Vile Resorts in This City Where Youth Is Corrupted and Women Slowly Slain... Life In the dives of San Francisco: What is it like? Tell us not that it is picturesque. Say not that it is permissible; that the low and vulgar will be low and vulgar, no matter what is said or done. Say that it is vile, and you have spoken of it in fit terms— sharp, short and to the point. Vile is the word. 

"There are different kinds of dives. There is the underground hall, where the fetid air reeks with a stench that never leaves the place night or day; where young maidenhood is debauched; where innocent youth becomes laden with foulness; where robberies are concocted; where men are slain; where licentiousness rules supreme. There is the hall just off the street, perhaps a step or two up from the sidewalk, which is just so many steps downward into Hades for those who go in as participants. Here, possibly, it is a little cleaner in a physical sense, though morally it is just as foul and loathsome as the dive-cellar. Then there are a few places where one goes upstairs in order to gain entrance. So far as good air and decency are concerned nothing is gained by the ascent. The upstairs places are just as vile as those in the cellars. Often they are worse.

"But they are all dives, whether above or below ground. The 'Century Dictionary' gives the definition if a dive as that of 'a disreputable place of resort, where drinking and other forms of vice are indulged in, and commonly vulgar entertainments are given.' So it may be in a cellar or in an attic. If it conforms to the foregoing definition putting it upstairs does not let it escape from the appellation of 'dive.' But there is a bitter name for them — crime hatcheries. That is what they are. The police records will prove it. Now, there are a great many dives in San Francisco. If there were only one, that would be one too many. Some of them are hidden away out of sight. Others flaunt themselves brazenly on our leading streets, their blatant bands of harsh music sending forth their discordant notes nightly.

"These places which greet the youth of the city with attractive signs, inviting them to come in and begin a course of vice, are maintained on such streets as Market and Kearny, staring the public in the face, saying, 'We are here to stay; what are you going to do about it?..' The dive-keepers have political pulls. They know how to get off easily when it comes to threatened punishment. They are experts at evasion of the law. They have plenty of money, and use it more unscrupulously than does any other class of corruptionists. They are moral lepers. And yet these same dive-keepers have the support of the law, after a fashion. To uproot them one most strike deep. It should be done. They should be uprooted, and with no tender hand; but mercilessly, just as they slay and corrupt. 

 

"There is the Cremorne Crime Hatchery. It is the worst of all. It would be closed to-morrow by the police if they had the power. The Police Commissioners refused to give their consent to license it; but it is licensed just the same. How is that done? Never mind, just now. It is done— rest assured of that. For there is money behind the Cremorne— big money. The Call will tell all about these things in the course of time. In this chapter it will merely introduce the reader to the Cremorne, the Star, the Eureka, the Olympic, the Palace Varieties, the Elite and other dives. See how vile they are! 

 

"TOBIN'S APPROVAL... R. J. Tobin, president of the Board of Police Commissioners, was told that The Call was collecting data for a crusade against the dens of depravity in this city. 'Good... We have had a great deal of trouble with the dens— a great deal. We know that in those places much of the crime that is committed in this city originates. We know that they are a stench in the nostrils of the community. We have done everything in our power to close the most disreputable of them, but we cannot go further than the law allows to go...' 

 

"WHAT THE CHIEF SAYS... 'These dives and dance-halls are like so many festering sores on the body politic, and were the power mine not one of the disreputable places would be open to-day.' It was P. Crowley who spoke, Chief of the Police Department of San Francisco. 'Some of them are vile and filthy places; none of them fit to live in a respectable community... Yes; some of them are worse than others. Some have bad criminal records. In some crime has been committed, even to murder... I can tell you which causes us the most trouble. That is the Cremorne, but the Bella Union, the Eureka music-hall and half a dozen others are just about as bad. The Cremorne is the most dangerous to the community because of its prominent location on Market street. But I look upon them all as so many plague-spots in the community... Dives cost the city more in a year than any other nuisance it has to contend against. Taxpayers ought to put their feet down on the dives and stamp them out of existence."

"THERE ARE MANY SUCH. Dives That are Moral Stenches to the Community... There are many dives in San Francisco— many more than in any other city of its size. We may be lacking in many things, but not in dives. Our gilded youth are well provided for in this respect, and the pitfalls for our own sons and daughters are numerous and varied. No; we are not backward in iniquity... The Palace Varieties, in the cellar at Grant avenue and Post street, deserves especial mention for its especial indecencies, but do not expect to see the unusual there. Only the most vulgar and commonplace performances are in vogue at this— and all— the dives... The main feature of all the dives are the female waiters. They are mostly aged, all are brazen and but few even passingly good looking. Yet they serve their purpose. They make the dive-keeper rich."

 

An August 6, 1892 article in the Chronicle:

 Thanks to Art Siegel for locating the article. 

 

 

"Sal. & Variety Bst" is the use shown for the Palace premises in this detail from image 10 of the 1899 Sanborn Real Estate Survey Map. Thanks to Art Siegel for locating this on the Library of Congress website.

Closing: The date is unknown.

The end: The building was destroyed in the 1906 earthquake and fire. 

 

A 1906 view by an unknown photographer of Post St. near Grant. Thanks to Art Siegel for locating the image on the Open SF History Project website. The site notes that it's a view southeast with the ruins of the Monadnock Building, the Mutual Savings Bank and the Call Building in the background. 

 

 

Another 1906 view of the south side of the street located by Art on the Open SF History Project site. It's a photo by B.L. Singley. They note on the site: "View east on Post to west side of Crocker Building in distance, ruined building held up with long beam at right, stone rubble filling street, downed power line on left. Top story of Chronicle Annex, under construction at time of quake, in distance top center."

Thanks to Art Siegel for all his research on this building.

Status: Dior is now the tenant on the ground floor of the building currently on the site.  

More information: Well, there isn't any yet. 

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