San Francisco Theatres

The Ferris Hartman Theatre / Ambassador Hotel

55 Mason St. | map |

Opened: Well, it never did. This announcement of the "Hotel and Theater Building" appeared in the June 17, 1911 issue of the San Francisco Call. Thanks to Art Siegel for locating it via the website of the California Digital Newspaper Collection.

Architect: William Beasley was the architect for version #1. For reasons unknown just months later Earl B. Scott did a different design for the same developers that was actually built. Well, part of it got built anyway. K. McDonald came along in 1922 as the architect when the project resumed construction.

Seating: It was announced as a 1,500 seat legit theatre in version #1. A story about version #2 noted it would be 1,600.

The location on the southwest corner of Mason and Eddy was the site of the Tivoli Opera House that had been lost in 1906. The replacement Tivoli Theatre, just around the corner at 70 Eddy St., would open in 1913.

The June 17, 1911 article in the Call appeared under the banner headline "Large Buildings Going Up In The Downtown District." The story was titled "New Theater, Hotel and Big Office Buildings" and also profiled two other buildings. It promised "Construction Work Now Under Way or Soon to Be Begun" and noted that with this work "the downtown district will rapidly take on a more finished aspect." They had this to say about the theatre building:

"New Theater And Hotel - The Downtown Realty company's theater and hotel building to be erected on the southwest corner of Eddy and Mason streets will be an imposing six story affair. The theater will seat 1,500 — 600 in balcony and 900 in the orchestra. A row of boxes will surround the balcony. The equipment will be of the most up to date style.

"The stage will have a 40 foot opening and a 35 foot depth. There will be a smoking room off one of the exits, a feature which no other theater in the city possesses. The entrance will be on the Mason street side. At one time the Shuberts had almost closed a lease for this site with the Prior estate, which owns the land. This was the site on which the Tivoli stood at the time of the fire. It was here that Mme. Tetrazzini was 'discovered' by San Francisco.

"A feature of the theater will be the absence of an advertising curtain. It will have a French velour drop curtain instead. The chairs will be large and roomy. Some of the dressing rooms will have baths, an unusual convenience. The scenery will be shifted by a new electrical contrivance instead of by ropes. The interior of the theater will be finished in ivory and gold. The exterior will be in Romanesque style, in red and buff brick, laid in Flemish bond.

"The hotel section of the building will be finished in Flemish oak with mosaic marble vestibule. it will be a high class European hostelry, with a cafe on the corner. The hotel will have three elevators and marble staircase and will be a very ornamental structure throughout. William Beasley is the architect."

A July 8, 1911 item in the Call noting that popular comedian Ferris Hartman would be operating the theatre. The article is on the CDNC website.

Design #2 with a different architect. This item appeared in the September 2, 1911 issue of the San Francisco Call. Beasley was no longer with the project. This was a design by Earl B. Scott.

The story that appeared in the September 2, 1911 issue of the Call noting that work would begin "within a fortnight." The Call's issue is on the California Digital Newspaper Collection website.

The Athens Lodgings (later the Bristol Hotel) is in the foreground as we look across to the construction fence around the lot where the new hotel, eventually to be called the Ambassador, would rise. Thanks to the late Mark Ellinger for locating the c.1911 photo in the collection of the UC Berkeley Bancroft Library.

The steel was going up on the theatre and hotel and things were far enough along that an artist was working on the "massive painting which will be in the proscenium arch, 40 by 80 feet...", according to this February 10, 1912 story in the Call. Thanks to Michael Thomas Angelo for finding this article as well as other items for a BAHT Facebook page post about the building. Angelo noted that Hartman died in an Oakland flop house in September 1931.

Legal troubles stopped the project in December 1912 with the building unfinished. The December 31, 1912 Call had a story headed "Prior Heirs Want Lot." It sat 10 years. It was a dispute between the developer, Downtown Realty, and the heirs of the person that had owned the land. It seems the developer hadn't been paying the rent and thought those unpaid amounts could eventually be paid as partial payment on an option they had to buy the property. They did not prevail. The story is on the CNDC website.

The never-to-be-completed theatre is shown in blue in this detail from image 65 of the 1913 Sanborn insurance map. That's Taylor St. at the bottom. Thanks to Art Siegel for locating the map in the Library of Congress collection.

"Legal Fight On Opera House Site" was the news in the April 9, 1913 Call. "Liens Filed On New Theater Building" was the Call's story in the September 10, 1913 issue. "Prior Estate Plans To Finish Building" was the Call's February 14, 1917 story. The story noted that there would be a "quick completion" and added that only the exterior of the building had been completed. The stories are on the CNDC website.

The building is on the right, sitting unfinished in 1920 with no work having been done on it since 1912. We're looking south on Mason toward Market St. It's a photo from the Jesse Brown Cook scrapbooks appearing on Calisphere from the UC Berkeley Bancroft Library. Gary Parks comments that the building we see on the right down on Market is the St. Francis Theatre.

The hotel portion of the project was completed in 1922. It's unknown how far along the theatre was when work stopped in 1912. When the building opened in 1922 the hotel was called the Ambassador -- and the space that was intended as the theatre had become a parking garage.

An early postcard of the Ambassador. Thanks to Michael Thomas Angelo for finding it.

A 1930 brochure for the hotel appearing on Wikimedia Commons.

A 2006 view of the building by Mark Ellinger. He called this his "postcard view."

A plaque on the building with several problems including calling the building the "former Ferris Harriman Theatre" and saying that the earlier building on the site was the "original Tivoli Opera House," when it was actually version #3. It's a 2010 photo by Badmachine that appears with the Wikipedia article about the hotel.

The Wikipedia story has its own set of issues. Among other problems, they also list Hartman's name as Harriman and assert that the theatre was completed with the rest of the building in 1911. When did it cease being a theatre and get turned into a parking garage? Well, they think that was a 1929 event. Such fun!

Looking south on Mason St. toward Market. On the left it's the Bristol Hotel, once the home of the Breakers Cafe and later the Black Cat. On the right is the Ambassador. Photo: Google Maps - 2019

Status: The Ambassador still operates. It's a 134 room SRO hotel now owned by the Tenderloin Neighborhood Development Corporation.

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

Breakers Cafe / Black Cat

56 Mason St. | map |

Opening: Early 1909 as the second location using the name. Thanks to Glenn Koch for sharing this postcard from his collection. It's unknown how much film they ran or if there was any vaudeville other than singers or music to dance to. The site Card Cow has another version of this card with a different photo appearing in the frame.

Tenderloin historian Peter M. Field notes:

"This second Breakers was owned and operated by Sandy McNaughton, a local sportsman, race horse owner, and frequent bettor on horse races and boxing matches.

Regarding the original Breakers Cafe location, Peter notes:

"McNaughton's original Breakers was out along Ocean Beach. That joint was listed first between 1906 and 1910 at 1534 Ocean Blvd., then later at the same number on 49th Ave., after the street's name change. It was between Kirkham and Lawton, just south of Carville, the famously Bohemian village of weekend cottages and permanent homes that were cobbled together out of cable cars that had been dumped along the beach by a streetcar company. That Breakers was taken over by someone else from 1911 on, after McNaughton left the city."

This second Breakers Cafe was in the basement of the building housing what is now called the Bristol Hotel, on the southeast corner of Mason and Eddy. It had been built as a lodging house called The Athens and was later called the Hotel Belmont. Peter Field notes that the Athens was a project of Alex W. Wilson, the property owner, and was still under construction as late as August 8, 1908.

Across the street, on the southwest corner, is the Ambassador Hotel, a project that, when it was conceived in 1911, was to have a legit theatre in it called the Ferris Hartman Theatre. Before the 1906 quake that corner, where the Ambassador now is, was the site of the Tivoli Opera House. The replacement Tivoli Theatre, just around the corner at 70 Eddy St., opened in 1913.

A February 7, 1909 ad for the Breakers that appeared in the San Francisco Examiner. Thanks to William David French, Jr. for locating it.

Peter Field notes that there was also coffee parlor operating in one of the hotel's storefronts by March 27, 1909 and adds that this location of the Breakers was mentioned in "San Francisco Woman's Fourth Marital Venture," an article in the June 4, 1909 issue of the San Francisco Call. He notes:

"The second Breakers, a branch of the original one opened by McNaughton, was first listed in the San Francisco city directory issue published in September 1909. It was under McNaughton's name, not as a separate listing under its own name, even though the original Breakers was listed under that name. The previous directory, published in October 1908, had only the Breakers on Ocean Blvd."

The 1910 directory has the same listings as in 1909. The building is listed as "The Athens, lodgings" in the alphabetical section. In the classified section it's under "Lodging Houses" and not "Hotels." McNaughton's listing was "McNaughton, Sandy, liquors, SE cor Eddy & Mason, 1534 Ocean Blvd." As Peter notes for the 1909 directory, in 1910 the only listing for "The Breakers" was the one on Ocean Blvd.

According to "Boisterous Dive's Saga..," a 2014 SF Gate story by Gary Kamiya, the Breakers was the first tenant in the basement space. The second tenant, the Black Cat, was the main focus of the story. Kamiya notes:

"According to Tenderloin historian Peter Field, the Black Cat, the Breakers, the Mirror, and half a dozen other cafes and saloons in the neighborhood were sketchy places, frequented by gamblers, pimps, prostitutes, petty criminals and other Uptown Tenderloin regulars. 'They used them to socialize and do business,' Field said. They were also good venues 'in which to trim slummers and the occasional "good thing" or wandering sucker.' Local merchants, along with religious and women’s groups, sought to get rid of places like the Black Cat.

"To understand this long-running conflict, it’s necessary to understand something about the history of the neighborhood. Field notes that after the 1906 earthquake and fire destroyed the Tenderloin, its businesses relocated west to lower Fillmore Street, which at that time became known as the Uptown Tenderloin. When the saloons, cafes, brothels and gambling dens were driven out of the Fillmore and returned to their original neighborhood, the name 'Uptown Tenderloin' relocated with them. But neighborhood improvement groups representing what was known as 'Down-town' were determined to get rid of the old vice district and and replace it with a cleaned-up shopping area.

"There was also a political dimension to the battle. Reform-minded Republican politicians sided with the improvement organizations against the corrupt GOP machine that had controlled City Hall for decades. Many Republican businessmen opposed the reformers because they owned Tenderloin cafes. This fight would continue until the Great Depression. Dance-license fights: Unable to revoke the cafes’ liquor licenses, the downtown boosters went after their dance licenses, which were handed out at the discretion of the Police Commission. Groups like the West of Powell Street Improvement Club and the YMCA pressured the panel and succeeded in driving the Breakers out of business. Soon after, the Black Cat opened in the same space, and the reformers went after it..."

Thanks Gary and Peter!

"Rigo every night..." It's a card with a November 1910 postmark from Card Cow. Peter Field comments:

"Janczi Rigo, the Hungarian Rom violinist and his (reportedly) Rom band, were written about as having just arrived in the city in "Gypsy Rigo Is Here With Latest Wife," a story in the June 11, 1909 issue of the San Francisco Examiner. The heavily retouched image of Rigo on the postcard shows a much thinner and less heavily mustached man than the Rigo in the picture in the Examiner article."

Closing: 1910. Peter comments:

"The Tenderloin Breakers was shut down by the Police Commission because he refused to obey their edict to forbid dancing after 1 a. m. He even published a small ad saying he'd be good from now on, but closed down in 1910, just over a year after he opened."

The Black Cat was the next tenant for the space. Peter comments:

"The original (San Francisco) Black Cat opened in the Breakers space shortly after, and had a run of about 12 years, finally driven out of business by Prohibition.

"The North Beach Black Cat was an entirely different and unrelated animal, an Italian coffee shop opened over a decade later (1933) that morphed into what may have been SF's first gay espresso joint, managed by a lesbian named Mona, a hangout for impecunious local writers, artists, and other cultural types, long before Alan Ginsberg, a former advertising agency writer, made North Beach and the Beats famous.

"By the same token, the current Black Cat restaurant and music club in the Tenderloin on Leavenworth Street is unrelated to the earlier places of that name."

Later Breakers Cafes: The January 1916 issue of the publication "Our Navy," on Google Books, had an ad for a later Breakers Cafe with an address of 199 Ellis, at the corner of Mason. The proprietors listed at that time were Carl Marlin and Pete Winandy.

The 1920 city directory listed a Breakers Cafe at 419 O' Farrell St.

A mural painted in 2012-13 by a group of Academy of Art University students at Eddy and Mason. It's on the Mason St. side of the Bristol, the same building where the Breakers was once located. It's based on a 1910 postcard in Glenn Koch's collection. The image appears on a page about the project on the site SF Mural Arts. The page also has three detail photos of the work. The sign in the mural says "Rigo every night at the Breakers Cafe Eddy and Mason. S. McNaughton, Mgr. San Francisco 1910."

The card the mural is based on is one that appears in Glenn's 2001 book "San Francisco Golden Age Postcards." See "San Francisco Like You've Never Seen It," a 2009 Beyond Chron story about the book. The book is available on Amazon. Other stories and images related to the mural project: Alamy Stock Photos | Beyond Chron | Getty Images | NBC Bay Area |

A post a few years ago on the Facebook page of the Mikkeller Bar, 24 Mason St., noted this area was "the block that was once the 'Paris of America.'" Peter Field comments:

"I've not come across anything that speaks of that block being singled out as the 'Paris of America.' But the phrase brings to mind two associations.

"The first is when Patrick 'P. H.' McCarthy, also known as Pinhead McCarthy, managed to win the SF mayoralty on the labor ticket for the 1910-1911 term. He got elected largely by opposing the previous political reform administration of Mayor Edward Robeson Taylor. One of his most publicized planks was to turn San Francisco into 'the Paris of America.' By this he meant, among other things, to allow 'legitimate' saloons, theaters, and other Tenderloin businesses to be allowed to operate without interference from goo-goo reformers.

"Tenderloin vice and entertainment businesses heavily endorsed his campaign, thinking he meant all of them, which was why so many were angry when McCarthy, once he was elected, tried to steer a middle course. This meant allowing 'legitimate' entertainment and vice businesses to operate, such as gambling in fraternal society buildings, operating parlor houses, and assignations at French restaurants, while suppressing the demi monde, that is, gambling clubs, lower-class prostitution, petty crime, and any other vices that might discourage tourists with money from visiting the city. But it didn't work, and became one of the reasons he lost the next election to James 'Sunny Jim' Rolph, who was supported by the reformers.

"The second association that comes to mind was when the building that housed the Hotel Bristol and the basement space was operated as the Streets of Paris night club from around 1939 to around 1944 and again from about 1959 to about 1969. Both were thinly disguised girlie joints. (It was the Spanish Village from about 1951 to 1958, same sort of girlie joint, but different theme.)

Looking south on Mason St. toward Market. On the left it's the Bristol Hotel, with the mural on the side and the hotel entrance down in the middle of the building. On the right is the Ambassador Hotel, dating from 1911. Photo: Google Maps - 2019

A 1920 version of the view. The Ambassador is sitting unfinished, after years of legal troubles. It's a photo from the Jesse Brown Cook scrapbooks appearing on Calisphere from the UC Berkeley Bancroft Library. Gary Parks comments that the building we see on the right down on Market is the St. Francis Theatre.

More information: For a fine history of the neighborhood see Peter M. Field's 2018 Arcadia Publishing book "The Tenderloin District of San Francisco Through Time." It's available through Amazon.

| back to top | San Francisco Theatres: by address and neighborhood | alphabetical list | list by architect | pre-1906 theatre list | home |

Art Theatres 1 & 2

55 Taylor St. | map |

Opened: July 1972 as the Stag Theatres 1 & 2. They were in the building on the west side of the street just north of the Golden Gate Theatre. The 1972 photo by Tom Gray is from the Jack Tillmany collection.

The were renamed Art Theatres 1 & 2 on July 14, 1973.

Closed: March 20, 1991. Thanks to Jack Tillmany for the research.

Status: The building is still there on Taylor St. but with other tenants.

The building the theatres would later be in is seen with the Chateau Restaurant as one of the tenants in this detail from a 1937 photo from the San Francisco Public Library collection. Will King's RKO Grill is in the Golden Gate Theatre's last storefront along Taylor St. Thanks to Jack Tillmany for the image. The photo appears on a Found SF page about the Golden Gate Theatre.

The Art 1 & 2 in 1973. Thanks to Jack Tillmany for sharing the photo by Tom Gray from his collection. It appears that they planned to run "Behind the Green Door" for quite some time.

A c.1990 view by Tom Gray that's in the Jack Tillmany collection. You could stop in at Muffins Coffee Shop for a bite to eat before the show. That oval sign above the marquee would lead you to believe the place was called Movies 1 & 2.

The theatre's marquee is visible on the far right in this 2008 photo from BW Chicago on Flickr.

The building in 2017. We're looking south toward the Golden Gate Theatre and Market St. beyond. Photo: Google Maps

Forbidden City / Sutter Cinema / Sutter St. Theatre

363 / 369 Sutter St. | map |

Opening: The Chinese nightclub Forbidden City opened in 1938 on the second floor of this building on the south side of the street in the middle of the block between Grant and Stockton. The club used a 363 Sutter Address. Prior to becoming Forbidden City the space was called the Aladdin Studio Tiffin Room.

A postcard of the Aladdin Studio Tiffin Room from the collection of Arthur Dong. This card and the one below appear in his book "Forbidden City, USA: Chinatown Nightclubs, 1936-1970."

Another Aladdin Studio card from Arthur's collection. The caption in the book: "The Aladdin Studio Tiffin Room, 'San Francisco’s Most Distinctive Oriental Show Place' and San Francisco’s first supper club. Decorated with a Chinese motif, it occupied the future site of the Forbidden City nightclub. Postcards ca. 1921-1925." Thanks, Arthur!

Forbidden City is said to be part of the inspiration for the Rogers and Hammerstein musical "Flower Drum Song." Another story is that when doing the film version of the musical the casting directors went to the club in search of talent and found Sammy Fong there.

A floor show at Forbidden City. The undated photo is from the San Francisco Public Library.

An undated ad that appears with the Wikipedia article on Forbidden City.

The nightclub closed in 1970. Still named Forbidden City, the venue re-opened as an X-rated film venue on May 21, 1970. The name was changed to Sutter Cinema shortly thereafter.

Thanks to James Bartlett for this 1972 flyer. In 1976 and 1977 the venue operated as the Sutter Street Theatre.

A May 20, 1977 ad for the venue rebranded as the "All New" Arena. Thanks to Jack Tillmany for this ad as well as research on the theatres dates of operation.

Closing: 1977 was the end of it as an entertainment space.

Status: It was later used as a franchise location of Barbizon Modeling and School. It's now used as office space.

Exterior views:

A 1970 look at the venue running adult movies but still called Forbidden City. It's a photo by Tom Gray from the Jack Tillmany collection. It appears on the Open SF History Project website.

Renamed the Sutter Cinema in 1970. Note the Forbidden City vertical still up on the right edge of the building. It's a photo by Tom Gray that's in the Jack Tillmany collection.

A 1970 photo taken by Clay Geerdes. By this time they had blacked out the Forbidden city vertical. Thanks to David Miller for sharing it on a post on the San Francisco Remembered Facebook page.

The operation as the Sutter Street Theatre in 1977. Note the new signage below the marquee saying "The Sutter Theatre - the Arena." It's a Tom Gray photo from the Jack Tillmany collection.

A 1977 photo from the Gfeller Collection. Thanks to Lily Castello for sharing it on the BAHT Facebook page. In the post it was given a 1981 date.

The building in 2019. Photo: Google Maps

The Sutter Cinema in the Movies:

The theatre is seen in this shot from Richard Rush's film "Freebie and the Bean" (Warner Bros., 1974). It stars Alan Arkin, James Caan and Loretta Swit. Thanks to Eric Schaefer for spotting the theatre and getting the screenshot. | On IMDb |

More Information: Jack Tillmany's Arcadia Publishing book "Theatres of San Francisco" can be previewed on Google Books. It's available from Amazon or your local bookseller.

Check out Arthur Dong's book "Forbidden City U.S.A: Chinatown Nightclubs 1936-1970." It's on Amazon. Also available is his 1989 documentary "Forbidden City USA."

Also see the Wikipedia article on Forbidden City.

| back to top | San Francisco Theatres: by address and neighborhood | alphabetical list | list by architect | pre-1906 theatre list | home |

Golden Gate Hall

625 Sutter St. | map |

This pre-1906 venue was on the south side of the street between Mason St. and Taylor St.

Capacity: 838 with 539 on the main floor and 299 in the balcony.

A main floor seating chart.

A balcony seating chart.

Thanks to Glenn Koch for sharing these images from a copy of the 1900 edition of the San Francisco Blue Book that's in his collection.

Closing: The 1906 earthquake destroyed the building.

| back to top | San Francisco Theatres: by address and neighborhood | alphabetical list | list by architect | pre-1906 theatre list | home |

The Bill Graham Civic Auditorium

99 Grove St. | map |

Opened: The building opened as the Exposition Auditorium on March 2, 1915. It was built for the Panama Pacific International Exposition. Thanks to Nick Wright for this lovely 1915 postcard view. It was a post on the San Francisco History Facebook page.

Architects: John Galen Howard, Frederick Meyer and John W. Reid, Jr.

There had been a 1911 design by Carl Warnecke that had been commissioned by Arthur Brown, Jr., a gentleman who would go on to design the War Memorial Opera House with G. Albert Lansburgh. Comments and drawings related to this early "A Public Auditorium" design are down at the bottom of the page.

Capacity: 8,500

The convention of the Motion Picture Exhibitors' League of America was one event in 1915. Thanks to Jack Tillmany for locating this ad.

The San Francisco Opera used the building from 1923 through 1932. They performed there again in 1996 when the Opera House was being renovated.

In the Fall of 1923 the San Francisco Grand Opera, supported by the San Francisco Symphony Orchestra, presented its first season under the direction of Gaetano Merola. Program located on eBay by Art Siegel.

It was still called the Exposition Auditorium when Frieda Hempel, billed as "The Jenny Lind of Today" dropped in in April, 1925. Handbill seen on eBay by Art Siegel.

A page from the December 1926 program for Max Reinhardt production of "The Miracle," a production brought to San Francisco by producer Morris Gest. After this engagement it went to the Shrine Expo Hall in Los Angeles.

Another page from the program. Thanks to Art Siegel for locating it on eBay where we only got images of six of the eighteen pages. Also included were: cover - statement from Morris Gest | the "Miracle" committee | next attraction | ad for Brunswick Panatrope |

A page from the 1948 Sanborn Fire Insurance Map. That's the Civic Auditorium in the upper right and the Fox Theatre below it. Market St. is on an angle in the lower right. Thanks to Art Siegel for locating this in the Library of Congress collection.

A closer look at the Auditorium from the 1948 Sanborn. That's Grove St. across the top, Polk St. on the left and Hayes across the bottom.

In 1992 the facility was renamed the Bill Graham Civic Auditorium. The building is now managed for the city by Another Planet Entertainment.

Interior views:

A 1914 construction view from the San Francisco Public Library. It made an appearance as a post on the Lost San Francisco Facebook page.

A construction view in the collection of the San Francisco Public Library. It's on a fine PPIE100 page with other photos of the building. Thanks to Mark Shankel spotting the page.

A December 31, 1915 photo by Horace Chaffee for the Department of Public Works. It's one of many photos of the building appearing on the Open SF History Project website.

A 1922 view of the setup designed by G. Albert Lansburgh for a visit by the Chicago Opera Company. The photo, from the scrapbooks of Hamilton Henry Dobbin, is in the California State Library collection, their item #01382051.

Gary parks comments: "The ceiling certainly looks Lansburghian. He did a massive tent ceiling for the Shrine Auditorium in LA, of course. It's a little-known fact that he also did one in the late Teens for the Kinema Theatre in Fresno, which inspired Pflueger in his design for the Castro. The Kinema's tent ceiling later got remodeled out of existence, if several batches of photos are to be believed."

A 1924 photo that was published with this caption: "Are symphony concerts appreciated? Every seat in the Civic Auditorium filled to hear conductor Hertz and his Orchestra. Thanks to Bob Ristelhueber for finding the photo for a post on the San Francisco Remembered Facebook page.

A photo from the July 1930 issue of the publication The Municipal Record. Thanks to Bob Ristelhueber for finding it for a post on the BAHT Facebook page. The caption: "Magnificent New Canopy in Auditorium - Designed, constructed and installed by the J.L. Stuart Co., this beautiful new canopy is without doubt the largest and most spectacular hand-painted canopy ever created."

A 1948 campaign event for Thomas Dewey and Earl Warren. The photo from the S.F. Examiner collection appears on the Open SF History Project website.

A 1949 ceiling view by Eddie Murphy for the S.F. News. It's in the San Francisco Public Library collection. It was published with this caption:

"The 30-ton canopy in Civic Auditorium has been cleaned, fire-proofed and redecorated by J. L. Stuart Co., and today was hoisted back into place. The 92,000 square feet of canvas hides the unsightly web of steel girders in the Auditorium's upper area. The great lightoliers that hang from the roof are in the foreground, ready to be raised. It's the first time in over a decade this big laundry job has been done."

A 1958 look at the canvas ceiling. The S.F. Daily News photo by Eddie Murphy is in the San Francisco Public Library collection. It appeared with this caption:

"Wear and tear of the Civic Auditorium's false canvas ceiling has been visible for years. Now the Fire Department adds its critical judgment: The canvas, 35 years old and not flame-proofed for 10 years, is hazardous and must come down. Workmen will begin the job tomorrow. At center is a view of what the ceiling will look like afterward. The city has budgeted $117,000 to replace fabric."

A 2014 photo taken by Justin Yee during a Phish concert. The photo appears on Live Music Blog.

More exterior views:

A June 1914 view by Horace Chaffee for the Department of Public Works. The photo appears on the Open SF History Project website.

A 1914 construction view located by Jack Tillmany for a post on the BAHF Facebook page.

A 1915 photo located by Jack Tillmany.

A c.1915 view of the Auditorium and City Hall, looking south from Larkin and McAllister. The San Francisco Public Library photo by R.J. Waters & Co. appears in Mark Ellinger's Up From The Deep survey of Mid-Market architecture. He notes: "The block-long excavation in the foreground marks the site of the California State Building, opened in 1922."

A 20s view from the air taken by U.S. Air Service. Thanks to Ragui H. Michael for posting the photo on San Francisco Remembered Facebook page.

A c.1930 look toward the building from City Hall. Thanks to Roger Rubin for finding the photo for a post on the BAHT Facebook page.

A photo from a 1935 ad for a LaSalle Coupe in front of the Auditorium. Thanks to Roger Rubin for finding the photo for a post on the San Francisco Remembered Facebook page.

A detail from a 1946 Morton-Waters Co. photo taken from 9th and Jessie that's in the Open SF History Project collection. Thanks to Art Siegel for the image. He notes that the signage below the "Auditorium" sign at the Market/Hayes/Larkin intersection is for "Up in Central Park," which played the venue in October.

A 1953 photo from the San Francisco Public Library collection.

Thanks to Bob Ristelhueber for locating this 1958 shot. The octagonal-roofed structure in the upper center is the Civic Auditorium. The Fox Theatre is below it with Polk St. to the left.

A c.2008 view with Fox Plaza in the background. It's a photo by J. Ash Bowie appearing with the Wikipedia article on the Civic Auditorium.

Looking along the Larkin St. side of the building toward Market. Photo: Google Maps - 2019

The back of the building as seen from Market St. That's Hayes St. on the left and Larkin on the right. Photo: Google Maps - 2019

An earlier unbuilt design:

This plan appears in a Terry Helgesen scrapbook that's now in the Ronald W. Mahan collection. Helgesen's comments with the drawing: "An early design for the Civic Auditorium at San Francisco. While it faces the Civic Center, the streets shown are not as finally re-built after the fire. At the time these drawings were made, the Civic Center design had not quite been 'set' (it wasn't till after World War 1)."

An elevation and sections for the Warnecke design. Terry Helgesen's comments: "Published in 1911, this design was by a very young (Warren would come later) Carl Warnecke, and was sponsored by Arthur Brown, Jr. who, with William Blakewell, designed the City Hall and the Opera House (with Lansburgh). The exterior was much handsomer than the later built design, but the actual auditorium would seem to be a bit larger (12,000) on Howard, Meyer and Reid's actually built structure." Thanks, Ron!

More information: Over 250 photos of the building are in the San Francisco Public Library collection if you care to go browsing.

The Open SF History Project site has about 100 photos of the Auditorium.

And, of course, Google will show you hundreds of recent photos.