Monday, March 22, 2010

North Beach from the top of the hill

Image made with an 8 x 10 view with a 1200mm lens - cropping in for this compacted view.  1984

Originally, the city's northeast shoreline extended only to what is today Taylor and Francisco streets. The area largely known today as North Beach was an actual beach, filled in with landfill around the late 19th century. Warehouses, fishing wharves, and docks were then built on the newly formed shoreline. Due to the proximity of the docks, the southern half of the neighborhood south of Broadway was home of the infamous Barbary Coast.

Due to its past legacy as the Barbary Coast, Broadway east of Columbus, grew to be the home of the city's red light district and striptease clubs. The Condor Club, on the corner of Columbus and Broadway, was opened in 1964 as America's first topless bar to which it still is as of today. The Lusty Lady, a peep-show establishment, is notable as the world's only worker cooperative strip club. The Broadway strip was also home to the Mabuhay Gardens, the Stone and On Broadway nightclubs, which were important venues in the punk rock scene of the late 1970s to mid-1980s...from Wikipedia

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