The Rise and Fall of the Bay Area Streetcar Transit System
From Armenia to San Francisco: The Duduk Whisperer Plays with Soul
The San Francisco Landmark You’ve Never Heard Of … Unless You’re French
Is It Crow-maggedon? Why Crows Are Flocking to Bay Area Cities Each Winter
How a Remarkable 19th-Century Revolutionary Priest From Ukraine Ended Up in Hayward
Inside the San Francisco Church Where John Coltrane is a Saint
How the Bay Area’s Gay Bars Became a Battleground for LGBTQ+ Rights in the 1950s
San Francisco’s Historic ‘Relief Cottages,’ Built After the 1906 Earthquake, Are Hidden in Plain Sight
The Best San Francisco Movies to Stream This Holiday Season
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"bio": "Asal Ehsanipour is a producer and reporter for Rightnowish, Bay Curious and The California Report Magazine. She is also a producer for \u003ca href=\"https://www.thedoubleshift.com/\">The Double Shift\u003c/a>, a podcast about a new generation of working mothers. In 2018, Asal was named an Emerging Journalist Fellow by the Journalism and Women’s Symposium. Her work has appeared on KQED, KALW, PRI’s The World, and in several food and travel publications.",
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"slug": "the-rise-and-fall-of-bay-area-streetcar-transit-system",
"title": "The Rise and Fall of the Bay Area Streetcar Transit System",
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"content": "\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"#episode-transcript\">\u003ci>View the full episode transcript.\u003c/i>\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>At the turn of the 20th century, streetcars crisscrossed the\u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/tag/bay-area\"> Bay Area\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>For many people, they were the primary way to get around town —and to San Francisco for work. People would walk out their doors in Berkeley, Alameda, Oakland, hop on a streetcar that would take them to a ferry and be in downtown San Francisco in about 40 minutes. Remnants of these lines can be seen in many Bay Area streetscapes.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Bay Curious listener Vanessa Boehm grew up in Germany with efficient public transportation, and as she looked around her neighborhood near the UC Berkeley campus, she wondered: “What happened to the streetcars that used to be around Oakland and the East Bay?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She’s not the first or the last to ask questions along those lines. The history and disappearance of the Key System, which once served East Bay residents, has captured the imagination of many transit aficionados. And among the many similar questions we’ve gotten are some from people who want to know whether it would be possible to recreate the streetcar networks that have long since vanished.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Without knowing it, perhaps, Vanessa and other listeners have touched on a disputed piece of both East Bay and national transportation history, a conspiracy theory that involves some of the nation’s most powerful corporations and the role they played — or didn’t play — in the disappearance of streetcars in the East Bay. The story also encompasses a real-estate development scheme that shaped Oakland and Berkeley, the rise of suburban sprawl, and the dawn of the motor vehicle age.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>\u003cstrong>Streetcars fundamentally shaped urban development\u003c/strong>\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Streetcars were essential to the growth of cities in the Bay Area and across the United States in the final years of the 19th century and the opening years of the 20th. Electric railroads — either streetcar networks connecting neighborhoods or interurban lines connecting towns and cities — served all nine Bay Area counties in the early 20th century.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The place where that electric streetcar legacy is most obvious is San Francisco, where several electric lines that operated in the 1920s — Muni’s J, K, L, M and N routes — are still essential parts of the city’s transportation system. Two other lines, the E and the F, feature tourist-oriented service using historic streetcars.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12073776\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 990px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/260218-KEY-SYSTEM-05-KQED.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12073776\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/260218-KEY-SYSTEM-05-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"An electric train crossing the lower deck of the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge.\" width=\"990\" height=\"796\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/260218-KEY-SYSTEM-05-KQED.jpg 990w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/260218-KEY-SYSTEM-05-KQED-160x129.jpg 160w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 990px) 100vw, 990px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">A Key System “A” line train on a test run across the Bay Bridge from San Francisco to Oakland in 1939. \u003ccite>(Courtesy of \u003ca href=\"https://www.foundsf.org/Key_System_and_March_of_Progress\">FoundSF.org\u003c/a>)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>For the first four decades of the 20th century, the East Bay was served by two major electric streetcar systems: one run by Southern Pacific and a competitor known popularly as the Key System. Southern Pacific’s system, initially called the Oakland, Alameda and Berkeley Lines, ran transbay service using ferries that left from long causeways, or moles, in West Oakland and Alameda.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Key System was a collection of East Bay streetcar and transbay lines built or purchased and consolidated by Francis Marion Smith, known as “Borax” Smith because of his success mining and marketing the all-purpose mineral in the deserts of Nevada and southeastern California. Starting in the 1890s, Smith created a network of lines that eventually stretched from Richmond to San Leandro.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But creating a transit system wasn’t Smith’s main objective. He and partner Frank Havens had purchased about 13,000 acres, more than 20 square miles, under the aegis of a separate enterprise known as The Realty Syndicate. The streetcar and transbay train system Smith created was \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11925112/idora-park-and-playland-at-the-beach-bay-area-amusement-parks-of-a-bygone-era\">designed to serve the new neighborhoods\u003c/a> that would be developed on the syndicate’s properties.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Oakland historian Mitchell Schwarzer said the streetcar network fundamentally changed the shape of the city. In his 2021 study of Oakland’s development, \u003ca href=\"https://www.ucpress.edu/books/hella-town/paper\">\u003cem>Hella Town,\u003c/em>\u003c/a> he said that by 1912, property subdividers had created more than 50,000 new residential lots close to streetcar routes.[aside postID=news_12068602 hero='https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/12/251204-EARTHQUAKECOTTAGES00030_TV-KQED.jpg']The effect on what had been a compact East Bay community focused on downtown was dramatic, with streetcar lines triggering a sprawl of new neighborhoods in every direction and the creation of commercial districts like Grand Lake, Rockridge, Piedmont Avenue and along stretches of San Pablo Avenue and East 14th Street, now International Boulevard.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The streetcar “affected everything — it affected where the residential areas developed, it affected where the commercial areas developed, it affected where industry moved pretty much,” Schwarzer said. Alongside the automobile, streetcars shaped the form Oakland took to this day, “both where things are located, how they’re distributed, how they’re built, what’s built, where they’re built,” Schwarzer said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He adds that this early episode of sprawl also helped shape Oakland’s future demographic and class profile. The city’s vast residential expansion “allowed for the wealthier people to live on larger lots and to live separately and to erect barriers to minorities moving into their communities. Without the streetcar, they couldn’t have done that.”\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>\u003cstrong>Financial failures\u003c/strong>\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Although the Key System and other streetcar operations were useful in driving real estate development and despite the fact that they carried more than 100 million passengers a year at their peak in the 1920s, they were, for the most part, failures as money-making enterprises.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Key System was in deep financial trouble by 1913. According to the late transportation reporter and historian Harre W. Demoro, the Key’s early money troubles could be traced directly to Borax Smith’s risky and chaotic business practices. With the company deeply in debt, Smith was forced out in 1913. A series of crises ensued, with the company teetering on the edge of failure and being foreclosed on and reorganized in 1923 and 1930.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>By this time, private automobiles had become a major presence in cities across the country, including those in the Bay Area. The growing popularity of car ownership is reflected in a steep decline in ridership for both the Southern Pacific and Key System after a peak recorded in the mid-1920s.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Drivers weren’t the only ones who were drawn to new motorized modes of transport. Starting before 1920, transit systems began to convert some of their train service to bus lines. By the mid-1920s, the Key System had joined in that trend, which accelerated through the U.S. entry into World War II in 1941.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Demoro found in \u003ca href=\"https://archive.org/details/bulletinnational446nati\">a 1979 study\u003c/a> of the Key System published in the National Railway Bulletin that by 1937, its buses accounted for more than half of the company’s business in terms of miles of service delivered. “From then on, the bus dominated” Key’s operation, Demoro wrote in \u003ca href=\"https://archive.org/embed/keyroutetransbay0000demo\">his two-volume history\u003c/a> of the transbay service.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12073773\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/260218-KEY-SYSTEM-02-KQED.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12073773\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/260218-KEY-SYSTEM-02-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"A two-car, orange-and-silver electric train shown in a car barn at the Western Railway Museum in Solano County.\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/260218-KEY-SYSTEM-02-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/260218-KEY-SYSTEM-02-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/260218-KEY-SYSTEM-02-KQED-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Key System Bridge Unit 187, part of the fleet that provided service across the Bay Bridge from the East Bay to San Francisco between 1939 and 1958, at the Western Railway Museum in Solano County. \u003ccite>(Dan Brekke/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>The decline accelerated after the Bay Bridge opened to drivers in November 1936. The planned railroad service on the bridge wasn’t ready when the bridge opened, creating an opportunity for East Bay residents to enjoy the ease of car travel. When train service on the bridge’s lower deck finally began in January 1939, it did little to reverse the ridership slump.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And it’s right here that the conspiracy theory mentioned earlier becomes part of the Key System story. Because as the car was becoming king, companies related to the automobile industry bought up dozens of streetcar lines and replaced them with buses. That effort was intended, the story goes, to undermine mass transit to such an extent that riders would desert it in preference for automobiles.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>\u003cstrong>A kernel of truth to the myth\u003c/strong>\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>General Motors, Standard Oil of California (now known as Chevron), Firestone Rubber and Phillips Petroleum really did invest in a company called National City Lines and a pair of subsidiaries that were in the business of buying mostly financially troubled streetcar systems and immediately converting them to bus systems. That happened in 46 cities across the country, including a few big ones, like Los Angeles, St. Louis, and yes, Oakland.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The government really did take National City Lines, GM, its partners and their executives to court. In 1949, a jury in Chicago really did convict them of one count of violating federal antitrust law by conspiring to monopolize the sale of buses, fuel, tires and other supplies to the transit systems that National City Lines and its subsidiaries had taken over. The companies were acquitted on a second count alleging they had conspired to block competitors from doing business with the National City companies. In other words, the defendants were found guilty of trying to control the purchase of supplies that newly “motorized” transit agencies would need, not of any broader conspiracy to wreck mass transit.[aside postID=news_12065901 hero='https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/10/251016-NIMITZHOUSE-38-BL-KQED.jpg']The penalties the judge imposed were trivial: $5,000 for each corporate defendant — about $68,000 in 2026 dollars — and $1 for each of the executives who had played a part in the conspiracy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But the story is more complex than the National City Lines case, said Ethan Elkind, who directs the climate program at UC Berkeley Law’s Center for Law, Energy and the Environment. “It’s really a story of technology change.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The electric streetcar systems that started appearing everywhere in the 1890s were a big leap in speed and performance compared to the horse-drawn omnibuses and cable cars they replaced. But then the next big innovation in transportation arrived.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“In the early 20th century, the big, disruptive technology was the automobile, and people adopted it en masse very rapidly, and it made these streetcars for a vast majority of the population essentially obsolete,” Elkind said. Cars not only competed for riders, they also competed for space on the streets.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“When you throw the automobile into that, and everybody’s driving now, these streetcars are getting stuck in traffic,” Elkind said. “They’re not really enjoyable for people to ride. And people are frustrated by the poor service, high fares, and they wanted the freedom and mobility that automobiles, private automobiles, represented.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The argument that GM’s National Cities gambit was chiefly responsible for the collapse of electric railways across the county has been widely criticized as little more than a myth, one that ignores other factors that made many streetcar systems vulnerable by the 1930s, including their often poor physical and financial condition and the fact that, as shown by the Key System, bus transportation was becoming steadily more popular and economical well before National City Lines appeared on the scene.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>\u003cstrong>The Key System’s slow demise\u003c/strong>\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>After struggling through most of the 1930s, a surge in wartime ridership had made the company profitable and by 1945, it was sitting on a sizable surplus. Although it had struggled to upgrade its cars and tracks before the war, it had begun making plans to revamp service.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The company began to follow through on all of these initiatives, contracting for new streetcars and moving ahead with the purchase of trolley buses to run on College Avenue and on the Arlington Avenue-Euclid Avenue service in the Berkeley Hills.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12073797\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1020px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/494425878_1249028317224906_1645347311867449341_n-2.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12073797\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/494425878_1249028317224906_1645347311867449341_n-2.jpg\" alt=\"Black-and-white image of people lined up to board commuter bus about 1960 in San Francisco's Transbay Terminal.\" width=\"1020\" height=\"734\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/494425878_1249028317224906_1645347311867449341_n-2.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/494425878_1249028317224906_1645347311867449341_n-2-160x115.jpg 160w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1020px) 100vw, 1020px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Berkeley-bound commuter line up to board a Key System “F” bus after San Francisco’s Transbay Terminal was reconfigured for bus service in 1959. AC Transit would take over the service the following year. \u003ccite>(Courtesy Western Railway Museum)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Then suddenly, all that work stopped. In May 1946, Key System management sold the company to National City Lines for $3 million ($52 million in 2026 dollars). By the end of the year, the company’s new owners decided to scrap all the remaining streetcar lines and replace trains with motor buses. The only trains the Key System still operated were the half-dozen transbay lines operating across the Bay Bridge.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In 1955, the company applied to the state Public Utilities Commission to abandon transbay service. The last trains ran over the bridge to San Francisco’s Transbay Terminal in April 1958. The Key System, now an all-bus operation, was purchased by a new public transit agency — AC Transit — in 1960.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>\u003cstrong>The evolution of the Bay Area’s transit system\u003c/strong>\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Looking back on those events in 1979, Demoro speculated that without the National City Lines takeover, the East Bay’s transit system would likely have evolved into a hybrid featuring streetcars, trolley buses along with motor buses. Whether the transbay service would have survived was less clear, he said, because of the state’s interest in reconfiguring the bridge to accommodate more motor vehicles — a goal realized when the Key System tracks were removed.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But he also marveled that \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11986396/when-bart-was-built-people-and-houses-had-to-go\">the region managed to build BART\u003c/a>, an agency created in the 1950s as the Key System trains were in their twilight years and both California and the rest of the United States went all in on highway spending. “That accomplishment … seems astounding today, he wrote.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12073772\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/260218-KEY-SYSTEM-01-KQED.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12073772\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/260218-KEY-SYSTEM-01-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"Black-and-white image of 1940s streetcars and automobiles in a traffic jam in Oakland, California.\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1048\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/260218-KEY-SYSTEM-01-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/260218-KEY-SYSTEM-01-KQED-160x84.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/260218-KEY-SYSTEM-01-KQED-1536x805.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">As automobile traffic grew, streetcars — and streetcar riders — often found themselves tangled in traffic jams like this 1940s faceoff between Key System trains and cars at 47th Avenue and East 14th Street (now International Boulevard) in Oakland. \u003ccite>(Courtesy Western Railway Museum)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>But in one sense, the Key System hasn’t gone away. When AC Transit took control of the Key’s bankrupt all-bus operation in 1960, it continued an East Bay transit legacy that stretched back nearly a century. AC Transit continues to be a vital transportation link for hundreds of thousands of East Bay residents, much the way the Key System was in its peak years. And for those who travel between the East Bay and San Francisco, BART now serves the riders the way the Key System’s trains and ferries once did, although maybe a lot less romantically.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s still possible to ride some of the few surviving Key System trains at Solano County’s \u003ca href=\"https://www.wrm.org/\">Western Railway Museum\u003c/a>, on Highway 12 between Fairfield and Rio Vista. Muni offers \u003ca href=\"https://www.streetcar.org/rider-information-map-2/\">a daily vintage streetcar experience\u003c/a> on its F trolley car line, running along Market Street between the Castro and Steuart Street downtown.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[baycuriousquestion]\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2 id=\"episode-transcript\">Episode Transcript\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>At the turn of the 20th century, streetcars crisscrossed the Bay Area. Nowadays, though, you rarely see them. So you might even be thinking to yourself, what even is a streetcar?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Music starts\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>Think of those old trolleys like the F line on Market Street in San Francisco.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Trolley dinging\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>It’s not a cable car, it’s not modern light rail. It’s an old-fashioned train, usually one or two cars, that runs above ground on a track, often with electric wires overhead to provide power.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Electric streetcars were big in the East Bay before the automobile took off. For many people, they were the primary way to get around town – and to San Francisco for work.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Archival video clip: \u003c/strong>Geared to the needs and dedicated to the service of the East Bay, Key System became one of the largest single businesses in the area.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>People would walk out their doors in Berkeley, Alameda, Oakland, hop on a slick orange and silver Key System streetcar.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Archival video clip: \u003c/strong>Transportation to San Francisco was by ferry, a convivial mode of travel that, particularly in the evening, had elements of fantasy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>That was the daily commute of many for decades. Our question asker this week, Vanessa Bohm, grew up in Germany and has seen some remnants of the Key system all around the East bay. She’s wondered…\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Vanessa Bohm: \u003c/strong>What happened to the streetcars that used to be around Oakland and the East Bay.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>Vanessa is not alone. We get questions about what happened to the key system a lot. Some people even wonder if those old streetcar lines could be put to use again.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Here to help us understand the rise and fall of Bay Area streetcarts is the man, the myth, the legend, recently retired, but back, because he just can’t quit, KQED’s transportation editor emeritus, Dan Brekke. Hi Dan.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Dan Brekke: \u003c/strong>Hi, Olivia.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>Can you start by painting a picture for us at its height? What would the East Bay have looked like during the streetcar era?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Dan Brekke: \u003c/strong>Well, you would have had dozens of streetcar lines, either running from neighborhood to neighborhood or from neighborhoods to downtowns, and you would’ve had a collection of trains that were starting at various nodes in the East Bay, like North Berkeley or Downtown Berkeley, University of California, Downtown Oakland, East Oakland, running to a little rail line that ran out into the middle of the bay where people would climb off their trains and catch ferries into the city. And those trains would get you from point A to point B in 35 or 40 minutes.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>We know electric streetcars became common across the country and in all nine counties of the Bay Area starting in the 1890s, but tell us more about how the key system in particular got started.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Dan Brekke: \u003c/strong>Early in the 20th century, in the very first years, real estate investors, led by somebody named Francis Marion Smith, whose nickname was Borax Smith, because he’d made a fortune in borax mining in the southwest. He was part of what was called the Realty Syndicate. And they owned something like 20 square miles of East Bay real estate. And it would make this property so much more valuable if there was an easy way for people to get to and from these areas that would then be ripe for development. And pretty much that’s what happened. These streetcar lines got built, and if you see a route map, there are tendrils stretching throughout what we think of as East Oakland today and north into Berkeley, with many lines that were both neighborhood lines where people could ride, say, from their neighborhood to downtown Oakland, and many lines that were traveling from the East Bay to San Francisco.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>So sort of a situation where if you build it, they will come.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Dan Brekke: \u003c/strong>They built it and they did come and much of the streetscape and the way neighborhoods are put together in Berkeley and Oakland really comes from that early streetcar development.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>One thing I find interesting is that these were not public works projects in the sense that the public owned them or they were, you know, done with tax dollars. These were private companies running these these streetcars.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Dan Brekke: \u003c/strong>Yeah, that’s right. Those streetcar lines we’re talking about and wherever we’re talking about them, you know, it would be hard to go to a town of any size in the early 20th century and find no street railroad, right? And, of course, Los Angeles was one of the places where they were most prevalent. But all of this was done through private capital that had some kind of investment goal in mind. And often it had to do with developing real estate.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>They didn’t own the street, so logistically, how did that even work?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Dan Brekke: \u003c/strong>Yeah, they would get a license from the cities where they wanted to operate and part of the license would be access to the street and also some agreement about who would take care of the tracks in the street because as you know, if you’ve been anywhere where there’s a railroad track in a street, there are usually some kind of pavement problems and so that would be part of the deal.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Music starts\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>Tell me about the experience of actually riding one of these cars. What would it have been like as a commuter to step foot on one?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Dan Brekke: \u003c/strong>If you want to experience what these trains were like, you don’t have to rely on imagination. If you go out to the Western Railway Museum, which is near Rio Vista, there’s an amazing collection of streetcars from all different eras.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Dan Brekke in scene: \u003c/strong>This is so cool. This one used to run in Oakland, going to the ballpark. And this is a Key System one too, this one that says E.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Dan Brekke: \u003c/strong>When they heard what I was up to, what I was interested in finding out about, they said, well, we can take one of those bridge units out and run it for you. Unbelievable. They roll out this retro, streamlined, two-car, orange and silver train, which is instantly a throwback to what people would have experienced their first day riding on the Bay Bridge in 1939. So then you know we’re on the platform waiting for this train to start up, we climb aboard.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Conductor:\u003c/strong> Welcome aboard.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Dan Brekke: \u003c/strong>First thing I notice is the windows don’t open, but that’s okay. There’s ventilation through a front door and we roll out down this, kind of beautifully recreated streetcar line, electrified streetcar line.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Trolley bell\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Dan Brekke: \u003c/strong>In the middle of nowhere, but here’s this train going through this kind of pristine-looking ranch environment, and you come to a little crossroad, you have to slow to a stop, sound the horn.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Horn blares\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Conductor: \u003c/strong>Hey, we’ve got a car for once!\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Dan Brekke: \u003c/strong>Because you don’t want to interfere with any crossing ranch traffic, and then you proceed to a little stop really out in the middle of nowhere. And get off.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Conductor: \u003c/strong>Okay, thank you.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Dan Brekke: \u003c/strong>The motorman changes ends of the car and then you head back.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>That sounds pretty fun. We’re going to take a quick break here, but we’ll get into why this system started to fall apart when we come back. Stay with us.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Sponsor message\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>So, Dan, the scene that you’ve painted so far, it’s very idyllic with all these streetcars whisking people from Berkeley and Oakland to Ferries and maybe taking them into the city. And that goes on for what, 40 odd years? When does it all start to change and what factors were behind the changes?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Dan Brekke: \u003c/strong>Well, the 1930s were a very rough decade for streetcar companies in general. You had the Great Depression, of course, that started in 1929 and deepened throughout the first half of the decade. The transit industry itself either recovered very slowly or not at all. A lot of that was because they were private companies that were locked into pretty disadvantageous contracts with the cities they served. Right? They could only raise fares so much. And they didn’t receive public subsidies. There was a big shift going on toward private automobiles that was also taking away some of their customers. In the Bay Area itself, you know, the relationship between the East Bay and the city of San Francisco changed dramatically in 1936 with the opening of the Bay Bridge.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Archival video clip: \u003c/strong>A six-lane double deck bridge, eight miles long, connecting San Francisco with the Oakland-Berkeley area, spanning the largest major navigable body of water ever bridged.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Dan Brekke: \u003c/strong>I mean, there was an incredible influx of traffic across the bridge into San Francisco, basically as soon as the bridge opened, and it just didn’t slow down. And one of the unfortunate things that happened at the same time was that while part of developing the Bay Bridge was to build railroad tracks across it so that these interurban trains could come in from the East Bay, but it wasn’t ready to use until early 1939. One of the factors that people point to in the demise of the key system, is that delay of more than two years where people got to experience that it was much easier to drive into the city and faster, perhaps, than it had been to take the train. Their habits changed, and the key systems never really recovered. And we also had this phenomenon of the slow transition in the key-system itself away from streetcars for their local service to buses. And by the late 1930s, buses were carrying most of the ridership. So all of those things together really started to dim the outlook for the streetcar companies.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Music starts\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>One narrative that I’ve heard over and over is that a big reason that streetcars failed was that essentially car companies bought the key system and then would intentionally run the company into the ground so people would be forced to buy more cars. Is there any truth to that?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Dan Brekke: \u003c/strong>There’s a kernel of truth to it. You know, when I talked to Ethan Elkind from UC Berkeley, you know, he talked about the effect of one particular movie in the 1980s on this view of history.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ethan Elkind: \u003c/strong>Well, in L.A., the conspiracy was really put on steroids by the movie who framed Roger Rabbit.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Judge Doom from “Who Framed Roger Rabbit”: \u003c/strong>I see a place where people get off and off the freeway. On and off, off and on, all day, all night! Soon, where Toon Town once stood will be a string of gas stations, inexpensive motels, restaurants that serve rapidly prepared food, tire salons, automobile dealerships…\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Oh, it’s so great to hear Christopher Lloyd in that. He was so good! And the character he was playing was Judge Doom and his masterplan was to destroy Toon Town, where Roger Rabbit lived, and a key part of the plot is to kill the streetcar system.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Who Framed Roger Rabbit clip: \u003c/strong>C’mon, Nobody’s gonna drive this lousy freeway when they can take the red car for a nickel. Well, they’ll drive. They’ll have to. You see, I bought the red car so I could dismantle it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ethan Elkind: \u003c/strong>Not an exaggeration that, you know, this 1989 semi-cartoon really fed this idea that it was highway interests that gobbled up the streetcar lines. And the story is much more complex than that.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Dan Brekke: \u003c/strong>The complexity people are talking about and the grain of truth to Roger Rabbit is because of a lawsuit that was filed against a company that was called National City Lines and some of its investors in the 1940s. And National City Lines was a company that went around the country buying up streetcar systems and they would convert those to bus systems, basically. That’s the long and the short of it. And by doing that, they were really helping out their investors who were General Motors, Standard Oil of California, Firestone Rubber, Phillips 66, companies like that.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>National City Lines showed up in Oakland in 1946 and took control of the Key System. And while the Key system had laid plans to sort of keep streetcars going and also keep them running into San Francisco. Across the Bay Bridge, the national city lines scrapped most of these development plans, let’s call them, right away. So within a very short amount of time, the streetcar lines in the East Bay turned into bus lines. The streetcar lines were abandoned. The exception was the inter-urban line into San Francisco. That continued running until the late 1950s, but it ran at a loss. It ran with fewer and fewer passengers every year, and the last key system cars ran across the Bay Bridge in 1958.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>When we start talking about public transportation, I’ve noticed that people are often very nostalgic for the past, and it can, you know, sort of become a little idealized, you know, oh, dreaming about riding across the Bay Bridge and the train, but there were some realities to the Key System that people forget about. Can you tell us about some of the drawbacks of the Key System, even when it was sort of at its height?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Dan Brekke: \u003c/strong>So there’s very definitely a paradise lost tone to the way people discuss the Key system. If we only hadn’t abandoned this beautiful streetcar system, just think how much better our world would be. I think that ignores the reality that they had huge power plants to supply the electricity for their systems. In the case of the Key System, they had a huge powerhouse in Emeryville. Kind of close to where Ikea is today. There was a gigantic smokestack there and they were burning coal. Sure, electric trains were much cleaner in terms of the environment around the lines themselves, but they still had an environmental footprint as all of our transportation choices do. And I talked to Mitchell Schwarzer, who’s a professor of architectural and urban history at the California College of the Arts about the social effects of the streetcar system. He wrote a book a few years ago called \u003cem>Hella Oakland\u003c/em>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mitchell Schwartzer: \u003c/strong>What the technology allowed for was a vast residential expansion outside of the inner areas of Oakland. And that allowed for the wealthier people to live on larger lots and to live separately and to erect barriers to minorities moving into their communities. Without the streetcar, they couldn’t have done that.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Dan Brekke: \u003c/strong>I will say also that there was some outrage about the lack of safety for streetcars. The years I’ve looked at were between 1906 and 1910. It’s absolutely hair-raising to see how many people were getting killed in streetcar accidents. The newspapers relished these stories. I mean, they were told in sometimes excruciating detail what happened to the victims.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>Definitely not insignificant safety and environmental concerns that you’ve brought up. But I do wanna say times are different now, right? We know how to run trains on green energy. We know to put safety protocols in place that will keep people more safe. One of our question askers wanted to know, could the old Key System sort of be a model for public transportation of the future?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Dan Brekke: \u003c/strong>Well I talked to Ethan Elkind from UC Berkeley Law School about this.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ethan Elkind: \u003c/strong>Well, I think you run into the same problems that the streetcars were running into in the old days, which is that a lot of them ran down highway medians. They would get stuck in traffic. They would hit red lights. They would have to wait for cars to pass. And they weren’t necessarily that fast. You need to have a dedicated separate right of way.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Dan Brekke: \u003c/strong>You have to deal with all the other street traffic. That’s a real problem in imagining streetcar lines flourishing again.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ethan Elkind: \u003c/strong>And then to really make transit make sense, you have to be able to serve dense concentrations of jobs and housing where people can easily walk or bike to the rail station. And unfortunately, what we’ve seen too often, especially in the higher income areas in the Bay area, they don’t allow new development. They don’t wanna see new apartment buildings come into their neighborhoods. And that’s what you would need to have to have the ridership really make sense. And so that these streetcar lines could actually have enough ridership where they wouldn’t require as much public subsidy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Dan Brekke: \u003c/strong>The other thing is they’re really damn expensive to build. Lots of transportation experts say that the workaround is right in front of us if we only had the political will to do it. And that is to dedicate more street space as bus only space, right? Mostly we’re talking about bus rapid transit where you have dedicated lanes for buses. You have signals that are set so they prioritize the bus traffic. Those are much, much less expensive to build, but they take a lot of planning, and there is an upfront investment that sometimes is difficult.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Music starts\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>Dan Brekke, thank you so much, as always, for reporting on this.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Dan Brekke: \u003c/strong>You’re very welcome. And as I conclude here, I want to make a couple of acknowledgements. One is, there’s kind of an amazing community of transit historians in the Bay Area, including some who are very painstakingly documenting some of this history of the key system. So that’s one acknowledgement. The other one is, thanks to you and Katrina. You guys are wonderful to work with.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>Listeners should know that Dan was one of my first editors here at KQED when I started out as a wee baby reporter. And, he’s reported some of my favorite Bay Curious episodes over the years. Like those mysterious East Bay walls, why there are so many crows in the bay area and he’s answered dozens of your transportation questions over the years. We’ll link to a few of his stories in our show notes, so go check those out.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Dan, thank you, thank you, thank you. You are the best. I hope you have a happy retirement, but also, I have a feeling you’ll be back.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Bay Curious is made in San Francisco at member-supported KQED.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>If you value what you hear on our show, consider becoming a KQED member. You can choose the level of support that works for your budget by going to \u003ca href=\"http://kqed.org/donate\">kqed.org/donate\u003c/a>. Thank you.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Bay Curious is made by Katrina Schwartz, Christopher Beale, and me, Olivia Allen-Price. Extra support from Maha Sanad, Katie Sprenger, Jen Chien, Ethan Toven-Lindsey and the whole KQED team.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Olivia Allen-Price: Some members of the KQED podcast team are represented by The Screen Actors Guild, American Federation of Television and Radio Artists, San Francisco Northern California Local.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>I’m Olivia Allen-Price. Have a great week.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"#episode-transcript\">\u003ci>View the full episode transcript.\u003c/i>\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>At the turn of the 20th century, streetcars crisscrossed the\u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/tag/bay-area\"> Bay Area\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>For many people, they were the primary way to get around town —and to San Francisco for work. People would walk out their doors in Berkeley, Alameda, Oakland, hop on a streetcar that would take them to a ferry and be in downtown San Francisco in about 40 minutes. Remnants of these lines can be seen in many Bay Area streetscapes.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Bay Curious listener Vanessa Boehm grew up in Germany with efficient public transportation, and as she looked around her neighborhood near the UC Berkeley campus, she wondered: “What happened to the streetcars that used to be around Oakland and the East Bay?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She’s not the first or the last to ask questions along those lines. The history and disappearance of the Key System, which once served East Bay residents, has captured the imagination of many transit aficionados. And among the many similar questions we’ve gotten are some from people who want to know whether it would be possible to recreate the streetcar networks that have long since vanished.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Without knowing it, perhaps, Vanessa and other listeners have touched on a disputed piece of both East Bay and national transportation history, a conspiracy theory that involves some of the nation’s most powerful corporations and the role they played — or didn’t play — in the disappearance of streetcars in the East Bay. The story also encompasses a real-estate development scheme that shaped Oakland and Berkeley, the rise of suburban sprawl, and the dawn of the motor vehicle age.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>\u003cstrong>Streetcars fundamentally shaped urban development\u003c/strong>\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Streetcars were essential to the growth of cities in the Bay Area and across the United States in the final years of the 19th century and the opening years of the 20th. Electric railroads — either streetcar networks connecting neighborhoods or interurban lines connecting towns and cities — served all nine Bay Area counties in the early 20th century.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The place where that electric streetcar legacy is most obvious is San Francisco, where several electric lines that operated in the 1920s — Muni’s J, K, L, M and N routes — are still essential parts of the city’s transportation system. Two other lines, the E and the F, feature tourist-oriented service using historic streetcars.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12073776\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 990px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/260218-KEY-SYSTEM-05-KQED.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12073776\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/260218-KEY-SYSTEM-05-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"An electric train crossing the lower deck of the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge.\" width=\"990\" height=\"796\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/260218-KEY-SYSTEM-05-KQED.jpg 990w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/260218-KEY-SYSTEM-05-KQED-160x129.jpg 160w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 990px) 100vw, 990px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">A Key System “A” line train on a test run across the Bay Bridge from San Francisco to Oakland in 1939. \u003ccite>(Courtesy of \u003ca href=\"https://www.foundsf.org/Key_System_and_March_of_Progress\">FoundSF.org\u003c/a>)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>For the first four decades of the 20th century, the East Bay was served by two major electric streetcar systems: one run by Southern Pacific and a competitor known popularly as the Key System. Southern Pacific’s system, initially called the Oakland, Alameda and Berkeley Lines, ran transbay service using ferries that left from long causeways, or moles, in West Oakland and Alameda.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Key System was a collection of East Bay streetcar and transbay lines built or purchased and consolidated by Francis Marion Smith, known as “Borax” Smith because of his success mining and marketing the all-purpose mineral in the deserts of Nevada and southeastern California. Starting in the 1890s, Smith created a network of lines that eventually stretched from Richmond to San Leandro.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But creating a transit system wasn’t Smith’s main objective. He and partner Frank Havens had purchased about 13,000 acres, more than 20 square miles, under the aegis of a separate enterprise known as The Realty Syndicate. The streetcar and transbay train system Smith created was \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11925112/idora-park-and-playland-at-the-beach-bay-area-amusement-parks-of-a-bygone-era\">designed to serve the new neighborhoods\u003c/a> that would be developed on the syndicate’s properties.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Oakland historian Mitchell Schwarzer said the streetcar network fundamentally changed the shape of the city. In his 2021 study of Oakland’s development, \u003ca href=\"https://www.ucpress.edu/books/hella-town/paper\">\u003cem>Hella Town,\u003c/em>\u003c/a> he said that by 1912, property subdividers had created more than 50,000 new residential lots close to streetcar routes.\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>The effect on what had been a compact East Bay community focused on downtown was dramatic, with streetcar lines triggering a sprawl of new neighborhoods in every direction and the creation of commercial districts like Grand Lake, Rockridge, Piedmont Avenue and along stretches of San Pablo Avenue and East 14th Street, now International Boulevard.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The streetcar “affected everything — it affected where the residential areas developed, it affected where the commercial areas developed, it affected where industry moved pretty much,” Schwarzer said. Alongside the automobile, streetcars shaped the form Oakland took to this day, “both where things are located, how they’re distributed, how they’re built, what’s built, where they’re built,” Schwarzer said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He adds that this early episode of sprawl also helped shape Oakland’s future demographic and class profile. The city’s vast residential expansion “allowed for the wealthier people to live on larger lots and to live separately and to erect barriers to minorities moving into their communities. Without the streetcar, they couldn’t have done that.”\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>\u003cstrong>Financial failures\u003c/strong>\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Although the Key System and other streetcar operations were useful in driving real estate development and despite the fact that they carried more than 100 million passengers a year at their peak in the 1920s, they were, for the most part, failures as money-making enterprises.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Key System was in deep financial trouble by 1913. According to the late transportation reporter and historian Harre W. Demoro, the Key’s early money troubles could be traced directly to Borax Smith’s risky and chaotic business practices. With the company deeply in debt, Smith was forced out in 1913. A series of crises ensued, with the company teetering on the edge of failure and being foreclosed on and reorganized in 1923 and 1930.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>By this time, private automobiles had become a major presence in cities across the country, including those in the Bay Area. The growing popularity of car ownership is reflected in a steep decline in ridership for both the Southern Pacific and Key System after a peak recorded in the mid-1920s.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Drivers weren’t the only ones who were drawn to new motorized modes of transport. Starting before 1920, transit systems began to convert some of their train service to bus lines. By the mid-1920s, the Key System had joined in that trend, which accelerated through the U.S. entry into World War II in 1941.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Demoro found in \u003ca href=\"https://archive.org/details/bulletinnational446nati\">a 1979 study\u003c/a> of the Key System published in the National Railway Bulletin that by 1937, its buses accounted for more than half of the company’s business in terms of miles of service delivered. “From then on, the bus dominated” Key’s operation, Demoro wrote in \u003ca href=\"https://archive.org/embed/keyroutetransbay0000demo\">his two-volume history\u003c/a> of the transbay service.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12073773\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/260218-KEY-SYSTEM-02-KQED.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12073773\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/260218-KEY-SYSTEM-02-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"A two-car, orange-and-silver electric train shown in a car barn at the Western Railway Museum in Solano County.\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/260218-KEY-SYSTEM-02-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/260218-KEY-SYSTEM-02-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/260218-KEY-SYSTEM-02-KQED-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Key System Bridge Unit 187, part of the fleet that provided service across the Bay Bridge from the East Bay to San Francisco between 1939 and 1958, at the Western Railway Museum in Solano County. \u003ccite>(Dan Brekke/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>The decline accelerated after the Bay Bridge opened to drivers in November 1936. The planned railroad service on the bridge wasn’t ready when the bridge opened, creating an opportunity for East Bay residents to enjoy the ease of car travel. When train service on the bridge’s lower deck finally began in January 1939, it did little to reverse the ridership slump.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And it’s right here that the conspiracy theory mentioned earlier becomes part of the Key System story. Because as the car was becoming king, companies related to the automobile industry bought up dozens of streetcar lines and replaced them with buses. That effort was intended, the story goes, to undermine mass transit to such an extent that riders would desert it in preference for automobiles.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>\u003cstrong>A kernel of truth to the myth\u003c/strong>\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>General Motors, Standard Oil of California (now known as Chevron), Firestone Rubber and Phillips Petroleum really did invest in a company called National City Lines and a pair of subsidiaries that were in the business of buying mostly financially troubled streetcar systems and immediately converting them to bus systems. That happened in 46 cities across the country, including a few big ones, like Los Angeles, St. Louis, and yes, Oakland.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The government really did take National City Lines, GM, its partners and their executives to court. In 1949, a jury in Chicago really did convict them of one count of violating federal antitrust law by conspiring to monopolize the sale of buses, fuel, tires and other supplies to the transit systems that National City Lines and its subsidiaries had taken over. The companies were acquitted on a second count alleging they had conspired to block competitors from doing business with the National City companies. In other words, the defendants were found guilty of trying to control the purchase of supplies that newly “motorized” transit agencies would need, not of any broader conspiracy to wreck mass transit.\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>The penalties the judge imposed were trivial: $5,000 for each corporate defendant — about $68,000 in 2026 dollars — and $1 for each of the executives who had played a part in the conspiracy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But the story is more complex than the National City Lines case, said Ethan Elkind, who directs the climate program at UC Berkeley Law’s Center for Law, Energy and the Environment. “It’s really a story of technology change.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The electric streetcar systems that started appearing everywhere in the 1890s were a big leap in speed and performance compared to the horse-drawn omnibuses and cable cars they replaced. But then the next big innovation in transportation arrived.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“In the early 20th century, the big, disruptive technology was the automobile, and people adopted it en masse very rapidly, and it made these streetcars for a vast majority of the population essentially obsolete,” Elkind said. Cars not only competed for riders, they also competed for space on the streets.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“When you throw the automobile into that, and everybody’s driving now, these streetcars are getting stuck in traffic,” Elkind said. “They’re not really enjoyable for people to ride. And people are frustrated by the poor service, high fares, and they wanted the freedom and mobility that automobiles, private automobiles, represented.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The argument that GM’s National Cities gambit was chiefly responsible for the collapse of electric railways across the county has been widely criticized as little more than a myth, one that ignores other factors that made many streetcar systems vulnerable by the 1930s, including their often poor physical and financial condition and the fact that, as shown by the Key System, bus transportation was becoming steadily more popular and economical well before National City Lines appeared on the scene.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>\u003cstrong>The Key System’s slow demise\u003c/strong>\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>After struggling through most of the 1930s, a surge in wartime ridership had made the company profitable and by 1945, it was sitting on a sizable surplus. Although it had struggled to upgrade its cars and tracks before the war, it had begun making plans to revamp service.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The company began to follow through on all of these initiatives, contracting for new streetcars and moving ahead with the purchase of trolley buses to run on College Avenue and on the Arlington Avenue-Euclid Avenue service in the Berkeley Hills.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12073797\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1020px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/494425878_1249028317224906_1645347311867449341_n-2.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12073797\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/494425878_1249028317224906_1645347311867449341_n-2.jpg\" alt=\"Black-and-white image of people lined up to board commuter bus about 1960 in San Francisco's Transbay Terminal.\" width=\"1020\" height=\"734\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/494425878_1249028317224906_1645347311867449341_n-2.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/494425878_1249028317224906_1645347311867449341_n-2-160x115.jpg 160w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1020px) 100vw, 1020px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Berkeley-bound commuter line up to board a Key System “F” bus after San Francisco’s Transbay Terminal was reconfigured for bus service in 1959. AC Transit would take over the service the following year. \u003ccite>(Courtesy Western Railway Museum)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Then suddenly, all that work stopped. In May 1946, Key System management sold the company to National City Lines for $3 million ($52 million in 2026 dollars). By the end of the year, the company’s new owners decided to scrap all the remaining streetcar lines and replace trains with motor buses. The only trains the Key System still operated were the half-dozen transbay lines operating across the Bay Bridge.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In 1955, the company applied to the state Public Utilities Commission to abandon transbay service. The last trains ran over the bridge to San Francisco’s Transbay Terminal in April 1958. The Key System, now an all-bus operation, was purchased by a new public transit agency — AC Transit — in 1960.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>\u003cstrong>The evolution of the Bay Area’s transit system\u003c/strong>\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Looking back on those events in 1979, Demoro speculated that without the National City Lines takeover, the East Bay’s transit system would likely have evolved into a hybrid featuring streetcars, trolley buses along with motor buses. Whether the transbay service would have survived was less clear, he said, because of the state’s interest in reconfiguring the bridge to accommodate more motor vehicles — a goal realized when the Key System tracks were removed.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But he also marveled that \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11986396/when-bart-was-built-people-and-houses-had-to-go\">the region managed to build BART\u003c/a>, an agency created in the 1950s as the Key System trains were in their twilight years and both California and the rest of the United States went all in on highway spending. “That accomplishment … seems astounding today, he wrote.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12073772\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/260218-KEY-SYSTEM-01-KQED.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12073772\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/260218-KEY-SYSTEM-01-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"Black-and-white image of 1940s streetcars and automobiles in a traffic jam in Oakland, California.\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1048\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/260218-KEY-SYSTEM-01-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/260218-KEY-SYSTEM-01-KQED-160x84.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/260218-KEY-SYSTEM-01-KQED-1536x805.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">As automobile traffic grew, streetcars — and streetcar riders — often found themselves tangled in traffic jams like this 1940s faceoff between Key System trains and cars at 47th Avenue and East 14th Street (now International Boulevard) in Oakland. \u003ccite>(Courtesy Western Railway Museum)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>But in one sense, the Key System hasn’t gone away. When AC Transit took control of the Key’s bankrupt all-bus operation in 1960, it continued an East Bay transit legacy that stretched back nearly a century. AC Transit continues to be a vital transportation link for hundreds of thousands of East Bay residents, much the way the Key System was in its peak years. And for those who travel between the East Bay and San Francisco, BART now serves the riders the way the Key System’s trains and ferries once did, although maybe a lot less romantically.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s still possible to ride some of the few surviving Key System trains at Solano County’s \u003ca href=\"https://www.wrm.org/\">Western Railway Museum\u003c/a>, on Highway 12 between Fairfield and Rio Vista. Muni offers \u003ca href=\"https://www.streetcar.org/rider-information-map-2/\">a daily vintage streetcar experience\u003c/a> on its F trolley car line, running along Market Street between the Castro and Steuart Street downtown.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2 id=\"episode-transcript\">Episode Transcript\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>At the turn of the 20th century, streetcars crisscrossed the Bay Area. Nowadays, though, you rarely see them. So you might even be thinking to yourself, what even is a streetcar?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Music starts\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>Think of those old trolleys like the F line on Market Street in San Francisco.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Trolley dinging\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>It’s not a cable car, it’s not modern light rail. It’s an old-fashioned train, usually one or two cars, that runs above ground on a track, often with electric wires overhead to provide power.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Electric streetcars were big in the East Bay before the automobile took off. For many people, they were the primary way to get around town – and to San Francisco for work.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Archival video clip: \u003c/strong>Geared to the needs and dedicated to the service of the East Bay, Key System became one of the largest single businesses in the area.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>People would walk out their doors in Berkeley, Alameda, Oakland, hop on a slick orange and silver Key System streetcar.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Archival video clip: \u003c/strong>Transportation to San Francisco was by ferry, a convivial mode of travel that, particularly in the evening, had elements of fantasy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>That was the daily commute of many for decades. Our question asker this week, Vanessa Bohm, grew up in Germany and has seen some remnants of the Key system all around the East bay. She’s wondered…\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Vanessa Bohm: \u003c/strong>What happened to the streetcars that used to be around Oakland and the East Bay.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>Vanessa is not alone. We get questions about what happened to the key system a lot. Some people even wonder if those old streetcar lines could be put to use again.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Here to help us understand the rise and fall of Bay Area streetcarts is the man, the myth, the legend, recently retired, but back, because he just can’t quit, KQED’s transportation editor emeritus, Dan Brekke. Hi Dan.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Dan Brekke: \u003c/strong>Hi, Olivia.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>Can you start by painting a picture for us at its height? What would the East Bay have looked like during the streetcar era?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Dan Brekke: \u003c/strong>Well, you would have had dozens of streetcar lines, either running from neighborhood to neighborhood or from neighborhoods to downtowns, and you would’ve had a collection of trains that were starting at various nodes in the East Bay, like North Berkeley or Downtown Berkeley, University of California, Downtown Oakland, East Oakland, running to a little rail line that ran out into the middle of the bay where people would climb off their trains and catch ferries into the city. And those trains would get you from point A to point B in 35 or 40 minutes.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>We know electric streetcars became common across the country and in all nine counties of the Bay Area starting in the 1890s, but tell us more about how the key system in particular got started.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Dan Brekke: \u003c/strong>Early in the 20th century, in the very first years, real estate investors, led by somebody named Francis Marion Smith, whose nickname was Borax Smith, because he’d made a fortune in borax mining in the southwest. He was part of what was called the Realty Syndicate. And they owned something like 20 square miles of East Bay real estate. And it would make this property so much more valuable if there was an easy way for people to get to and from these areas that would then be ripe for development. And pretty much that’s what happened. These streetcar lines got built, and if you see a route map, there are tendrils stretching throughout what we think of as East Oakland today and north into Berkeley, with many lines that were both neighborhood lines where people could ride, say, from their neighborhood to downtown Oakland, and many lines that were traveling from the East Bay to San Francisco.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>So sort of a situation where if you build it, they will come.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Dan Brekke: \u003c/strong>They built it and they did come and much of the streetscape and the way neighborhoods are put together in Berkeley and Oakland really comes from that early streetcar development.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>One thing I find interesting is that these were not public works projects in the sense that the public owned them or they were, you know, done with tax dollars. These were private companies running these these streetcars.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Dan Brekke: \u003c/strong>Yeah, that’s right. Those streetcar lines we’re talking about and wherever we’re talking about them, you know, it would be hard to go to a town of any size in the early 20th century and find no street railroad, right? And, of course, Los Angeles was one of the places where they were most prevalent. But all of this was done through private capital that had some kind of investment goal in mind. And often it had to do with developing real estate.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>They didn’t own the street, so logistically, how did that even work?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Dan Brekke: \u003c/strong>Yeah, they would get a license from the cities where they wanted to operate and part of the license would be access to the street and also some agreement about who would take care of the tracks in the street because as you know, if you’ve been anywhere where there’s a railroad track in a street, there are usually some kind of pavement problems and so that would be part of the deal.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Music starts\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>Tell me about the experience of actually riding one of these cars. What would it have been like as a commuter to step foot on one?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Dan Brekke: \u003c/strong>If you want to experience what these trains were like, you don’t have to rely on imagination. If you go out to the Western Railway Museum, which is near Rio Vista, there’s an amazing collection of streetcars from all different eras.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Dan Brekke in scene: \u003c/strong>This is so cool. This one used to run in Oakland, going to the ballpark. And this is a Key System one too, this one that says E.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Dan Brekke: \u003c/strong>When they heard what I was up to, what I was interested in finding out about, they said, well, we can take one of those bridge units out and run it for you. Unbelievable. They roll out this retro, streamlined, two-car, orange and silver train, which is instantly a throwback to what people would have experienced their first day riding on the Bay Bridge in 1939. So then you know we’re on the platform waiting for this train to start up, we climb aboard.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Conductor:\u003c/strong> Welcome aboard.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Dan Brekke: \u003c/strong>First thing I notice is the windows don’t open, but that’s okay. There’s ventilation through a front door and we roll out down this, kind of beautifully recreated streetcar line, electrified streetcar line.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Trolley bell\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Dan Brekke: \u003c/strong>In the middle of nowhere, but here’s this train going through this kind of pristine-looking ranch environment, and you come to a little crossroad, you have to slow to a stop, sound the horn.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Horn blares\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Conductor: \u003c/strong>Hey, we’ve got a car for once!\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Dan Brekke: \u003c/strong>Because you don’t want to interfere with any crossing ranch traffic, and then you proceed to a little stop really out in the middle of nowhere. And get off.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Conductor: \u003c/strong>Okay, thank you.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Dan Brekke: \u003c/strong>The motorman changes ends of the car and then you head back.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>That sounds pretty fun. We’re going to take a quick break here, but we’ll get into why this system started to fall apart when we come back. Stay with us.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Sponsor message\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>So, Dan, the scene that you’ve painted so far, it’s very idyllic with all these streetcars whisking people from Berkeley and Oakland to Ferries and maybe taking them into the city. And that goes on for what, 40 odd years? When does it all start to change and what factors were behind the changes?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Dan Brekke: \u003c/strong>Well, the 1930s were a very rough decade for streetcar companies in general. You had the Great Depression, of course, that started in 1929 and deepened throughout the first half of the decade. The transit industry itself either recovered very slowly or not at all. A lot of that was because they were private companies that were locked into pretty disadvantageous contracts with the cities they served. Right? They could only raise fares so much. And they didn’t receive public subsidies. There was a big shift going on toward private automobiles that was also taking away some of their customers. In the Bay Area itself, you know, the relationship between the East Bay and the city of San Francisco changed dramatically in 1936 with the opening of the Bay Bridge.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Archival video clip: \u003c/strong>A six-lane double deck bridge, eight miles long, connecting San Francisco with the Oakland-Berkeley area, spanning the largest major navigable body of water ever bridged.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Dan Brekke: \u003c/strong>I mean, there was an incredible influx of traffic across the bridge into San Francisco, basically as soon as the bridge opened, and it just didn’t slow down. And one of the unfortunate things that happened at the same time was that while part of developing the Bay Bridge was to build railroad tracks across it so that these interurban trains could come in from the East Bay, but it wasn’t ready to use until early 1939. One of the factors that people point to in the demise of the key system, is that delay of more than two years where people got to experience that it was much easier to drive into the city and faster, perhaps, than it had been to take the train. Their habits changed, and the key systems never really recovered. And we also had this phenomenon of the slow transition in the key-system itself away from streetcars for their local service to buses. And by the late 1930s, buses were carrying most of the ridership. So all of those things together really started to dim the outlook for the streetcar companies.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Music starts\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>One narrative that I’ve heard over and over is that a big reason that streetcars failed was that essentially car companies bought the key system and then would intentionally run the company into the ground so people would be forced to buy more cars. Is there any truth to that?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Dan Brekke: \u003c/strong>There’s a kernel of truth to it. You know, when I talked to Ethan Elkind from UC Berkeley, you know, he talked about the effect of one particular movie in the 1980s on this view of history.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ethan Elkind: \u003c/strong>Well, in L.A., the conspiracy was really put on steroids by the movie who framed Roger Rabbit.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Judge Doom from “Who Framed Roger Rabbit”: \u003c/strong>I see a place where people get off and off the freeway. On and off, off and on, all day, all night! Soon, where Toon Town once stood will be a string of gas stations, inexpensive motels, restaurants that serve rapidly prepared food, tire salons, automobile dealerships…\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Oh, it’s so great to hear Christopher Lloyd in that. He was so good! And the character he was playing was Judge Doom and his masterplan was to destroy Toon Town, where Roger Rabbit lived, and a key part of the plot is to kill the streetcar system.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Who Framed Roger Rabbit clip: \u003c/strong>C’mon, Nobody’s gonna drive this lousy freeway when they can take the red car for a nickel. Well, they’ll drive. They’ll have to. You see, I bought the red car so I could dismantle it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ethan Elkind: \u003c/strong>Not an exaggeration that, you know, this 1989 semi-cartoon really fed this idea that it was highway interests that gobbled up the streetcar lines. And the story is much more complex than that.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Dan Brekke: \u003c/strong>The complexity people are talking about and the grain of truth to Roger Rabbit is because of a lawsuit that was filed against a company that was called National City Lines and some of its investors in the 1940s. And National City Lines was a company that went around the country buying up streetcar systems and they would convert those to bus systems, basically. That’s the long and the short of it. And by doing that, they were really helping out their investors who were General Motors, Standard Oil of California, Firestone Rubber, Phillips 66, companies like that.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>National City Lines showed up in Oakland in 1946 and took control of the Key System. And while the Key system had laid plans to sort of keep streetcars going and also keep them running into San Francisco. Across the Bay Bridge, the national city lines scrapped most of these development plans, let’s call them, right away. So within a very short amount of time, the streetcar lines in the East Bay turned into bus lines. The streetcar lines were abandoned. The exception was the inter-urban line into San Francisco. That continued running until the late 1950s, but it ran at a loss. It ran with fewer and fewer passengers every year, and the last key system cars ran across the Bay Bridge in 1958.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>When we start talking about public transportation, I’ve noticed that people are often very nostalgic for the past, and it can, you know, sort of become a little idealized, you know, oh, dreaming about riding across the Bay Bridge and the train, but there were some realities to the Key System that people forget about. Can you tell us about some of the drawbacks of the Key System, even when it was sort of at its height?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Dan Brekke: \u003c/strong>So there’s very definitely a paradise lost tone to the way people discuss the Key system. If we only hadn’t abandoned this beautiful streetcar system, just think how much better our world would be. I think that ignores the reality that they had huge power plants to supply the electricity for their systems. In the case of the Key System, they had a huge powerhouse in Emeryville. Kind of close to where Ikea is today. There was a gigantic smokestack there and they were burning coal. Sure, electric trains were much cleaner in terms of the environment around the lines themselves, but they still had an environmental footprint as all of our transportation choices do. And I talked to Mitchell Schwarzer, who’s a professor of architectural and urban history at the California College of the Arts about the social effects of the streetcar system. He wrote a book a few years ago called \u003cem>Hella Oakland\u003c/em>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mitchell Schwartzer: \u003c/strong>What the technology allowed for was a vast residential expansion outside of the inner areas of Oakland. And that allowed for the wealthier people to live on larger lots and to live separately and to erect barriers to minorities moving into their communities. Without the streetcar, they couldn’t have done that.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Dan Brekke: \u003c/strong>I will say also that there was some outrage about the lack of safety for streetcars. The years I’ve looked at were between 1906 and 1910. It’s absolutely hair-raising to see how many people were getting killed in streetcar accidents. The newspapers relished these stories. I mean, they were told in sometimes excruciating detail what happened to the victims.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>Definitely not insignificant safety and environmental concerns that you’ve brought up. But I do wanna say times are different now, right? We know how to run trains on green energy. We know to put safety protocols in place that will keep people more safe. One of our question askers wanted to know, could the old Key System sort of be a model for public transportation of the future?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Dan Brekke: \u003c/strong>Well I talked to Ethan Elkind from UC Berkeley Law School about this.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ethan Elkind: \u003c/strong>Well, I think you run into the same problems that the streetcars were running into in the old days, which is that a lot of them ran down highway medians. They would get stuck in traffic. They would hit red lights. They would have to wait for cars to pass. And they weren’t necessarily that fast. You need to have a dedicated separate right of way.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Dan Brekke: \u003c/strong>You have to deal with all the other street traffic. That’s a real problem in imagining streetcar lines flourishing again.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ethan Elkind: \u003c/strong>And then to really make transit make sense, you have to be able to serve dense concentrations of jobs and housing where people can easily walk or bike to the rail station. And unfortunately, what we’ve seen too often, especially in the higher income areas in the Bay area, they don’t allow new development. They don’t wanna see new apartment buildings come into their neighborhoods. And that’s what you would need to have to have the ridership really make sense. And so that these streetcar lines could actually have enough ridership where they wouldn’t require as much public subsidy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Dan Brekke: \u003c/strong>The other thing is they’re really damn expensive to build. Lots of transportation experts say that the workaround is right in front of us if we only had the political will to do it. And that is to dedicate more street space as bus only space, right? Mostly we’re talking about bus rapid transit where you have dedicated lanes for buses. You have signals that are set so they prioritize the bus traffic. Those are much, much less expensive to build, but they take a lot of planning, and there is an upfront investment that sometimes is difficult.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Music starts\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>Dan Brekke, thank you so much, as always, for reporting on this.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Dan Brekke: \u003c/strong>You’re very welcome. And as I conclude here, I want to make a couple of acknowledgements. One is, there’s kind of an amazing community of transit historians in the Bay Area, including some who are very painstakingly documenting some of this history of the key system. So that’s one acknowledgement. The other one is, thanks to you and Katrina. You guys are wonderful to work with.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>Listeners should know that Dan was one of my first editors here at KQED when I started out as a wee baby reporter. And, he’s reported some of my favorite Bay Curious episodes over the years. Like those mysterious East Bay walls, why there are so many crows in the bay area and he’s answered dozens of your transportation questions over the years. We’ll link to a few of his stories in our show notes, so go check those out.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Dan, thank you, thank you, thank you. You are the best. I hope you have a happy retirement, but also, I have a feeling you’ll be back.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Bay Curious is made in San Francisco at member-supported KQED.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>If you value what you hear on our show, consider becoming a KQED member. You can choose the level of support that works for your budget by going to \u003ca href=\"http://kqed.org/donate\">kqed.org/donate\u003c/a>. Thank you.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Bay Curious is made by Katrina Schwartz, Christopher Beale, and me, Olivia Allen-Price. Extra support from Maha Sanad, Katie Sprenger, Jen Chien, Ethan Toven-Lindsey and the whole KQED team.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Olivia Allen-Price: Some members of the KQED podcast team are represented by The Screen Actors Guild, American Federation of Television and Radio Artists, San Francisco Northern California Local.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>I’m Olivia Allen-Price. Have a great week.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"title": "From Armenia to San Francisco: The Duduk Whisperer Plays with Soul",
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"content": "\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"#episode-transcript\">\u003ci>View the full episode transcript.\u003c/i>\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">While you might not recognize the name, there’s a good chance you’ve heard the haunting, almost otherworldly sound the duduk makes. This humble shepherd’s flute wandered out of the Armenian countryside and into Hollywood, making cameos on the scores of movies and shows like \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_nxEDN3909M&list=RD_nxEDN3909M&start_radio=1\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The Gladiator\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> and\u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JrpVgVOYEgc&list=RDJrpVgVOYEgc&start_radio=1\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> The Last Temptation of Christ.\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> The duduk was even recently synthesized on both \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wOVzpJQTNhk&list=RDwOVzpJQTNhk&start_radio=1\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Dune \u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">soundtracks.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">duduk\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">, an ancient Armenian double reed woodwind carved from apricot wood, has a melancholy sound and is an enduring \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"http://archive.org/details/roughguidetoworl00simo/page/334/mode/2up\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">symbol\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> of Armenia. Its plaintive tone is said to express the \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://archive.org/details/roughguidetoworl00simo/page/334/mode/2up\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">soul\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> and tragedy of the country’s history.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Audiences in the Bay Area don’t get many chances to hear the instrument live — unless they’re able to catch Khatchadour Khatchadourian. Those who follow him know him by his Instagram handle: “\u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.instagram.com/dudukwhisperer/\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The Duduk Whisperer.\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">”\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Read all about the Duduk Whisperer in \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/12060906/meet-the-duduk-whisperer-a-bay-area-armenian-folk-musician-revives-centuries-of-soul\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Elize Manoukian’s feature\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> for The California Report Magazine.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c!-- iframe plugin v.4.3 wordpress.org/plugins/iframe/ -->\u003cbr>\n\u003ciframe loading=\"lazy\" frameborder=\"0\" height=\"200\" scrolling=\"no\" src=\"https://playlist.megaphone.fm?e=KQINC7375698456&light=true\" width=\"100%\" class=\"iframe-class\">\u003c/iframe>\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2 id=\"episode-transcript\">Episode Transcript\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> It’s a Saturday night in San Francisco and a tiny performance space called Red Poppy Art House is packed with people. They’re here to listen to a unique wooden reed instrument called the duduk that has cultural ties to Armenia.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Ethereal music starts\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">And even if you don’t recognize the name duduk there’s a good chance you’ve heard it before — in the soundtracks to some major Hollywood movies – like The Last Temptation of Chris, Dune and Gladiator. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Ethereal music plays\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It’s now a staple for Hollywood composers\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The duduk’s sound is haunting, and almost otherworldly…it transports you.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Khatchadour Khatchadourian:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> When it hits you, it hits you. It takes you to the place it wants to go\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">That’s Khatchadour Khatchadourian, the duduk musician and vocalist who performed at the Red Poppy.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Sounds of Khatchadourian playing duduk music\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">He’s one of the few in the Bay Area who plays the instrument. His followers call him “the \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.instagram.com/dudukwhisperer/?hl=en\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Duduk Whisperer\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">.” \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">He uses it to push the boundaries of traditional Armenian music. And, as our producer Elize Manoukian learned along the way, he’s preserving cultural identity through sound. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Elize Manoukian:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> The duduk is said to be the world’s oldest double reed instrument. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">But that doesn’t make it easy to play.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Squeaking sounds\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Elize Manoukian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">When I play it, I sound like a dying goose. But in Khatchadour Khatchadourian’s hands, the instrument comes to life.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Expert duduk music\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Khatchadour Khatchadourian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">when you know that something effortlessly flows through you, that’s meant for you. With the double-reed nature, the physical nature of this fantastically torturous instrument, yet utterly beautiful instrument, there is a lot of grappling. It’s a very physical instrument. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Elize Manoukian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Khatchadour, who I call Khatch, and I are sitting in his home studio in Santa Rosa, and he’s explaining the origins of his beloved duduk. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Khatchadour Khatchadourian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Traditionally, the duduk is the pairing of an apricot wood, the more aged the better, the tone of the instrument, paired with a double reed bamboo, which is pliant and soft. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Elize Manoukian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">No longer than your forearm, and with only one single octave, the duduk gives off a powerfully tragic, almost melodramatic sound\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Khatchadour Khatchadourian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The aged nature of the wood adds a little dark tone that I haven’t found elsewhere. The soul of the instrument is full of longing. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Elize Manoukian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Many Armenians understand this longing. especially those with family members who survived the 1915 Armenian genocide. Khatch’s family fled eastern Turkey along with more than a million others. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">For Armenians, the duduk’s mournful melodies are stories told by multiple generations about the warmth, the joy, and the tragedy of their homeland. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Khatchadour Khatchadourian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Armenians as people have been around for several thousand years, we’ve kept our traditions and cultures and language and expressions for a long time. I would say that the duduk speaks to that longevity, to that survival.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Elize Manoukian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The music Khatch plays with the duduk draws from a lot of new age, folk and world music influences. But some of his inspiration comes from a more unusual source: \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">the music of the region’s troubadours, known as \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">ashugh\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> in Armenian. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Khatchadour Khatchadourian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Ashugh people have traveled the region, the villages kind of carrying the wisdom traditions, the metaphor, And embedding that in the song.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Elize Manoukian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Like this song Khatch is playing by an 18th century troubadour. These musicians were like the hippies of the Persian empire. They sang about love and yearning, and crossed cultures and borders to spread their poetry— borders which are strictly enforced now.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Khatchadour Khatchadourian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">He wrote an Armenian, Azeri, Persian, Farsi, and Georgian. that is borderless state of artistry it contains all these worlds.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Elize Manoukian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">In a sense, Khatch is the latest in a long line of these troubadours. This style is freeing to him as an artist he says — both as a musician and singer.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Khatchadour Khatchadourian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">You’re no longer classical, you don’t care about what others think, how the voice soars. You just let the voice soar, you really become your being in that sense that you’re meant to. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Elize Manoukian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Khatchadour was born to an Armenian family in Beirut, which for years was known as the Paris of the Middle East. Before 1975, Beirut had around 200,000 Armenians, who had built new lives there after the Genocide. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">But by the time Khatch was born, the city had exploded into civil war. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Khatchadour Khatchadourian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> I have pretty dark memories, running to underground refuges, bunkers, or what have you. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Elize Manoukian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">This is a familiar story for the people of Lebanon, who were caught up in senseless violence for 15 years. The war separated his family, with his father heading to the U.S., while Khatch, his mother and sister fled across the border to Aleppo, in Syria. Khatch didn’t see his dad again for another 12 years. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">For much of his time in Aleppo, Khatch sang with his middle school’s choir. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Sound of child singing\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Elize Manoukian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">That’s Khatch singing his first solo in 1997. The choir sang Armenian, Arabic and some English songs too. He said it was an important outlet for him as a kid. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Khatchadour Khatchadourian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It was really the funnest thing ever, because we were so restricted between school and just the way life was.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Elize Manoukian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The choir was led by a man who Khatch called Maestro Abadjian.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Khatchadour Khatchadourian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I always remember torturing the maestro like he was such a kind, kind guy but I remember him having very little hair and his hair would just move on his hair a little bit and we would all be children and kind of like giggle.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Elize Manoukian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Performing with this choir and learning from Maestro Abajian became the foundation of his love for music. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u003c/span>\u003cb>Khatchadour Khatchadourian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I remember his green eyes. Such a beautiful person. Like he would carry an artistic torch in a place that probably needed it.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Elize Manoukian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">When Khatch was 15, his family moved to Los Angeles, where his dad had been living for over a decade. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The transition was rough. It was hard being a teenager in a new country, especially after living through so much turmoil. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Khatchadour Khatchadourian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I did not do any music for about ten years.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Elize Manoukian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">He went to UC Berkeley, hoping to find himself on his own, away from the nest. He almost became a political scientist, researching the Armenian community of Lebanon. But studying his own experience only brought him more darkness, and he was desperate for a creative outlet to channel it. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">That’s when he found the duduk. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Khatchadour Khatchadourian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I was suffering, and I was tremendously isolated, um, and to find kind of a meaning within myself, I was in a lot of pain, psychological pain, and the duduk spoke to that. It worked beautifully, I wouldn’t say it’s cheaper than therapy [[laughs]].\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">When we return, Khatch’s duduk career takes off – and takes him around the world. Stay with us…\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Sponsor message\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> When Khatch discovered the duduk in college, he had finally found an instrument that could express what he was feeling inside. His initial interest grew into a full fledged career.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Sound of duduk music\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Elize Manoukian:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Over the past ten years, Khatch has sung and performed the duduk all over the world. He’s recorded five studio albums, all featuring the duduk and voice — including an album of Armenian lullabies. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Lullabies across cultures have been traditionally performed by women, and passed down through their voices. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Khatchadour Khatchadourian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Not that Armenian males don’t sing to their sons and daughters, but I wanted to make kind of a public statement around it.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Elize Manoukian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">So Khatch decided to record an album of Armenian lullabies and songs for children, which he released in 2019. He was the first person to do this in a male voice\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">lullaby plays\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Khatchadour Khatchadourian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Underneath all of that, I was also dealing with being raised without a father, saying, “How did that shape the masculine and the male that I am?” And in what sense can I invite others, in this case, the masculine to be vulnerable, to be open, to be tender.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Elize Manoukian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Because the pandemic hit right after the album release he didn’t get many chances to perform it. As fate would have it, he performed that album for the first time at a children’s festival in Turkey. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The Flying Carpet Festival brings music and arts to kids displaced by conflicts like the Syrian civil war and others in the region\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Khatchadour Khatchadourian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Singing Armenian to Kurdish, to Arab, to Turkish children was profound because I was a singing about childhood, about innocence, about those energies that in a sense, I hope, we all protect. And in the light of actually what’s happened in Gaza, we failed to do. Just saying it as I see it, we failed to protect children. The most vulnerable, yet, most open of our humanity.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Elize Manoukian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">A simple song for a child can be a sanctuary. Take this lullaby from Khatch’s album: \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Khatchadour Khatchadourian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">When I perform it, I actually tear up as well, it moves a lot in me. It says, the sun is your father, the moon is your mother, the trees rock you. And, you know, it’s elemental.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Elize Manoukian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Khatch was moved by the story the lullaby told about the relationship between the singer and the land. But what he \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">didn’t\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> know when he recorded this album, was that the meaning of that song would soon change for him.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The song comes from a village in Nagorno-Karabakh, an enclave in the former Soviet Union and with a history dating back thousands of years. But just two years ago, conflict escalated between Armenia and Azerbaijan, neighboring countries who both claimed the region. In 2023, more than 120,000 Armenians fled their homes, carrying their belongings and their songs with them. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Khatch now holds onto this music, as a way to hold onto a piece of his people’s history. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Khatchadour Khatchadourian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The fact that you’re singing it, you’re carrying part of a tradition that has endured. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u003c/span>\u003cb>Elize Manoukian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Music and culture are not fixed in stone, he says, nor can they be easily erased. These troubadour love songs and lullabies come back to life whenever they’re heard or played.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Khatchadour Khatchadourian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">And hopefully they remain with us as, as more people, more artists see the value of keeping alive these precious jewels.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Elize Manoukian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Khatch is now working on his 6th album, and has spent hundreds of hours composing and arranging original pieces out of these cultural relics. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">But the duduk’s power doesn’t just come from what it keeps alive from the past. For Khatch, it’s a doorway to something greater than himself.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The duduk allows him to say what words often fail to capture. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Studio recording of duduk \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Khatchadour Khatchadourian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I find myself in my own studio. It’s a lot of darkness I’m going through in a sad moment, that I just put my headphones, I start the practice of playing the instrument. And I feel my soul exalted, something is lifted. And then aww, like just as if I’m among fields of stars or something transformative deep down happened. Yet I am in my studio. So I didn’t go to another edge of the universe, so this instrument does that to you.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> Khatchadour Khatchadourian, the Duduk Whisperer. His story came to us from producer Elize Manoukian. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cb>\u003cbr>\n\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">This story first aired on \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The California Report Magazine. Be sure to check out their podcast for more stories from around the Golden State. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">This episode was produced by Victoria Mauleon, Suzie Racho, Brendan Willard, Katherine Monahan, Srishti Prabha and Sasha Khokha. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The Bay Curious team is Katrina Schwartz, Christopher Beale and me Olivia Allen-Price.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Both Bay Curious and The California Report Magazine are made in San Francisco at KQED – your local public media station. Join thousands of your neighbors in supported us today at \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"http://kqed.org/donate\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">KQED.org/donate\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Some members of the KQED podcast team are represented by The Screen Actors Guild, American Federation of Television and Radio Artists. San Francisco Northern California Local.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I’m Olivia Allen-Price. I’ll see ya next time. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[baycuriousquestion]\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"#episode-transcript\">\u003ci>View the full episode transcript.\u003c/i>\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">While you might not recognize the name, there’s a good chance you’ve heard the haunting, almost otherworldly sound the duduk makes. This humble shepherd’s flute wandered out of the Armenian countryside and into Hollywood, making cameos on the scores of movies and shows like \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_nxEDN3909M&list=RD_nxEDN3909M&start_radio=1\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The Gladiator\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> and\u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JrpVgVOYEgc&list=RDJrpVgVOYEgc&start_radio=1\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> The Last Temptation of Christ.\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> The duduk was even recently synthesized on both \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wOVzpJQTNhk&list=RDwOVzpJQTNhk&start_radio=1\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Dune \u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">soundtracks.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">duduk\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">, an ancient Armenian double reed woodwind carved from apricot wood, has a melancholy sound and is an enduring \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"http://archive.org/details/roughguidetoworl00simo/page/334/mode/2up\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">symbol\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> of Armenia. Its plaintive tone is said to express the \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://archive.org/details/roughguidetoworl00simo/page/334/mode/2up\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">soul\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> and tragedy of the country’s history.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Audiences in the Bay Area don’t get many chances to hear the instrument live — unless they’re able to catch Khatchadour Khatchadourian. Those who follow him know him by his Instagram handle: “\u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.instagram.com/dudukwhisperer/\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The Duduk Whisperer.\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">”\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Read all about the Duduk Whisperer in \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/12060906/meet-the-duduk-whisperer-a-bay-area-armenian-folk-musician-revives-centuries-of-soul\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Elize Manoukian’s feature\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> for The California Report Magazine.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c!-- iframe plugin v.4.3 wordpress.org/plugins/iframe/ -->\u003cbr>\n\u003ciframe loading=\"lazy\" frameborder=\"0\" height=\"200\" scrolling=\"no\" src=\"https://playlist.megaphone.fm?e=KQINC7375698456&light=true\" width=\"100%\" class=\"iframe-class\">\u003c/iframe>\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2 id=\"episode-transcript\">Episode Transcript\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> It’s a Saturday night in San Francisco and a tiny performance space called Red Poppy Art House is packed with people. They’re here to listen to a unique wooden reed instrument called the duduk that has cultural ties to Armenia.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Ethereal music starts\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">And even if you don’t recognize the name duduk there’s a good chance you’ve heard it before — in the soundtracks to some major Hollywood movies – like The Last Temptation of Chris, Dune and Gladiator. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Ethereal music plays\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It’s now a staple for Hollywood composers\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The duduk’s sound is haunting, and almost otherworldly…it transports you.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Khatchadour Khatchadourian:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> When it hits you, it hits you. It takes you to the place it wants to go\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">That’s Khatchadour Khatchadourian, the duduk musician and vocalist who performed at the Red Poppy.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Sounds of Khatchadourian playing duduk music\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">He’s one of the few in the Bay Area who plays the instrument. His followers call him “the \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.instagram.com/dudukwhisperer/?hl=en\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Duduk Whisperer\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">.” \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">He uses it to push the boundaries of traditional Armenian music. And, as our producer Elize Manoukian learned along the way, he’s preserving cultural identity through sound. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Elize Manoukian:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> The duduk is said to be the world’s oldest double reed instrument. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">But that doesn’t make it easy to play.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Squeaking sounds\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Elize Manoukian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">When I play it, I sound like a dying goose. But in Khatchadour Khatchadourian’s hands, the instrument comes to life.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Expert duduk music\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Khatchadour Khatchadourian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">when you know that something effortlessly flows through you, that’s meant for you. With the double-reed nature, the physical nature of this fantastically torturous instrument, yet utterly beautiful instrument, there is a lot of grappling. It’s a very physical instrument. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Elize Manoukian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Khatchadour, who I call Khatch, and I are sitting in his home studio in Santa Rosa, and he’s explaining the origins of his beloved duduk. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Khatchadour Khatchadourian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Traditionally, the duduk is the pairing of an apricot wood, the more aged the better, the tone of the instrument, paired with a double reed bamboo, which is pliant and soft. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Elize Manoukian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">No longer than your forearm, and with only one single octave, the duduk gives off a powerfully tragic, almost melodramatic sound\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Khatchadour Khatchadourian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The aged nature of the wood adds a little dark tone that I haven’t found elsewhere. The soul of the instrument is full of longing. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Elize Manoukian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Many Armenians understand this longing. especially those with family members who survived the 1915 Armenian genocide. Khatch’s family fled eastern Turkey along with more than a million others. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">For Armenians, the duduk’s mournful melodies are stories told by multiple generations about the warmth, the joy, and the tragedy of their homeland. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Khatchadour Khatchadourian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Armenians as people have been around for several thousand years, we’ve kept our traditions and cultures and language and expressions for a long time. I would say that the duduk speaks to that longevity, to that survival.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Elize Manoukian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The music Khatch plays with the duduk draws from a lot of new age, folk and world music influences. But some of his inspiration comes from a more unusual source: \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">the music of the region’s troubadours, known as \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">ashugh\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> in Armenian. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Khatchadour Khatchadourian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Ashugh people have traveled the region, the villages kind of carrying the wisdom traditions, the metaphor, And embedding that in the song.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Elize Manoukian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Like this song Khatch is playing by an 18th century troubadour. These musicians were like the hippies of the Persian empire. They sang about love and yearning, and crossed cultures and borders to spread their poetry— borders which are strictly enforced now.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Khatchadour Khatchadourian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">He wrote an Armenian, Azeri, Persian, Farsi, and Georgian. that is borderless state of artistry it contains all these worlds.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Elize Manoukian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">In a sense, Khatch is the latest in a long line of these troubadours. This style is freeing to him as an artist he says — both as a musician and singer.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Khatchadour Khatchadourian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">You’re no longer classical, you don’t care about what others think, how the voice soars. You just let the voice soar, you really become your being in that sense that you’re meant to. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Elize Manoukian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Khatchadour was born to an Armenian family in Beirut, which for years was known as the Paris of the Middle East. Before 1975, Beirut had around 200,000 Armenians, who had built new lives there after the Genocide. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">But by the time Khatch was born, the city had exploded into civil war. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Khatchadour Khatchadourian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> I have pretty dark memories, running to underground refuges, bunkers, or what have you. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Elize Manoukian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">This is a familiar story for the people of Lebanon, who were caught up in senseless violence for 15 years. The war separated his family, with his father heading to the U.S., while Khatch, his mother and sister fled across the border to Aleppo, in Syria. Khatch didn’t see his dad again for another 12 years. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">For much of his time in Aleppo, Khatch sang with his middle school’s choir. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Sound of child singing\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Elize Manoukian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">That’s Khatch singing his first solo in 1997. The choir sang Armenian, Arabic and some English songs too. He said it was an important outlet for him as a kid. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Khatchadour Khatchadourian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It was really the funnest thing ever, because we were so restricted between school and just the way life was.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Elize Manoukian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The choir was led by a man who Khatch called Maestro Abadjian.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Khatchadour Khatchadourian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I always remember torturing the maestro like he was such a kind, kind guy but I remember him having very little hair and his hair would just move on his hair a little bit and we would all be children and kind of like giggle.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Elize Manoukian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Performing with this choir and learning from Maestro Abajian became the foundation of his love for music. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u003c/span>\u003cb>Khatchadour Khatchadourian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I remember his green eyes. Such a beautiful person. Like he would carry an artistic torch in a place that probably needed it.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Elize Manoukian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">When Khatch was 15, his family moved to Los Angeles, where his dad had been living for over a decade. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The transition was rough. It was hard being a teenager in a new country, especially after living through so much turmoil. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Khatchadour Khatchadourian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I did not do any music for about ten years.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Elize Manoukian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">He went to UC Berkeley, hoping to find himself on his own, away from the nest. He almost became a political scientist, researching the Armenian community of Lebanon. But studying his own experience only brought him more darkness, and he was desperate for a creative outlet to channel it. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">That’s when he found the duduk. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Khatchadour Khatchadourian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I was suffering, and I was tremendously isolated, um, and to find kind of a meaning within myself, I was in a lot of pain, psychological pain, and the duduk spoke to that. It worked beautifully, I wouldn’t say it’s cheaper than therapy [[laughs]].\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">When we return, Khatch’s duduk career takes off – and takes him around the world. Stay with us…\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Sponsor message\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> When Khatch discovered the duduk in college, he had finally found an instrument that could express what he was feeling inside. His initial interest grew into a full fledged career.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Sound of duduk music\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Elize Manoukian:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Over the past ten years, Khatch has sung and performed the duduk all over the world. He’s recorded five studio albums, all featuring the duduk and voice — including an album of Armenian lullabies. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Lullabies across cultures have been traditionally performed by women, and passed down through their voices. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Khatchadour Khatchadourian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Not that Armenian males don’t sing to their sons and daughters, but I wanted to make kind of a public statement around it.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Elize Manoukian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">So Khatch decided to record an album of Armenian lullabies and songs for children, which he released in 2019. He was the first person to do this in a male voice\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">lullaby plays\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Khatchadour Khatchadourian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Underneath all of that, I was also dealing with being raised without a father, saying, “How did that shape the masculine and the male that I am?” And in what sense can I invite others, in this case, the masculine to be vulnerable, to be open, to be tender.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Elize Manoukian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Because the pandemic hit right after the album release he didn’t get many chances to perform it. As fate would have it, he performed that album for the first time at a children’s festival in Turkey. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The Flying Carpet Festival brings music and arts to kids displaced by conflicts like the Syrian civil war and others in the region\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Khatchadour Khatchadourian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Singing Armenian to Kurdish, to Arab, to Turkish children was profound because I was a singing about childhood, about innocence, about those energies that in a sense, I hope, we all protect. And in the light of actually what’s happened in Gaza, we failed to do. Just saying it as I see it, we failed to protect children. The most vulnerable, yet, most open of our humanity.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Elize Manoukian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">A simple song for a child can be a sanctuary. Take this lullaby from Khatch’s album: \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Khatchadour Khatchadourian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">When I perform it, I actually tear up as well, it moves a lot in me. It says, the sun is your father, the moon is your mother, the trees rock you. And, you know, it’s elemental.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Elize Manoukian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Khatch was moved by the story the lullaby told about the relationship between the singer and the land. But what he \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">didn’t\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> know when he recorded this album, was that the meaning of that song would soon change for him.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The song comes from a village in Nagorno-Karabakh, an enclave in the former Soviet Union and with a history dating back thousands of years. But just two years ago, conflict escalated between Armenia and Azerbaijan, neighboring countries who both claimed the region. In 2023, more than 120,000 Armenians fled their homes, carrying their belongings and their songs with them. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Khatch now holds onto this music, as a way to hold onto a piece of his people’s history. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Khatchadour Khatchadourian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The fact that you’re singing it, you’re carrying part of a tradition that has endured. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u003c/span>\u003cb>Elize Manoukian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Music and culture are not fixed in stone, he says, nor can they be easily erased. These troubadour love songs and lullabies come back to life whenever they’re heard or played.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Khatchadour Khatchadourian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">And hopefully they remain with us as, as more people, more artists see the value of keeping alive these precious jewels.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Elize Manoukian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Khatch is now working on his 6th album, and has spent hundreds of hours composing and arranging original pieces out of these cultural relics. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">But the duduk’s power doesn’t just come from what it keeps alive from the past. For Khatch, it’s a doorway to something greater than himself.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The duduk allows him to say what words often fail to capture. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Studio recording of duduk \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Khatchadour Khatchadourian: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I find myself in my own studio. It’s a lot of darkness I’m going through in a sad moment, that I just put my headphones, I start the practice of playing the instrument. And I feel my soul exalted, something is lifted. And then aww, like just as if I’m among fields of stars or something transformative deep down happened. Yet I am in my studio. So I didn’t go to another edge of the universe, so this instrument does that to you.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> Khatchadour Khatchadourian, the Duduk Whisperer. His story came to us from producer Elize Manoukian. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cb>\u003cbr>\n\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">This story first aired on \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The California Report Magazine. Be sure to check out their podcast for more stories from around the Golden State. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">This episode was produced by Victoria Mauleon, Suzie Racho, Brendan Willard, Katherine Monahan, Srishti Prabha and Sasha Khokha. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The Bay Curious team is Katrina Schwartz, Christopher Beale and me Olivia Allen-Price.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Both Bay Curious and The California Report Magazine are made in San Francisco at KQED – your local public media station. Join thousands of your neighbors in supported us today at \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"http://kqed.org/donate\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">KQED.org/donate\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Some members of the KQED podcast team are represented by The Screen Actors Guild, American Federation of Television and Radio Artists. San Francisco Northern California Local.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I’m Olivia Allen-Price. I’ll see ya next time. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"slug": "the-san-francisco-landmark-youve-never-heard-of-unless-youre-french",
"title": "The San Francisco Landmark You’ve Never Heard Of … Unless You’re French",
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"content": "\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"#episode-transcript\">\u003cem>Read a transcript of this episode.\u003c/em>\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>This story first published on August 17, 2023.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Bay Curious listener Helen Walker has lived in the Bay Area for decades. A few years ago, her daughter’s friend came to visit from Grenoble, France.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[baycuriouspodcastinfo]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“He said, ‘Before I leave, I have to go see The Blue House.’ And I’m like, ‘The Blue House? What are you talking about?’” Walker said. She’s no stranger to French language and culture — “I took twelve years of French and it was my major in college. And I love going to France!” — but she had never heard of The Blue House. Turns out it’s a famous site of French pilgrimage hidden in plain sight in San Francisco.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>The song that made a landmark\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>The Blue House sits at 3841 18th Street in the Castro, and on any given day you’re likely to bump into a throng of French tourists snapping photos out front. That’s because the home is the subject of a beloved song by French singer-songwriter Maxime Le Forestier called “San Francisco.” It was featured on his 1972 debut album, \u003cem>Mon Frère\u003c/em>, and quickly became a smash hit in France. The album sold more than a million copies, and “San Francisco” was its most famous song. The song has lived on as a French classic, and is still widely known.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s a beautiful song, even if you don’t speak French. Give it a listen.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9-XkBwoiAog\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>The lyrics and story behind the song\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>In the first verse, the singer describes a blue house that backs onto a hill. You walk up and don’t bother knocking because the people who live there threw out the key.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>C’est une maison bleue\u003c/em>\u003cbr>\n\u003cem>Adossée à la colline\u003c/em>\u003cbr>\n\u003cem>On y vient à pied\u003c/em>\u003cbr>\n\u003cem>On ne frappe pas\u003c/em>\u003cbr>\n\u003cem>Ceux qui vivent là\u003c/em>\u003cbr>\n\u003cem>Ont jeté la clé\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This is the perfect introduction to daily life at the real Blue House, as it was in 1971, when Maxime Le Forestier stayed for a visit. It was a hippie commune called Hunga Dunga, mostly inhabited by a bunch of young LGBTQ artists and activists. Le Forestier next describes the happy-go-lucky, communal atmosphere at the house.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>On se retrouve ensemble\u003c/em>\u003cbr>\n\u003cem>Après des années de route\u003c/em>\u003cbr>\n\u003cem>Et on vient s’asseoir\u003c/em>\u003cbr>\n\u003cem>Autour du repas\u003c/em>\u003cbr>\n\u003cem>Tout le monde est là\u003c/em>\u003cbr>\n\u003cem>À cinq heures du soir\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He sings about a daily ritual at The Blue House — where everyone sits down to eat a meal together at 5 p.m.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We had no rules whatsoever,” said Phil Polizatto, a resident of The Blue House during Le Forestier’s visit, who \u003ca href=\"https://www.amazon.com/Hunga-Dunga-Phil-Polizatto/dp/1598587374\">wrote a book about the Hunga Dunga.\u003c/a> “The only rule we had was that at 5 p.m. everybody had to be sitting on the floor for dinner.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Food was a central focus of the Hunga Dunga, and they operated on a barter system, often delivering food to other communes in the area, like the Golden Aura Commune and the Friends of Perfection.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We delivered food to around 14 communes for free,” Polizatto said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11958389\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-11958389 size-medium\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/hungadungas-3-in-backyard-at-the-blue-house-800x618.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"618\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/hungadungas-3-in-backyard-at-the-blue-house-800x618.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/hungadungas-3-in-backyard-at-the-blue-house-1020x788.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/hungadungas-3-in-backyard-at-the-blue-house-160x124.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/hungadungas-3-in-backyard-at-the-blue-house-1536x1187.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/hungadungas-3-in-backyard-at-the-blue-house.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Maxime Le Forestier and his sister, Catherine, came to stay with the Hunga Dungas in 1971. \u003ccite>(Courtesy of Phil Polizatto)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>When they weren’t busy pushing back against capitalism, Phil says the Hunga Dungas did a lot of drugs and had a lot of sex. People came and went. It was a bit of a free for all.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We just were a bunch of freaks who wound up living together in this big house,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Phil says one of the roommates, a Belgian guy named Luc, invited Maxime Le Forestier and his sister, Catherine, to stay at the house while they were traveling around the U.S. No one in the house had much of an idea that the Le Forestier siblings were starting to make a name for themselves as musicians in their native France. During the 1971 visit, Phil says the Hunga Dungas didn’t think much of the young Frenchman.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“He was like a lamp. He didn’t do anything. He didn’t do the dishes. He didn’t vacuum the floor,” Polizatto said. “He just sat in that chair with his guitar, strumming a little bit. And of course, my immediate impression was, ‘Wow, what a slouch.’”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>After a few weeks, the Le Forestiers moved on. Then, about a year later, the Hunga Dungas received a record in the mail.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We opened it up and it was Maxim’s first album. And you know what? We put it in the bookcase and no one ever played it,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11958393\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-11958393 size-full\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1451807478.jpg\" alt=\"A black and white portrait of a man sitting on a couch. He is looking slighly to the left. he has a soft expression on his face, dark heard a beard and mustache. \" width=\"1920\" height=\"1280\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1451807478.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1451807478-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1451807478-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1451807478-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1451807478-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">A 1973 photograph of Maxime Le Forestier whose album Mon Frère achieved great success. \u003ccite>(Daniel SIMON/Gamma-Rapho via Getty Images)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>It wasn’t until months later that roommate Luc suggested they give the album a listen. No one who lived in the house realized that that record was such a smash in France, and that its most famous song, “San Francisco,” was about them and their house.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“When we heard the song ‘San Francisco,’ we were just simply blown away. I mean, what nicer thank you note could one be given than that song?” said Polizatto.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[emailsignup newslettername=\"baycurious\" align=\"right\"]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Hunga Dunga community dissolved in the mid-1970s. Many of its members, including Phil, moved out of town. For decades, barely anyone in San Francisco knew the significance of The Blue House. At some point, it was even painted green.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In 2010 \u003ca href=\"https://www.sfgate.com/entertainment/article/parisian-finds-s-f-s-much-sung-of-blue-house-3173452.php\">journalist Alexis Venifleis rediscovered the house\u003c/a> and its story. The French Consulate in San Francisco petitioned the owners to repaint the facade blue. They did! And today there’s also a commemorative plaque outside with the singer’s face on it. Le Forestier returned to San Francisco in 2011 to celebrate the updates and meet with fans.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11958396\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-11958396 size-full\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1559346143.jpg\" alt=\"A man stands centered in front of a blue Victorian home. He is framed by the house. He has white hair and is wearing a blue shirt with a black blazer over top. \" width=\"1920\" height=\"1131\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1559346143.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1559346143-800x471.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1559346143-1020x601.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1559346143-160x94.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1559346143-1536x905.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">French singer Maxime Le Forestier returned to Maison Bleue on June 22, 2011 for a ceremony that commemorated the house, which was newly repainted in blue. \u003ccite>(Gabriel Bouys/AFP via Getty Images)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>[baycuriousquestion]\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2 id=\"episode-transcript\">Episode Transcript\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">This is a computer-generated transcript. While our team has reviewed it, there may be errors.\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I’m Olivia Allen-Price, host of Bay Curious. One thing I love about living in the San Francisco Bay Area is getting to meet people from all over the world who travel here for vacation. They give me perspective. I may have seen the Golden Gate Bridge a thousand times by now, but knowing other people pay good money to hop on a plane and come see it? I don’t know, it helps me maintain some reverence. Stoke my sense of wonder…\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[A pop of street sound]\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">But sometimes the tourists know something that I don’t. They’ve come to see something I never knew was there. Which brings me to one Castro landmark that few people know anything about…Unless you’re French, that is. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sylvie Walters: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">La fameuse Maison Bleue.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The famous Blue House. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sylvie Walters: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Tous les Français connaissent la Maison Bleue et tous les Français veulent voir la Maison Bleue. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">That’s San Francisco-based French tour guide Sylvie Walters. She says “All the French know the Blue House and all the French want to see the Blue House.” Take a stroll by 3841 18th Street in San Francisco and you’ll spot it … a pastel-blue Victorian that, while lovely, looks like many others that line the street—Except there’s a throng of French tourists outside.\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Today on the show: What makes the privately-owned Blue House in The Castro such a magnet for people from France? \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[Theme Music plays]\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003cb>\u003ci>\u003cbr>\n\u003c/i>\u003c/b>\u003cb>\u003ci>\u003cbr>\n\u003c/i>\u003c/b>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> Listener Helen Walker, who’s based in Berkeley, asked us if we could share the story of the Blue House. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Helen Walker:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> I took twelve years of French and it was my major in college. And I love going to France. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> Helen has lived in the Bay Area for decades. But she says the first she’d ever heard of this famous site of French pilgrimage was a few years ago, when her daughter’s twenty-something friend came to visit from Grenoble, France.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Helen Walker:\u003c/b> \u003cb> \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">And he said, “Before I leave, I have to go see the Blue House.” And I’m like, “The Blue House? What are you talking about?” \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> The answer to this question seemed like something NPR Culture Correspondent Chloe Veltman might know. She’s half French. And she’s been living in San Francisco for more than twenty years. Hey Chloe. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Chloe Veltman: \u003c/b>B\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">onjour Olivia. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">What I didn’t know when I approached you about doing this story was your personal connection to it. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Chloe Veltman:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> That’s right, Olivia. So, my connection to the Blue House…stems from a song.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>[Guitar intro to “San Francisco” by Maxime le Forestier]\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Chloe Veltman: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The song is called “San Francisco.” And it’s by French singer-songwriter Maxime Le Forestier. He wrote the track in 1971 after staying at the Blue House, in San Francisco’s Castro District, that summer. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[Opening verse of “San Francisco” up and in the clear: “\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">C’est une maison bleue, Adossée à la colline. On y vient à pied, on ne frappe pas. Ceux qui vivent là, ont jeté la clé…”]\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Chloe Veltman: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Maxime Le Forestier’s “San Francisco” was a big part of my childhood. The track was in my mom’s record collection. She’s from Paris. I couldn’t stop listening to this song as a kid. I kept putting it on mixtapes and playlists long after I moved out of my parents’ house. I was, and still am, entranced by the dusky, modal harmonies and the plaintiff guitar riff that sounds almost like a cowboy tune.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[Chorus from the song up and in the clear: “…\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Quand San Francisco s’embrume, Quand San Francisco s’allume, San Francisco, où êtes vous ? Liza et Luc, Sylvia, attendez-moi…” \u003c/span>\u003c/i> \u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I see what you mean…It has a Wild-West high-lonesome quality to it. \u003c/span> \u003cb>Chloe Veltman: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> Yeah, and this song made San Francisco seem like a magical place to me—a place I couldn’t even imagine visiting as I was growing up in stodgy, straight-laced England, let alone calling home now for almost a quarter of a century. It’s fair to say “San Francisco” inspired me to move to San Francisco. \u003c/span> \u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> It’s a really pretty song. I can see why it lured you here. Tell us more about it. \u003c/span> \u003cb>Chloe Veltman:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> Sure! Well, “San Francisco” appeared on le Forestier’s first solo studio album, \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Mon Frère\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">, and quickly became the singer-songwriter’s first hit. He went on to become a major star in France. \u003c/span> \u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[Maxime le Forestier singing the opening lines of “San Francisco”, up and in the clear: “…\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">C’est une maison bleue / Adossée à la colline / On y vient à pied / On ne frappe pas/ Ceux qui vivent là / Ont jeté la clé…”]\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Chloe Veltman:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> In the first verse, the singer describes a blue house that backs onto a hill. You walk up, don’t bother knocking because the people who live there threw out the key. This is the perfect introduction to daily life at the Blue House: It was a hippie commune at the time, mostly inhabited by a bunch of young and idealistic LGBTQ artists and activists. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Le Forestier goes on to describe the happy-go-lucky, communal atmosphere at the house. People are reunited there after years on the road. He also sings about a daily ritual at the blue house — where everyone sits down to eat a meal together at five o’clock in the evening.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Phil Polizatto:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">We had no rules whatsoever.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Chloe Veltman: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">That’s Phil Polizatto.\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Phil Polizatto:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> The only rule we had was that at 5:00 p.m. everybody had to be sitting on the floor for dinner.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Chloe Veltman:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> Phil lived in the Blue House in the 1970s and is the author of a book about it that’s also been translated into French.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Phil actually gets namechecked in Le Forestier’s song.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[Verse from “San Francisco” mentioning Phil up and in the clear: “…\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Nageant dans le brouillard, Enlacés, roulant dans l’herbe, On écoutera Tom à la guitare, Phil à la quena, jusqu’à la nuit noire…” then duck under and out.]\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Chloe Veltman:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> He’s singing: “Swimming in the fog, rolling in the grass entwined, we’ll listen to Tom on the guitar, Phil on the \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">quena\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">, long into the night.” Just in case you’re wondering, the \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">quena\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> is an ancient flute from the Central Andes. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[Burst of quena music]\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Chloe Veltman:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> Anyway, Phil says the commune that lived at 3841 18th Street back then went by the name Hunga Dunga. It was part of a network of hippie houses around the city, like the Golden Aura Commune and the Friends of Perfection. Phil says they all operated on a barter system. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Phil Polizatto:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> We delivered food to around fourteen communes for free.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Chloe Veltman:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> And when they weren’t busy pushing back against capitalism, Phil says the Hunga Dungas basically did a lot of drugs and had a lot of sex. People came and went. It was a bit of a free for all.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Phil Polizatto: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">We just were a bunch of freaks who wound up living together in this big house. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Chloe Veltman:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> Phil says one of the roommates, a Belgian guy named Luc, invited Maxime le Forestier and his sister Catherine to stay at the house while they were traveling around the U.S. No one in the house…besides Luc…had much of an idea that the Le Forestier siblings were starting to make a name for themselves as musicians in their native France when they came to San Francisco in 1971. Phil says the Hunga Dungas didn’t think much of the young Frenchman.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Phil Polizatto:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> He was like a lamp. He didn’t do anything. He didn’t do the dishes. He didn’t vacuum the floor. He just sat in that chair with his guitar, strumming a little bit. And of course, my immediate impression was, “Wow, what a slouch.” \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>\u003c/b>\u003cb>Chloe Veltman:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> After a few weeks, the Le Forestiers moved on. Then, about a year later, Phil says the Hunga Dungas received a record in the mail.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Phil Polizatto:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> And we opened it up and it was Maxim’s first album. And you know what? We put it in the bookcase and no one ever played it.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>\u003c/b>\u003cb>Chloe Veltman:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> It wasn’t until months later that roommate Luc suggested they give the album a listen. The thing is, no one who lived in the house realized that that record was such a smash in France…it sold over one million copies…and that “San Francisco” was its most famous song. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[“San Francisco” plays again]\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003c/i>\u003cb>Phil Polizatto:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> And when we heard the song “San Francisco,” we were just simply blown away. I mean, what nicer thank you note could one be given than that song.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[\u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Song fades out]\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>\u003c/b>\u003cb>Chloe Veltman: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The community dissolved in the mid-1970s. Many of its members, including Phil, moved out of town. For decades, barely anyone in San Francisco knew the significance of the Blue House. At some point, it was painted green. It wasn’t until just over a decade ago that an enterprising journalist rediscovered the house and its story. The French consulate here in San Francisco petitioned the owners to repaint the façade blue. They did, and today there’s also a commemorative plaque outside with the singer’s face on it. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[Sounds of people on a street]\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Cathy Colonges:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> Tout le monde a un souvenir autour de cette chanson, de l’endroit où on l’a appris. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>\u003c/b>\u003cb>Chloe Veltman:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> That’s Cathy Colonges. She’s a visitor from the South of France I meet on a group tour of the neighborhood. As we stand outside the Blue House, Cathy says the song is so well known in her home country, many people can remember how they first came across it.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Cathy Colonges:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> J’ai appris cette chanson avec une de mes cousines qui était un peu plus âgé que nous, qui nous la chanter et qui nous a fait aussi connaître Maxime Le Forestier. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Chloe Veltman:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> In Cathy’s case, she learned to sing it as a kid from an older cousin, who also introduced her to more songs by Maxime Le Forestier. At that point, other random French people start to appear in front of the house. Our tour guide, Sylvie Walters, invites them to join us. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[Greetings exchanged “…Vous venez voir la maison bleue?” “Voilà, je savais même pas qu’elle était par là…”] \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Chloe Veltman:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> People exchange stories about how they know the song.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Person 1:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> On a tous chanté quand on avait quinze ans autour d’un feu, le soir, pendant les vacances, en été…\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Chloe Veltman:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> One person says she sang it when she was fifteen years old at night around the fire on vacation.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Person 2: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Mes parents la mettaient de temps en temps dans la voiture, mais…\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Chloe Veltman:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> Another says her parents put “San Francisco” on in the car from time to time. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> [“ Un, deux, trois…”] \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Chloe Veltman:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> Before going our separate ways, we sing the song right there on 18th Street, in front of the house that inspired it.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[People singing: “… C’est une maison bleue adossée à la colline. On y vient à pied, on ne frappe pas ceux qui vivent là etc…” Transitions into Maxime Le Forestier singing “San Francisco”…]\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">That was reporter Chloe Veltman…etc \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">We shot a TikTok and Instagram video for this story, so if you want to see the house for yourself, check KQED’s accounts… We’re @KQED.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">If you are new to Bay Curious – Bonjour! WELCOME! We are so glad you’re here. Be sure to subscribe to the podcast wherever you listen so you don’t miss a future episode. If you dig our show, we’d also love if you left us a rating or review wherever you listen. Subscription numbers and ratings really help us out – so thanks for chippin in!\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Bay Curious is made in San Francisco at member-supported KQED. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The show is produced by Amanda Font, Christopher Beale and me, Olivia Allen-Price. Additional support from Jen Chien, Katie Sprenger, Cesar Saldana and Holly Kernan.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I hope you have a wonderful week! Au revoir!\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp> \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"#episode-transcript\">\u003cem>Read a transcript of this episode.\u003c/em>\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>This story first published on August 17, 2023.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Bay Curious listener Helen Walker has lived in the Bay Area for decades. A few years ago, her daughter’s friend came to visit from Grenoble, France.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003caside class=\"alignleft utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__bayCuriousPodcastShortcode__bayCurious\">\u003cimg src=https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/02/bayCuriousLogo.png alt=\"Bay Curious Podcast\" loading=\"lazy\" />\n \u003ca href=\"/news/series/baycurious\">Bay Curious\u003c/a> is a podcast that answers your questions about the Bay Area.\n Subscribe on \u003ca href=\"https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/bay-curious/id1172473406\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Apple Podcasts\u003c/a>,\n \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/podcasts/500557090/bay-curious\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">NPR One\u003c/a> or your favorite podcast platform.\u003c/aside>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“He said, ‘Before I leave, I have to go see The Blue House.’ And I’m like, ‘The Blue House? What are you talking about?’” Walker said. She’s no stranger to French language and culture — “I took twelve years of French and it was my major in college. And I love going to France!” — but she had never heard of The Blue House. Turns out it’s a famous site of French pilgrimage hidden in plain sight in San Francisco.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>The song that made a landmark\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>The Blue House sits at 3841 18th Street in the Castro, and on any given day you’re likely to bump into a throng of French tourists snapping photos out front. That’s because the home is the subject of a beloved song by French singer-songwriter Maxime Le Forestier called “San Francisco.” It was featured on his 1972 debut album, \u003cem>Mon Frère\u003c/em>, and quickly became a smash hit in France. The album sold more than a million copies, and “San Francisco” was its most famous song. The song has lived on as a French classic, and is still widely known.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s a beautiful song, even if you don’t speak French. Give it a listen.\u003c/p>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/9-XkBwoiAog'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/9-XkBwoiAog'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003ch2>The lyrics and story behind the song\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>In the first verse, the singer describes a blue house that backs onto a hill. You walk up and don’t bother knocking because the people who live there threw out the key.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>C’est une maison bleue\u003c/em>\u003cbr>\n\u003cem>Adossée à la colline\u003c/em>\u003cbr>\n\u003cem>On y vient à pied\u003c/em>\u003cbr>\n\u003cem>On ne frappe pas\u003c/em>\u003cbr>\n\u003cem>Ceux qui vivent là\u003c/em>\u003cbr>\n\u003cem>Ont jeté la clé\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This is the perfect introduction to daily life at the real Blue House, as it was in 1971, when Maxime Le Forestier stayed for a visit. It was a hippie commune called Hunga Dunga, mostly inhabited by a bunch of young LGBTQ artists and activists. Le Forestier next describes the happy-go-lucky, communal atmosphere at the house.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>On se retrouve ensemble\u003c/em>\u003cbr>\n\u003cem>Après des années de route\u003c/em>\u003cbr>\n\u003cem>Et on vient s’asseoir\u003c/em>\u003cbr>\n\u003cem>Autour du repas\u003c/em>\u003cbr>\n\u003cem>Tout le monde est là\u003c/em>\u003cbr>\n\u003cem>À cinq heures du soir\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He sings about a daily ritual at The Blue House — where everyone sits down to eat a meal together at 5 p.m.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We had no rules whatsoever,” said Phil Polizatto, a resident of The Blue House during Le Forestier’s visit, who \u003ca href=\"https://www.amazon.com/Hunga-Dunga-Phil-Polizatto/dp/1598587374\">wrote a book about the Hunga Dunga.\u003c/a> “The only rule we had was that at 5 p.m. everybody had to be sitting on the floor for dinner.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Food was a central focus of the Hunga Dunga, and they operated on a barter system, often delivering food to other communes in the area, like the Golden Aura Commune and the Friends of Perfection.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We delivered food to around 14 communes for free,” Polizatto said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11958389\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-11958389 size-medium\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/hungadungas-3-in-backyard-at-the-blue-house-800x618.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"618\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/hungadungas-3-in-backyard-at-the-blue-house-800x618.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/hungadungas-3-in-backyard-at-the-blue-house-1020x788.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/hungadungas-3-in-backyard-at-the-blue-house-160x124.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/hungadungas-3-in-backyard-at-the-blue-house-1536x1187.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/hungadungas-3-in-backyard-at-the-blue-house.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Maxime Le Forestier and his sister, Catherine, came to stay with the Hunga Dungas in 1971. \u003ccite>(Courtesy of Phil Polizatto)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>When they weren’t busy pushing back against capitalism, Phil says the Hunga Dungas did a lot of drugs and had a lot of sex. People came and went. It was a bit of a free for all.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We just were a bunch of freaks who wound up living together in this big house,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Phil says one of the roommates, a Belgian guy named Luc, invited Maxime Le Forestier and his sister, Catherine, to stay at the house while they were traveling around the U.S. No one in the house had much of an idea that the Le Forestier siblings were starting to make a name for themselves as musicians in their native France. During the 1971 visit, Phil says the Hunga Dungas didn’t think much of the young Frenchman.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“He was like a lamp. He didn’t do anything. He didn’t do the dishes. He didn’t vacuum the floor,” Polizatto said. “He just sat in that chair with his guitar, strumming a little bit. And of course, my immediate impression was, ‘Wow, what a slouch.’”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>After a few weeks, the Le Forestiers moved on. Then, about a year later, the Hunga Dungas received a record in the mail.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We opened it up and it was Maxim’s first album. And you know what? We put it in the bookcase and no one ever played it,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11958393\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-11958393 size-full\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1451807478.jpg\" alt=\"A black and white portrait of a man sitting on a couch. He is looking slighly to the left. he has a soft expression on his face, dark heard a beard and mustache. \" width=\"1920\" height=\"1280\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1451807478.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1451807478-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1451807478-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1451807478-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1451807478-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">A 1973 photograph of Maxime Le Forestier whose album Mon Frère achieved great success. \u003ccite>(Daniel SIMON/Gamma-Rapho via Getty Images)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>It wasn’t until months later that roommate Luc suggested they give the album a listen. No one who lived in the house realized that that record was such a smash in France, and that its most famous song, “San Francisco,” was about them and their house.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“When we heard the song ‘San Francisco,’ we were just simply blown away. I mean, what nicer thank you note could one be given than that song?” said Polizatto.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Hunga Dunga community dissolved in the mid-1970s. Many of its members, including Phil, moved out of town. For decades, barely anyone in San Francisco knew the significance of The Blue House. At some point, it was even painted green.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In 2010 \u003ca href=\"https://www.sfgate.com/entertainment/article/parisian-finds-s-f-s-much-sung-of-blue-house-3173452.php\">journalist Alexis Venifleis rediscovered the house\u003c/a> and its story. The French Consulate in San Francisco petitioned the owners to repaint the facade blue. They did! And today there’s also a commemorative plaque outside with the singer’s face on it. Le Forestier returned to San Francisco in 2011 to celebrate the updates and meet with fans.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11958396\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-11958396 size-full\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1559346143.jpg\" alt=\"A man stands centered in front of a blue Victorian home. He is framed by the house. He has white hair and is wearing a blue shirt with a black blazer over top. \" width=\"1920\" height=\"1131\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1559346143.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1559346143-800x471.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1559346143-1020x601.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1559346143-160x94.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1559346143-1536x905.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">French singer Maxime Le Forestier returned to Maison Bleue on June 22, 2011 for a ceremony that commemorated the house, which was newly repainted in blue. \u003ccite>(Gabriel Bouys/AFP via Getty Images)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2 id=\"episode-transcript\">Episode Transcript\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">This is a computer-generated transcript. While our team has reviewed it, there may be errors.\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I’m Olivia Allen-Price, host of Bay Curious. One thing I love about living in the San Francisco Bay Area is getting to meet people from all over the world who travel here for vacation. They give me perspective. I may have seen the Golden Gate Bridge a thousand times by now, but knowing other people pay good money to hop on a plane and come see it? I don’t know, it helps me maintain some reverence. Stoke my sense of wonder…\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[A pop of street sound]\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">But sometimes the tourists know something that I don’t. They’ve come to see something I never knew was there. Which brings me to one Castro landmark that few people know anything about…Unless you’re French, that is. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sylvie Walters: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">La fameuse Maison Bleue.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The famous Blue House. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sylvie Walters: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Tous les Français connaissent la Maison Bleue et tous les Français veulent voir la Maison Bleue. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">That’s San Francisco-based French tour guide Sylvie Walters. She says “All the French know the Blue House and all the French want to see the Blue House.” Take a stroll by 3841 18th Street in San Francisco and you’ll spot it … a pastel-blue Victorian that, while lovely, looks like many others that line the street—Except there’s a throng of French tourists outside.\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Today on the show: What makes the privately-owned Blue House in The Castro such a magnet for people from France? \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[Theme Music plays]\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003cb>\u003ci>\u003cbr>\n\u003c/i>\u003c/b>\u003cb>\u003ci>\u003cbr>\n\u003c/i>\u003c/b>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> Listener Helen Walker, who’s based in Berkeley, asked us if we could share the story of the Blue House. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Helen Walker:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> I took twelve years of French and it was my major in college. And I love going to France. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> Helen has lived in the Bay Area for decades. But she says the first she’d ever heard of this famous site of French pilgrimage was a few years ago, when her daughter’s twenty-something friend came to visit from Grenoble, France.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Helen Walker:\u003c/b> \u003cb> \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">And he said, “Before I leave, I have to go see the Blue House.” And I’m like, “The Blue House? What are you talking about?” \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> The answer to this question seemed like something NPR Culture Correspondent Chloe Veltman might know. She’s half French. And she’s been living in San Francisco for more than twenty years. Hey Chloe. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Chloe Veltman: \u003c/b>B\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">onjour Olivia. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">What I didn’t know when I approached you about doing this story was your personal connection to it. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Chloe Veltman:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> That’s right, Olivia. So, my connection to the Blue House…stems from a song.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>[Guitar intro to “San Francisco” by Maxime le Forestier]\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Chloe Veltman: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The song is called “San Francisco.” And it’s by French singer-songwriter Maxime Le Forestier. He wrote the track in 1971 after staying at the Blue House, in San Francisco’s Castro District, that summer. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[Opening verse of “San Francisco” up and in the clear: “\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">C’est une maison bleue, Adossée à la colline. On y vient à pied, on ne frappe pas. Ceux qui vivent là, ont jeté la clé…”]\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Chloe Veltman: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Maxime Le Forestier’s “San Francisco” was a big part of my childhood. The track was in my mom’s record collection. She’s from Paris. I couldn’t stop listening to this song as a kid. I kept putting it on mixtapes and playlists long after I moved out of my parents’ house. I was, and still am, entranced by the dusky, modal harmonies and the plaintiff guitar riff that sounds almost like a cowboy tune.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[Chorus from the song up and in the clear: “…\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Quand San Francisco s’embrume, Quand San Francisco s’allume, San Francisco, où êtes vous ? Liza et Luc, Sylvia, attendez-moi…” \u003c/span>\u003c/i> \u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I see what you mean…It has a Wild-West high-lonesome quality to it. \u003c/span> \u003cb>Chloe Veltman: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> Yeah, and this song made San Francisco seem like a magical place to me—a place I couldn’t even imagine visiting as I was growing up in stodgy, straight-laced England, let alone calling home now for almost a quarter of a century. It’s fair to say “San Francisco” inspired me to move to San Francisco. \u003c/span> \u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> It’s a really pretty song. I can see why it lured you here. Tell us more about it. \u003c/span> \u003cb>Chloe Veltman:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> Sure! Well, “San Francisco” appeared on le Forestier’s first solo studio album, \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Mon Frère\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">, and quickly became the singer-songwriter’s first hit. He went on to become a major star in France. \u003c/span> \u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[Maxime le Forestier singing the opening lines of “San Francisco”, up and in the clear: “…\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">C’est une maison bleue / Adossée à la colline / On y vient à pied / On ne frappe pas/ Ceux qui vivent là / Ont jeté la clé…”]\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Chloe Veltman:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> In the first verse, the singer describes a blue house that backs onto a hill. You walk up, don’t bother knocking because the people who live there threw out the key. This is the perfect introduction to daily life at the Blue House: It was a hippie commune at the time, mostly inhabited by a bunch of young and idealistic LGBTQ artists and activists. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Le Forestier goes on to describe the happy-go-lucky, communal atmosphere at the house. People are reunited there after years on the road. He also sings about a daily ritual at the blue house — where everyone sits down to eat a meal together at five o’clock in the evening.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Phil Polizatto:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">We had no rules whatsoever.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Chloe Veltman: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">That’s Phil Polizatto.\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Phil Polizatto:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> The only rule we had was that at 5:00 p.m. everybody had to be sitting on the floor for dinner.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Chloe Veltman:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> Phil lived in the Blue House in the 1970s and is the author of a book about it that’s also been translated into French.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Phil actually gets namechecked in Le Forestier’s song.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[Verse from “San Francisco” mentioning Phil up and in the clear: “…\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Nageant dans le brouillard, Enlacés, roulant dans l’herbe, On écoutera Tom à la guitare, Phil à la quena, jusqu’à la nuit noire…” then duck under and out.]\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Chloe Veltman:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> He’s singing: “Swimming in the fog, rolling in the grass entwined, we’ll listen to Tom on the guitar, Phil on the \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">quena\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">, long into the night.” Just in case you’re wondering, the \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">quena\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> is an ancient flute from the Central Andes. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[Burst of quena music]\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Chloe Veltman:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> Anyway, Phil says the commune that lived at 3841 18th Street back then went by the name Hunga Dunga. It was part of a network of hippie houses around the city, like the Golden Aura Commune and the Friends of Perfection. Phil says they all operated on a barter system. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Phil Polizatto:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> We delivered food to around fourteen communes for free.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Chloe Veltman:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> And when they weren’t busy pushing back against capitalism, Phil says the Hunga Dungas basically did a lot of drugs and had a lot of sex. People came and went. It was a bit of a free for all.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Phil Polizatto: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">We just were a bunch of freaks who wound up living together in this big house. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Chloe Veltman:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> Phil says one of the roommates, a Belgian guy named Luc, invited Maxime le Forestier and his sister Catherine to stay at the house while they were traveling around the U.S. No one in the house…besides Luc…had much of an idea that the Le Forestier siblings were starting to make a name for themselves as musicians in their native France when they came to San Francisco in 1971. Phil says the Hunga Dungas didn’t think much of the young Frenchman.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Phil Polizatto:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> He was like a lamp. He didn’t do anything. He didn’t do the dishes. He didn’t vacuum the floor. He just sat in that chair with his guitar, strumming a little bit. And of course, my immediate impression was, “Wow, what a slouch.” \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>\u003c/b>\u003cb>Chloe Veltman:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> After a few weeks, the Le Forestiers moved on. Then, about a year later, Phil says the Hunga Dungas received a record in the mail.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Phil Polizatto:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> And we opened it up and it was Maxim’s first album. And you know what? We put it in the bookcase and no one ever played it.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>\u003c/b>\u003cb>Chloe Veltman:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> It wasn’t until months later that roommate Luc suggested they give the album a listen. The thing is, no one who lived in the house realized that that record was such a smash in France…it sold over one million copies…and that “San Francisco” was its most famous song. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[“San Francisco” plays again]\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003c/i>\u003cb>Phil Polizatto:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> And when we heard the song “San Francisco,” we were just simply blown away. I mean, what nicer thank you note could one be given than that song.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[\u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Song fades out]\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>\u003c/b>\u003cb>Chloe Veltman: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The community dissolved in the mid-1970s. Many of its members, including Phil, moved out of town. For decades, barely anyone in San Francisco knew the significance of the Blue House. At some point, it was painted green. It wasn’t until just over a decade ago that an enterprising journalist rediscovered the house and its story. The French consulate here in San Francisco petitioned the owners to repaint the façade blue. They did, and today there’s also a commemorative plaque outside with the singer’s face on it. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[Sounds of people on a street]\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Cathy Colonges:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> Tout le monde a un souvenir autour de cette chanson, de l’endroit où on l’a appris. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>\u003c/b>\u003cb>Chloe Veltman:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> That’s Cathy Colonges. She’s a visitor from the South of France I meet on a group tour of the neighborhood. As we stand outside the Blue House, Cathy says the song is so well known in her home country, many people can remember how they first came across it.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Cathy Colonges:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> J’ai appris cette chanson avec une de mes cousines qui était un peu plus âgé que nous, qui nous la chanter et qui nous a fait aussi connaître Maxime Le Forestier. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Chloe Veltman:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> In Cathy’s case, she learned to sing it as a kid from an older cousin, who also introduced her to more songs by Maxime Le Forestier. At that point, other random French people start to appear in front of the house. Our tour guide, Sylvie Walters, invites them to join us. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[Greetings exchanged “…Vous venez voir la maison bleue?” “Voilà, je savais même pas qu’elle était par là…”] \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Chloe Veltman:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> People exchange stories about how they know the song.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Person 1:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> On a tous chanté quand on avait quinze ans autour d’un feu, le soir, pendant les vacances, en été…\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Chloe Veltman:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> One person says she sang it when she was fifteen years old at night around the fire on vacation.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Person 2: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Mes parents la mettaient de temps en temps dans la voiture, mais…\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Chloe Veltman:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> Another says her parents put “San Francisco” on in the car from time to time. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> [“ Un, deux, trois…”] \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Chloe Veltman:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> Before going our separate ways, we sing the song right there on 18th Street, in front of the house that inspired it.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[People singing: “… C’est une maison bleue adossée à la colline. On y vient à pied, on ne frappe pas ceux qui vivent là etc…” Transitions into Maxime Le Forestier singing “San Francisco”…]\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">That was reporter Chloe Veltman…etc \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">We shot a TikTok and Instagram video for this story, so if you want to see the house for yourself, check KQED’s accounts… We’re @KQED.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">If you are new to Bay Curious – Bonjour! WELCOME! We are so glad you’re here. Be sure to subscribe to the podcast wherever you listen so you don’t miss a future episode. If you dig our show, we’d also love if you left us a rating or review wherever you listen. Subscription numbers and ratings really help us out – so thanks for chippin in!\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Bay Curious is made in San Francisco at member-supported KQED. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The show is produced by Amanda Font, Christopher Beale and me, Olivia Allen-Price. Additional support from Jen Chien, Katie Sprenger, Cesar Saldana and Holly Kernan.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I hope you have a wonderful week! Au revoir!\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp> \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"slug": "is-it-crow-maggedon-why-crows-are-flocking-to-bay-area-cities-each-winter",
"title": "Is It Crow-maggedon? Why Crows Are Flocking to Bay Area Cities Each Winter",
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"headTitle": "Is It Crow-maggedon? Why Crows Are Flocking to Bay Area Cities Each Winter | KQED",
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"content": "\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"#episode-transcript\">\u003ci>View the full episode transcript.\u003c/i>\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Around sunset on winter evenings, hordes of crows choke the night sky over the Bay Area, often flocking to the same favorite spots night after night.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Bay Curious listener Matteo Clark-Hurley asked: “Is there a crow-maggedon happening in downtown areas of Oakland and San Francisco? Hundreds come out at dusk. Sections of streets with trees are covered in bird poop. Are there more crows now?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And Clark-Hurley’s not the only one — many Bay Curious fans have written to ask why there are so many crows, where they’re going and why they’ve chosen to congregate in certain locations in Oakland and San Francisco.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The short answer is yes, there are more crows now. The crow population in the Bay Area has been on a steady increase since about 1975, but really exploded after 2000 or so.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Every December, \u003ca href=\"https://goldengatebirdalliance.org/birding-resources/birding-information/christmas-bird-counts/\">volunteers \u003c/a>head out on one particular day and count as many birds as they can to get an approximation of the winter population. In 2025, populations in San Francisco and Oakland both doubled. Volunteers counted \u003ca href=\"https://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/crow-populations-san-francisco-21316117.php\">more than 3,000 crows in San Francisco alone\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12073969\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2090px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12073969\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/iStock-1223536047.jpg\" alt=\"Three black birds perch on a concrete wall looking at the ocean.\" width=\"2090\" height=\"1434\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/iStock-1223536047.jpg 2090w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/iStock-1223536047-2000x1372.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/iStock-1223536047-160x110.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/iStock-1223536047-1536x1054.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/iStock-1223536047-2048x1405.jpg 2048w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2090px) 100vw, 2090px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Three crows at perch on a wall at Ocean Beach. Crows used to live more rurally, but have increasingly been flocking to urban areas where food is plentiful. \u003ccite>(Auseklis/iStock)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“There’s been basically logarithmic growth, which is sort of what you would expect in an unchecked system,” said Glenn Phillips, executive director of the \u003ca href=\"https://goldengatebirdalliance.org/\">Golden Gate Bird Alliance\u003c/a>, which runs the count.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Why so many more crows, you ask? Well, many bird experts think that \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11800958/crows-are-crowding-your-bay-area-skies-why-2\">their range has shifted\u003c/a>. Crows used to be found in more rural areas, where they could have a damaging effect on crops. Even though it’s illegal to kill crows — the Migratory Bird Treaty Act protects them — farmers can get a special permit to hunt them.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Crows are not only very smart, they have amazing memory,” Phillips said. “So crows learn who is trouble … and they can share that information with their peers and their offspring.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Crows have learned to stay away from rural areas where they’re being hunted and have instead discovered that cities are \u003cem>great\u003c/em> places to find food. Because crows will eat almost anything — from bugs to roadkill, baby birds and cherries — the backyards and streets of the Bay Area offer abundant food for them. They also don’t have many predators, which is why their numbers have grown so steadily.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>They are susceptible to some diseases, though.[aside postID=news_12072333 hero='https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/Milan-Cortina-Olympics-cropped-2000x1125.jpg']“All the crows and their relatives are really susceptible to West Nile,” Phillips said. “The crow populations have some years where they crash and other years when they keep booming.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And, while we \u003cem>are\u003c/em> seeing more crows in the Bay Area, overall, the crow population is not dramatically increasing in California.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Now, onto the dramatic roosting behavior people have noticed in December, January and February.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“This is a seasonal phenomenon that crows gather in large roosts during the winter,” Phillips said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Scientists believe it happens for two reasons. First, there is protection in numbers. Any bigger bird that wants to attack a crow will be overwhelmed by its brethren. Second, crows gather and share information about where to find food, which can be harder to forage in the wintertime. And, after they gather and share information, they sleep.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Many of us think of birds and nests, assuming the nest is a bird’s home. But Phillips said that’s a common misperception.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11752335\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/06/47607919412_9471ea2cf2_o-e1559676823145.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11752335\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/06/47607919412_9471ea2cf2_o-e1559676823145.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1246\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">A power trio of crows hanging out in Berkeley. \u003ccite>(Dan Brekke/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“The nest is only used during the breeding season for the vast majority of birds,” he said. “They don’t use it when they’re not raising their young. It’s the nursery, not the home. And so most birds sleep in trees, on cliffs, on buildings.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Those big gatherings of crows people have seen near Lake Merritt in Oakland or by the East Cut in San Francisco, or even out by San Francisco International Airport, are where the crows roost and sleep for the night in winter. They’re usually looking for a place with good perches, that has vantage points to spot predators and that’s protected from wind and rain.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“You could almost set your watch by it,” Phillips said. “They’re really consistent when they come.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Always at sunset, no matter when sunset is.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Bay Curious listener Kevin Branch has another question we hear a lot about crows: “There are so many crows around nowadays. Are they pushing out the old normal birds that I grew up with — the bluejays, the mockingbirds, the redwing blackbird?”[aside postID=news_12071437 hero='https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/09/250919-UKRAINIANFARM_01564_TV-KQED.jpg']Crows are opportunistic eaters and there’s no doubt that they will raid nests of other birds and eat their young. But they don’t target other birds intentionally. Phillips said so far, there’s no evidence that the increased number of crows is responsible for declines in other species. Crows also aren’t the only critters that raid nests — squirrels, gulls and cats do a lot of damage too.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s part of the cycle,” Phillips said. He often reminds folks worried about songbirds that certain species adapt to being prey.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“[For example], robins can lay six to eight eggs and they can have two or three clutches a year. So if every robin grew up to be an adult, we would be up to our eyeballs in robins.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Crows also behave differently in the spring and summer when it’s time to breed. Rather than large roosts, they’ll split into smaller groups, dividing up territory so that each bird can feed its young. Come springtime, you’ll be far less likely to see a horde of crows darkening the sky at sunset.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Have more questions about why the crow population has increased and what scientists say we should do about it? Check out this \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11800958/crows-are-crowding-your-bay-area-skies-why-2\">excellent feature from KQED’s Dan Brekke\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[baycuriousquestion]\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2 id=\"episode-transcript\">Episode Transcript\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Bay Curious in your feed on a Monday? It’s true. We’re dropping two episodes each week for a while — and experimenting with some new things along the way. Let us know what you think! Our email is \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"mailto:baycurious@kqed.org\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">baycurious@kqed.org\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Now on to the episode…\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Sounds of crows\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Chances are good, that is a familiar sound.\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Crow sounds\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Those would be “Corvus brachyrhynchos” aka crows.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Our often \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">unwanted\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> urban neighbors. Crows are thought to be loud, pesky, aggressive — even sinister. No matter what you think of them, they’re hard not to notice. They really demand our attention. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I’m Olivia Allen-Price. This is Bay Curious and recently several listeners have written to us observing there’s a “crow-maggedon” happening in downtown Oakland and San Francisco. Listeners are seeing huge flocks of crows flying across the sky around sunset, congregating in the same locations night after night after night. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cb>Glenn Phillips: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">This is a seasonal phenomenon that crows gather in large roosts during the winter. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> Glenn Phillips is the executive director of the Golden Gate Bird Alliance. They count the crows every winter. The most recent count happened in December 2025 and in Oakland and San Francisco, the crow population basically doubled from the year before.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Glenn Phillips: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">One reason for roosting in large numbers is that there’s safety in numbers. Any predator that would be wanting to take out a crow is gonna have to deal with not just one crow but thousands.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">But also, crows are social animals. They share information about where to find food when they gather to sleep at night. And they certainly have some favorite places to sleep.\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">They’re looking for good places to perch, with views of predators, shelter from wind and rain…\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">A place they can let their metaphorical hair down – or, in a crow’s world, let their claws tighten.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Glenn Phillips: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">When you relax your hand, it’s loose. When a bird relaxes its claw, it is firm and tight. So that they actually have to actively open their feet in order to let go of something. So when they’re sleeping, they aren’t gonna fall off because that grip is tight.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Pretty wild! \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">So that answers some of your questions about crows. But for the rest of today’s episode we’ll focus on this one sent in from San Mateo listener Kevin Branch in 2019. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Kevin Branch: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">There are so many crows around nowadays. Are they pushing out the old normal birds that I grew up with — the bluejays, the mockingbirds, the redwing blackbird — the birds I used to grow up listening to in the morning. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> Kevin also wanted to know if there\u003c/span> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">is a plan to,\u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> ahem,\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> reduce their populations. We asked KQED’s Dan Brekke, who has a fascination with just about everything including the natural world, to take a stab at answering them. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">So Dan, what have you got for us? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Dan Brekke:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> Let’s just say Kevin isn’t imagining things. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Sounds of birds\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Dan Brekke: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I visited him at work — a theatrical rigging company down in Redwood City —\u003c/span> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">and he says it’s the same thing every day — crows. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Kevin Branch: I see ‘em in the morning, I see ‘em in the afternoon, I see ‘em up in trees, I see ‘em on top of buildings. They’re everywhere. I kind of feel like the crow has taken over big time.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Dan Brekke: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">And after hearing all those crows, Kevin has a pretty good crow caw himself.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Kevin Branch:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> CAW CAW!\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Dan Brekke: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Kevin’s right — we’re seeing more crows these days. How many more? The numbers are surprising. I spoke with Bob Lewis, who helps run the Golden Gate Audubon Society’s Annual Christmas Bird Count. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Bob Lewis: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">So, I just took a look at the count today, and starting with 2000, year 2000, there were 167 crows in our circle.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Dan Brekke: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">That ‘circle’ covers Oakland and a large part of the East Bay shoreline and hills. Around Christmastime, 300 volunteers canvas the area and tally the birds.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Bob Lewis: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It’s the biggest count in the U.S. Actually, it’s the biggest count in the world.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Dan Brekke: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">So, we started in 2000 with 167 crows. And since then?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Bob Lewis: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">In 2002, there were 250, it went up significantly. In 2005 there were 400. At 2010, there was over a thousand. 2015 almost fifteen hundred. And in 2018, there were almost twenty-five hundred crows.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Dan Brekke: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">From 167 crows to twenty-five hundred in less than 20 years. That’s fifteen times as many!\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Not everywhere in the Bay Area has seen that kind of spike. For instance, South Bay crow populations have fallen in the Christmas Bird Count over the last decade, apparently because of a spike in West Nile virus that killed many of the birds.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">But John Marzluff, a University of Washington wildlife biologist, says the pattern of increasing crow populations is a familiar one.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>John Marzluff:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> That’s a common trend for a lot of corvids across the western U.S., for sure.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Dan Brekke: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">That word he said is “corvids.”\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">That’s a family of birds that includes crows and ravens — another species whose Bay Area population has soared in recent decades. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> OK, so we clearly have more crows, at least in most parts of the Bay Area. Kevin also wanted to know why?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Dan Brekke: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The people who watch the birds point to an equation with two major parts. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The first part has to do with where crows are not very welcome. Here’s Bob Lewis again. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Bob Lewis:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> One argument, which may be true, is that crows are smart birds, and crows have historically inhabited the countryside. Farmers put up scarecrows and crows eat corn. But in the country, crows get shot, too, and crows have perhaps discovered in the cities and towns that it’s a much safer place to be.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Sounds of a hunting video sneak up\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Dan Brekke: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">That’s sound from one of the many, many crow hunt videos you can find online. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">You can’t really blame crows for feeling like they’re not wanted out there in the country. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Shotgun sound in the clear\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Dan Brekke: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">One hundred years ago this year a company in the ammunition industry launched a “national crow shoot,” ostensibly to get rid of a threat to crops and other birds. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">And this wasn’t just a “country activity.” \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">San Francisco’s Golden Gate Park employed a hunter — usually a city cop — to shoot crows and other unwanted animals, like jays and coyotes. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Crow shoot with hunter voices: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">“Take him,” (laughter) “I think you hit him that one.”\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Dan Brekke: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">And here in California, crows are fair game in most rural areas from December 1st to the beginning of April. In 2015, California hunters reported killing about 35,000 crows. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Hunting video: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Nice! There you go!”\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Dan Brekke: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">But unfriendly humans are just one factor that has led to more crows becoming city dwellers. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>John Marzluff:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> I think it’s kind of simple myself. Basically, we’ve provided more food for them. Now, the reasons for that may be more complex, because it includes things like garbage, like fast-food restaurant waste, like road kill, so there are a lot of ways we provide them food. But that’s the bottom line. That’s why they’re more abundant.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">But haven’t we city dwellers have always been pretty messy. Look at the giant open garbage dumps that used to be on the edge of every big city. If garbage is attracting crows — where were they before?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>John Marzluff:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> You don’t have to have a dump. I mean, I think actually in terms of territoriality and increasing the breeding population, it’s better to have food more uniformly distributed.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Dan Brekke: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Our urbanized area is much, much larger than it used to be. And we’re providing rich, dependable sources of food — from lawns to leftovers. More food allows crow populations to become more dense.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>John Marzluff:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> They only defend enough space that’s necessary to get enough food to raise their young and survive. So as more food is available, they can live in tighter and tighter quarters and you can fit more of them into the place.\u003c/span>\u003cb>\u003ci>\u003cbr>\n\u003c/i>\u003c/b>\u003cb>\u003ci>\u003cbr>\n\u003c/i>\u003c/b>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">When we return, we get to the bloody truth. Are these crows killing other birds? Stay with us.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Sponsor break\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">So now we know that we do have more crows, and we have some ideas about why. The next question is: Are they killing other species of birds? Like those songbirds Kevin remembers?\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Songbird sounds\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Dan Brekke:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> One of the “crow people” I talked to is named Kaeli Swift, a wildlife scientist who has done lots of research on crows.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">She said there are limited instances where crows — abetted by humans, typically — can pose an unusual threat to endangered species like snowy plovers.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Kaeli Swift:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> But your standard suburban backyard like L.A. or Seattle or New York or anywhere else in the country — not so much. Most people that contact me feeling like crows wiped away all of the birds in their neighborhood — and just have this perception that if you see a flock of crows it means none of your songbirds aren’t going to reproduce, that everything is doomed — the science just does not back that up. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Dan Brekke: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">So research does not show that crows are remorseless killers.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">And if there are in fact fewer songbirds than when Kevin grew up, it could be for many reasons — loss of habitat, those pesky squirrels or even our domestic cats. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Swift points to a long list of the birds’ winning qualities.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Kaeli Swift:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> There’s a lot of qualities that I don’t think you can help but find really attractive — like their ability to learn our faces and be pretty excited to see us when you’ve built up a positive relationship with them by feeding them, for example. They play, so you can watch them play games, particularly the young birds. And they’re just kind of charismatic and goofy in the way that a dog with a really strong personality is. For me, crows have the same sort of quality where if you watch them you just see them do all these things that are so interesting that you just kind of can’t help falling in love with them if you just open yourself up to that. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> They sound like humans.\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cb>Dan Brekke:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> Kaeli Swift says many of our problems with crows may stem from how much we share in common with them.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Kaeli Swift: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">They’re clever, so they’re able to outsmart some of the ways we try to keep them out of our garbage or out of our property. They are social, so they are really noisy. They are protective parents, so they can be aggressive around their babies when they feel like they’re being a threat.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Dan Brekke:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> I keep coming back to this thing John Marzluff said, that it’s important to remember crows are “sentient beings,” like us, and that we ought to learn to use our big human brains to discover and address the problems we have with a growing crow population. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>John Marzluff:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> I do end every one of my talks about crows with a slide that’s like, ‘OK, these things can get under our skin. Why? And what should we do?’ And my take-home is that we should celebrate them for being successful, and if we need to control them in places, we need to think hard about it. Like they think about how to live with us, we need to think about how to live with them and come up with strategies that will have meaningful effects on their populations — not just kill a bunch of them.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Dan Brekke:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> Things like better managing our waste and being faster about removing roadkill.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> But mostly, it sounds like we need to just learn to co-exist with crows. And see the good in them?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Dan Brekke:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> Exactly. While I was doing research for this story I came across a poetry collection about crows.\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> Sounds good. We will listen to one of those poems on the way out. But first, thank you — reporter Dan Brekke — for your reporting this week.\u003c/span>\u003cb>Dan Brekke: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">You’re welcome\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">And also a big thanks to our question asker, Kevin Branch. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cb>Kevin Branch: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Bay Curious is made in San Francisco at KQED. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">This episode was produced by Amanda Font, Christopher Beale, Katie McMurran, Katrina Schwartz and me, Olivia Allen-Price. Special thanks this week to Pauline Bartolone. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">And now the poem we promised you.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sasha Khokha reads “Early Morning Crow” by Jim Natal: \u003c/b>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Crows have no shame. They caw at 6 a.m., \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">expect a response from the windows reflecting\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">overcast skies, wait for an echo\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">to return across the canyon, for the bottle \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">to wash up on shore, the telephone\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">to ring, the empty half of the bed to fill.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">You cannot throw\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">a boot at them like sex-struck cartoon cats\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">yowling backlit by the moon, cannot\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">shoo them like pie-faced pasture cows ruminating\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">with the intensity of low-watt bulbs.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The crows wake you\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">too early. And there you are, an overdue \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">bill, over-ripe melon, alone with your thoughts sluicing\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">back through the gates you had to lower by hand\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">the night before, cranking rusty cogs and wheels\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">so you could get some sleep.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The bed floods\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> and you rise, afloat with black wings spread\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">like oil upon the surface, a near-fatality\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">the cold almost got, wet through and hearing \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">a solitary crow that croaks: \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Is anybody there?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Is anybody there?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">then flies away before you can form \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">a suitable answer. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Some members of the KQED podcast team are represented by The Screen Actors Guild, American Federation of Television and Radio Artists. San Francisco Northern California Local.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I’m Olivia Allen-Price. Have a wonderful week.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n",
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"excerpt": "Have you seen the huge gatherings of crows near Oakland’s Lake Merritt or in downtown San Francisco? There’s an explanation for their behavior.",
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"title": "Is It Crow-maggedon? Why Crows Are Flocking to Bay Area Cities Each Winter | KQED",
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"headline": "Is It Crow-maggedon? Why Crows Are Flocking to Bay Area Cities Each Winter",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"#episode-transcript\">\u003ci>View the full episode transcript.\u003c/i>\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Around sunset on winter evenings, hordes of crows choke the night sky over the Bay Area, often flocking to the same favorite spots night after night.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Bay Curious listener Matteo Clark-Hurley asked: “Is there a crow-maggedon happening in downtown areas of Oakland and San Francisco? Hundreds come out at dusk. Sections of streets with trees are covered in bird poop. Are there more crows now?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And Clark-Hurley’s not the only one — many Bay Curious fans have written to ask why there are so many crows, where they’re going and why they’ve chosen to congregate in certain locations in Oakland and San Francisco.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The short answer is yes, there are more crows now. The crow population in the Bay Area has been on a steady increase since about 1975, but really exploded after 2000 or so.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Every December, \u003ca href=\"https://goldengatebirdalliance.org/birding-resources/birding-information/christmas-bird-counts/\">volunteers \u003c/a>head out on one particular day and count as many birds as they can to get an approximation of the winter population. In 2025, populations in San Francisco and Oakland both doubled. Volunteers counted \u003ca href=\"https://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/crow-populations-san-francisco-21316117.php\">more than 3,000 crows in San Francisco alone\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12073969\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2090px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12073969\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/iStock-1223536047.jpg\" alt=\"Three black birds perch on a concrete wall looking at the ocean.\" width=\"2090\" height=\"1434\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/iStock-1223536047.jpg 2090w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/iStock-1223536047-2000x1372.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/iStock-1223536047-160x110.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/iStock-1223536047-1536x1054.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/iStock-1223536047-2048x1405.jpg 2048w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2090px) 100vw, 2090px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Three crows at perch on a wall at Ocean Beach. Crows used to live more rurally, but have increasingly been flocking to urban areas where food is plentiful. \u003ccite>(Auseklis/iStock)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“There’s been basically logarithmic growth, which is sort of what you would expect in an unchecked system,” said Glenn Phillips, executive director of the \u003ca href=\"https://goldengatebirdalliance.org/\">Golden Gate Bird Alliance\u003c/a>, which runs the count.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Why so many more crows, you ask? Well, many bird experts think that \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11800958/crows-are-crowding-your-bay-area-skies-why-2\">their range has shifted\u003c/a>. Crows used to be found in more rural areas, where they could have a damaging effect on crops. Even though it’s illegal to kill crows — the Migratory Bird Treaty Act protects them — farmers can get a special permit to hunt them.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Crows are not only very smart, they have amazing memory,” Phillips said. “So crows learn who is trouble … and they can share that information with their peers and their offspring.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Crows have learned to stay away from rural areas where they’re being hunted and have instead discovered that cities are \u003cem>great\u003c/em> places to find food. Because crows will eat almost anything — from bugs to roadkill, baby birds and cherries — the backyards and streets of the Bay Area offer abundant food for them. They also don’t have many predators, which is why their numbers have grown so steadily.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>They are susceptible to some diseases, though.\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>“All the crows and their relatives are really susceptible to West Nile,” Phillips said. “The crow populations have some years where they crash and other years when they keep booming.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And, while we \u003cem>are\u003c/em> seeing more crows in the Bay Area, overall, the crow population is not dramatically increasing in California.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Now, onto the dramatic roosting behavior people have noticed in December, January and February.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“This is a seasonal phenomenon that crows gather in large roosts during the winter,” Phillips said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Scientists believe it happens for two reasons. First, there is protection in numbers. Any bigger bird that wants to attack a crow will be overwhelmed by its brethren. Second, crows gather and share information about where to find food, which can be harder to forage in the wintertime. And, after they gather and share information, they sleep.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Many of us think of birds and nests, assuming the nest is a bird’s home. But Phillips said that’s a common misperception.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11752335\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/06/47607919412_9471ea2cf2_o-e1559676823145.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11752335\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/06/47607919412_9471ea2cf2_o-e1559676823145.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1246\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">A power trio of crows hanging out in Berkeley. \u003ccite>(Dan Brekke/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“The nest is only used during the breeding season for the vast majority of birds,” he said. “They don’t use it when they’re not raising their young. It’s the nursery, not the home. And so most birds sleep in trees, on cliffs, on buildings.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Those big gatherings of crows people have seen near Lake Merritt in Oakland or by the East Cut in San Francisco, or even out by San Francisco International Airport, are where the crows roost and sleep for the night in winter. They’re usually looking for a place with good perches, that has vantage points to spot predators and that’s protected from wind and rain.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“You could almost set your watch by it,” Phillips said. “They’re really consistent when they come.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Always at sunset, no matter when sunset is.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Bay Curious listener Kevin Branch has another question we hear a lot about crows: “There are so many crows around nowadays. Are they pushing out the old normal birds that I grew up with — the bluejays, the mockingbirds, the redwing blackbird?”\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>Crows are opportunistic eaters and there’s no doubt that they will raid nests of other birds and eat their young. But they don’t target other birds intentionally. Phillips said so far, there’s no evidence that the increased number of crows is responsible for declines in other species. Crows also aren’t the only critters that raid nests — squirrels, gulls and cats do a lot of damage too.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s part of the cycle,” Phillips said. He often reminds folks worried about songbirds that certain species adapt to being prey.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“[For example], robins can lay six to eight eggs and they can have two or three clutches a year. So if every robin grew up to be an adult, we would be up to our eyeballs in robins.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Crows also behave differently in the spring and summer when it’s time to breed. Rather than large roosts, they’ll split into smaller groups, dividing up territory so that each bird can feed its young. Come springtime, you’ll be far less likely to see a horde of crows darkening the sky at sunset.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Have more questions about why the crow population has increased and what scientists say we should do about it? Check out this \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11800958/crows-are-crowding-your-bay-area-skies-why-2\">excellent feature from KQED’s Dan Brekke\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2 id=\"episode-transcript\">Episode Transcript\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Bay Curious in your feed on a Monday? It’s true. We’re dropping two episodes each week for a while — and experimenting with some new things along the way. Let us know what you think! Our email is \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"mailto:baycurious@kqed.org\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">baycurious@kqed.org\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Now on to the episode…\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Sounds of crows\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Chances are good, that is a familiar sound.\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Crow sounds\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Those would be “Corvus brachyrhynchos” aka crows.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Our often \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">unwanted\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> urban neighbors. Crows are thought to be loud, pesky, aggressive — even sinister. No matter what you think of them, they’re hard not to notice. They really demand our attention. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I’m Olivia Allen-Price. This is Bay Curious and recently several listeners have written to us observing there’s a “crow-maggedon” happening in downtown Oakland and San Francisco. Listeners are seeing huge flocks of crows flying across the sky around sunset, congregating in the same locations night after night after night. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cb>Glenn Phillips: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">This is a seasonal phenomenon that crows gather in large roosts during the winter. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> Glenn Phillips is the executive director of the Golden Gate Bird Alliance. They count the crows every winter. The most recent count happened in December 2025 and in Oakland and San Francisco, the crow population basically doubled from the year before.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Glenn Phillips: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">One reason for roosting in large numbers is that there’s safety in numbers. Any predator that would be wanting to take out a crow is gonna have to deal with not just one crow but thousands.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">But also, crows are social animals. They share information about where to find food when they gather to sleep at night. And they certainly have some favorite places to sleep.\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">They’re looking for good places to perch, with views of predators, shelter from wind and rain…\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">A place they can let their metaphorical hair down – or, in a crow’s world, let their claws tighten.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Glenn Phillips: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">When you relax your hand, it’s loose. When a bird relaxes its claw, it is firm and tight. So that they actually have to actively open their feet in order to let go of something. So when they’re sleeping, they aren’t gonna fall off because that grip is tight.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Pretty wild! \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">So that answers some of your questions about crows. But for the rest of today’s episode we’ll focus on this one sent in from San Mateo listener Kevin Branch in 2019. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Kevin Branch: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">There are so many crows around nowadays. Are they pushing out the old normal birds that I grew up with — the bluejays, the mockingbirds, the redwing blackbird — the birds I used to grow up listening to in the morning. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> Kevin also wanted to know if there\u003c/span> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">is a plan to,\u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> ahem,\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> reduce their populations. We asked KQED’s Dan Brekke, who has a fascination with just about everything including the natural world, to take a stab at answering them. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">So Dan, what have you got for us? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Dan Brekke:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> Let’s just say Kevin isn’t imagining things. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Sounds of birds\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Dan Brekke: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I visited him at work — a theatrical rigging company down in Redwood City —\u003c/span> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">and he says it’s the same thing every day — crows. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Kevin Branch: I see ‘em in the morning, I see ‘em in the afternoon, I see ‘em up in trees, I see ‘em on top of buildings. They’re everywhere. I kind of feel like the crow has taken over big time.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Dan Brekke: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">And after hearing all those crows, Kevin has a pretty good crow caw himself.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Kevin Branch:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> CAW CAW!\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Dan Brekke: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Kevin’s right — we’re seeing more crows these days. How many more? The numbers are surprising. I spoke with Bob Lewis, who helps run the Golden Gate Audubon Society’s Annual Christmas Bird Count. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Bob Lewis: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">So, I just took a look at the count today, and starting with 2000, year 2000, there were 167 crows in our circle.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Dan Brekke: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">That ‘circle’ covers Oakland and a large part of the East Bay shoreline and hills. Around Christmastime, 300 volunteers canvas the area and tally the birds.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Bob Lewis: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It’s the biggest count in the U.S. Actually, it’s the biggest count in the world.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Dan Brekke: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">So, we started in 2000 with 167 crows. And since then?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Bob Lewis: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">In 2002, there were 250, it went up significantly. In 2005 there were 400. At 2010, there was over a thousand. 2015 almost fifteen hundred. And in 2018, there were almost twenty-five hundred crows.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Dan Brekke: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">From 167 crows to twenty-five hundred in less than 20 years. That’s fifteen times as many!\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Not everywhere in the Bay Area has seen that kind of spike. For instance, South Bay crow populations have fallen in the Christmas Bird Count over the last decade, apparently because of a spike in West Nile virus that killed many of the birds.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">But John Marzluff, a University of Washington wildlife biologist, says the pattern of increasing crow populations is a familiar one.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>John Marzluff:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> That’s a common trend for a lot of corvids across the western U.S., for sure.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Dan Brekke: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">That word he said is “corvids.”\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">That’s a family of birds that includes crows and ravens — another species whose Bay Area population has soared in recent decades. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> OK, so we clearly have more crows, at least in most parts of the Bay Area. Kevin also wanted to know why?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Dan Brekke: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The people who watch the birds point to an equation with two major parts. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The first part has to do with where crows are not very welcome. Here’s Bob Lewis again. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Bob Lewis:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> One argument, which may be true, is that crows are smart birds, and crows have historically inhabited the countryside. Farmers put up scarecrows and crows eat corn. But in the country, crows get shot, too, and crows have perhaps discovered in the cities and towns that it’s a much safer place to be.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Sounds of a hunting video sneak up\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Dan Brekke: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">That’s sound from one of the many, many crow hunt videos you can find online. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">You can’t really blame crows for feeling like they’re not wanted out there in the country. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Shotgun sound in the clear\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Dan Brekke: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">One hundred years ago this year a company in the ammunition industry launched a “national crow shoot,” ostensibly to get rid of a threat to crops and other birds. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">And this wasn’t just a “country activity.” \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">San Francisco’s Golden Gate Park employed a hunter — usually a city cop — to shoot crows and other unwanted animals, like jays and coyotes. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Crow shoot with hunter voices: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">“Take him,” (laughter) “I think you hit him that one.”\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Dan Brekke: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">And here in California, crows are fair game in most rural areas from December 1st to the beginning of April. In 2015, California hunters reported killing about 35,000 crows. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Hunting video: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Nice! There you go!”\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Dan Brekke: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">But unfriendly humans are just one factor that has led to more crows becoming city dwellers. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>John Marzluff:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> I think it’s kind of simple myself. Basically, we’ve provided more food for them. Now, the reasons for that may be more complex, because it includes things like garbage, like fast-food restaurant waste, like road kill, so there are a lot of ways we provide them food. But that’s the bottom line. That’s why they’re more abundant.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">But haven’t we city dwellers have always been pretty messy. Look at the giant open garbage dumps that used to be on the edge of every big city. If garbage is attracting crows — where were they before?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>John Marzluff:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> You don’t have to have a dump. I mean, I think actually in terms of territoriality and increasing the breeding population, it’s better to have food more uniformly distributed.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Dan Brekke: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Our urbanized area is much, much larger than it used to be. And we’re providing rich, dependable sources of food — from lawns to leftovers. More food allows crow populations to become more dense.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>John Marzluff:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> They only defend enough space that’s necessary to get enough food to raise their young and survive. So as more food is available, they can live in tighter and tighter quarters and you can fit more of them into the place.\u003c/span>\u003cb>\u003ci>\u003cbr>\n\u003c/i>\u003c/b>\u003cb>\u003ci>\u003cbr>\n\u003c/i>\u003c/b>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">When we return, we get to the bloody truth. Are these crows killing other birds? Stay with us.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Sponsor break\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">So now we know that we do have more crows, and we have some ideas about why. The next question is: Are they killing other species of birds? Like those songbirds Kevin remembers?\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Songbird sounds\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Dan Brekke:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> One of the “crow people” I talked to is named Kaeli Swift, a wildlife scientist who has done lots of research on crows.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">She said there are limited instances where crows — abetted by humans, typically — can pose an unusual threat to endangered species like snowy plovers.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Kaeli Swift:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> But your standard suburban backyard like L.A. or Seattle or New York or anywhere else in the country — not so much. Most people that contact me feeling like crows wiped away all of the birds in their neighborhood — and just have this perception that if you see a flock of crows it means none of your songbirds aren’t going to reproduce, that everything is doomed — the science just does not back that up. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Dan Brekke: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">So research does not show that crows are remorseless killers.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">And if there are in fact fewer songbirds than when Kevin grew up, it could be for many reasons — loss of habitat, those pesky squirrels or even our domestic cats. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Swift points to a long list of the birds’ winning qualities.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Kaeli Swift:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> There’s a lot of qualities that I don’t think you can help but find really attractive — like their ability to learn our faces and be pretty excited to see us when you’ve built up a positive relationship with them by feeding them, for example. They play, so you can watch them play games, particularly the young birds. And they’re just kind of charismatic and goofy in the way that a dog with a really strong personality is. For me, crows have the same sort of quality where if you watch them you just see them do all these things that are so interesting that you just kind of can’t help falling in love with them if you just open yourself up to that. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> They sound like humans.\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cb>Dan Brekke:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> Kaeli Swift says many of our problems with crows may stem from how much we share in common with them.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Kaeli Swift: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">They’re clever, so they’re able to outsmart some of the ways we try to keep them out of our garbage or out of our property. They are social, so they are really noisy. They are protective parents, so they can be aggressive around their babies when they feel like they’re being a threat.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Dan Brekke:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> I keep coming back to this thing John Marzluff said, that it’s important to remember crows are “sentient beings,” like us, and that we ought to learn to use our big human brains to discover and address the problems we have with a growing crow population. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>John Marzluff:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> I do end every one of my talks about crows with a slide that’s like, ‘OK, these things can get under our skin. Why? And what should we do?’ And my take-home is that we should celebrate them for being successful, and if we need to control them in places, we need to think hard about it. Like they think about how to live with us, we need to think about how to live with them and come up with strategies that will have meaningful effects on their populations — not just kill a bunch of them.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Dan Brekke:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> Things like better managing our waste and being faster about removing roadkill.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> But mostly, it sounds like we need to just learn to co-exist with crows. And see the good in them?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Dan Brekke:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> Exactly. While I was doing research for this story I came across a poetry collection about crows.\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> Sounds good. We will listen to one of those poems on the way out. But first, thank you — reporter Dan Brekke — for your reporting this week.\u003c/span>\u003cb>Dan Brekke: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">You’re welcome\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">And also a big thanks to our question asker, Kevin Branch. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cb>Kevin Branch: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Bay Curious is made in San Francisco at KQED. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">This episode was produced by Amanda Font, Christopher Beale, Katie McMurran, Katrina Schwartz and me, Olivia Allen-Price. Special thanks this week to Pauline Bartolone. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">And now the poem we promised you.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sasha Khokha reads “Early Morning Crow” by Jim Natal: \u003c/b>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Crows have no shame. They caw at 6 a.m., \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">expect a response from the windows reflecting\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">overcast skies, wait for an echo\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">to return across the canyon, for the bottle \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">to wash up on shore, the telephone\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">to ring, the empty half of the bed to fill.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">You cannot throw\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">a boot at them like sex-struck cartoon cats\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">yowling backlit by the moon, cannot\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">shoo them like pie-faced pasture cows ruminating\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">with the intensity of low-watt bulbs.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The crows wake you\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">too early. And there you are, an overdue \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">bill, over-ripe melon, alone with your thoughts sluicing\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">back through the gates you had to lower by hand\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">the night before, cranking rusty cogs and wheels\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">so you could get some sleep.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The bed floods\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> and you rise, afloat with black wings spread\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">like oil upon the surface, a near-fatality\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">the cold almost got, wet through and hearing \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">a solitary crow that croaks: \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Is anybody there?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Is anybody there?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">then flies away before you can form \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">a suitable answer. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Some members of the KQED podcast team are represented by The Screen Actors Guild, American Federation of Television and Radio Artists. San Francisco Northern California Local.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I’m Olivia Allen-Price. Have a wonderful week.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"slug": "how-a-remarkable-19th-century-revolutionary-priest-from-ukraine-ended-up-in-hayward",
"title": "How a Remarkable 19th-Century Revolutionary Priest From Ukraine Ended Up in Hayward",
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"content": "\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"#episode-transcript\">\u003ci>View the full episode transcript.\u003c/i>\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s hard not to feel glum reading the \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/12070573/a-generation-orphaned-by-war-ukrainian-children-grow-up-amid-loss-and-recovery\">news headlines from Ukraine\u003c/a> these days, even if you’re not Ukrainian or Ukrainian American.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But at the same time, the conflict can feel far away. And yet, in the late 19th century, the Bay Area was home to a Ukrainian man who was exactly the type of revolutionary dissident Russia wanted to silence.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>There’s a historical marker commemorating him in, of all places, \u003ca href=\"https://www.ebparks.org/sites/default/files/garin_honcharenkos_santuary.pdf\">Garin Regional Park\u003c/a>. Tony Divito of San Mateo passed a road sign nearby on his commute, calling attention to that marker and wondered.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I just wanted to know the backstory,” he told Bay Curious.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The answer leads to a man of many disparate layers; a devout Orthodox priest, a relentless dissident and outlaw, a groundbreaking publisher, and subsistence farmer. The life of Agapius Honcharenko reads like an epic thriller, albeit one that ends improbably on a quiet hilltop farm tucked high in the Hayward Hills. But let’s start at the very beginning.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>\u003cstrong>A keen intellect and empathetic soul\u003c/strong>\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>The man who came to be known in the Bay Area as Agapius Honcharenko was born Andrii Humnytsky in 1832. The son of an Orthodox priest, he displayed a keen intellect at a young age and caught the attention of the highest-ranking church official in Ukraine at the time, becoming his personal assistant. As a consequence, young Humnytsky bore witness to the hardships endured by peasants and serfs, agricultural laborers bound to their lords’ estates. The very word “slave” comes from the word “Slav.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“He was appalled by the poverty in these villages,” said Jars Balan, a researcher at the Canadian Institute of Ukrainian Studies at the University of Alberta\u003cstrong>. \u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12057937\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/09/250927-UKRAINIANFARM01005_TV-KQED.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12057937\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/09/250927-UKRAINIANFARM01005_TV-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/09/250927-UKRAINIANFARM01005_TV-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/09/250927-UKRAINIANFARM01005_TV-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/09/250927-UKRAINIANFARM01005_TV-KQED-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Father Oleg Kepeshchuk of the Greek Catholic Church of the Immaculate Conception video calls a friend to show them the view of the burial site where Ukrainian patriot and exiled orthodox priest Agapius Honcharenko and his wife Albina are buried at Garin Regional Park in Hayward on Sept. 27, 2025. \u003ccite>(Tâm Vũ/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>When Humnytsky delivered his ordination sermon, Balan said, he called on the church to melt down all the gold and precious jewels, “and use the money to feed, to help the poor.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This kind of talk did not go over well in 19th-century Ukraine. Still, Humnytsky would not cool his revolutionary jets. He got acquainted with — and radicalized by — fellow countrymen who, decades before, were involved in a failed attempt to overthrow the czar, the emperor of Russia.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Humnytsky’s boss saw trouble brewing, so he sent him out of the country. Because Ukraine was part of Russia at the time, he sent Humnytsky to serve in the chapel of the Imperial Russian Consulate in Greece.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But there, too, Humnytsky fell in with like-minded revolutionaries. He started writing for a dissident journal called \u003cem>Kolokol\u003c/em>, in English, \u003cem>The Bell\u003c/em>.[aside postID=news_12070415 hero='https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/12/20251221_JohnColtraneChurch_December_GH-15_qed.jpg']After publishing searing articles calling for the emancipation of serfs and criticizing the Orthodox Church’s support for tsarist autocracy, Humnytsky was arrested.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Russian authorities imprisoned him in the hold of a warship, which set sail for what is now Istanbul. According to his later recollections, Humnytsky arranged a daring escape with the help of his family back in Moscow. He would recall years later, “I escaped for an eternal glory, to be a Kozak in the free world.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This episode marked the start of a life on the run from Russian justice. Repeatedly over the years that followed, Humnytsky would pop up in a new location, work all sorts of odd hustles, make friends with anarchists, dissidents, and revolutionaries, and then the Russians would catch up with him.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>At one point, he returned to Greece for additional professional spiritual training on the remote peninsula of Mount Athos, home to the world’s largest monastic community. It’s a UNESCO World Heritage Site today. Back then, it was an excellent place to hide from the Russians. He had a facility with languages, so in London, he was a Russian language tutor to Greeks, and a specialist in old coins at the British Museum. In Cairo, he organized sightseeing tours — and survived a knifing paid for by the local Russian consulate.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>By his early thirties, Humnytsky decided to try his luck on the other side of the Atlantic Ocean.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>\u003cstrong>A new life in America\u003c/strong>\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>In 1865, he landed in Boston, headed to New York, then New Orleans. Around this time, Andrii Humnytsky changed his name to Agapius, or Ahapi, Honcharenko, to seem more Greek and avoid detection from the Russians. But even in the United States, wherever he went, local Russians eventually figured out Father Agapius was not actually a Greek with remarkably good command of Russian. Balan, who wrote a \u003ca href=\"https://ia800309.us.archive.org/25/items/journalofukraini3334cana/journalofukraini3334cana.pdf\">well-regarded study\u003c/a> of Honcharenko’s life, calls him a “renegade monastic.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>While in New York, Honcharenko married the daughter of one of the Italian radicals he met, a young school teacher named Albina Citi. The match was not to the liking of her anti-religious family, Balan said, “but they were in love, and they wanted to go to the West Coast.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12071447\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 1289px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/01/E6B7271A-ABCD-48CC-AE56-C2102783C328_1_201_a.jpeg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12071447\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/01/E6B7271A-ABCD-48CC-AE56-C2102783C328_1_201_a.jpeg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1289\" height=\"2090\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/01/E6B7271A-ABCD-48CC-AE56-C2102783C328_1_201_a.jpeg 1289w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/01/E6B7271A-ABCD-48CC-AE56-C2102783C328_1_201_a-160x259.jpeg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/01/E6B7271A-ABCD-48CC-AE56-C2102783C328_1_201_a-947x1536.jpeg 947w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/01/E6B7271A-ABCD-48CC-AE56-C2102783C328_1_201_a-1263x2048.jpeg 1263w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1289px) 100vw, 1289px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">One of the photos used to illustrate the book Ahapius Honcharenko “Alaska Man,” by Wasyl Luciw, Ph.D. And Theodore Luciw, M. A., published in Toronto by Slavia Library in 1963. \u003ccite>(Courtesy Jars Balan)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>And so it was that Honcharenko arrived in San Francisco in the 1860s, bringing with him typesetting skills he had honed in London. He purchased Cyrillic fonts and launched the \u003ca href=\"https://diasporiana.org.ua/wp-content/uploads/books/13652/file.pdf\">\u003cem>Alaska Herald\u003c/em>\u003c/a>, which included a Ukrainian-language supplement.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The paper became a vital resource for Ukrainian and Russian émigrés alike, providing news to people living far from home. But Honcharenko couldn’t resist publishing some biting commentary as well. Here’s an excerpt of an issue celebrating the publication’s second year:\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>From the day of its birth it assumed a certain attitude, and it has unflinchingly maintained its position and consistency during these two years. It has struggled hard and bitterly because it was on the side of right and justice, and they who champion the oppressed seldom find their work either cheerful or remunerative.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The problem for Honcharenko was that he was a critic of imperial malfeasance wherever he saw it. Eventually, he bit the hand that fed him, which in this case was none other than the U.S. government, a primary backer of the \u003cem>Alaska Herald\u003c/em>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Because the administration that the Americans set up had problems with corruption,” Balan explained. “[Honcharenko] was critical of the way the American administration treated Native people. He had some environmental concerns. When he became critical of what was going on in Alaska, they pulled the funding.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Meanwhile, the Russian Orthodox Church relocated its U.S. base of operations from Sitka in Alaska to San Francisco in California. It came to their attention that a renegade priest was holding services in the city, and that’s when Honcharenko and his wife decided to decamp for Alameda County.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>\u003cstrong>A quieter life\u003c/strong>\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Honcharenko sold his printing press, bought a 40-acre farm in the hills above \u003ca href=\"https://www.haywardareahistory.org/agapius-honcharenko\">Hayward\u003c/a>, named the place “Ukraina,” and settled into a relatively calm life for the next 40-odd years. He led weekly Orthodox church services on the farm for local and visiting Slavic immigrants, conducted baptisms and weddings. His homestead became a small but significant hub for Ukrainian-American life on the West Coast.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The last years of his life were hard. The couple’s daughter died when she was just ten years old. The subsistence farm didn’t produce enough food to live on. However, Agapius and Albina Hocharenko had given so much to so many over the decades that when they were in need, a lot of locals returned the favor.[aside postID=news_12068602 hero='https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/12/251204-EARTHQUAKECOTTAGES00030_TV-KQED.jpg']Still, Honcharenko continued to write, publish, and mentor émigrés. His farm briefly hosted a utopian colony, a dream of community that ultimately failed, but further cemented his reputation among the diaspora.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The couple also gardened. They sent numerous samples of plants and vegetables to the editors of the \u003cem>California Horticulturalist and Floral Magazine\u003c/em>, who wrote back to praise the “monster squash,” and “some of the finest sugar table corn and nutmeg melons we have ever tasted.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“His life was amazing,” Balan said. “He was eccentric, he was quirky. He had strange ideas about some things; there’s no doubt. But when you look at the trajectory of his life, it’s an amazing story.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Honcharenko died in 1916 at the age of 84, shortly after his wife. Although his passing was noted in the local papers and inspired a couple of \u003ca href=\"https://diasporiana.org.ua/wp-content/uploads/books/17172/file.pdf\">biographies\u003c/a>, it wasn’t until 1997 that the California Historical Resources Commission designated his farm and gravesite as a state historical landmark. A cairn and plaque followed.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Today, there’s a \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11906285/ukrainians-in-california-devastated-by-russian-invasion\">sizable\u003c/a> and \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11942336/despite-a-year-of-suffering-some-silicon-valley-companies-tied-to-ukraine-remain-optimistic\">organized\u003c/a> local Ukrainian-American community in the Bay Area, some of whom gather on a mile-long hike every year to \u003ca href=\"https://ohp.parks.ca.gov/ListedResources/Detail/1025\">\u003cem>Ukraina\u003c/em>\u003c/a> to honor Honcharenko’s memory. They sing in Ukrainian and offer prayers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12057938\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/09/250927-UKRAINIANFARM01016_TV-KQED.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12057938\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/09/250927-UKRAINIANFARM01016_TV-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/09/250927-UKRAINIANFARM01016_TV-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/09/250927-UKRAINIANFARM01016_TV-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/09/250927-UKRAINIANFARM01016_TV-KQED-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Taras Turiv’s (left) daughter, Victoria (right), wears a Ukrainian flag at the burial site where Ukrainian patriot and exiled orthodox priest Agapius Honcharenko and his wife Albina are buried at Garin Regional Park in Hayward on Sept. 27, 2025. \u003ccite>(Tâm Vũ/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Software engineer Alla Kashaba was among the 20 or so in attendance the last time. She lives in Los Altos now, but comes originally from Kharkiv, in eastern Ukraine. “He was [a] very interesting person, and I hope someday, someone will make an interesting movie about him, like, adventure movie,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This whole story was news to Bay Curious question asker Tony Divito.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I think we’re incredibly fortunate and lucky to have him as part of Bay Area history,” Divito said. “It goes with our history of allowing refuge, of allowing people from desperate situations to come here and thrive here and contribute to our society, our community,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>KQED’s \u003c/em>\u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/author/gglueck\">\u003cem>Gabriela Glueck\u003c/em>\u003c/a>\u003cem> contributed reporting to this story.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[baycuriousquestion]\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2 id=\"episode-transcript\">Episode Transcript\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>We start today’s episode in Garin Regional Park – high in the hills overlooking Hayward. If you drive over this way, you might pass by an intriguing sign. That’s what happened to Tony Divito of San Mateo.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Tony Divito: \u003c/strong>I saw a sign for a Ukrainian farm in Hayward. I just wanted to know the backstory.\u003cbr>\n\u003cstrong>\u003cbr>\nOlivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>Deep in the park is California registered historical landmark #1025.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>VOICE: “Ukraina” is the site of the farm and burial place of the Ukrainian patriot and exiled orthodox priest Agapius Honcharenko (1832-1916) and his wife Albina.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Olivia Allen-Price: It’s a serene setting now, but the life of this guy – Agapius Honcharenko – was anything but. He spent much of his life fleeing Russian forces, traveling the globe and stirring up revolutionary inklings in his wake. Not exactly the image you might expect from an orthodox priest. Today on the show, we’ll delve into what made Honcharenko so notable that more than 100 years after his death, he’s still celebrated by local communities. Buckle up, it’s a wild ride! I’m Olivia Allen-Price. You’re listening to Bay Curious.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Sponsor Message\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>In the 19th century, all sorts of curious characters washed up on California’s shores, looking for fortune, a fresh start, or in the case of Father Agapius Honcharenko … a safe place to hide. KQED’s Rachael Myrow found a group of people who gather every year to honor him. She went to find out why…\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Singing in Ukrainian\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>The mood was contemplative, even somber, at the 9th annual Park Ukraina Hike and Panahdya — a memorial service for Honcharenko. Representatives from local Ukrainian churches hiked a mile to offer prayers over the grave of a remarkable man who established a farm here on this hilltop.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Man reading a prayer in Ukrainian\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>Software engineer, Alla Kashaba was among the 20 or so in attendance. She lives in Los Altos now, but comes originally from Karghiv, in eastern Ukraine.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Alla Kashaba: \u003c/strong>He was very interesting person, and I hope someday someone will make an interesting movie about him, like, adventure movie. All about how he hide from Russian forces? I don’t know how to translate this. All across the globe. So he was running from them in London, in Egypt, in Jerusalem, and ended up in America.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>Intriguing, no?? Let’s step back in time to understand what exactly this man was running from. Born Andrii Humnytsky in what is now central Ukraine in 1832, this guy was destined to become an Orthodox priest like his father. He certainly caught the eye of the highest-ranking church leader in Ukraine at the time, a man named Metropolitan Philaret.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Jars Balan: \u003c/strong>The Metropolitan of the Orthodox Church in Ukraine at that time, Metropolitan Philaret, saw that this guy was smart and capable, and made him his personal assistant.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>That’s Jars Balan, a researcher at the Institute of Ukrainian Studies at the University of Alberta. He’s written the definitive research paper on our man Humnytsky, and he spoke at the unveiling of that plaque in Hayward. Balan says, from childhood, Humnytsky felt a fierce pride in his Ukrainian ancestry and his Christian spirituality. He took the monastic name Agapius, derived from the Greek word \u003cem>agape\u003c/em>, meaning selfless love, and pretty much from the start, his politics leaned progressive.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Jars Balan: \u003c/strong>Because he got to travel around with the Metropolitan, he visited a lot of communities, and he was appalled by the poverty in these villages. This is still a time of serfdom, and the church even had serfs, and he found that appalling.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>The word SLAV is where English speakers get the word slave, because Slavs became synonymous with enslavement in the Middle Ages. A serf, for those of you not up on your Eastern European history, is an agricultural laborer bound to work on their lord’s estate. Humnytsky hated the practice.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Jars Balan: \u003c/strong>In fact, when he was [in] his first level of ordination, and he gave his ordination sermon, he called on the church to melt down all the gold and precious jewels, all the golden precious metals, and use the money to feed, to help the poor.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>Sounds Christian in the OG sense, but this talk did not go over well in mid-19th-century Ukraine. Still, Humnytsky would not cool his revolutionary jets. He got acquainted with – and radicalized by – locals who, decades before, were involved in a failed attempt to overthrow the czar, the emperor of Russia.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Humnytsky’s boss, the Metropolitan, saw trouble brewing, so he sent him out of the country. Because Ukraine was part of Russia at the time, he sent Humnytsky to serve in the chapel of the Imperial Russian Consulate in Greece. But there, too, Humnytsky fell in with like-minded revolutionaries. He started writing for a dissident journal called \u003cem>Kolokol\u003c/em>. In English, \u003cem>The Bell\u003c/em>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>After publishing searing articles calling for the emancipation of serfs and criticizing the Orthodox Church’s support for Tsarist autocracy, Humnytsky was arrested and imprisoned in the hold of the Russian warship, which set sail for what is now Istanbul.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Jars Balan: \u003c/strong>He managed to arrange an escape when they were holding him in Istanbul. He had an aunt who was in Moscow. She had some connections, managed to pull a few strings, maybe pay a few bribes.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>In his memoirs written decades later, the dissident priest recalled his optimism as a young man:\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Voice actor reading from Humnytsky’s memoirs: \u003c/strong>“I escaped for an eternal glory, to be a Kozak in the free world.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>Things didn’t quite pan out that way.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>In point of fact, this episode was just the start of a life on the run from Russian justice. Repeatedly over the years that followed, he’d pop up in a new location, work all sorts of odd hustles, and then the Russians would catch up with him. For instance, he had a facility with languages, so in London, he was a Russian language tutor to Greeks, and a specialist in old coins at the British Museum.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Jars Balan: \u003c/strong>How he picked up the specialty, I’m not sure, but I said he was a very bright guy and interested in history and archeology and theology and all kinds of things.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>It’s around this time that Humnytsky began using “Honcharenko” as his nom de plume. And – I mean, you can’t make this stuff up, this guy was extraordinarily bright – he picked up a craft – typesetting – that would come in handy later in his life.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Jars Balan:\u003c/strong> …in a printer shop and learned how to print. He translated a rare sort of, I think it was a 15th century book called Stoflau // calling for reforms in the Orthodox Church.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>Troublemaker, right? And remember, everywhere Humnytsky goes, he makes friends with anarchists, dissidents and revolutionaries. But he never lost his passion for spirituality. In fact, he returned to Greece for additional professional training.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Sound of monks chanting\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>…on a remote peninsula in the northeast. It’s home to the largest monastic community in the world, a UNESCO World Heritage Site today, and an excellent place to hide from the Russians.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This meant Humnytsky was now able to lead prayers, conduct marriages and baptisms, and otherwise tend to lay people’s spiritual needs.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Humnytsky bounced around for years. Jerusalem, the mountains of Lebanon, Cairo, where he survived a knifing paid for by the local Russian consulate.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Not long after, he decided to make a break for the New World, quite likely because he wanted to put as much space as he could between himself and the Russians. In 1865, in his early thirties, he landed in Boston, headed to New York, then New Orleans. But even on this side of the Atlantic, local Russians would eventually figure out Father Agapius was not actually a Greek with remarkably good command of Russian.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Around this time, Andrii Humnytsky changed his name – not just his nom de plum – to Agapius, or Ahapi, Honcharenko, to avoid detection from the Russians.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Also, while in New York, he married the daughter of one of the Italian radicals he met in the U.S., a young school teacher named Albina Citi.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Jars Balan: \u003c/strong>Not to the liking, particularly of her family.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>Her deeply anti-religious family was put off by this…\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Jars Balan: \u003c/strong>… bearded orthodox priest in wearing cassocks and things. But they were in love, and they wanted to go to the West Coast.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>So, in his mid-30s, Honcharenko landed in San Francisco with his wife, Albina. Remember how he learned about printing in London? He bought a set of Cyrillic fonts and launched the \u003cem>Alaska Herald\u003c/em> — with a Ukrainian-language supplement. That was one of the very first Ukrainian publications in North America, and a must-read for Ukrainian expats from New York to Siberia. A must-read for a lot of Russian expats, too.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Jars Balan: \u003c/strong>He was successful in getting the paper going. He got funding from the American government initially.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>Here’s an excerpt of an issue celebrating the publication’s second year:\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Voice reading from newspaper article: \u003c/strong>From the day of its birth it assumed a certain attitude, and it has unflinchingly maintained its position and consistency during these two years. It has struggled hard and bitterly because it was on the side of right and justice, and they who champion the oppressed seldom find their work either cheerful or remunerative.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>OK, so Honcharenko could get a little strident and self-aggrandizing…\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Voice reading from newspaper article: \u003c/strong>Of course, it has encountered severe hostility at the hands of those whom it has exposed; of course, it has made enemies for itself by the score.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>The problem for Honcharenko was that he was a critic of imperial malfeasance wherever he saw it, and eventually, he bit the hand that fed him, none other than the U.S. government, a primary backer of the Alaska Herald.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Jars Balan: \u003c/strong>Because the administration that the Americans set up had problems with corruption. He was critical of the way the American administration treated Native people. He had some environmental concerns. When he became critical of what was going on in Alaska, they pulled the funding.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>Meanwhile, the Russian Orthodox Church relocated its U.S. base of operations from Sitka in Alaska to San Francisco in California. And it came to their attention that a renegade priest was holding services in the city. And that’s when the couple decided to decamp for Alameda County.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>Honcharenko sold his printing press, bought a 40-acre farm in the hills above Hayward, named the place “Ukraina,” and settled into a relatively calmer life for the next 40-odd years. He led weekly Orthodox church services on the farm for local and visiting Slavic immigrants, conducted baptisms, and weddings. The couple also gardened. They sent numerous samples of plants and vegetables to the editors of the \u003cem>California Horticulturalist and Floral Magazine\u003c/em>, who wrote back to praise the “monster squash,” and “some of the finest sugar table corn and nutmeg melons we have ever tasted.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Jars Balan: \u003c/strong>His life was amazing. He was eccentric, he was quirky. He had strange ideas about some things; there’s no doubt. But when you look at the trajectory of his life, it’s an amazing story.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>He continued to publish articles and even a memoir in 1894. His homestead became a stopping place for fellow countrymen passing through. For half a minute, a small group of dreamers tried a utopian colony on his land. The venture failed, but it burnished Honcharenko’s reputation and ensured his lasting memory in the Ukrainian diaspora.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Jars Balan: \u003c/strong>There are stories that say, no, no, he exaggerated or that he made up stories about his life and everything like that. He might have exaggerated certain things, but there are a lot of things that my research has shown actually were based in fact.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>The last years were hard. Their daughter died when she was just ten years old. The subsistence farming wasn’t enough to subsist on. But they’d given so much to so many over the decades, a lot of locals returned the favor.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Jars Balan: \u003c/strong>They were very poor at the end, and really dependent on the charity of ranchers in the surrounding community who took an interest in him and helped the two of them out in their last years. So his life wasn’t any easy life.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>Honcharenko died at the age of 84 in 1916, a little over a year after his wife. His death was front-page news in several papers, and his life inspired a couple of biographies, but it wasn’t until 1997 that the California Historical Resources Commission designated his ranch and gravesite a state historical landmark, and a couple years later, a cairn and plaque honoring Honcharenko were unveiled there.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sounds from the celebration: \u003c/strong>Odyn, dva, tray. Slava Ukraini! Slava Ukraini! Hey, I want to hear it again! Slava Ukraini! Slava Ukraini! OK, that’s better.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>Back at Garin Regional Park, the group of Ukrainian-Americans we met at the start of this story takes a group photo, with the Ukrainian national salute that translates to “Glory to Ukraine!” This bucolic hilltop with its historic marker and park panels tells the broad arc: émigré priest, dissident publisher, gentleman farmer. Ukrainians here and abroad remember, but what about the rest of us? This whole story is certainly news to our question-asker, Tony.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Tony Divito: \u003c/strong>I think we’re incredibly fortunate and lucky to have him as part of Bay Area history. It goes with our history of allowing refuge, of allowing people from desperate situations to come here and thrive here and contribute to our community.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>His story was just, like, epic. Right? Like it’s, you know…\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Tony Divito: \u003c/strong>It deserves, you know, a series. Like a television mini-series or an audiobook of some sort.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>Hit me up for the writers’ room, guys!\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>That was KQED’s Rachael Myrow. Special thanks to Gabriela Glueck, who literally went the extra mile up that hill to help us report this story, and to Dan Brekke, who read Honcharenko’s archival writings.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Tony Divito sent in today’s question, and I want you to be like Tony! Head to \u003ca href=\"http://baycurious.org\">BayCurious.org\u003c/a> to submit a question you’ve been wondering about. We are always on the lookout for great questions and yours could be what we tackle on next! Again, head to \u003ca href=\"http://baycuious.org\">BayCurious.org\u003c/a> to ask.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Bay Curious is made in San Francisco at member-supported KQED.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Our show is produced by Katrina Schwartz, Christopher Beale and me, Olivia Allen-Price.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Extra support from Maha Sanad, Katie Sprenger, Jen Chien, Ethan Toven-Lindsey, Dan Brekke and everyone on team KQED.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Some members of the KQED podcast team are represented by the Screen Actors Guild, American Federation of Television and Radio Artists. San Francisco Northern California Local.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>I’m Olivia Allen-Price. See ya next time.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"#episode-transcript\">\u003ci>View the full episode transcript.\u003c/i>\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s hard not to feel glum reading the \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/12070573/a-generation-orphaned-by-war-ukrainian-children-grow-up-amid-loss-and-recovery\">news headlines from Ukraine\u003c/a> these days, even if you’re not Ukrainian or Ukrainian American.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But at the same time, the conflict can feel far away. And yet, in the late 19th century, the Bay Area was home to a Ukrainian man who was exactly the type of revolutionary dissident Russia wanted to silence.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>There’s a historical marker commemorating him in, of all places, \u003ca href=\"https://www.ebparks.org/sites/default/files/garin_honcharenkos_santuary.pdf\">Garin Regional Park\u003c/a>. Tony Divito of San Mateo passed a road sign nearby on his commute, calling attention to that marker and wondered.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I just wanted to know the backstory,” he told Bay Curious.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The answer leads to a man of many disparate layers; a devout Orthodox priest, a relentless dissident and outlaw, a groundbreaking publisher, and subsistence farmer. The life of Agapius Honcharenko reads like an epic thriller, albeit one that ends improbably on a quiet hilltop farm tucked high in the Hayward Hills. But let’s start at the very beginning.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>\u003cstrong>A keen intellect and empathetic soul\u003c/strong>\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>The man who came to be known in the Bay Area as Agapius Honcharenko was born Andrii Humnytsky in 1832. The son of an Orthodox priest, he displayed a keen intellect at a young age and caught the attention of the highest-ranking church official in Ukraine at the time, becoming his personal assistant. As a consequence, young Humnytsky bore witness to the hardships endured by peasants and serfs, agricultural laborers bound to their lords’ estates. The very word “slave” comes from the word “Slav.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“He was appalled by the poverty in these villages,” said Jars Balan, a researcher at the Canadian Institute of Ukrainian Studies at the University of Alberta\u003cstrong>. \u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12057937\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/09/250927-UKRAINIANFARM01005_TV-KQED.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12057937\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/09/250927-UKRAINIANFARM01005_TV-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/09/250927-UKRAINIANFARM01005_TV-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/09/250927-UKRAINIANFARM01005_TV-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/09/250927-UKRAINIANFARM01005_TV-KQED-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Father Oleg Kepeshchuk of the Greek Catholic Church of the Immaculate Conception video calls a friend to show them the view of the burial site where Ukrainian patriot and exiled orthodox priest Agapius Honcharenko and his wife Albina are buried at Garin Regional Park in Hayward on Sept. 27, 2025. \u003ccite>(Tâm Vũ/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>When Humnytsky delivered his ordination sermon, Balan said, he called on the church to melt down all the gold and precious jewels, “and use the money to feed, to help the poor.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This kind of talk did not go over well in 19th-century Ukraine. Still, Humnytsky would not cool his revolutionary jets. He got acquainted with — and radicalized by — fellow countrymen who, decades before, were involved in a failed attempt to overthrow the czar, the emperor of Russia.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Humnytsky’s boss saw trouble brewing, so he sent him out of the country. Because Ukraine was part of Russia at the time, he sent Humnytsky to serve in the chapel of the Imperial Russian Consulate in Greece.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But there, too, Humnytsky fell in with like-minded revolutionaries. He started writing for a dissident journal called \u003cem>Kolokol\u003c/em>, in English, \u003cem>The Bell\u003c/em>.\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>After publishing searing articles calling for the emancipation of serfs and criticizing the Orthodox Church’s support for tsarist autocracy, Humnytsky was arrested.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Russian authorities imprisoned him in the hold of a warship, which set sail for what is now Istanbul. According to his later recollections, Humnytsky arranged a daring escape with the help of his family back in Moscow. He would recall years later, “I escaped for an eternal glory, to be a Kozak in the free world.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This episode marked the start of a life on the run from Russian justice. Repeatedly over the years that followed, Humnytsky would pop up in a new location, work all sorts of odd hustles, make friends with anarchists, dissidents, and revolutionaries, and then the Russians would catch up with him.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>At one point, he returned to Greece for additional professional spiritual training on the remote peninsula of Mount Athos, home to the world’s largest monastic community. It’s a UNESCO World Heritage Site today. Back then, it was an excellent place to hide from the Russians. He had a facility with languages, so in London, he was a Russian language tutor to Greeks, and a specialist in old coins at the British Museum. In Cairo, he organized sightseeing tours — and survived a knifing paid for by the local Russian consulate.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>By his early thirties, Humnytsky decided to try his luck on the other side of the Atlantic Ocean.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>\u003cstrong>A new life in America\u003c/strong>\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>In 1865, he landed in Boston, headed to New York, then New Orleans. Around this time, Andrii Humnytsky changed his name to Agapius, or Ahapi, Honcharenko, to seem more Greek and avoid detection from the Russians. But even in the United States, wherever he went, local Russians eventually figured out Father Agapius was not actually a Greek with remarkably good command of Russian. Balan, who wrote a \u003ca href=\"https://ia800309.us.archive.org/25/items/journalofukraini3334cana/journalofukraini3334cana.pdf\">well-regarded study\u003c/a> of Honcharenko’s life, calls him a “renegade monastic.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>While in New York, Honcharenko married the daughter of one of the Italian radicals he met, a young school teacher named Albina Citi. The match was not to the liking of her anti-religious family, Balan said, “but they were in love, and they wanted to go to the West Coast.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12071447\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 1289px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/01/E6B7271A-ABCD-48CC-AE56-C2102783C328_1_201_a.jpeg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12071447\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/01/E6B7271A-ABCD-48CC-AE56-C2102783C328_1_201_a.jpeg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1289\" height=\"2090\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/01/E6B7271A-ABCD-48CC-AE56-C2102783C328_1_201_a.jpeg 1289w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/01/E6B7271A-ABCD-48CC-AE56-C2102783C328_1_201_a-160x259.jpeg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/01/E6B7271A-ABCD-48CC-AE56-C2102783C328_1_201_a-947x1536.jpeg 947w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/01/E6B7271A-ABCD-48CC-AE56-C2102783C328_1_201_a-1263x2048.jpeg 1263w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1289px) 100vw, 1289px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">One of the photos used to illustrate the book Ahapius Honcharenko “Alaska Man,” by Wasyl Luciw, Ph.D. And Theodore Luciw, M. A., published in Toronto by Slavia Library in 1963. \u003ccite>(Courtesy Jars Balan)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>And so it was that Honcharenko arrived in San Francisco in the 1860s, bringing with him typesetting skills he had honed in London. He purchased Cyrillic fonts and launched the \u003ca href=\"https://diasporiana.org.ua/wp-content/uploads/books/13652/file.pdf\">\u003cem>Alaska Herald\u003c/em>\u003c/a>, which included a Ukrainian-language supplement.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The paper became a vital resource for Ukrainian and Russian émigrés alike, providing news to people living far from home. But Honcharenko couldn’t resist publishing some biting commentary as well. Here’s an excerpt of an issue celebrating the publication’s second year:\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>From the day of its birth it assumed a certain attitude, and it has unflinchingly maintained its position and consistency during these two years. It has struggled hard and bitterly because it was on the side of right and justice, and they who champion the oppressed seldom find their work either cheerful or remunerative.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The problem for Honcharenko was that he was a critic of imperial malfeasance wherever he saw it. Eventually, he bit the hand that fed him, which in this case was none other than the U.S. government, a primary backer of the \u003cem>Alaska Herald\u003c/em>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Because the administration that the Americans set up had problems with corruption,” Balan explained. “[Honcharenko] was critical of the way the American administration treated Native people. He had some environmental concerns. When he became critical of what was going on in Alaska, they pulled the funding.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Meanwhile, the Russian Orthodox Church relocated its U.S. base of operations from Sitka in Alaska to San Francisco in California. It came to their attention that a renegade priest was holding services in the city, and that’s when Honcharenko and his wife decided to decamp for Alameda County.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>\u003cstrong>A quieter life\u003c/strong>\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Honcharenko sold his printing press, bought a 40-acre farm in the hills above \u003ca href=\"https://www.haywardareahistory.org/agapius-honcharenko\">Hayward\u003c/a>, named the place “Ukraina,” and settled into a relatively calm life for the next 40-odd years. He led weekly Orthodox church services on the farm for local and visiting Slavic immigrants, conducted baptisms and weddings. His homestead became a small but significant hub for Ukrainian-American life on the West Coast.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The last years of his life were hard. The couple’s daughter died when she was just ten years old. The subsistence farm didn’t produce enough food to live on. However, Agapius and Albina Hocharenko had given so much to so many over the decades that when they were in need, a lot of locals returned the favor.\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>Still, Honcharenko continued to write, publish, and mentor émigrés. His farm briefly hosted a utopian colony, a dream of community that ultimately failed, but further cemented his reputation among the diaspora.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The couple also gardened. They sent numerous samples of plants and vegetables to the editors of the \u003cem>California Horticulturalist and Floral Magazine\u003c/em>, who wrote back to praise the “monster squash,” and “some of the finest sugar table corn and nutmeg melons we have ever tasted.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“His life was amazing,” Balan said. “He was eccentric, he was quirky. He had strange ideas about some things; there’s no doubt. But when you look at the trajectory of his life, it’s an amazing story.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Honcharenko died in 1916 at the age of 84, shortly after his wife. Although his passing was noted in the local papers and inspired a couple of \u003ca href=\"https://diasporiana.org.ua/wp-content/uploads/books/17172/file.pdf\">biographies\u003c/a>, it wasn’t until 1997 that the California Historical Resources Commission designated his farm and gravesite as a state historical landmark. A cairn and plaque followed.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Today, there’s a \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11906285/ukrainians-in-california-devastated-by-russian-invasion\">sizable\u003c/a> and \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11942336/despite-a-year-of-suffering-some-silicon-valley-companies-tied-to-ukraine-remain-optimistic\">organized\u003c/a> local Ukrainian-American community in the Bay Area, some of whom gather on a mile-long hike every year to \u003ca href=\"https://ohp.parks.ca.gov/ListedResources/Detail/1025\">\u003cem>Ukraina\u003c/em>\u003c/a> to honor Honcharenko’s memory. They sing in Ukrainian and offer prayers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12057938\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/09/250927-UKRAINIANFARM01016_TV-KQED.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12057938\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/09/250927-UKRAINIANFARM01016_TV-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/09/250927-UKRAINIANFARM01016_TV-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/09/250927-UKRAINIANFARM01016_TV-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/09/250927-UKRAINIANFARM01016_TV-KQED-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Taras Turiv’s (left) daughter, Victoria (right), wears a Ukrainian flag at the burial site where Ukrainian patriot and exiled orthodox priest Agapius Honcharenko and his wife Albina are buried at Garin Regional Park in Hayward on Sept. 27, 2025. \u003ccite>(Tâm Vũ/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Software engineer Alla Kashaba was among the 20 or so in attendance the last time. She lives in Los Altos now, but comes originally from Kharkiv, in eastern Ukraine. “He was [a] very interesting person, and I hope someday, someone will make an interesting movie about him, like, adventure movie,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This whole story was news to Bay Curious question asker Tony Divito.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I think we’re incredibly fortunate and lucky to have him as part of Bay Area history,” Divito said. “It goes with our history of allowing refuge, of allowing people from desperate situations to come here and thrive here and contribute to our society, our community,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>KQED’s \u003c/em>\u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/author/gglueck\">\u003cem>Gabriela Glueck\u003c/em>\u003c/a>\u003cem> contributed reporting to this story.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2 id=\"episode-transcript\">Episode Transcript\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>We start today’s episode in Garin Regional Park – high in the hills overlooking Hayward. If you drive over this way, you might pass by an intriguing sign. That’s what happened to Tony Divito of San Mateo.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Tony Divito: \u003c/strong>I saw a sign for a Ukrainian farm in Hayward. I just wanted to know the backstory.\u003cbr>\n\u003cstrong>\u003cbr>\nOlivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>Deep in the park is California registered historical landmark #1025.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>VOICE: “Ukraina” is the site of the farm and burial place of the Ukrainian patriot and exiled orthodox priest Agapius Honcharenko (1832-1916) and his wife Albina.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Olivia Allen-Price: It’s a serene setting now, but the life of this guy – Agapius Honcharenko – was anything but. He spent much of his life fleeing Russian forces, traveling the globe and stirring up revolutionary inklings in his wake. Not exactly the image you might expect from an orthodox priest. Today on the show, we’ll delve into what made Honcharenko so notable that more than 100 years after his death, he’s still celebrated by local communities. Buckle up, it’s a wild ride! I’m Olivia Allen-Price. You’re listening to Bay Curious.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Sponsor Message\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>In the 19th century, all sorts of curious characters washed up on California’s shores, looking for fortune, a fresh start, or in the case of Father Agapius Honcharenko … a safe place to hide. KQED’s Rachael Myrow found a group of people who gather every year to honor him. She went to find out why…\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Singing in Ukrainian\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>The mood was contemplative, even somber, at the 9th annual Park Ukraina Hike and Panahdya — a memorial service for Honcharenko. Representatives from local Ukrainian churches hiked a mile to offer prayers over the grave of a remarkable man who established a farm here on this hilltop.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Man reading a prayer in Ukrainian\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>Software engineer, Alla Kashaba was among the 20 or so in attendance. She lives in Los Altos now, but comes originally from Karghiv, in eastern Ukraine.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Alla Kashaba: \u003c/strong>He was very interesting person, and I hope someday someone will make an interesting movie about him, like, adventure movie. All about how he hide from Russian forces? I don’t know how to translate this. All across the globe. So he was running from them in London, in Egypt, in Jerusalem, and ended up in America.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>Intriguing, no?? Let’s step back in time to understand what exactly this man was running from. Born Andrii Humnytsky in what is now central Ukraine in 1832, this guy was destined to become an Orthodox priest like his father. He certainly caught the eye of the highest-ranking church leader in Ukraine at the time, a man named Metropolitan Philaret.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Jars Balan: \u003c/strong>The Metropolitan of the Orthodox Church in Ukraine at that time, Metropolitan Philaret, saw that this guy was smart and capable, and made him his personal assistant.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>That’s Jars Balan, a researcher at the Institute of Ukrainian Studies at the University of Alberta. He’s written the definitive research paper on our man Humnytsky, and he spoke at the unveiling of that plaque in Hayward. Balan says, from childhood, Humnytsky felt a fierce pride in his Ukrainian ancestry and his Christian spirituality. He took the monastic name Agapius, derived from the Greek word \u003cem>agape\u003c/em>, meaning selfless love, and pretty much from the start, his politics leaned progressive.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Jars Balan: \u003c/strong>Because he got to travel around with the Metropolitan, he visited a lot of communities, and he was appalled by the poverty in these villages. This is still a time of serfdom, and the church even had serfs, and he found that appalling.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>The word SLAV is where English speakers get the word slave, because Slavs became synonymous with enslavement in the Middle Ages. A serf, for those of you not up on your Eastern European history, is an agricultural laborer bound to work on their lord’s estate. Humnytsky hated the practice.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Jars Balan: \u003c/strong>In fact, when he was [in] his first level of ordination, and he gave his ordination sermon, he called on the church to melt down all the gold and precious jewels, all the golden precious metals, and use the money to feed, to help the poor.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>Sounds Christian in the OG sense, but this talk did not go over well in mid-19th-century Ukraine. Still, Humnytsky would not cool his revolutionary jets. He got acquainted with – and radicalized by – locals who, decades before, were involved in a failed attempt to overthrow the czar, the emperor of Russia.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Humnytsky’s boss, the Metropolitan, saw trouble brewing, so he sent him out of the country. Because Ukraine was part of Russia at the time, he sent Humnytsky to serve in the chapel of the Imperial Russian Consulate in Greece. But there, too, Humnytsky fell in with like-minded revolutionaries. He started writing for a dissident journal called \u003cem>Kolokol\u003c/em>. In English, \u003cem>The Bell\u003c/em>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>After publishing searing articles calling for the emancipation of serfs and criticizing the Orthodox Church’s support for Tsarist autocracy, Humnytsky was arrested and imprisoned in the hold of the Russian warship, which set sail for what is now Istanbul.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Jars Balan: \u003c/strong>He managed to arrange an escape when they were holding him in Istanbul. He had an aunt who was in Moscow. She had some connections, managed to pull a few strings, maybe pay a few bribes.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>In his memoirs written decades later, the dissident priest recalled his optimism as a young man:\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Voice actor reading from Humnytsky’s memoirs: \u003c/strong>“I escaped for an eternal glory, to be a Kozak in the free world.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>Things didn’t quite pan out that way.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>In point of fact, this episode was just the start of a life on the run from Russian justice. Repeatedly over the years that followed, he’d pop up in a new location, work all sorts of odd hustles, and then the Russians would catch up with him. For instance, he had a facility with languages, so in London, he was a Russian language tutor to Greeks, and a specialist in old coins at the British Museum.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Jars Balan: \u003c/strong>How he picked up the specialty, I’m not sure, but I said he was a very bright guy and interested in history and archeology and theology and all kinds of things.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>It’s around this time that Humnytsky began using “Honcharenko” as his nom de plume. And – I mean, you can’t make this stuff up, this guy was extraordinarily bright – he picked up a craft – typesetting – that would come in handy later in his life.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Jars Balan:\u003c/strong> …in a printer shop and learned how to print. He translated a rare sort of, I think it was a 15th century book called Stoflau // calling for reforms in the Orthodox Church.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>Troublemaker, right? And remember, everywhere Humnytsky goes, he makes friends with anarchists, dissidents and revolutionaries. But he never lost his passion for spirituality. In fact, he returned to Greece for additional professional training.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Sound of monks chanting\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>…on a remote peninsula in the northeast. It’s home to the largest monastic community in the world, a UNESCO World Heritage Site today, and an excellent place to hide from the Russians.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This meant Humnytsky was now able to lead prayers, conduct marriages and baptisms, and otherwise tend to lay people’s spiritual needs.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Humnytsky bounced around for years. Jerusalem, the mountains of Lebanon, Cairo, where he survived a knifing paid for by the local Russian consulate.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Not long after, he decided to make a break for the New World, quite likely because he wanted to put as much space as he could between himself and the Russians. In 1865, in his early thirties, he landed in Boston, headed to New York, then New Orleans. But even on this side of the Atlantic, local Russians would eventually figure out Father Agapius was not actually a Greek with remarkably good command of Russian.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Around this time, Andrii Humnytsky changed his name – not just his nom de plum – to Agapius, or Ahapi, Honcharenko, to avoid detection from the Russians.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Also, while in New York, he married the daughter of one of the Italian radicals he met in the U.S., a young school teacher named Albina Citi.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Jars Balan: \u003c/strong>Not to the liking, particularly of her family.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>Her deeply anti-religious family was put off by this…\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Jars Balan: \u003c/strong>… bearded orthodox priest in wearing cassocks and things. But they were in love, and they wanted to go to the West Coast.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>So, in his mid-30s, Honcharenko landed in San Francisco with his wife, Albina. Remember how he learned about printing in London? He bought a set of Cyrillic fonts and launched the \u003cem>Alaska Herald\u003c/em> — with a Ukrainian-language supplement. That was one of the very first Ukrainian publications in North America, and a must-read for Ukrainian expats from New York to Siberia. A must-read for a lot of Russian expats, too.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Jars Balan: \u003c/strong>He was successful in getting the paper going. He got funding from the American government initially.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>Here’s an excerpt of an issue celebrating the publication’s second year:\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Voice reading from newspaper article: \u003c/strong>From the day of its birth it assumed a certain attitude, and it has unflinchingly maintained its position and consistency during these two years. It has struggled hard and bitterly because it was on the side of right and justice, and they who champion the oppressed seldom find their work either cheerful or remunerative.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>OK, so Honcharenko could get a little strident and self-aggrandizing…\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Voice reading from newspaper article: \u003c/strong>Of course, it has encountered severe hostility at the hands of those whom it has exposed; of course, it has made enemies for itself by the score.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>The problem for Honcharenko was that he was a critic of imperial malfeasance wherever he saw it, and eventually, he bit the hand that fed him, none other than the U.S. government, a primary backer of the Alaska Herald.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Jars Balan: \u003c/strong>Because the administration that the Americans set up had problems with corruption. He was critical of the way the American administration treated Native people. He had some environmental concerns. When he became critical of what was going on in Alaska, they pulled the funding.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>Meanwhile, the Russian Orthodox Church relocated its U.S. base of operations from Sitka in Alaska to San Francisco in California. And it came to their attention that a renegade priest was holding services in the city. And that’s when the couple decided to decamp for Alameda County.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>Honcharenko sold his printing press, bought a 40-acre farm in the hills above Hayward, named the place “Ukraina,” and settled into a relatively calmer life for the next 40-odd years. He led weekly Orthodox church services on the farm for local and visiting Slavic immigrants, conducted baptisms, and weddings. The couple also gardened. They sent numerous samples of plants and vegetables to the editors of the \u003cem>California Horticulturalist and Floral Magazine\u003c/em>, who wrote back to praise the “monster squash,” and “some of the finest sugar table corn and nutmeg melons we have ever tasted.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Jars Balan: \u003c/strong>His life was amazing. He was eccentric, he was quirky. He had strange ideas about some things; there’s no doubt. But when you look at the trajectory of his life, it’s an amazing story.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>He continued to publish articles and even a memoir in 1894. His homestead became a stopping place for fellow countrymen passing through. For half a minute, a small group of dreamers tried a utopian colony on his land. The venture failed, but it burnished Honcharenko’s reputation and ensured his lasting memory in the Ukrainian diaspora.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Jars Balan: \u003c/strong>There are stories that say, no, no, he exaggerated or that he made up stories about his life and everything like that. He might have exaggerated certain things, but there are a lot of things that my research has shown actually were based in fact.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>The last years were hard. Their daughter died when she was just ten years old. The subsistence farming wasn’t enough to subsist on. But they’d given so much to so many over the decades, a lot of locals returned the favor.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Jars Balan: \u003c/strong>They were very poor at the end, and really dependent on the charity of ranchers in the surrounding community who took an interest in him and helped the two of them out in their last years. So his life wasn’t any easy life.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>Honcharenko died at the age of 84 in 1916, a little over a year after his wife. His death was front-page news in several papers, and his life inspired a couple of biographies, but it wasn’t until 1997 that the California Historical Resources Commission designated his ranch and gravesite a state historical landmark, and a couple years later, a cairn and plaque honoring Honcharenko were unveiled there.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sounds from the celebration: \u003c/strong>Odyn, dva, tray. Slava Ukraini! Slava Ukraini! Hey, I want to hear it again! Slava Ukraini! Slava Ukraini! OK, that’s better.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>Back at Garin Regional Park, the group of Ukrainian-Americans we met at the start of this story takes a group photo, with the Ukrainian national salute that translates to “Glory to Ukraine!” This bucolic hilltop with its historic marker and park panels tells the broad arc: émigré priest, dissident publisher, gentleman farmer. Ukrainians here and abroad remember, but what about the rest of us? This whole story is certainly news to our question-asker, Tony.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Tony Divito: \u003c/strong>I think we’re incredibly fortunate and lucky to have him as part of Bay Area history. It goes with our history of allowing refuge, of allowing people from desperate situations to come here and thrive here and contribute to our community.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>His story was just, like, epic. Right? Like it’s, you know…\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Tony Divito: \u003c/strong>It deserves, you know, a series. Like a television mini-series or an audiobook of some sort.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Rachael Myrow: \u003c/strong>Hit me up for the writers’ room, guys!\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>That was KQED’s Rachael Myrow. Special thanks to Gabriela Glueck, who literally went the extra mile up that hill to help us report this story, and to Dan Brekke, who read Honcharenko’s archival writings.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Tony Divito sent in today’s question, and I want you to be like Tony! Head to \u003ca href=\"http://baycurious.org\">BayCurious.org\u003c/a> to submit a question you’ve been wondering about. We are always on the lookout for great questions and yours could be what we tackle on next! Again, head to \u003ca href=\"http://baycuious.org\">BayCurious.org\u003c/a> to ask.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Bay Curious is made in San Francisco at member-supported KQED.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Our show is produced by Katrina Schwartz, Christopher Beale and me, Olivia Allen-Price.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Extra support from Maha Sanad, Katie Sprenger, Jen Chien, Ethan Toven-Lindsey, Dan Brekke and everyone on team KQED.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Some members of the KQED podcast team are represented by the Screen Actors Guild, American Federation of Television and Radio Artists. San Francisco Northern California Local.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>I’m Olivia Allen-Price. See ya next time.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"#episode-transcript\">\u003ci>View the full episode transcript.\u003c/i>\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/arts/13892202/watch-saint-coltrane-a-short-film-about-the-san-francisco-church-built-on-a-love-supreme\">Saint John Coltrane \u003c/a>African Orthodox Church Global Spiritual Community begins \u003ca href=\"https://www.coltranechurch.org/\">Sunday mass\u003c/a> with the blow of a conch shell. Then the saxophone comes in, blaring the opening notes of John Coltrane’s jazz masterpiece, \u003cem>A Love Supreme\u003c/em>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A Byzantine-style portrait of Coltrane is displayed on the altar. He’s wearing a white robe and clutching his soprano saxophone, a gold halo glittering above his head.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Throughout the service, the church band alternates between saxophone, bass and drum solos in a kind of makeshift jazz concert. Later, the sermon offered by His Eminence Archbishop Franzo W. King is a mix of traditional Christian teachings and references to Coltrane. It’s a fusion that King and his wife, the Most Reverend Mother Marina King, call “Coltrane Consciousness.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Coltrane Consciousness is acknowledging that the music and the sound of John Coltrane is that anointed sound that leaped down from the throne of heaven,” King said. “We want everybody to become aware of the power of this music, of this man, that testimony.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Coltrane Church, as it’s often called, is the \u003ca href=\"https://www.sf.gov/sites/default/files/2022-09/Item%202e.%20LBR-2021-22-019%20St.%20John%20Coltrane%20Church.pdf\">oldest \u003c/a>Black jazz organization in San Francisco now. And it has taken a windy path to achieve that longevity.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>A baptism of sound\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>The Coltrane Church’s origins date back to the 1960s.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Kings had recently moved to San Francisco as a young couple in love. Upon arrival they were met with a vibrant music scene, with jazz venues dotting the city. The Fillmore District became known as “The Harlem of the West” for its abundance of Black-owned nightclubs and restaurants.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12068339\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1999px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/12/20251221_JohnColtraneChurch_December_GH-1_qed.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12068339\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/12/20251221_JohnColtraneChurch_December_GH-1_qed.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1999\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/12/20251221_JohnColtraneChurch_December_GH-1_qed.jpg 1999w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/12/20251221_JohnColtraneChurch_December_GH-1_qed-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/12/20251221_JohnColtraneChurch_December_GH-1_qed-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1999px) 100vw, 1999px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Supreme Mother Rev. Marina King sings during Sunday mass at the St. John Coltrane Church at Fort Mason in San Francisco on Dec. 21, 2025. \u003ccite>(Gustavo Hernandez/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“The music was as hip as you could get, and we were trying to be hipsters and being into this music,” King said. “You could leave your house on a Friday night and you wouldn’t have to come home until Sunday afternoon.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>On Sept. 18, 1965, the Kings celebrated their first wedding anniversary by going to see The John Coltrane Quartet at a North Beach club called The Jazz Workshop. King knew the doorman, who seated them in the front row despite them being underage.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As soon as Coltrane and his band entered the room, King said he felt the energy around him shift, “like [the band was] walking on a carpet of air.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It was immediate,” Mother Marina agreed. “You could feel the presence, that energy. And then [Coltrane] lifted his horn. We were right in front, and he pointed right at our table.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Kings said they were rendered speechless throughout Coltrane’s set, hardly touching their drinks as they were transported to a spiritual realm beyond the jazz club.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MAgJ-igwuSQ\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We were caught in a windstorm of the spirit of the Holy Ghost. It was a powerful thing,” King said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Kings call this experience their “sound baptism.” From then on, their calling would be to spread John Coltrane’s gospel.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>From fans to worshippers\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>They started out by hosting listening sessions with friends in their home. They’d cook up a pot of beans and some cornbread to share, then pour over music, interviews and liner notes from jazz greats like John Coltrane, Thelonius Monk and Charlie Parker.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>On July 17, 1967, Archbishop King was out at a jazz club when he learned that Coltrane had died. The Kings’ daughter, Pastor Wanika King-Stephens, remembers walking into the living room the next morning to find that her dad and uncle had stayed up all night listening to Coltrane’s music.[aside postID=news_11954252 hero='https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/06/062723-Wanda-Salvatto-07-RT-KQED-e1687904264135-1020x680.jpg']“They killed John,” King-Stephens recalled her father saying.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Coltrane died from liver cancer, most likely fueled by his drug and alcohol addiction in the earlier years of his fame. But Archbishop King believed Coltrane’s death symbolized the systems of racism that targeted Black men in America. This was a time of heightened tension for San Francisco’s Black population. Throughout the 1960s, the city’s so-called “\u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11825401/how-urban-renewal-decimated-the-fillmore-district-and-took-jazz-with-it\">redevelopment for urban renewal\u003c/a>” ” program targeted low-income neighborhoods with minority residents for demolition.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The redevelopment came in with the Negro removal and devastated the community,” King said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>San Francisco’s redevelopment project brought an end to the “Harlem of the West” that had once defined the Fillmore District. Jazz clubs shuttered, minority and elderly residents were forced from their homes, and the city’s Black-owned music scene was decimated.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Kings, though, were passionate that people still needed to hear this music. Motivated by an era of Black consciousness and political activity, they opened “The Yardbird Club,” a jazz club based out of their basement. The name paid homage to the jazz musician Charlie “Yardbird” Parker.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This makeshift venue functioned as a space where artists visiting San Francisco could experiment with new sounds, much like the city’s jazz clubs had once done.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But around 1969, something shifted for the Kings. It wasn’t just about saving the music or the culture anymore. It was about saving souls.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>After years of studying Coltrane, they came to believe that his music, his activism — his whole belief system — was really a declaration of faith.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12068329\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/12/20251221_JohnColtraneChurch_December_GH-6_qed.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12068329\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/12/20251221_JohnColtraneChurch_December_GH-6_qed.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/12/20251221_JohnColtraneChurch_December_GH-6_qed.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/12/20251221_JohnColtraneChurch_December_GH-6_qed-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/12/20251221_JohnColtraneChurch_December_GH-6_qed-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">His Eminence Archbishop Franzo W. King greets congregants after Sunday mass at the St. John Coltrane Church at Fort Mason in San Francisco on Dec. 21, 2025. \u003ccite>(Gustavo Hernandez/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“We hear John Coltrane saying, ‘My music is the spiritual expression of what I am, my faith, my knowledge, my being,” King-Stephens said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Kings went all in on their devotion. “The Yardbird Club” became “The Yardbird Temple.” They didn’t just revere Coltrane anymore — they worshiped him, believed him to be the second coming of Christ and cited \u003cem>A Love Supreme\u003c/em> as his most sacred text.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>A higher power\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Coltrane composed \u003cem>A Love Supreme\u003c/em> in the aftermath of heroin and alcohol addiction. Though he had risen to fame by the 1950s, Coltrane’s substance abuse made him unreliable. Miles Davis famously fired Coltrane from his band because of it. Coltrane had hit rock bottom and his music career was foundering because of it. So, he got clean — went cold turkey — and heard the voice of God.[aside postID=news_11881696 hero='https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/E-40.DeFremery-1020x682.jpg']Coltrane described this experience in the album’s liner notes: \u003cem>“During the year 1957, I experienced by the grace of God a spiritual awakening which was to lead me to a richer, fuller, more productive life. At that time, in gratitude, I humbly ask to be given the means and the privilege to make others happy through music.”\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>A Love Supreme\u003c/em>, which came out in 1965, marked a turning point in Coltrane’s career. The album was his declaration to God and an expression of his commitment to love and the divine. For 32 minutes and 47 seconds, Coltrane’s saxophone pulses and intertwines with piano and drums — a four-note bassline bedded beneath the sound. It’s played in all 12 keys, sending a \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/2000/10/23/148148986/a-love-supreme\">message\u003c/a> that you can find \u003cem>A Love Supreme\u003c/em> everywhere.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We hear the Lord speaking to us in this music,” King said. “I’ve had John Coltrane through the music call my name. So we have revelations that come through the music.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Mother Marina agreed. “Every time I hear it, there’s something new,” she said. “There’s always life there. It’s in the music. The magic is in the music.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12068328\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/12/20251221_JohnColtraneChurch_December_GH-5_qed.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12068328\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/12/20251221_JohnColtraneChurch_December_GH-5_qed.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1334\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/12/20251221_JohnColtraneChurch_December_GH-5_qed.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/12/20251221_JohnColtraneChurch_December_GH-5_qed-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/12/20251221_JohnColtraneChurch_December_GH-5_qed-1536x1025.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Rev. Marlee-I Mystic and His Eminence Archbishop Franzo W. King pause to speak with churchgoers following Sunday mass at the St. John Coltrane Church in San Francisco on Dec. 21, 2025. \u003ccite>(Gustavo Hernandez/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>The Kings say the album’s four song titles — \u003cem>Acknowledgement, Resolution, Pursuance \u003c/em>and \u003cem>Psalm\u003c/em> — offer a formula for how to reach a higher power.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The way his notes are moving and the way the sounds are connected, it’s almost like a rumble. It’s like a war. Sometimes he’s pleading your case. It’s many different feelings,” Mother Marina said.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>The 1970s: A period of transformation\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Now a religious community, the Kings surrendered themselves to Coltrane. They prayed, meditated and fasted for days at a time.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Everything was falling into place, and the Kings “felt like we were in the right place at the right time, and that the spirit of God was really heavy in this part of the world,” King said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12068333\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/12/20251221_JohnColtraneChurch_December_GH-12_qed.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12068333\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/12/20251221_JohnColtraneChurch_December_GH-12_qed.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/12/20251221_JohnColtraneChurch_December_GH-12_qed.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/12/20251221_JohnColtraneChurch_December_GH-12_qed-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/12/20251221_JohnColtraneChurch_December_GH-12_qed-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Music memorabilia adorns the space in preparation for Sunday mass at the St. John Coltrane Church at Fort Mason in San Francisco on Dec. 21, 2025. \u003ccite>(Gustavo Hernandez/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>The Black Panther Party also became supporters of the church. Its co-founder, Huey P. Newton had become a mentor to Archbishop King and encouraged him to fuse politics, culture and religion. After moving to a storefront on Divisadero Street, the church began hosting programs that mirrored The Black Panthers’ Free Breakfast Program.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>King-Stephens said the church’s free food program was “one of my [her] favorite things in the whole world.” Seven days a week, church members would prepare free vegetarian meals for hundreds of people. The lines snaked around the block.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We would go to Safeways and the supermarkets and the stuff that they would throw out, we’d take it out, put it in a tub, clean it, and serve it to the people,” King said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Kings believed that to be right with God was to be right with the people. Inspired by San Francisco’s hippie movement in the 1970s, they also hosted free yoga classes, practiced vegetarianism, and started borrowing from Eastern spirituality, led by Coltrane’s music.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“John Coltrane has an album entitled \u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GwrV0qCX1LU&list=RDGwrV0qCX1LU&start_radio=1\">\u003cem>Om\u003c/em>\u003c/a>, and we literally took that as John saying, ‘I am Om,’” Mother Marina said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>They studied the Sufi mystic, Inayat Khan, who believed music and sound to be the world’s life source, and incorporated Sanskrit chanting in their service.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We embrace the unity of religious ideas,” King said. “If you want to say that Buddha is the light, we don’t have a problem with that.”\u003cem> \u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12070432\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/01/GettyImages-74258876-scaled-e1768939107671.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12070432\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/01/GettyImages-74258876-scaled-e1768939107671.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1420\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">American jazz musician and composer Alice Coltrane in 1970. \u003ccite>(Photo by Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>In 1974, the Kings met Alice Coltrane, John’s widow. She had converted to Hinduism after her husband’s death and came to San Francisco to deepen her practice. The Kings joined her spiritual community in San Francisco, the Vedantic Center, and began worshipping her as the wife of God. They adopted Hindu names and sang backup on her early devotional \u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=759TXOUIpjQ\">records\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But in 1981, Coltrane filed a $7.5 million \u003ca href=\"https://www.nytimes.com/1981/10/24/nyregion/notes-on-people-coltrane-s-widow-sues-san-francisco-church.html\">lawsuit\u003c/a> against the Coltrane Church for copyright infringement and using her husband’s name and likeness without permission. She eventually dropped the lawsuit, but it set the Kings on a new path. The incident drew the attention of the African Orthodox Church, which wanted to expand to the West Coast. To join, the Kings had to recharacterize Coltrane from their God incarnate to a patron saint. They agreed.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Culture keepers\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>The church joined the A.O.C and became the Saint John Coltrane African Orthodox Church in 1982. Now part of an organized religious movement, the Coltrane church leaned into its status as public-facing leaders and keepers of San Francisco culture.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I think this is something people need to understand that this church has been an ambassador for this city,” King said.[aside postID=news_12059962 hero='https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/10/Jello-Biafra-of-the-Dead-Kennedys-performing-at-the-Mabuhay-Gardens-.jpg']They have traveled around the world, including to the \u003ca href=\"https://jazzajuan.com/en/\">Antibes Jazz Festival\u003c/a> in France — where Coltrane himself famously \u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lWuhPVb175Y&list=RDlWuhPVb175Y&start_radio=1\">performed\u003c/a> A Love Supreme in 1965. The Kings were joined onstage by Carlos Santana, an early supporter of the church. Several travel guides even named them a top destination when visiting San Francisco.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Kings and their church were vocal advocates on issues including environmental racism and police brutality, continuing the work that had long been part of their ethos. But the year 2000 marked yet another shift for the Coltrane Church. They were forced to leave their Divisadero storefront, the church’s home for nearly 30 years, after their rent more than \u003ca href=\"https://www.sfchronicle.com/news/article/coltrane-church-holds-last-service-at-longtime-3239485.php\">doubled\u003c/a>. They also had to end their free food program.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“That was our home,” King-Stephens said. “And then, I watched that whole community change. And I tell you, I couldn’t drive through that neighborhood without crying for a whole year.”\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Looking to the future\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>They’ve relocated a few times since then. First, to the Fillmore, where they were one of just a handful of jazz institutions left. But they were evicted from that space too, before moving to their current location out of Fort Mason’s Magic Theater.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Now, King and Mother Marina see the church as a kind of Mecca, where Coltrane disciples from around the world can worship together. At the end of Sunday mass, Archbishop King and Mother Marina asked the community for donations. They’re trying to raise money to buy a building — what they hope will be a permanent home.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12068330\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/12/20251221_JohnColtraneChurch_December_GH-8_qed.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12068330\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/12/20251221_JohnColtraneChurch_December_GH-8_qed.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/12/20251221_JohnColtraneChurch_December_GH-8_qed.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/12/20251221_JohnColtraneChurch_December_GH-8_qed-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/12/20251221_JohnColtraneChurch_December_GH-8_qed-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Rev. Marlee-I Mystic (center) closes Sunday mass in a burst of joy and laughter at the St. John Coltrane Church in San Francisco on Dec. 21, 2025. \u003ccite>(Gustavo Hernandez/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>The Kings are in their eighties and looking towards the future of the church. Their daughter plans to usher the church into its next chapter.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Since the first sound baptism in 1965, the Coltrane Church has had different names, locations and philosophies. In fact, King often said that as the seasons change, so do the needs of the people. Change, he said, is baked into the very essence of the church.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“And then at the same time, the church never changes,” King said. ”It remains constantly rooted in love and \u003cem>A Love Supreme\u003c/em>.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[baycuriousquestion]\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2 id=\"episode-transcript\">Episode Transcript\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price:\u003c/strong> John Coltrane on the saxophone is like nothing else.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Sound of Coltrane playing\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>He grew up in North Carolina in the 1930s…where the church was a big part of his life. Both of his grandfathers were ministers. But his calling was different. After high school, he moved to Philadelphia with his mother, where his music career started to take off. …\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Music plays\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>By the mid-1950s, Coltrane was gaining recognition among other jazz musicians for the way he played, skipping scales in a style that became known as “sheets of sound.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Music plays\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>Here’s Coltrane in a 1960 radio interview.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>John Coltrane: \u003c/strong>There’s some set things I know, some harmonic devices that I know that will take me out of the ordinary path if I use these. But I haven’t played them enough, and I”m not familiar enough, to take the one familiar line, so I play all of them so I can acclimate my ear. So I can hear.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>He was a famously hard worker, practicing fingering, breath control…even specific notes for hours at a time. He was even said to fall asleep with his horn in his mouth. He caught the attention of some of the most famous jazz artists of his day… playing with folks like Thelonious Monk and Miles Davis.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>John Coltrane: \u003c/strong>When I started it it was a little different because I started through Miles Davis and he was an accepted musician, you see. They got used to me in the States now when they first heard me when I was here they did not like it I remember. It’s a little different. They’re going to reject it at first.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>But throughout these years of success, Coltrane struggled with alcohol and heroin addiction. Miles Davis famously fired him from his band for it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And so, the story goes, Coltrane got clean, cold turkey, an experience he describes in the liner notes of his masterpiece, \u003cem>A Love Supreme\u003c/em>, which came out in 1965. Here’s Denzel Washington reading them in the documentary \u003cem>Chasing Trane\u003c/em>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Denzel Washington reading Coltrane: \u003c/strong>During the year 1957, I experienced by the grace of Gd a spiritual awakening which was to lead me to a richer, fuller, more productive life. At that time, in gratitude, I humbly ask to be given the means and the privilege to make others happy through music.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>A Love Supreme marked a turning point in Coltrane’s career. The album was Coltrane’s declaration to God, his commitment to love and the divine.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And it has become the sacred text of a church in San Francisco — the Saint John Coltrane African Orthodox Church, Global Spiritual Community.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Opening riff of A Love Supreme plays\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>Today on Bay Curious, we’re going to church to learn how a jazz musician came to be revered as a saint and how the Coltrane Church has been a part of many cultural movements over the decades, transforming alongside the city. I’m Olivia Allen-Price. Don’t go away.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Sponsor message\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>The Coltrane Church has been worshipping John Coltrane’s music, philosophy, and at times, even the man himself for 60 years. Reporter Asal Ehsanipour takes us to Sunday mass to learn more about what that sounds like.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Sounds of Coltrane Church Mass\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>The Saint John Coltrane African Orthodox Church opens Sunday mass with the blow of a conch shell.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Sound of conch shell blowing\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>Then the saxophone comes in, blaring the opening notes of John Coltrane’s \u003cem>A Love Supreme\u003c/em>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>A Love Supreme plays\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>On the altar is a Byzantine-style portrait of John Coltrane. He’s wearing a white robe and clutching his soprano saxophone. A gold halo glitters above his head.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Throughout the service, the band alternates between sax, bass, and drum solos in a kind of makeshift jazz concert. Later, the sermon offered by His Eminence the Most Reverend Franzo W. King is a mix of traditional Christian teachings, and references to Coltrane.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Archbishop King during mass: \u003c/strong>Jesus is the Lord of lords and the king of kings. And that one John Will.i.am Coltrane is that anointed sound that leaped down from the throne of heaven.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>For Archbishop King and his wife, the Most Reverend Mother Marina, the music and their worship is one and the same.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mother Marina King: \u003c/strong>The mission of the church is to paint the globe with Coltrane Consciousness.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>Coltrane Consciousness.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Archbishop King: \u003c/strong>Coltrane Consciousness is acknowledging that the music and the sound of John Coltraine is that anointed sound. So we want everybody to become aware of the power of this music, of this man, that testimony.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>The Kings first heard the power of that testimony in 1960s San Francisco — as a young couple in love.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Archbishop King: \u003c/strong>The music was as hip as you could get, and we were trying to be hipsters and being into this music.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>One weekend, 1965, Franzo and Marina planned to celebrate their first wedding anniversary. They wanted to see The John Coltrane Quartet at a club in North Beach called The Jazz Workshop.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Archbishop King: \u003c/strong>You had to be 21 and we were both underage, but I knew the doorman. And he took us right up front.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>As soon as Coltrane entered the room, the Kings felt the energy around them shift.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Archbishop King: \u003c/strong>When they walked out, it was almost like they were walking on a carpet of air.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mother Marina: \u003c/strong>It was immediate. You could feel the presence, that energy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Coltrane music starts here\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mother Marina King: \u003c/strong>And then he lifted his horn. We were right in front, and he pointed right at our table.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Archbishop King: \u003c/strong>From the first note, we were lifted into another place beyond the confines of that jazz club. And when we finished, our drinks were still on the table, the ice had melted. I don’t remember us even talking to each other.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mother Marina King: \u003c/strong>I didn’t know exactly how to react to it. I was just in the moment of experiencing a new experience.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Archbishop King: \u003c/strong>We were caught in a windstorm of the spirit of the Holy Ghost. It was a powerful thing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>They call this experience their “sound baptism.” From then on, their calling would be to spread John Coltrane’s gospel.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Archbishop King: \u003c/strong>We couldn’t keep it to ourselves. We had to give testimony, we had to tell people.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>And tell people they did. Franzo and Marina had actually created a space to share their favorite music with friends — in a way, their first iteration of the Coltrane Church. Pastor Wanika King-Stephens still remembers those evenings her parents used to host.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Wanika King-Stephens: \u003c/strong>Really what that entailed was our listening clinic that took place in my parents’ living room. My mom would put on a pot of beans and make some cornbread and have people come over and they would sit and listen to the music of Thelonious Monk and Charlie Parker.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>Franzo and Marina poured over liner notes and interviews, spent hours absorbed in the music, analyzing it together. Then came July 17, 1967.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Wanika King-Stephens: \u003c/strong>When John Coltrane died I came into the living room to find my dad and my uncle and they had been up all night. Listening to Trane and just talking about him and the music and so when I came in the room, I’m like, “what’s what’s wrong?” You know, they said, you know, “they killed John.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>Coltrane died from liver cancer, most likely fueled by his drug and alcohol addiction. But to Franzo, his death symbolized the systems of racism that targeted Black men in America.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This was a time of heightened tension for San Francisco’s Black population. The city’s so-called “urban renewal” project was in full swing and it targeted low-income neighborhoods with minority residents for demolition.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Archbishop King: \u003c/strong>The redevelopment came in with the Negro removal and devastated the community.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>Redevelopment brought an end to the “Harlem of the West” that defined the Fillmore in the 40s and 50s. Jazz clubs shuttered. Minority and elderly residents were forced from their homes. And the city’s Black-owned music scene was decimated. Franzo, though, was passionate that people needed to hear this music.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Archbishop King: \u003c/strong>And it was during that period, too, where so-called black consciousness was coming out. It was just a very high cultural, political things going on.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>So he and Marina mobilized. They opened what was essentially an underground jazz club — from their basement.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Coltrane had been outspoken about the “corporatization” of jazz. It was just \u003cu>one\u003c/u> example of how he’d grown into an icon for the Black Power movement.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Coltrane’s song Alabama plays \u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>Here’s Coltrane’s 1963 song, Alabama, about the 16th Street Church bombing in Birmingham that killed four African American girls. Coltrane composed it to the rhythm of Martin Luther King Jr.’s eulogy following the attack.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mother Marina King: \u003c/strong>So we’re living in these times of turmoil, yes it comes out in the music.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>But eventually, something shifted. For the Kings, the work stopped being about saving the music or the culture. It was about saving souls. Because after years of studying Coltrane, it had become clear to them that his music, his activism — his whole belief system — was really a declaration of faith.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Wanika King-Stephens: \u003c/strong>And we hear John Coltrane saying, my music is the spiritual expression of what I am, my faith, my knowledge, my being.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>The Kings went all in on their devotion. They converted the jazz club into a temple. Now they didn’t just revere Coltrane. They worshipped him. Believed he was the second coming of Christ.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Archbishop King: \u003c/strong>That he’s more than just a musician, but he is a prophet.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>And that \u003cem>A Love Supreme \u003c/em>was his sacred text — his doctrine.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>A Love Supreme starts playing\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>For 32 minutes and 47 seconds, Coltrane’s saxophone pulses and intertwines with piano and drums, a four note bassline bedded beneath the sound. It’s played in all 12 keys, sending a message that you can find A Love Supreme everywhere.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Archbishop King: \u003c/strong>We hear the Lord speaking to us in this music. I’ve had John Coltrane through the music call my name. So we have revelations that come through the music. And you find that in the sound of the music, you find it in the name of the compositions.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>Archbishop King and Mother Marina say the album’s four song titles — \u003cem>Acknowledgment, Resolution, Pursuance, and Psalm —\u003c/em> offer a formula for how to reach a higher power.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mother Marina King: \u003c/strong>The way his notes are moving and the way the sounds are connected, it’s almost like a rumble. It’s like a war. Sometimes he’s pleading your case. Every time I hear it, there’s something new. There’s always life there. It’s in the music, the magic is in the music.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>Franzo and Marina surrendered themselves to Coltrane. They prayed, meditated, and fasted for days at a time.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Archbishop King: \u003c/strong>And we just felt like we were in the right place at the right time, and that the Spirit of God was really heavy in this part of the world.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>Around this time, The Black Panther Party was gaining traction. Started in Oakland in 1966 its co-founder Huey P. Newton had become a kind of mentor to Franzo.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Huey P. Newton: \u003c/strong>The Black Panther Party for self defense is organized now throughout the nation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>Here’s Newton in 1968 describing the mission of the Panthers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Huey P Newton: \u003c/strong>And we advocate that all Black people in America are taught what politics is all about and what our history is all about.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>Newton encouraged the Coltrane Church to fuse politics and culture with religion. And in 1971, the Kings opened their first permanent location in a storefront on Divisadero St. From there, they started hosting social programs, similar to the Black Panthers’ Free Breakfast Program.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Wanika King-Stephens: \u003c/strong>The food program was one of my favorite things in the whole world.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>Pastor Wanika says that seven days a week, they’d give free vegetarian meals to hundreds of people. The lines snaked around the block.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Wanika King-Stephens: \u003c/strong>We would sing songs, you know, \u003cem>‘Serving the people makes me mighty glad. [fade under] \u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Archbishop King: \u003c/strong>We would go to Safeways and the supermarkets and the stuff that they would throw out. We’d take it out, put it in a tub, clean it, and serve it to the people.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>Franzo and Marina believed that to be right with God was to be \u003cem>\u003cu>right\u003c/u>\u003c/em> with the people. So they also hosted free yoga classes and donated clothes to the community.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Archbishop King: \u003c/strong>We kind of learned that stuff from the hippies.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>The vibe was Flower Power, psychedelics…\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Archbishop King: \u003c/strong>The Grateful Dead…\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>Utopian communes based out of old Victorian houses.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Archbishop King: \u003c/strong>The so-called hippie movement was a powerful thing and we were very much a part of that.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>And like the hippies, the Kings started borrowing from Eastern spirituality, led by Coltrane’s music.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Opening notes of “Om” by John Coltrane – 00:00\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mother Marina King: \u003c/strong>John Coltrane has an album entitled Om. I thought of that as far as one of the albums that meant so much to us, especially early on.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Sound of Coltrane’s “Om” playing \u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mother Marina King: \u003c/strong>And we literally took that as John saying, “I am Om.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>By the mid-70s, the Kings began shifting away from Christianity.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp> \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Archbishop King: \u003c/strong>We embrace the unity of religious ideas. If you want to say that Buddha is the light, we don’t have a problem with that.\u003cem> \u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>They incorporated Sanskrit chanting in their service.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Archbishop King chanting\u003cem>: \u003c/em>\u003c/strong>That’s something that we learned from Alice Coltrane.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>Alice Coltrane, John’s widow, had been immersed in Hindu spirituality for years and had come to San Francisco to deepen her practice. The Kings met her here and eventually joined her \u003cu>new\u003c/u> religious community called the Vedantic Center. Franzo and Marina began worshipping Alice as the wife of God and adopted Hindu names.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Pastor Wanika remembers when her parents made that shift.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Wanika King-Stephens: \u003c/strong>So we go from jazz to Sanskrit and chanting and singing, you know, Hare Krishna and Shiva, Lord Shiva.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>The Kings sang backup on Alice’s early devotional records, like this one.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Singing \u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>But in the early 80s, their relationship splintered. Alice filed a 7.5 million dollar lawsuit against the Coltrane Church for copyright infringement and using her husband’s name and likeness without permission. Alice eventually dropped the lawsuit, but the incident drew the attention of the African Orthodox Church, who wanted to expand to the West Coast. For the Kings, it was actually kind of similar to the temple they’d first opened except they had to recharacterize Coltrane from their God incarnate to a patron saint. They agreed.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Wanika King-Stephens: \u003c/strong>For me, John was always just sort of evolving in my consciousness. So for him to go from God to Saint was not a big stretch for me. It’s like, great, okay. I can swing with that.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>So in 1982, they became the \u003cem>\u003cu>Saint\u003c/u>\u003c/em> John Coltrane African Orthodox Church. Now part of an organized religious movement, the Coltrane Church leaned into its status as public facing leaders. Keepers, if you will, of San Francisco culture.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Archbishop King: \u003c/strong>I think this is something people need to understand that this church has been an ambassador for this city.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>They traveled around the world. Like to the Antibes Jazz Festival in France — where Coltrane himself famously performed \u003cem>A Love Supreme\u003c/em> in 1965.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Archbishop King: \u003c/strong>Carlos Santana joined us on the stage.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mother Marina King: \u003c/strong>And even on airlines, we would say, hey, I saw your church advertised on United Airlines, and it would, you know, it was like a goal of places you need to see in San Francisco, and it would be the St. John Coltrane Church.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>But the year 2000 marked yet another shift for the Coltrane Church when they were forced out of their Divisadero storefront. Their home of nearly 30 years.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Wanika King-Stephens: \u003c/strong>It was awful, it was awful. I mean, I know I never saw it coming.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>Their rent more than doubled, and they had to end their free food program.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Wanika King-Stephens: \u003c/strong>We had to leave, and that was our home. That was our home. And then I watched that whole community change. And I just, I tell you, I couldn’t drive through that neighborhood without crying for, like, a whole year.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>They’ve relocated a few times since then. First to the Fillmore where they were one of just a handful of jazz institutions left. But they were evicted from that space too, before moving to their current location out of Fort Mason’s Magic Theater.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Sounds of Coltrane Church mass: Hallelujah! \u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mother Marina King during service: \u003c/strong>This next composition is entitled Tune Gene, and it means “He who comes in the glory of the Lord.” So I want you to clap your hands, pick up your tambourines. Do we have any dancers? You know, King David danced before the Lord with all the power of his might.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>Now, Archbishop King and Mother Marina see the church as a kind of Mecca, where Coltrane disciples from just about anywhere can worship together. On the day I visit, they’ve come from New York, Seattle, and closer to home, Redwood City.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Archbishop King in the service: \u003c/strong>This is the St. John Will-i-am Coltrane African Orthodox Church Global Spiritual Community. Amen. So we all are family, amen.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>At the end of Sunday mass Archbishop King and Mother Marina asked for donations. They’re trying to raise money to buy a building. What they hope will be a permanent home.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Archbishop King: \u003c/strong>So this church needs your money. Amen. Some of y’all are holding on to God’s money now.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>Archbishop King and Mother Marina are in their 80s and are looking towards the future of the church, how it can live beyond them. Their daughter, Pastor Wanika, plans to take it over, to continue sharing the church’s message.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Archbishop King: \u003c/strong>So Coltrane Consciousness is a love supreme, a love supreme, a love supreme. That’s what this coltrane consciousness is all about.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>Since Archbishop King and Mother Marina’s sound baptism in 1965, the Coltrane Church has had different names, locations, philosophies. In fact, Archbishop King often says that as the seasons change, so do the needs of the people. Change, he says, is baked into the very essence of the church.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Archbishop King: \u003c/strong>And then at the same time, the church never changes. It remains constantly rooted in love and \u003cem>A Love Supreme\u003c/em>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Music fades out\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price:\u003c/strong> That story was reported by Asal Ehsanipour. You can attend mass at the Saint John Coltrane African Orthodox Church every Sunday at the Magic Theater at Fort Mason.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Bay Curious is produced at member-supported KQED in San Francisco.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Our show is made by Katrina Schwartz, Christopher Beale and me, Olivia Allen-Price.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>With extra support from Maha Sanad, Katie Sprenger, Jen Chien, Ethan Toven-Lindsey and everyone on team KQED.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Some members of the KQED podcast team are represented by the Screen Actors Guild American Federation of Television and Radio Artists, San Francisco, Northern California local.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Thanks for listening. Have a great week.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"#episode-transcript\">\u003ci>View the full episode transcript.\u003c/i>\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/arts/13892202/watch-saint-coltrane-a-short-film-about-the-san-francisco-church-built-on-a-love-supreme\">Saint John Coltrane \u003c/a>African Orthodox Church Global Spiritual Community begins \u003ca href=\"https://www.coltranechurch.org/\">Sunday mass\u003c/a> with the blow of a conch shell. Then the saxophone comes in, blaring the opening notes of John Coltrane’s jazz masterpiece, \u003cem>A Love Supreme\u003c/em>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A Byzantine-style portrait of Coltrane is displayed on the altar. He’s wearing a white robe and clutching his soprano saxophone, a gold halo glittering above his head.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Throughout the service, the church band alternates between saxophone, bass and drum solos in a kind of makeshift jazz concert. Later, the sermon offered by His Eminence Archbishop Franzo W. King is a mix of traditional Christian teachings and references to Coltrane. It’s a fusion that King and his wife, the Most Reverend Mother Marina King, call “Coltrane Consciousness.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Coltrane Consciousness is acknowledging that the music and the sound of John Coltrane is that anointed sound that leaped down from the throne of heaven,” King said. “We want everybody to become aware of the power of this music, of this man, that testimony.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Coltrane Church, as it’s often called, is the \u003ca href=\"https://www.sf.gov/sites/default/files/2022-09/Item%202e.%20LBR-2021-22-019%20St.%20John%20Coltrane%20Church.pdf\">oldest \u003c/a>Black jazz organization in San Francisco now. And it has taken a windy path to achieve that longevity.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>A baptism of sound\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>The Coltrane Church’s origins date back to the 1960s.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Kings had recently moved to San Francisco as a young couple in love. Upon arrival they were met with a vibrant music scene, with jazz venues dotting the city. The Fillmore District became known as “The Harlem of the West” for its abundance of Black-owned nightclubs and restaurants.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12068339\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1999px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/12/20251221_JohnColtraneChurch_December_GH-1_qed.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12068339\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/12/20251221_JohnColtraneChurch_December_GH-1_qed.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1999\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/12/20251221_JohnColtraneChurch_December_GH-1_qed.jpg 1999w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/12/20251221_JohnColtraneChurch_December_GH-1_qed-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/12/20251221_JohnColtraneChurch_December_GH-1_qed-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1999px) 100vw, 1999px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Supreme Mother Rev. Marina King sings during Sunday mass at the St. John Coltrane Church at Fort Mason in San Francisco on Dec. 21, 2025. \u003ccite>(Gustavo Hernandez/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“The music was as hip as you could get, and we were trying to be hipsters and being into this music,” King said. “You could leave your house on a Friday night and you wouldn’t have to come home until Sunday afternoon.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>On Sept. 18, 1965, the Kings celebrated their first wedding anniversary by going to see The John Coltrane Quartet at a North Beach club called The Jazz Workshop. King knew the doorman, who seated them in the front row despite them being underage.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As soon as Coltrane and his band entered the room, King said he felt the energy around him shift, “like [the band was] walking on a carpet of air.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It was immediate,” Mother Marina agreed. “You could feel the presence, that energy. And then [Coltrane] lifted his horn. We were right in front, and he pointed right at our table.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Kings said they were rendered speechless throughout Coltrane’s set, hardly touching their drinks as they were transported to a spiritual realm beyond the jazz club.\u003c/p>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/MAgJ-igwuSQ'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/MAgJ-igwuSQ'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>“We were caught in a windstorm of the spirit of the Holy Ghost. It was a powerful thing,” King said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Kings call this experience their “sound baptism.” From then on, their calling would be to spread John Coltrane’s gospel.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>From fans to worshippers\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>They started out by hosting listening sessions with friends in their home. They’d cook up a pot of beans and some cornbread to share, then pour over music, interviews and liner notes from jazz greats like John Coltrane, Thelonius Monk and Charlie Parker.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>On July 17, 1967, Archbishop King was out at a jazz club when he learned that Coltrane had died. The Kings’ daughter, Pastor Wanika King-Stephens, remembers walking into the living room the next morning to find that her dad and uncle had stayed up all night listening to Coltrane’s music.\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>“They killed John,” King-Stephens recalled her father saying.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Coltrane died from liver cancer, most likely fueled by his drug and alcohol addiction in the earlier years of his fame. But Archbishop King believed Coltrane’s death symbolized the systems of racism that targeted Black men in America. This was a time of heightened tension for San Francisco’s Black population. Throughout the 1960s, the city’s so-called “\u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11825401/how-urban-renewal-decimated-the-fillmore-district-and-took-jazz-with-it\">redevelopment for urban renewal\u003c/a>” ” program targeted low-income neighborhoods with minority residents for demolition.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The redevelopment came in with the Negro removal and devastated the community,” King said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>San Francisco’s redevelopment project brought an end to the “Harlem of the West” that had once defined the Fillmore District. Jazz clubs shuttered, minority and elderly residents were forced from their homes, and the city’s Black-owned music scene was decimated.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Kings, though, were passionate that people still needed to hear this music. Motivated by an era of Black consciousness and political activity, they opened “The Yardbird Club,” a jazz club based out of their basement. The name paid homage to the jazz musician Charlie “Yardbird” Parker.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This makeshift venue functioned as a space where artists visiting San Francisco could experiment with new sounds, much like the city’s jazz clubs had once done.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But around 1969, something shifted for the Kings. It wasn’t just about saving the music or the culture anymore. It was about saving souls.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>After years of studying Coltrane, they came to believe that his music, his activism — his whole belief system — was really a declaration of faith.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12068329\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/12/20251221_JohnColtraneChurch_December_GH-6_qed.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12068329\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/12/20251221_JohnColtraneChurch_December_GH-6_qed.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/12/20251221_JohnColtraneChurch_December_GH-6_qed.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/12/20251221_JohnColtraneChurch_December_GH-6_qed-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/12/20251221_JohnColtraneChurch_December_GH-6_qed-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">His Eminence Archbishop Franzo W. King greets congregants after Sunday mass at the St. John Coltrane Church at Fort Mason in San Francisco on Dec. 21, 2025. \u003ccite>(Gustavo Hernandez/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“We hear John Coltrane saying, ‘My music is the spiritual expression of what I am, my faith, my knowledge, my being,” King-Stephens said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Kings went all in on their devotion. “The Yardbird Club” became “The Yardbird Temple.” They didn’t just revere Coltrane anymore — they worshiped him, believed him to be the second coming of Christ and cited \u003cem>A Love Supreme\u003c/em> as his most sacred text.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>A higher power\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Coltrane composed \u003cem>A Love Supreme\u003c/em> in the aftermath of heroin and alcohol addiction. Though he had risen to fame by the 1950s, Coltrane’s substance abuse made him unreliable. Miles Davis famously fired Coltrane from his band because of it. Coltrane had hit rock bottom and his music career was foundering because of it. So, he got clean — went cold turkey — and heard the voice of God.\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>Coltrane described this experience in the album’s liner notes: \u003cem>“During the year 1957, I experienced by the grace of God a spiritual awakening which was to lead me to a richer, fuller, more productive life. At that time, in gratitude, I humbly ask to be given the means and the privilege to make others happy through music.”\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>A Love Supreme\u003c/em>, which came out in 1965, marked a turning point in Coltrane’s career. The album was his declaration to God and an expression of his commitment to love and the divine. For 32 minutes and 47 seconds, Coltrane’s saxophone pulses and intertwines with piano and drums — a four-note bassline bedded beneath the sound. It’s played in all 12 keys, sending a \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/2000/10/23/148148986/a-love-supreme\">message\u003c/a> that you can find \u003cem>A Love Supreme\u003c/em> everywhere.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We hear the Lord speaking to us in this music,” King said. “I’ve had John Coltrane through the music call my name. So we have revelations that come through the music.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Mother Marina agreed. “Every time I hear it, there’s something new,” she said. “There’s always life there. It’s in the music. The magic is in the music.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12068328\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/12/20251221_JohnColtraneChurch_December_GH-5_qed.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12068328\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/12/20251221_JohnColtraneChurch_December_GH-5_qed.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1334\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/12/20251221_JohnColtraneChurch_December_GH-5_qed.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/12/20251221_JohnColtraneChurch_December_GH-5_qed-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/12/20251221_JohnColtraneChurch_December_GH-5_qed-1536x1025.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Rev. Marlee-I Mystic and His Eminence Archbishop Franzo W. King pause to speak with churchgoers following Sunday mass at the St. John Coltrane Church in San Francisco on Dec. 21, 2025. \u003ccite>(Gustavo Hernandez/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>The Kings say the album’s four song titles — \u003cem>Acknowledgement, Resolution, Pursuance \u003c/em>and \u003cem>Psalm\u003c/em> — offer a formula for how to reach a higher power.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The way his notes are moving and the way the sounds are connected, it’s almost like a rumble. It’s like a war. Sometimes he’s pleading your case. It’s many different feelings,” Mother Marina said.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>The 1970s: A period of transformation\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Now a religious community, the Kings surrendered themselves to Coltrane. They prayed, meditated and fasted for days at a time.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Everything was falling into place, and the Kings “felt like we were in the right place at the right time, and that the spirit of God was really heavy in this part of the world,” King said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12068333\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/12/20251221_JohnColtraneChurch_December_GH-12_qed.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12068333\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/12/20251221_JohnColtraneChurch_December_GH-12_qed.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/12/20251221_JohnColtraneChurch_December_GH-12_qed.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/12/20251221_JohnColtraneChurch_December_GH-12_qed-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/12/20251221_JohnColtraneChurch_December_GH-12_qed-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Music memorabilia adorns the space in preparation for Sunday mass at the St. John Coltrane Church at Fort Mason in San Francisco on Dec. 21, 2025. \u003ccite>(Gustavo Hernandez/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>The Black Panther Party also became supporters of the church. Its co-founder, Huey P. Newton had become a mentor to Archbishop King and encouraged him to fuse politics, culture and religion. After moving to a storefront on Divisadero Street, the church began hosting programs that mirrored The Black Panthers’ Free Breakfast Program.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>King-Stephens said the church’s free food program was “one of my [her] favorite things in the whole world.” Seven days a week, church members would prepare free vegetarian meals for hundreds of people. The lines snaked around the block.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We would go to Safeways and the supermarkets and the stuff that they would throw out, we’d take it out, put it in a tub, clean it, and serve it to the people,” King said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Kings believed that to be right with God was to be right with the people. Inspired by San Francisco’s hippie movement in the 1970s, they also hosted free yoga classes, practiced vegetarianism, and started borrowing from Eastern spirituality, led by Coltrane’s music.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“John Coltrane has an album entitled \u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GwrV0qCX1LU&list=RDGwrV0qCX1LU&start_radio=1\">\u003cem>Om\u003c/em>\u003c/a>, and we literally took that as John saying, ‘I am Om,’” Mother Marina said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>They studied the Sufi mystic, Inayat Khan, who believed music and sound to be the world’s life source, and incorporated Sanskrit chanting in their service.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We embrace the unity of religious ideas,” King said. “If you want to say that Buddha is the light, we don’t have a problem with that.”\u003cem> \u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12070432\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/01/GettyImages-74258876-scaled-e1768939107671.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12070432\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/01/GettyImages-74258876-scaled-e1768939107671.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1420\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">American jazz musician and composer Alice Coltrane in 1970. \u003ccite>(Photo by Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>In 1974, the Kings met Alice Coltrane, John’s widow. She had converted to Hinduism after her husband’s death and came to San Francisco to deepen her practice. The Kings joined her spiritual community in San Francisco, the Vedantic Center, and began worshipping her as the wife of God. They adopted Hindu names and sang backup on her early devotional \u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=759TXOUIpjQ\">records\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But in 1981, Coltrane filed a $7.5 million \u003ca href=\"https://www.nytimes.com/1981/10/24/nyregion/notes-on-people-coltrane-s-widow-sues-san-francisco-church.html\">lawsuit\u003c/a> against the Coltrane Church for copyright infringement and using her husband’s name and likeness without permission. She eventually dropped the lawsuit, but it set the Kings on a new path. The incident drew the attention of the African Orthodox Church, which wanted to expand to the West Coast. To join, the Kings had to recharacterize Coltrane from their God incarnate to a patron saint. They agreed.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Culture keepers\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>The church joined the A.O.C and became the Saint John Coltrane African Orthodox Church in 1982. Now part of an organized religious movement, the Coltrane church leaned into its status as public-facing leaders and keepers of San Francisco culture.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I think this is something people need to understand that this church has been an ambassador for this city,” King said.\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>They have traveled around the world, including to the \u003ca href=\"https://jazzajuan.com/en/\">Antibes Jazz Festival\u003c/a> in France — where Coltrane himself famously \u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lWuhPVb175Y&list=RDlWuhPVb175Y&start_radio=1\">performed\u003c/a> A Love Supreme in 1965. The Kings were joined onstage by Carlos Santana, an early supporter of the church. Several travel guides even named them a top destination when visiting San Francisco.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Kings and their church were vocal advocates on issues including environmental racism and police brutality, continuing the work that had long been part of their ethos. But the year 2000 marked yet another shift for the Coltrane Church. They were forced to leave their Divisadero storefront, the church’s home for nearly 30 years, after their rent more than \u003ca href=\"https://www.sfchronicle.com/news/article/coltrane-church-holds-last-service-at-longtime-3239485.php\">doubled\u003c/a>. They also had to end their free food program.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“That was our home,” King-Stephens said. “And then, I watched that whole community change. And I tell you, I couldn’t drive through that neighborhood without crying for a whole year.”\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Looking to the future\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>They’ve relocated a few times since then. First, to the Fillmore, where they were one of just a handful of jazz institutions left. But they were evicted from that space too, before moving to their current location out of Fort Mason’s Magic Theater.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Now, King and Mother Marina see the church as a kind of Mecca, where Coltrane disciples from around the world can worship together. At the end of Sunday mass, Archbishop King and Mother Marina asked the community for donations. They’re trying to raise money to buy a building — what they hope will be a permanent home.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12068330\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/12/20251221_JohnColtraneChurch_December_GH-8_qed.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12068330\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/12/20251221_JohnColtraneChurch_December_GH-8_qed.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/12/20251221_JohnColtraneChurch_December_GH-8_qed.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/12/20251221_JohnColtraneChurch_December_GH-8_qed-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/12/20251221_JohnColtraneChurch_December_GH-8_qed-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Rev. Marlee-I Mystic (center) closes Sunday mass in a burst of joy and laughter at the St. John Coltrane Church in San Francisco on Dec. 21, 2025. \u003ccite>(Gustavo Hernandez/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>The Kings are in their eighties and looking towards the future of the church. Their daughter plans to usher the church into its next chapter.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Since the first sound baptism in 1965, the Coltrane Church has had different names, locations and philosophies. In fact, King often said that as the seasons change, so do the needs of the people. Change, he said, is baked into the very essence of the church.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“And then at the same time, the church never changes,” King said. ”It remains constantly rooted in love and \u003cem>A Love Supreme\u003c/em>.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2 id=\"episode-transcript\">Episode Transcript\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price:\u003c/strong> John Coltrane on the saxophone is like nothing else.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Sound of Coltrane playing\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>He grew up in North Carolina in the 1930s…where the church was a big part of his life. Both of his grandfathers were ministers. But his calling was different. After high school, he moved to Philadelphia with his mother, where his music career started to take off. …\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Music plays\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>By the mid-1950s, Coltrane was gaining recognition among other jazz musicians for the way he played, skipping scales in a style that became known as “sheets of sound.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Music plays\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>Here’s Coltrane in a 1960 radio interview.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>John Coltrane: \u003c/strong>There’s some set things I know, some harmonic devices that I know that will take me out of the ordinary path if I use these. But I haven’t played them enough, and I”m not familiar enough, to take the one familiar line, so I play all of them so I can acclimate my ear. So I can hear.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>He was a famously hard worker, practicing fingering, breath control…even specific notes for hours at a time. He was even said to fall asleep with his horn in his mouth. He caught the attention of some of the most famous jazz artists of his day… playing with folks like Thelonious Monk and Miles Davis.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>John Coltrane: \u003c/strong>When I started it it was a little different because I started through Miles Davis and he was an accepted musician, you see. They got used to me in the States now when they first heard me when I was here they did not like it I remember. It’s a little different. They’re going to reject it at first.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>But throughout these years of success, Coltrane struggled with alcohol and heroin addiction. Miles Davis famously fired him from his band for it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And so, the story goes, Coltrane got clean, cold turkey, an experience he describes in the liner notes of his masterpiece, \u003cem>A Love Supreme\u003c/em>, which came out in 1965. Here’s Denzel Washington reading them in the documentary \u003cem>Chasing Trane\u003c/em>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Denzel Washington reading Coltrane: \u003c/strong>During the year 1957, I experienced by the grace of Gd a spiritual awakening which was to lead me to a richer, fuller, more productive life. At that time, in gratitude, I humbly ask to be given the means and the privilege to make others happy through music.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>A Love Supreme marked a turning point in Coltrane’s career. The album was Coltrane’s declaration to God, his commitment to love and the divine.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And it has become the sacred text of a church in San Francisco — the Saint John Coltrane African Orthodox Church, Global Spiritual Community.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Opening riff of A Love Supreme plays\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>Today on Bay Curious, we’re going to church to learn how a jazz musician came to be revered as a saint and how the Coltrane Church has been a part of many cultural movements over the decades, transforming alongside the city. I’m Olivia Allen-Price. Don’t go away.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Sponsor message\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>The Coltrane Church has been worshipping John Coltrane’s music, philosophy, and at times, even the man himself for 60 years. Reporter Asal Ehsanipour takes us to Sunday mass to learn more about what that sounds like.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Sounds of Coltrane Church Mass\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>The Saint John Coltrane African Orthodox Church opens Sunday mass with the blow of a conch shell.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Sound of conch shell blowing\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>Then the saxophone comes in, blaring the opening notes of John Coltrane’s \u003cem>A Love Supreme\u003c/em>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>A Love Supreme plays\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>On the altar is a Byzantine-style portrait of John Coltrane. He’s wearing a white robe and clutching his soprano saxophone. A gold halo glitters above his head.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Throughout the service, the band alternates between sax, bass, and drum solos in a kind of makeshift jazz concert. Later, the sermon offered by His Eminence the Most Reverend Franzo W. King is a mix of traditional Christian teachings, and references to Coltrane.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Archbishop King during mass: \u003c/strong>Jesus is the Lord of lords and the king of kings. And that one John Will.i.am Coltrane is that anointed sound that leaped down from the throne of heaven.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>For Archbishop King and his wife, the Most Reverend Mother Marina, the music and their worship is one and the same.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mother Marina King: \u003c/strong>The mission of the church is to paint the globe with Coltrane Consciousness.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>Coltrane Consciousness.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Archbishop King: \u003c/strong>Coltrane Consciousness is acknowledging that the music and the sound of John Coltraine is that anointed sound. So we want everybody to become aware of the power of this music, of this man, that testimony.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>The Kings first heard the power of that testimony in 1960s San Francisco — as a young couple in love.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Archbishop King: \u003c/strong>The music was as hip as you could get, and we were trying to be hipsters and being into this music.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>One weekend, 1965, Franzo and Marina planned to celebrate their first wedding anniversary. They wanted to see The John Coltrane Quartet at a club in North Beach called The Jazz Workshop.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Archbishop King: \u003c/strong>You had to be 21 and we were both underage, but I knew the doorman. And he took us right up front.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>As soon as Coltrane entered the room, the Kings felt the energy around them shift.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Archbishop King: \u003c/strong>When they walked out, it was almost like they were walking on a carpet of air.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mother Marina: \u003c/strong>It was immediate. You could feel the presence, that energy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Coltrane music starts here\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mother Marina King: \u003c/strong>And then he lifted his horn. We were right in front, and he pointed right at our table.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Archbishop King: \u003c/strong>From the first note, we were lifted into another place beyond the confines of that jazz club. And when we finished, our drinks were still on the table, the ice had melted. I don’t remember us even talking to each other.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mother Marina King: \u003c/strong>I didn’t know exactly how to react to it. I was just in the moment of experiencing a new experience.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Archbishop King: \u003c/strong>We were caught in a windstorm of the spirit of the Holy Ghost. It was a powerful thing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>They call this experience their “sound baptism.” From then on, their calling would be to spread John Coltrane’s gospel.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Archbishop King: \u003c/strong>We couldn’t keep it to ourselves. We had to give testimony, we had to tell people.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>And tell people they did. Franzo and Marina had actually created a space to share their favorite music with friends — in a way, their first iteration of the Coltrane Church. Pastor Wanika King-Stephens still remembers those evenings her parents used to host.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Wanika King-Stephens: \u003c/strong>Really what that entailed was our listening clinic that took place in my parents’ living room. My mom would put on a pot of beans and make some cornbread and have people come over and they would sit and listen to the music of Thelonious Monk and Charlie Parker.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>Franzo and Marina poured over liner notes and interviews, spent hours absorbed in the music, analyzing it together. Then came July 17, 1967.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Wanika King-Stephens: \u003c/strong>When John Coltrane died I came into the living room to find my dad and my uncle and they had been up all night. Listening to Trane and just talking about him and the music and so when I came in the room, I’m like, “what’s what’s wrong?” You know, they said, you know, “they killed John.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>Coltrane died from liver cancer, most likely fueled by his drug and alcohol addiction. But to Franzo, his death symbolized the systems of racism that targeted Black men in America.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This was a time of heightened tension for San Francisco’s Black population. The city’s so-called “urban renewal” project was in full swing and it targeted low-income neighborhoods with minority residents for demolition.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Archbishop King: \u003c/strong>The redevelopment came in with the Negro removal and devastated the community.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>Redevelopment brought an end to the “Harlem of the West” that defined the Fillmore in the 40s and 50s. Jazz clubs shuttered. Minority and elderly residents were forced from their homes. And the city’s Black-owned music scene was decimated. Franzo, though, was passionate that people needed to hear this music.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Archbishop King: \u003c/strong>And it was during that period, too, where so-called black consciousness was coming out. It was just a very high cultural, political things going on.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>So he and Marina mobilized. They opened what was essentially an underground jazz club — from their basement.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Coltrane had been outspoken about the “corporatization” of jazz. It was just \u003cu>one\u003c/u> example of how he’d grown into an icon for the Black Power movement.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Coltrane’s song Alabama plays \u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>Here’s Coltrane’s 1963 song, Alabama, about the 16th Street Church bombing in Birmingham that killed four African American girls. Coltrane composed it to the rhythm of Martin Luther King Jr.’s eulogy following the attack.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mother Marina King: \u003c/strong>So we’re living in these times of turmoil, yes it comes out in the music.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>But eventually, something shifted. For the Kings, the work stopped being about saving the music or the culture. It was about saving souls. Because after years of studying Coltrane, it had become clear to them that his music, his activism — his whole belief system — was really a declaration of faith.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Wanika King-Stephens: \u003c/strong>And we hear John Coltrane saying, my music is the spiritual expression of what I am, my faith, my knowledge, my being.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>The Kings went all in on their devotion. They converted the jazz club into a temple. Now they didn’t just revere Coltrane. They worshipped him. Believed he was the second coming of Christ.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Archbishop King: \u003c/strong>That he’s more than just a musician, but he is a prophet.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>And that \u003cem>A Love Supreme \u003c/em>was his sacred text — his doctrine.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>A Love Supreme starts playing\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>For 32 minutes and 47 seconds, Coltrane’s saxophone pulses and intertwines with piano and drums, a four note bassline bedded beneath the sound. It’s played in all 12 keys, sending a message that you can find A Love Supreme everywhere.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Archbishop King: \u003c/strong>We hear the Lord speaking to us in this music. I’ve had John Coltrane through the music call my name. So we have revelations that come through the music. And you find that in the sound of the music, you find it in the name of the compositions.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>Archbishop King and Mother Marina say the album’s four song titles — \u003cem>Acknowledgment, Resolution, Pursuance, and Psalm —\u003c/em> offer a formula for how to reach a higher power.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mother Marina King: \u003c/strong>The way his notes are moving and the way the sounds are connected, it’s almost like a rumble. It’s like a war. Sometimes he’s pleading your case. Every time I hear it, there’s something new. There’s always life there. It’s in the music, the magic is in the music.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>Franzo and Marina surrendered themselves to Coltrane. They prayed, meditated, and fasted for days at a time.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Archbishop King: \u003c/strong>And we just felt like we were in the right place at the right time, and that the Spirit of God was really heavy in this part of the world.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>Around this time, The Black Panther Party was gaining traction. Started in Oakland in 1966 its co-founder Huey P. Newton had become a kind of mentor to Franzo.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Huey P. Newton: \u003c/strong>The Black Panther Party for self defense is organized now throughout the nation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>Here’s Newton in 1968 describing the mission of the Panthers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Huey P Newton: \u003c/strong>And we advocate that all Black people in America are taught what politics is all about and what our history is all about.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>Newton encouraged the Coltrane Church to fuse politics and culture with religion. And in 1971, the Kings opened their first permanent location in a storefront on Divisadero St. From there, they started hosting social programs, similar to the Black Panthers’ Free Breakfast Program.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Wanika King-Stephens: \u003c/strong>The food program was one of my favorite things in the whole world.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>Pastor Wanika says that seven days a week, they’d give free vegetarian meals to hundreds of people. The lines snaked around the block.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Wanika King-Stephens: \u003c/strong>We would sing songs, you know, \u003cem>‘Serving the people makes me mighty glad. [fade under] \u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Archbishop King: \u003c/strong>We would go to Safeways and the supermarkets and the stuff that they would throw out. We’d take it out, put it in a tub, clean it, and serve it to the people.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>Franzo and Marina believed that to be right with God was to be \u003cem>\u003cu>right\u003c/u>\u003c/em> with the people. So they also hosted free yoga classes and donated clothes to the community.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Archbishop King: \u003c/strong>We kind of learned that stuff from the hippies.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>The vibe was Flower Power, psychedelics…\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Archbishop King: \u003c/strong>The Grateful Dead…\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>Utopian communes based out of old Victorian houses.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Archbishop King: \u003c/strong>The so-called hippie movement was a powerful thing and we were very much a part of that.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>And like the hippies, the Kings started borrowing from Eastern spirituality, led by Coltrane’s music.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Opening notes of “Om” by John Coltrane – 00:00\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mother Marina King: \u003c/strong>John Coltrane has an album entitled Om. I thought of that as far as one of the albums that meant so much to us, especially early on.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Sound of Coltrane’s “Om” playing \u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mother Marina King: \u003c/strong>And we literally took that as John saying, “I am Om.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>By the mid-70s, the Kings began shifting away from Christianity.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp> \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Archbishop King: \u003c/strong>We embrace the unity of religious ideas. If you want to say that Buddha is the light, we don’t have a problem with that.\u003cem> \u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>They incorporated Sanskrit chanting in their service.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Archbishop King chanting\u003cem>: \u003c/em>\u003c/strong>That’s something that we learned from Alice Coltrane.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>Alice Coltrane, John’s widow, had been immersed in Hindu spirituality for years and had come to San Francisco to deepen her practice. The Kings met her here and eventually joined her \u003cu>new\u003c/u> religious community called the Vedantic Center. Franzo and Marina began worshipping Alice as the wife of God and adopted Hindu names.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Pastor Wanika remembers when her parents made that shift.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Wanika King-Stephens: \u003c/strong>So we go from jazz to Sanskrit and chanting and singing, you know, Hare Krishna and Shiva, Lord Shiva.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>The Kings sang backup on Alice’s early devotional records, like this one.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Singing \u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>But in the early 80s, their relationship splintered. Alice filed a 7.5 million dollar lawsuit against the Coltrane Church for copyright infringement and using her husband’s name and likeness without permission. Alice eventually dropped the lawsuit, but the incident drew the attention of the African Orthodox Church, who wanted to expand to the West Coast. For the Kings, it was actually kind of similar to the temple they’d first opened except they had to recharacterize Coltrane from their God incarnate to a patron saint. They agreed.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Wanika King-Stephens: \u003c/strong>For me, John was always just sort of evolving in my consciousness. So for him to go from God to Saint was not a big stretch for me. It’s like, great, okay. I can swing with that.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>So in 1982, they became the \u003cem>\u003cu>Saint\u003c/u>\u003c/em> John Coltrane African Orthodox Church. Now part of an organized religious movement, the Coltrane Church leaned into its status as public facing leaders. Keepers, if you will, of San Francisco culture.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Archbishop King: \u003c/strong>I think this is something people need to understand that this church has been an ambassador for this city.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>They traveled around the world. Like to the Antibes Jazz Festival in France — where Coltrane himself famously performed \u003cem>A Love Supreme\u003c/em> in 1965.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Archbishop King: \u003c/strong>Carlos Santana joined us on the stage.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mother Marina King: \u003c/strong>And even on airlines, we would say, hey, I saw your church advertised on United Airlines, and it would, you know, it was like a goal of places you need to see in San Francisco, and it would be the St. John Coltrane Church.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>But the year 2000 marked yet another shift for the Coltrane Church when they were forced out of their Divisadero storefront. Their home of nearly 30 years.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Wanika King-Stephens: \u003c/strong>It was awful, it was awful. I mean, I know I never saw it coming.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>Their rent more than doubled, and they had to end their free food program.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Wanika King-Stephens: \u003c/strong>We had to leave, and that was our home. That was our home. And then I watched that whole community change. And I just, I tell you, I couldn’t drive through that neighborhood without crying for, like, a whole year.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>They’ve relocated a few times since then. First to the Fillmore where they were one of just a handful of jazz institutions left. But they were evicted from that space too, before moving to their current location out of Fort Mason’s Magic Theater.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Sounds of Coltrane Church mass: Hallelujah! \u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mother Marina King during service: \u003c/strong>This next composition is entitled Tune Gene, and it means “He who comes in the glory of the Lord.” So I want you to clap your hands, pick up your tambourines. Do we have any dancers? You know, King David danced before the Lord with all the power of his might.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>Now, Archbishop King and Mother Marina see the church as a kind of Mecca, where Coltrane disciples from just about anywhere can worship together. On the day I visit, they’ve come from New York, Seattle, and closer to home, Redwood City.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Archbishop King in the service: \u003c/strong>This is the St. John Will-i-am Coltrane African Orthodox Church Global Spiritual Community. Amen. So we all are family, amen.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>At the end of Sunday mass Archbishop King and Mother Marina asked for donations. They’re trying to raise money to buy a building. What they hope will be a permanent home.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Archbishop King: \u003c/strong>So this church needs your money. Amen. Some of y’all are holding on to God’s money now.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>Archbishop King and Mother Marina are in their 80s and are looking towards the future of the church, how it can live beyond them. Their daughter, Pastor Wanika, plans to take it over, to continue sharing the church’s message.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Archbishop King: \u003c/strong>So Coltrane Consciousness is a love supreme, a love supreme, a love supreme. That’s what this coltrane consciousness is all about.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asal Ehsanipour: \u003c/strong>Since Archbishop King and Mother Marina’s sound baptism in 1965, the Coltrane Church has had different names, locations, philosophies. In fact, Archbishop King often says that as the seasons change, so do the needs of the people. Change, he says, is baked into the very essence of the church.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Archbishop King: \u003c/strong>And then at the same time, the church never changes. It remains constantly rooted in love and \u003cem>A Love Supreme\u003c/em>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Music fades out\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price:\u003c/strong> That story was reported by Asal Ehsanipour. You can attend mass at the Saint John Coltrane African Orthodox Church every Sunday at the Magic Theater at Fort Mason.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Bay Curious is produced at member-supported KQED in San Francisco.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Our show is made by Katrina Schwartz, Christopher Beale and me, Olivia Allen-Price.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>With extra support from Maha Sanad, Katie Sprenger, Jen Chien, Ethan Toven-Lindsey and everyone on team KQED.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Some members of the KQED podcast team are represented by the Screen Actors Guild American Federation of Television and Radio Artists, San Francisco, Northern California local.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Thanks for listening. Have a great week.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"slug": "how-the-bay-areas-gay-bars-became-a-battleground-for-lgtbq-rights-in-the-1950s",
"title": "How the Bay Area’s Gay Bars Became a Battleground for LGBTQ+ Rights in the 1950s",
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"headTitle": "How the Bay Area’s Gay Bars Became a Battleground for LGBTQ+ Rights in the 1950s | KQED",
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"content": "\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"#episode-transcript\">\u003ci>View the full episode transcript.\u003c/i>\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/tag/san-francisco\">San Francisco\u003c/a> has an international reputation as a haven of freedom and culture for the \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/tag/lgbtq\">LGBTQ+\u003c/a> community. And with good reason.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>San Francisco elected \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11706248/40-years-after-assassinations-assessing-the-legacies-of-harvey-milk-and-george-moscone\">Harvey Milk\u003c/a>, California’s first openly gay public official. It’s \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11876846/never-take-it-down-the-original-1978-rainbow-flag-returns-to-sf\">the birthplace of the rainbow pride flag\u003c/a>, now a global symbol. The city has also long had an iconic drag queen scene and legendary nightlife with \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/arts/13930323/san-francisco-gay-bars-history-silver-rail-febes-black-cat\">a long history of bustling gay\u003c/a> and \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/arts/13929998/historic-lesbian-bars-san-francisco-mauds-pegs-front-anns-monas-440-tommy-vasu\">lesbian bars\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But the Bay Area was not always this way. The LGBTQ+ community had to fight for these freedoms and safe spaces. Often, this fight was against oppressive policing from the state and local government. And some important moments in that fight happened in unexpected places, like Pacifica.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I was like, whoa, it says this was in Pacifica! Why have I never heard of it?” Bay Curious listener Henry Lie asked. He’d stumbled across mention of a 1956 police raid at a bar called Hazel’s Inn, where nearly a hundred queer folks were arrested. He wanted to know more.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Progress and repression of LGBTQ+ rights\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>“The early 1950s, I would say it was the heyday of gay nightlife in San Francisco,” said Nan Alamilla Boyd, an oral historian at the UC Berkeley’s Bancroft Library. As a longtime researcher of San Francisco’s LGBTQ+ history, Boyd has interviewed dozens of queer individuals who frequented gay bars during this time.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Her interviews uncover stories of the Bay Area’s history, especially the repression queer people faced in the 1950s.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12069459\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/01/HAZEL_S-BUILDING_1966-KQED.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12069459\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/01/HAZEL_S-BUILDING_1966-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1171\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/01/HAZEL_S-BUILDING_1966-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/01/HAZEL_S-BUILDING_1966-KQED-160x94.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/01/HAZEL_S-BUILDING_1966-KQED-1536x899.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The building once housed Hazel’s Inn. This photo was taken in 1966, when the city condemned the building. \u003ccite>(Courtesy of The Pacifica Historical Society)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“A lot of these people [I interviewed] witnessed front row seats to [this repressive era], and kept being as out and proud as possible and survived to tell about it,” Boyd said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In 1951, the California State Board of Equalization revoked the liquor license of the Black Cat Cafe, a popular gay bar, because the establishment was “injurious to public morals.” The Black Cat owner, Sol Stouman, appealed the move to the California Supreme Court. The court ruled in his favor, affirming that the presence of LGBTQ+ people in a bar was allowable, as long as there were no “immoral acts” taking place. The case is known as Stoumen v. Reilly and many historians see it as the first legal victory for the LGBTQ+ community.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The argument was that it’s not illegal to be a homosexual, it’s illegal to do homosexual acts,” Boyd explained. “I know it seems really regressive now, but the decision was liberating because the conclusion was that it wasn’t status that was illegal, it was behavior.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>For the first time, LGBTQ+ people had the protected right to gather at bars without facing prosecution for simply being a queer person in public. And so queer nightlife blossomed.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“There were maybe four or five ‘lesbian bars’ in North Beach within walking distance of each other at any point in time between 1948 and 1955,” Boyd said.[aside postID=news_12029551 hero='https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/03/250205-WildSideWest-21-BL_qed-1020x680.jpg']But just a few years later, the U.S. government started targeting the LGBTQ+ community. Now known as the \u003ca href=\"https://www.history.com/articles/state-department-gay-employees-outed-fired-lavender-scare\">Lavender Scare\u003c/a>, many of the freedoms enjoyed in the early 50s came under attack.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>President Dwight D. Eisenhower signed an executive order in 1953 banning gay people from federal work for immoral conduct and “sexual perversion.” And in California, a new state agency called the Department of Alcoholic Beverage Control was created in 1955. Known as the ABC, its job was to ensure that licensed bars abided by legal and \u003cem>moral \u003c/em>codes.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Things really changed in 1955,” Boyd said. The ABC began waging a war against gay bars.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The agency found ways to undermine the protections previously won by the LGBTQ+ community in Stouman v. Reilly. Since “homosexual acts” were still illegal, suddenly the state was very concerned about specific actions taking place in bars.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“There was a question about what exactly [were] the behaviors that [were] illegal,” Boyd said. “Do you have to see someone having sex in the bar? Or is it kissing? What about fondling? What about sitting on a lap? What about dancing close? So, all this stuff then started being hashed out.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>With each enforcement action against queer bar patrons, the ABC expanded the definition of illegal acts. Soon, even dancing with someone of the same sex was punishable. The ABC even collaborated with local law enforcement agencies to conduct undercover surveillance operations that identified and monitored LGBTQ gathering spots.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>By 1955, the gay bars in San Francisco were getting less and less safe. And as harassment and policing increased, the LGBTQ+ community began looking for new places to gather outside of San Francisco, away from well-known gay bars. The community ended up down the coast, where they made Hazel’s Inn their spot.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>The Hazel’s Inn raid\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>In the early hours of Feb. 19, 1956, a group of 35 ABC and San Mateo County Sheriff’s officers stormed into a full and bustling Hazel’s Inn. There were around 200 patrons present in the bar, mostly men, when the sheriff jumped onto the bar and announced, “This is a raid!”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Ninety people were arrested that night, including the bar’s owner, Hazel Nikola, a straight woman in her 60’s.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12069461\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 2125px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/01/San_Francisco_Chronicle__February_20_1956__Hazel_s-Inn-KQED-1-scaled.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12069461\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/01/San_Francisco_Chronicle__February_20_1956__Hazel_s-Inn-KQED-1-scaled.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2125\" height=\"2560\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/01/San_Francisco_Chronicle__February_20_1956__Hazel_s-Inn-KQED-1-scaled.jpg 2125w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/01/San_Francisco_Chronicle__February_20_1956__Hazel_s-Inn-KQED-1-2000x2409.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/01/San_Francisco_Chronicle__February_20_1956__Hazel_s-Inn-KQED-1-160x193.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/01/San_Francisco_Chronicle__February_20_1956__Hazel_s-Inn-KQED-1-1275x1536.jpg 1275w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/01/San_Francisco_Chronicle__February_20_1956__Hazel_s-Inn-KQED-1-1700x2048.jpg 1700w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2125px) 100vw, 2125px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Coverage of the Hazel’s Inn raid from the San Francisco Chronicle in 1956. It was common, at the time, for newspapers to use derogatory language in reference to the LGBTQ community. \u003ccite>(The San Francisco Chronicle via Newsbank)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Hazel’s Inn had been under state surveillance for months, and patrons were forced to walk past a line of agents who had been watching them. One by one, agents picked out those they had seen showing queer affection. Most of those arrested faced vagrancy charges. Nikola’s liquor license was quickly revoked for knowingly hosting a hangout for queer people and for serving an underage person.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>When \u003ca href=\"https://www.newspapers.com/article/the-times-20-february-1956-smt-hazels-i/10556199/\">\u003cem>The San Mateo Times\u003c/em>\u003c/a> asked Sheriff Earl Whitmore about the raid, he said, “Let it be known that we are not going to tolerate gatherings of homosexuals in the county.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The full extent of the ABC’s operation at Hazel’s Inn became clear as the case was brought before\u003ca href=\"https://go.gale.com/ps/i.do?p=AHSI&u=glbths&id=GALE%7CMDRLJF555849529&v=2.1&it=r&sid=bookmark-AHSI&sPage=11&asid=6014d9b9\"> the ABC Board\u003c/a> and the \u003ca href=\"https://caselaw.findlaw.com/court/ca-court-of-appeal/1810632.html\">court\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In court documents, Laurence E. Strong, an ABC agent, described the scene at Hazel’s Inn the night of the raid and in the months leading up to it. Strong described how one male patron sat on another man’s lap and how two others were seen holding hands. In the corner of the bar, a couple was seen embracing as one nestled his head into the other’s shoulder. Some men pinched each other’s butts and fondled each other while dancing. Women danced close together with other women. Men were seen powdering their faces and women wore slacks and sports coats.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>These scenes of queerness would be used in court to justify the revocation of Nikola’s liquor license for being a “resort for sexual perverts.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>While most of those arrested that night were cleared of charges, the damage had already been done. Newspapers caught wind of the raid, and patrons were publicly outed, with their names, occupations and home addresses published for all to see.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“People were so fearful,” Boyd said. “There were [LGBTQ+ people] who would never go out because they were afraid of getting arrested. And then [their] name would be in the paper and [their] life would be ruined.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Hazel’s Inn raid became a playbook for the state to target the queer community over the following 15 years. Surveillance, raids, and the revocation of liquor licenses were all part of a strategy to push LGBTQ+ people out of the Bay Area.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Resistance amidst repression\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Looking back at this history of aggressive policing against queer people and their bars, it’s no surprise that queer nightlife continues to be central to the LGBTQ+ community. For many, gay bars were the only spaces they were afforded the freedom to be openly queer. They were also the battlegrounds where civil rights were won and lost.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And the fight for LGBTQ+ rights continues. As the federal government uses its power to withhold \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/12049666/nowhere-else-to-go-sf-families-protest-kaisers-new-limits-on-gender-affirming-care\">gender-affirming healthcare\u003c/a> and to target\u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/12047432/us-sues-california-over-its-refusal-to-ban-transgender-athletes-from-girls-sports\"> transgender youth in sports\u003c/a>, Boyd said it can be hard to keep hope alive.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12068581\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/01/260102-hazelsinnraid00178_TV_qed.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12068581\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/01/260102-hazelsinnraid00178_TV_qed.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/01/260102-hazelsinnraid00178_TV_qed.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/01/260102-hazelsinnraid00178_TV_qed-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/01/260102-hazelsinnraid00178_TV_qed-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Nan Alamilla Boyd, a historian, poses for a portrait at the GLBT Historical Society Archives in San Francisco on Jan. 2, 2026. \u003ccite>(Tâm Vũ / KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“The hits [to LGBTQ+ rights] keep coming and in many different ways,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Still, her work has taught her that in times of repression, powerful political organizing and cultural innovation can emerge.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“By the early 1960s, [queer] bartenders and the bar owners had pretty elaborate methods to resist the policing agencies,” Boyd said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>They created a resistance movement powerful enough to outlast the government’s efforts to eradicate queer nightlife.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“You can’t really make cultural innovation illegal because it happens,” Boyd said. “It’s everything, everywhere, all at once. It’s the thing that’s our spirit.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And it’s because of that indomitable spirit that the Bay Area looks and feels the way it does today.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postID=news_12063643 hero='https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/11/251008-GirlintheFishbowl-01-BL.jpg']\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[baycuriousquestion]\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2 id=\"episode-transcript\">Episode Transcript\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>San Francisco and its surrounding Bay Area have long been known as a gay capital of the world.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Music starts\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>After all, it’s here, where the first lesbian civil rights group was formed, the Daughters of Bilitis.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And where Harvey Milk became an iconic gay public official! [tape]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Harvey Milk:\u003c/strong> I will fight to represent my constituents. I will fight to represent the city and county of San Francisco. I will fight to give those people who once walked away hope, so that those people will walk back in. Thank you very much. [clapping]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>It was the birthplace of the Gay pride flag. And it’s where city hall is lit up in a rainbow for pride month. This is the Bay Area that our question asker, Henry Lie, knows well.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Music stops\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Henry Lie: \u003c/strong>I’m originally from Pacifica…went to high school at Terranova High School.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>Henry always thought of Pacifica as an extension of San Francisco — it’s just a few miles south, after all. And, there’s not a whole lot that surprises Henry about his hometown. That is until he learned about a moment in Pacifica’s history that left him with a ton of questions.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Henry Lie:\u003c/strong> We have this museum.. I think I was there and saw like a footnote or something and it just said like, oh yeah, Hazel’s Inn raid where, you know, there was a large gathering of LGBTQ+ identifying people and a bunch of people were arrested, couple of people charged.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>Henry had stumbled across a forgotten moment in history — a massive police raid that took place in 1956, part of a crusade to push LGBTQ people out of the Bay Area.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Ominous music starts\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Local newspapers documented the raid.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>\u003cstrong>Voice Over 1: \u003c/strong>San Francisco Examiner: Ninety persons, mostly men, were booked at the San Mateo County jail yesterday after a vice raid on a tavern suspected of being a gathering place for sex deviates.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>\u003cstrong>Voice Over 2: \u003c/strong>San Mateo Times: The raid, according to Sheriff Whitmore, “was to let homosexuals know we’re not going to tolerate their congregation in this county.” \u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>\u003cstrong>Voice Over 3: \u003c/strong>Redwood City Tribune: Mrs. Nicola, owner of Hazel’s Inn, is charged with operating a resort for sexual deviates. \u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price:\u003c/strong> Big questions began surfacing for Henry.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Henry Lie:\u003c/strong> And I was like, whoa, I’ve never even heard of Hazel’s Inn. This says this was in Pacifica. Why have I never heard of it?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price:\u003c/strong> So he came to Bay Curious, hoping to find out more.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Henry Lie:\u003c/strong> Could you dive deeper into the Hazel’s Inn raid in Pacifica and the effects that it had on the LGBTQ plus community in the greater Bay area in the late 1950s?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Bay Curious theme music starts\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>I’m Olivia Allen-Price and this is Bay Curious. This week, we’re going back to the gay bars of the 1950s to learn about a moment in time when the San Francisco Bay Area was far less welcoming.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>All that coming right up.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Theme music ends\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Sponsor Break\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>To dig deeper into Bay Area queer history, KQED’s Ana De Almeida Amaral takes us to Pacifica.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ana De Almeida Amaral:\u003c/strong> Pacifica is a beautiful place, with sprawling views of the ocean and stunning beaches. It has that small town feel, complete with a\u003cem> tiny\u003c/em> museum showcasing its history.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Laura Del Rosso:\u003c/strong> This is our little museum…\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ana De Almeida Amaral: \u003c/strong>Laura Del Rosso was born and raised in Pacifica, and serves as a docent and board member for the Pacifica Coastside Museum.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Laura Del Rosso:\u003c/strong> This whole area around here was full of speakeasies, taverns, restaurants, and brothels during Prohibition.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ana De Almeida Amaral: \u003c/strong>It seems hard to imagine now, but this small town was once infamous for its nightlife.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Laura Del Rosso: \u003c/strong>Some people think that San Mateo County coast was actually the wettest place in the whole United States, meaning there was more booze here and in Half Moon Bay area than anywhere else in the country.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ana De Almeida Amaral: \u003c/strong>While the historical society has long been aware of the clandestine nightlife during Prohibition, it wasn’t until a few years ago that they started uncovering the history of a hushed queer nightlife scene that took hold right here, in the 1950’s.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Jazzy music starts\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ana De Almeida Amaral: \u003c/strong>Hazel’s Inn was a tavern in Sharp Park, now a neighborhood in Pacifica. ^The bar is long gone^, but in 1956 the Pacifica Tribune, described it as a large and homey space, with knick-nacks above a mahogany bar, a shuffle board, a dance floor and a jukebox.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Hazel’s Inn was owned and run by Hazel Nikola, a straight woman in her 60s.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Laura Del Rosso:\u003c/strong> From what we understand then, after she got a divorce she was running the place by herself.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ana De Almeida Amaral: \u003c/strong>And the place was popular! Sometimes there were up to 500 patrons in a weekend. For a long time it catered mostly to locals and tourists on holiday at the beach, but then in 1955 and 56, the LGBT community made it \u003cem>their\u003c/em> spot.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Laura Del Rosso:\u003c/strong> When the gay men started coming from San Francisco, she welcomed them. And she was non-judgmental. However, it’s obvious that somebody was not happy and did contact the sheriff.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ana De Almeida Amaral: \u003c/strong>But before we can get to that night — the night of the Hazel’s Inn raid — we have to ask why here? Miles from San Francisco, hidden in a small town, far from any other gay nightlife, why was Hazel’s Inn the place that attracted hundreds of LGBTQ people?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ana De Almeida Amaral: \u003c/strong>To answer this question, I went to the archives at the GLBT historical society — where collections documenting the Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, and Trans community are housed.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>There, I met Dr. Nan Alamilla Boyd. She’s an oral historian with the Bancroft Library at UC Berkeley.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Dr. Nan Alamilla Boyd: \u003c/strong>I was professor of women and gender studies at San Francisco State for decades.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ana De Almeida Amaral: \u003c/strong>She’s one of the few people who has researched queer nightlife in the 1950’s.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Dr. Nan Alamilla Boyd:\u003c/strong> 1956, 90 persons, mostly men were booked at the San Mateo county jail…\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ana De Almeida Amaral: \u003c/strong>At the archives we read some of the newspaper clippings about Hazel’s Inn.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Dr. Nan Alamilla Boyd:\u003c/strong> Suspected of being a gathering place for sex deviates…\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ana De Almeida Amaral: \u003c/strong>She did a lot of her research back in the 1990s and was able to interview dozens of queer people who lived in the Bay Area in the 1940s and 50s. Most of them have since passed away, so her work and these archives are some of the last links to this story.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Piano music starts\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ana De Almeida Amaral: \u003c/strong>Back in the 1940s, San Francisco already had a queer nightlife scene, but at the time it was illegal to be gay. And bars that were caught serving queer people… that was illegal too.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Dr. Nan Alamilla Boyd:\u003c/strong> If you were not a legal kind of person, then you couldn’t like buy a drink in a bar.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ana De Almeida Amaral: \u003c/strong>But the law changed in 1951— when the Black Cat Cafe, in San Francisco, had its liquor license suspended for serving members of the LGBT community. The owner appealed the decision to the California Supreme court. The case is known as Stouman vs. Riley and it’s a big moment in queer civil rights history.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Dr. Nan Alamilla Boyd:\u003c/strong> The argument was that it’s not illegal to be a homosexual, it’s illegal to do homosexual acts.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ana De Almeida Amaral: \u003c/strong>The court agreed. And the ruling became one of the first civil rights protections for LGBTQ people.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Music ends\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ana De Almeida Amaral: \u003c/strong>For the first time, they had the protected right to assemble. Gay men and lesbian women could buy drinks at bars and hang out with other queer friends.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That is as long as there were no homosexual acts taking place that were deemed “illegal or immoral.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Like many legal decisions, it was a vague but powerful protection.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Dr. Nan Alamilla Boyd:\u003c/strong> I know it seems really regressive now, right? But the decision was liberating because the conclusion was that it wasn’t Status that was illegal, it was behavior.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ana De Almeida Amaral: \u003c/strong>And so queer nightlife in the Bay Area blossomed.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Dr. Nan Alamilla Boyd:\u003c/strong> In the early 1950s, I would say it was the heyday of gay nightlife in San Francisco.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ana De Almeida Amaral: \u003c/strong>And really iconic gay bars came into the picture. The Black Cat Cafe was running again, Tommy’s Place and Ann’s 440 opened. And these places became sanctuaries for the LGBT community to be \u003cem>together. \u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Dr. Nan Alamilla Boyd:\u003c/strong> There were maybe four or five quote unquote lesbian bars in North Beach in walking distance of each other at any point in time between like, let’s say, 1948 and 1955. So it’s like a really interesting community that evolved.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ana De Almeida Amaral: \u003c/strong>And this was really important because in the 1950s it was still not super safe to be gay. Many queer folks were closeted by day in order to keep their jobs. But at night…at the bar…there was a freedom that didn’t really exist anywhere else.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Dr. Nan Alamilla Boyd:\u003c/strong> And it was before the state caught wind of what was happening.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ana De Almeida Amaral: \u003c/strong>But then a panic started to take hold in the United States…\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Senator McCarthy archival tape:\u003c/strong> Are you a member of the communist conspiracy as of this moment?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ana De Almeida Amaral: \u003c/strong>A conservative mindset took hold in American politics and culture — ushering in a time of suspicion and fear.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Senator McCarthy archival tape:\u003c/strong> Our nation may very well die, and I ask you caused it?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ana De Almeida Amaral: \u003c/strong>And quickly, LGBT people become \u003cu>targets\u003c/u> at the federal, state and local level.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>President Eisenhower signed an executive order in 1953 banning gay people from federal work, labeling them as having immoral conduct and “sexual perversion.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And, in 1955 \u003cem>California\u003c/em> created a new state agency called the Department of Alcoholic Beverage Control or the ABC. An agency whose sole job was to ensure that licensed bars abided by legal and \u003cem>moral\u003c/em> codes.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And from the moment the department of Alcoholic Beverage control was created a top priority for them was to…\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Dr. Nan Alamilla Boyd: \u003c/strong>Shut down the gay bars.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ana De Almeida Amaral: \u003c/strong>And they did this by finding ways around those vague protections won in the Stouman v. Riley case.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>While queer people were granted the right to assemble, “homosexual acts” were still illegal, so authorities started taking an interest in the specifics of what that meant.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Dr. Nan Alamilla Boyd:\u003c/strong> There’s a question about like, well then what exactly are the behaviors that are illegal? Like, do you have to like see someone, having sex in the bar? Or is it kissing? What about fondling? What about sitting on a lap? What about holding hands? What about dancing close? So all this stuff was like, then started being hashed out, you know, this is an illegal act.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ana De Almeida Amaral: \u003c/strong>And the Department of Alcoholic Beverage Control started collaborating with a bunch of law enforcement agencies throughout the Bay Area to ferret out people engaged in those acts.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>By 1955, the gay bars in San Francisco were getting less and less safe.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And as harassment and policing increased, the LGBT community began looking for new places to gather outside of San Francisco, away from well-known gay bars, and they ended up down the coast, at Hazel’s Inn.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Sound design of a raucous bar scene\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The only testimonies about what happened on Feb. 19, 1956, the night that Hazel’s Inn was raided, come from court documents and hearings at the Alcoholic Beverage Control Board. Laurence E. Strong, an ABC agent, described in detail what was happening at the bar.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That night, the dance floor was alive, and the bar was filled with around 200 patrons, mostly men. These men wrapped their arms around each other and embraced one another while dancing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He also described how one patron sat on another man’s lap and how two other men held hands. In the corner of the bar, a couple embraced as one nestled his head into the other’s shoulder. Some men pinched each other’s butts and fondled each other while dancing. Women danced close together with other women. Men were seen powdering their faces and women wore slacks and sports coats.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It sounds like a scene of queer joy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Music turns tense\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Suddenly, 35 law enforcement agents stormed the bar — a mix of San Mateo county sheriff’s officers and ABC agents began arresting people. The sheriff jumped on to the bar and announced:\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Voice over:\u003c/strong> “This is a raid!”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ana De Almeida Amaral: \u003c/strong>Patrons were forced to walk past a line of agents. And one by one, agents picked out people they had seen showing queer affection.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Dr. Boyd says that the Alcoholic Beverage Control Board had been watching Hazel’s Inn for months, gathering evidence and building a case that behavior there was “illegal and immoral.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Dr. Nan Alamilla Boyd: \u003c/strong>They had undercover agents in the bars. And they would go in twos or threes and they would watch each other. And somebody would get an interested person, and then would sort of lead them on, until there was some kind of physical, sexual, or flirtatious engagement that involved touching. It was entrapment. And that was a common and acceptable practice.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ana De Almeida Amaral: \u003c/strong>Ninety people were arrested that night at Hazel’s Inn, including Hazel Nikola — the owner. The bar’s liquor license was quickly revoked for being quote “a resort for sexual perverts” and for serving someone underaged.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The mass arrest caught the attention of a variety of civil rights groups, including the ACLU who represented 30 defendants. Most of those arrested were cleared of charges, but the damage had already been done. People were outed in the newspapers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Dr. Nan Alamilla Boyd:\u003c/strong> There would be a list of the people and their address and sometimes their occupation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Voice over: \u003c/strong>The San Mateo Times: Local persons arrested were: Iris Ann Glasgow, 24 years old. Clerk. 1515 James Street, Redwood City.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ana De Almeida Amaral: \u003c/strong>Many of these people were publicly named as “sexual perverts”. That often meant being ostracized or losing their job.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Dr. Nan Alamilla Boyd:\u003c/strong> People were so fearful.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Cello music starts\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ana De Almeida Amaral: \u003c/strong>As for the bar, Hazel fought the revocation of her liquor license for\u003cem> two years \u003c/em>but the court ultimately sided with the ABC.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Laura Del Rosso:\u003c/strong> I think she was just really bitter about what happened here.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Music ends\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ana De Almeida Amaral: \u003c/strong>Back in the Pacifica Coastside museum, Laura reflected on what the raid did to Hazel Nikola.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Laura Del Rosso:\u003c/strong> She lost her liquor license and things just kind of went downhill for her. You have that information on the thing. And she ended up, she ended closing. She was very, very bitter at the end. She felt like she was really an important part of the community and that they had kind of betrayed her. She left Sharp Park and went to live somewhere else. And never came back.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ana De Almeida Amaral: \u003c/strong>For the queer community, the effects were even more devastating. The Hazel’s Inn Raid became a playbook for the state to target the queer community over the next 15 years. (Surveillance, raids, and the revocation of liquor licenses.) It was a strategy to push LGBTQ people out of the Bay Area.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But it didn’t work.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Despite this aggressive policing and repression, the gay bars never died.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Queer patrons, and bartenders, and bar owners found ways to keep going. They found ways to spot surveillance in their bars, they organized and worked to keep the police out of their spaces.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Historian Dr. Boyd again:\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Dr. Nan Alamilla Boyd:\u003c/strong> My takeaway from history as a historian is that during these times of repression. There’s cultural innovation that happens. You can’t really name it yet, right? But it’s taking shape you know, that there’s something coming.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Music starts\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ana De Almeida Amaral: \u003c/strong>During those years of extreme repression, queer activists were making connections, organizing, and laying the groundwork for the next several decades of activism that would see LGBTQ rights expand.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Bay Area has changed a lot since the raid at Hazel’s Inn. But still, a fearless commitment to community and authenticity — the spirit that kept these gay bars alive — lives on here.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>That was reporter Ana De Almeida Amaral. Featuring the voices of Azul Dahlstrom-Eckman, Carly Severn, Christopher Beale and Paul Lancour for archival material.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Did you know that Bay Curious listeners help choose which questions we answer on the podcast? Each month we have a new voting round up at \u003ca href=\"http://baycurious.org\">BayCurious.org\u003c/a>, with three fascinating questions to choose from. This month…\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Question 1: \u003c/strong>Did the Navy airship America crash land into several houses? What happened to the crew?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Question 2:\u003c/strong> Why is San Francisco home to so many federal and statewide courts? Why aren’t they in Sacramento or Los Angeles?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Question 3: \u003c/strong>I want to learn more about San Francisco upzoning and how people feel about it in the Richmond and Sunset districts.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>Cast your vote with one click at \u003ca href=\"http://baycurious.org\">BayCurious.org\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Henry Lie:\u003c/strong> Bay Curious is made in San Francisco at member-supported KQED.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>Become a member today at \u003ca href=\"http://kqed.org/donate\">kqed.org/donate\u003c/a>. Our show is produced by Katrina Schwartz, Christopher Beale and me Olivia Allen-Price. With extra support from Katie Sprenger, Matt Morales, Tim Olsen, Maha Sanad, Jen Chien, Ethan Toven-Lindsey and everyone on team KQED.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Some members of the KQED podcast team are represented by The Screen Actors Guild, American Federation of Television and Radio Artists. San Francisco Northern California Local.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>I’m Olivia Allen-Price. Have a wonderful week.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"#episode-transcript\">\u003ci>View the full episode transcript.\u003c/i>\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/tag/san-francisco\">San Francisco\u003c/a> has an international reputation as a haven of freedom and culture for the \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/tag/lgbtq\">LGBTQ+\u003c/a> community. And with good reason.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>San Francisco elected \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11706248/40-years-after-assassinations-assessing-the-legacies-of-harvey-milk-and-george-moscone\">Harvey Milk\u003c/a>, California’s first openly gay public official. It’s \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11876846/never-take-it-down-the-original-1978-rainbow-flag-returns-to-sf\">the birthplace of the rainbow pride flag\u003c/a>, now a global symbol. The city has also long had an iconic drag queen scene and legendary nightlife with \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/arts/13930323/san-francisco-gay-bars-history-silver-rail-febes-black-cat\">a long history of bustling gay\u003c/a> and \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/arts/13929998/historic-lesbian-bars-san-francisco-mauds-pegs-front-anns-monas-440-tommy-vasu\">lesbian bars\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But the Bay Area was not always this way. The LGBTQ+ community had to fight for these freedoms and safe spaces. Often, this fight was against oppressive policing from the state and local government. And some important moments in that fight happened in unexpected places, like Pacifica.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I was like, whoa, it says this was in Pacifica! Why have I never heard of it?” Bay Curious listener Henry Lie asked. He’d stumbled across mention of a 1956 police raid at a bar called Hazel’s Inn, where nearly a hundred queer folks were arrested. He wanted to know more.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Progress and repression of LGBTQ+ rights\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>“The early 1950s, I would say it was the heyday of gay nightlife in San Francisco,” said Nan Alamilla Boyd, an oral historian at the UC Berkeley’s Bancroft Library. As a longtime researcher of San Francisco’s LGBTQ+ history, Boyd has interviewed dozens of queer individuals who frequented gay bars during this time.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Her interviews uncover stories of the Bay Area’s history, especially the repression queer people faced in the 1950s.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12069459\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/01/HAZEL_S-BUILDING_1966-KQED.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12069459\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/01/HAZEL_S-BUILDING_1966-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1171\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/01/HAZEL_S-BUILDING_1966-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/01/HAZEL_S-BUILDING_1966-KQED-160x94.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/01/HAZEL_S-BUILDING_1966-KQED-1536x899.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The building once housed Hazel’s Inn. This photo was taken in 1966, when the city condemned the building. \u003ccite>(Courtesy of The Pacifica Historical Society)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“A lot of these people [I interviewed] witnessed front row seats to [this repressive era], and kept being as out and proud as possible and survived to tell about it,” Boyd said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In 1951, the California State Board of Equalization revoked the liquor license of the Black Cat Cafe, a popular gay bar, because the establishment was “injurious to public morals.” The Black Cat owner, Sol Stouman, appealed the move to the California Supreme Court. The court ruled in his favor, affirming that the presence of LGBTQ+ people in a bar was allowable, as long as there were no “immoral acts” taking place. The case is known as Stoumen v. Reilly and many historians see it as the first legal victory for the LGBTQ+ community.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The argument was that it’s not illegal to be a homosexual, it’s illegal to do homosexual acts,” Boyd explained. “I know it seems really regressive now, but the decision was liberating because the conclusion was that it wasn’t status that was illegal, it was behavior.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>For the first time, LGBTQ+ people had the protected right to gather at bars without facing prosecution for simply being a queer person in public. And so queer nightlife blossomed.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“There were maybe four or five ‘lesbian bars’ in North Beach within walking distance of each other at any point in time between 1948 and 1955,” Boyd said.\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>But just a few years later, the U.S. government started targeting the LGBTQ+ community. Now known as the \u003ca href=\"https://www.history.com/articles/state-department-gay-employees-outed-fired-lavender-scare\">Lavender Scare\u003c/a>, many of the freedoms enjoyed in the early 50s came under attack.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>President Dwight D. Eisenhower signed an executive order in 1953 banning gay people from federal work for immoral conduct and “sexual perversion.” And in California, a new state agency called the Department of Alcoholic Beverage Control was created in 1955. Known as the ABC, its job was to ensure that licensed bars abided by legal and \u003cem>moral \u003c/em>codes.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Things really changed in 1955,” Boyd said. The ABC began waging a war against gay bars.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The agency found ways to undermine the protections previously won by the LGBTQ+ community in Stouman v. Reilly. Since “homosexual acts” were still illegal, suddenly the state was very concerned about specific actions taking place in bars.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“There was a question about what exactly [were] the behaviors that [were] illegal,” Boyd said. “Do you have to see someone having sex in the bar? Or is it kissing? What about fondling? What about sitting on a lap? What about dancing close? So, all this stuff then started being hashed out.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>With each enforcement action against queer bar patrons, the ABC expanded the definition of illegal acts. Soon, even dancing with someone of the same sex was punishable. The ABC even collaborated with local law enforcement agencies to conduct undercover surveillance operations that identified and monitored LGBTQ gathering spots.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>By 1955, the gay bars in San Francisco were getting less and less safe. And as harassment and policing increased, the LGBTQ+ community began looking for new places to gather outside of San Francisco, away from well-known gay bars. The community ended up down the coast, where they made Hazel’s Inn their spot.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>The Hazel’s Inn raid\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>In the early hours of Feb. 19, 1956, a group of 35 ABC and San Mateo County Sheriff’s officers stormed into a full and bustling Hazel’s Inn. There were around 200 patrons present in the bar, mostly men, when the sheriff jumped onto the bar and announced, “This is a raid!”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Ninety people were arrested that night, including the bar’s owner, Hazel Nikola, a straight woman in her 60’s.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12069461\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 2125px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/01/San_Francisco_Chronicle__February_20_1956__Hazel_s-Inn-KQED-1-scaled.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12069461\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/01/San_Francisco_Chronicle__February_20_1956__Hazel_s-Inn-KQED-1-scaled.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2125\" height=\"2560\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/01/San_Francisco_Chronicle__February_20_1956__Hazel_s-Inn-KQED-1-scaled.jpg 2125w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/01/San_Francisco_Chronicle__February_20_1956__Hazel_s-Inn-KQED-1-2000x2409.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/01/San_Francisco_Chronicle__February_20_1956__Hazel_s-Inn-KQED-1-160x193.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/01/San_Francisco_Chronicle__February_20_1956__Hazel_s-Inn-KQED-1-1275x1536.jpg 1275w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/01/San_Francisco_Chronicle__February_20_1956__Hazel_s-Inn-KQED-1-1700x2048.jpg 1700w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2125px) 100vw, 2125px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Coverage of the Hazel’s Inn raid from the San Francisco Chronicle in 1956. It was common, at the time, for newspapers to use derogatory language in reference to the LGBTQ community. \u003ccite>(The San Francisco Chronicle via Newsbank)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Hazel’s Inn had been under state surveillance for months, and patrons were forced to walk past a line of agents who had been watching them. One by one, agents picked out those they had seen showing queer affection. Most of those arrested faced vagrancy charges. Nikola’s liquor license was quickly revoked for knowingly hosting a hangout for queer people and for serving an underage person.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>When \u003ca href=\"https://www.newspapers.com/article/the-times-20-february-1956-smt-hazels-i/10556199/\">\u003cem>The San Mateo Times\u003c/em>\u003c/a> asked Sheriff Earl Whitmore about the raid, he said, “Let it be known that we are not going to tolerate gatherings of homosexuals in the county.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The full extent of the ABC’s operation at Hazel’s Inn became clear as the case was brought before\u003ca href=\"https://go.gale.com/ps/i.do?p=AHSI&u=glbths&id=GALE%7CMDRLJF555849529&v=2.1&it=r&sid=bookmark-AHSI&sPage=11&asid=6014d9b9\"> the ABC Board\u003c/a> and the \u003ca href=\"https://caselaw.findlaw.com/court/ca-court-of-appeal/1810632.html\">court\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In court documents, Laurence E. Strong, an ABC agent, described the scene at Hazel’s Inn the night of the raid and in the months leading up to it. Strong described how one male patron sat on another man’s lap and how two others were seen holding hands. In the corner of the bar, a couple was seen embracing as one nestled his head into the other’s shoulder. Some men pinched each other’s butts and fondled each other while dancing. Women danced close together with other women. Men were seen powdering their faces and women wore slacks and sports coats.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>These scenes of queerness would be used in court to justify the revocation of Nikola’s liquor license for being a “resort for sexual perverts.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>While most of those arrested that night were cleared of charges, the damage had already been done. Newspapers caught wind of the raid, and patrons were publicly outed, with their names, occupations and home addresses published for all to see.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“People were so fearful,” Boyd said. “There were [LGBTQ+ people] who would never go out because they were afraid of getting arrested. And then [their] name would be in the paper and [their] life would be ruined.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Hazel’s Inn raid became a playbook for the state to target the queer community over the following 15 years. Surveillance, raids, and the revocation of liquor licenses were all part of a strategy to push LGBTQ+ people out of the Bay Area.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Resistance amidst repression\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Looking back at this history of aggressive policing against queer people and their bars, it’s no surprise that queer nightlife continues to be central to the LGBTQ+ community. For many, gay bars were the only spaces they were afforded the freedom to be openly queer. They were also the battlegrounds where civil rights were won and lost.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And the fight for LGBTQ+ rights continues. As the federal government uses its power to withhold \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/12049666/nowhere-else-to-go-sf-families-protest-kaisers-new-limits-on-gender-affirming-care\">gender-affirming healthcare\u003c/a> and to target\u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/12047432/us-sues-california-over-its-refusal-to-ban-transgender-athletes-from-girls-sports\"> transgender youth in sports\u003c/a>, Boyd said it can be hard to keep hope alive.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12068581\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/01/260102-hazelsinnraid00178_TV_qed.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12068581\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/01/260102-hazelsinnraid00178_TV_qed.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/01/260102-hazelsinnraid00178_TV_qed.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/01/260102-hazelsinnraid00178_TV_qed-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/01/260102-hazelsinnraid00178_TV_qed-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Nan Alamilla Boyd, a historian, poses for a portrait at the GLBT Historical Society Archives in San Francisco on Jan. 2, 2026. \u003ccite>(Tâm Vũ / KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“The hits [to LGBTQ+ rights] keep coming and in many different ways,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Still, her work has taught her that in times of repression, powerful political organizing and cultural innovation can emerge.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“By the early 1960s, [queer] bartenders and the bar owners had pretty elaborate methods to resist the policing agencies,” Boyd said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>They created a resistance movement powerful enough to outlast the government’s efforts to eradicate queer nightlife.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“You can’t really make cultural innovation illegal because it happens,” Boyd said. “It’s everything, everywhere, all at once. It’s the thing that’s our spirit.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And it’s because of that indomitable spirit that the Bay Area looks and feels the way it does today.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2 id=\"episode-transcript\">Episode Transcript\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>San Francisco and its surrounding Bay Area have long been known as a gay capital of the world.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Music starts\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>After all, it’s here, where the first lesbian civil rights group was formed, the Daughters of Bilitis.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And where Harvey Milk became an iconic gay public official! [tape]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Harvey Milk:\u003c/strong> I will fight to represent my constituents. I will fight to represent the city and county of San Francisco. I will fight to give those people who once walked away hope, so that those people will walk back in. Thank you very much. [clapping]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>It was the birthplace of the Gay pride flag. And it’s where city hall is lit up in a rainbow for pride month. This is the Bay Area that our question asker, Henry Lie, knows well.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Music stops\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Henry Lie: \u003c/strong>I’m originally from Pacifica…went to high school at Terranova High School.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>Henry always thought of Pacifica as an extension of San Francisco — it’s just a few miles south, after all. And, there’s not a whole lot that surprises Henry about his hometown. That is until he learned about a moment in Pacifica’s history that left him with a ton of questions.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Henry Lie:\u003c/strong> We have this museum.. I think I was there and saw like a footnote or something and it just said like, oh yeah, Hazel’s Inn raid where, you know, there was a large gathering of LGBTQ+ identifying people and a bunch of people were arrested, couple of people charged.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>Henry had stumbled across a forgotten moment in history — a massive police raid that took place in 1956, part of a crusade to push LGBTQ people out of the Bay Area.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Ominous music starts\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Local newspapers documented the raid.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>\u003cstrong>Voice Over 1: \u003c/strong>San Francisco Examiner: Ninety persons, mostly men, were booked at the San Mateo County jail yesterday after a vice raid on a tavern suspected of being a gathering place for sex deviates.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>\u003cstrong>Voice Over 2: \u003c/strong>San Mateo Times: The raid, according to Sheriff Whitmore, “was to let homosexuals know we’re not going to tolerate their congregation in this county.” \u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>\u003cstrong>Voice Over 3: \u003c/strong>Redwood City Tribune: Mrs. Nicola, owner of Hazel’s Inn, is charged with operating a resort for sexual deviates. \u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price:\u003c/strong> Big questions began surfacing for Henry.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Henry Lie:\u003c/strong> And I was like, whoa, I’ve never even heard of Hazel’s Inn. This says this was in Pacifica. Why have I never heard of it?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price:\u003c/strong> So he came to Bay Curious, hoping to find out more.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Henry Lie:\u003c/strong> Could you dive deeper into the Hazel’s Inn raid in Pacifica and the effects that it had on the LGBTQ plus community in the greater Bay area in the late 1950s?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Bay Curious theme music starts\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>I’m Olivia Allen-Price and this is Bay Curious. This week, we’re going back to the gay bars of the 1950s to learn about a moment in time when the San Francisco Bay Area was far less welcoming.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>All that coming right up.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Theme music ends\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Sponsor Break\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>To dig deeper into Bay Area queer history, KQED’s Ana De Almeida Amaral takes us to Pacifica.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ana De Almeida Amaral:\u003c/strong> Pacifica is a beautiful place, with sprawling views of the ocean and stunning beaches. It has that small town feel, complete with a\u003cem> tiny\u003c/em> museum showcasing its history.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Laura Del Rosso:\u003c/strong> This is our little museum…\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ana De Almeida Amaral: \u003c/strong>Laura Del Rosso was born and raised in Pacifica, and serves as a docent and board member for the Pacifica Coastside Museum.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Laura Del Rosso:\u003c/strong> This whole area around here was full of speakeasies, taverns, restaurants, and brothels during Prohibition.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ana De Almeida Amaral: \u003c/strong>It seems hard to imagine now, but this small town was once infamous for its nightlife.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Laura Del Rosso: \u003c/strong>Some people think that San Mateo County coast was actually the wettest place in the whole United States, meaning there was more booze here and in Half Moon Bay area than anywhere else in the country.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ana De Almeida Amaral: \u003c/strong>While the historical society has long been aware of the clandestine nightlife during Prohibition, it wasn’t until a few years ago that they started uncovering the history of a hushed queer nightlife scene that took hold right here, in the 1950’s.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Jazzy music starts\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ana De Almeida Amaral: \u003c/strong>Hazel’s Inn was a tavern in Sharp Park, now a neighborhood in Pacifica. ^The bar is long gone^, but in 1956 the Pacifica Tribune, described it as a large and homey space, with knick-nacks above a mahogany bar, a shuffle board, a dance floor and a jukebox.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Hazel’s Inn was owned and run by Hazel Nikola, a straight woman in her 60s.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Laura Del Rosso:\u003c/strong> From what we understand then, after she got a divorce she was running the place by herself.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ana De Almeida Amaral: \u003c/strong>And the place was popular! Sometimes there were up to 500 patrons in a weekend. For a long time it catered mostly to locals and tourists on holiday at the beach, but then in 1955 and 56, the LGBT community made it \u003cem>their\u003c/em> spot.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Laura Del Rosso:\u003c/strong> When the gay men started coming from San Francisco, she welcomed them. And she was non-judgmental. However, it’s obvious that somebody was not happy and did contact the sheriff.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ana De Almeida Amaral: \u003c/strong>But before we can get to that night — the night of the Hazel’s Inn raid — we have to ask why here? Miles from San Francisco, hidden in a small town, far from any other gay nightlife, why was Hazel’s Inn the place that attracted hundreds of LGBTQ people?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ana De Almeida Amaral: \u003c/strong>To answer this question, I went to the archives at the GLBT historical society — where collections documenting the Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, and Trans community are housed.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>There, I met Dr. Nan Alamilla Boyd. She’s an oral historian with the Bancroft Library at UC Berkeley.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Dr. Nan Alamilla Boyd: \u003c/strong>I was professor of women and gender studies at San Francisco State for decades.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ana De Almeida Amaral: \u003c/strong>She’s one of the few people who has researched queer nightlife in the 1950’s.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Dr. Nan Alamilla Boyd:\u003c/strong> 1956, 90 persons, mostly men were booked at the San Mateo county jail…\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ana De Almeida Amaral: \u003c/strong>At the archives we read some of the newspaper clippings about Hazel’s Inn.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Dr. Nan Alamilla Boyd:\u003c/strong> Suspected of being a gathering place for sex deviates…\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ana De Almeida Amaral: \u003c/strong>She did a lot of her research back in the 1990s and was able to interview dozens of queer people who lived in the Bay Area in the 1940s and 50s. Most of them have since passed away, so her work and these archives are some of the last links to this story.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Piano music starts\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ana De Almeida Amaral: \u003c/strong>Back in the 1940s, San Francisco already had a queer nightlife scene, but at the time it was illegal to be gay. And bars that were caught serving queer people… that was illegal too.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Dr. Nan Alamilla Boyd:\u003c/strong> If you were not a legal kind of person, then you couldn’t like buy a drink in a bar.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ana De Almeida Amaral: \u003c/strong>But the law changed in 1951— when the Black Cat Cafe, in San Francisco, had its liquor license suspended for serving members of the LGBT community. The owner appealed the decision to the California Supreme court. The case is known as Stouman vs. Riley and it’s a big moment in queer civil rights history.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Dr. Nan Alamilla Boyd:\u003c/strong> The argument was that it’s not illegal to be a homosexual, it’s illegal to do homosexual acts.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ana De Almeida Amaral: \u003c/strong>The court agreed. And the ruling became one of the first civil rights protections for LGBTQ people.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Music ends\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ana De Almeida Amaral: \u003c/strong>For the first time, they had the protected right to assemble. Gay men and lesbian women could buy drinks at bars and hang out with other queer friends.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That is as long as there were no homosexual acts taking place that were deemed “illegal or immoral.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Like many legal decisions, it was a vague but powerful protection.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Dr. Nan Alamilla Boyd:\u003c/strong> I know it seems really regressive now, right? But the decision was liberating because the conclusion was that it wasn’t Status that was illegal, it was behavior.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ana De Almeida Amaral: \u003c/strong>And so queer nightlife in the Bay Area blossomed.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Dr. Nan Alamilla Boyd:\u003c/strong> In the early 1950s, I would say it was the heyday of gay nightlife in San Francisco.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ana De Almeida Amaral: \u003c/strong>And really iconic gay bars came into the picture. The Black Cat Cafe was running again, Tommy’s Place and Ann’s 440 opened. And these places became sanctuaries for the LGBT community to be \u003cem>together. \u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Dr. Nan Alamilla Boyd:\u003c/strong> There were maybe four or five quote unquote lesbian bars in North Beach in walking distance of each other at any point in time between like, let’s say, 1948 and 1955. So it’s like a really interesting community that evolved.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ana De Almeida Amaral: \u003c/strong>And this was really important because in the 1950s it was still not super safe to be gay. Many queer folks were closeted by day in order to keep their jobs. But at night…at the bar…there was a freedom that didn’t really exist anywhere else.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Dr. Nan Alamilla Boyd:\u003c/strong> And it was before the state caught wind of what was happening.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ana De Almeida Amaral: \u003c/strong>But then a panic started to take hold in the United States…\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Senator McCarthy archival tape:\u003c/strong> Are you a member of the communist conspiracy as of this moment?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ana De Almeida Amaral: \u003c/strong>A conservative mindset took hold in American politics and culture — ushering in a time of suspicion and fear.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Senator McCarthy archival tape:\u003c/strong> Our nation may very well die, and I ask you caused it?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ana De Almeida Amaral: \u003c/strong>And quickly, LGBT people become \u003cu>targets\u003c/u> at the federal, state and local level.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>President Eisenhower signed an executive order in 1953 banning gay people from federal work, labeling them as having immoral conduct and “sexual perversion.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And, in 1955 \u003cem>California\u003c/em> created a new state agency called the Department of Alcoholic Beverage Control or the ABC. An agency whose sole job was to ensure that licensed bars abided by legal and \u003cem>moral\u003c/em> codes.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And from the moment the department of Alcoholic Beverage control was created a top priority for them was to…\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Dr. Nan Alamilla Boyd: \u003c/strong>Shut down the gay bars.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ana De Almeida Amaral: \u003c/strong>And they did this by finding ways around those vague protections won in the Stouman v. Riley case.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>While queer people were granted the right to assemble, “homosexual acts” were still illegal, so authorities started taking an interest in the specifics of what that meant.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Dr. Nan Alamilla Boyd:\u003c/strong> There’s a question about like, well then what exactly are the behaviors that are illegal? Like, do you have to like see someone, having sex in the bar? Or is it kissing? What about fondling? What about sitting on a lap? What about holding hands? What about dancing close? So all this stuff was like, then started being hashed out, you know, this is an illegal act.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ana De Almeida Amaral: \u003c/strong>And the Department of Alcoholic Beverage Control started collaborating with a bunch of law enforcement agencies throughout the Bay Area to ferret out people engaged in those acts.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>By 1955, the gay bars in San Francisco were getting less and less safe.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And as harassment and policing increased, the LGBT community began looking for new places to gather outside of San Francisco, away from well-known gay bars, and they ended up down the coast, at Hazel’s Inn.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Sound design of a raucous bar scene\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The only testimonies about what happened on Feb. 19, 1956, the night that Hazel’s Inn was raided, come from court documents and hearings at the Alcoholic Beverage Control Board. Laurence E. Strong, an ABC agent, described in detail what was happening at the bar.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That night, the dance floor was alive, and the bar was filled with around 200 patrons, mostly men. These men wrapped their arms around each other and embraced one another while dancing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He also described how one patron sat on another man’s lap and how two other men held hands. In the corner of the bar, a couple embraced as one nestled his head into the other’s shoulder. Some men pinched each other’s butts and fondled each other while dancing. Women danced close together with other women. Men were seen powdering their faces and women wore slacks and sports coats.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It sounds like a scene of queer joy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Music turns tense\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Suddenly, 35 law enforcement agents stormed the bar — a mix of San Mateo county sheriff’s officers and ABC agents began arresting people. The sheriff jumped on to the bar and announced:\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Voice over:\u003c/strong> “This is a raid!”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ana De Almeida Amaral: \u003c/strong>Patrons were forced to walk past a line of agents. And one by one, agents picked out people they had seen showing queer affection.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Dr. Boyd says that the Alcoholic Beverage Control Board had been watching Hazel’s Inn for months, gathering evidence and building a case that behavior there was “illegal and immoral.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Dr. Nan Alamilla Boyd: \u003c/strong>They had undercover agents in the bars. And they would go in twos or threes and they would watch each other. And somebody would get an interested person, and then would sort of lead them on, until there was some kind of physical, sexual, or flirtatious engagement that involved touching. It was entrapment. And that was a common and acceptable practice.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ana De Almeida Amaral: \u003c/strong>Ninety people were arrested that night at Hazel’s Inn, including Hazel Nikola — the owner. The bar’s liquor license was quickly revoked for being quote “a resort for sexual perverts” and for serving someone underaged.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The mass arrest caught the attention of a variety of civil rights groups, including the ACLU who represented 30 defendants. Most of those arrested were cleared of charges, but the damage had already been done. People were outed in the newspapers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Dr. Nan Alamilla Boyd:\u003c/strong> There would be a list of the people and their address and sometimes their occupation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Voice over: \u003c/strong>The San Mateo Times: Local persons arrested were: Iris Ann Glasgow, 24 years old. Clerk. 1515 James Street, Redwood City.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ana De Almeida Amaral: \u003c/strong>Many of these people were publicly named as “sexual perverts”. That often meant being ostracized or losing their job.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Dr. Nan Alamilla Boyd:\u003c/strong> People were so fearful.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Cello music starts\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ana De Almeida Amaral: \u003c/strong>As for the bar, Hazel fought the revocation of her liquor license for\u003cem> two years \u003c/em>but the court ultimately sided with the ABC.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Laura Del Rosso:\u003c/strong> I think she was just really bitter about what happened here.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Music ends\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ana De Almeida Amaral: \u003c/strong>Back in the Pacifica Coastside museum, Laura reflected on what the raid did to Hazel Nikola.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Laura Del Rosso:\u003c/strong> She lost her liquor license and things just kind of went downhill for her. You have that information on the thing. And she ended up, she ended closing. She was very, very bitter at the end. She felt like she was really an important part of the community and that they had kind of betrayed her. She left Sharp Park and went to live somewhere else. And never came back.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ana De Almeida Amaral: \u003c/strong>For the queer community, the effects were even more devastating. The Hazel’s Inn Raid became a playbook for the state to target the queer community over the next 15 years. (Surveillance, raids, and the revocation of liquor licenses.) It was a strategy to push LGBTQ people out of the Bay Area.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But it didn’t work.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Despite this aggressive policing and repression, the gay bars never died.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Queer patrons, and bartenders, and bar owners found ways to keep going. They found ways to spot surveillance in their bars, they organized and worked to keep the police out of their spaces.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Historian Dr. Boyd again:\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Dr. Nan Alamilla Boyd:\u003c/strong> My takeaway from history as a historian is that during these times of repression. There’s cultural innovation that happens. You can’t really name it yet, right? But it’s taking shape you know, that there’s something coming.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Music starts\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ana De Almeida Amaral: \u003c/strong>During those years of extreme repression, queer activists were making connections, organizing, and laying the groundwork for the next several decades of activism that would see LGBTQ rights expand.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Bay Area has changed a lot since the raid at Hazel’s Inn. But still, a fearless commitment to community and authenticity — the spirit that kept these gay bars alive — lives on here.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>That was reporter Ana De Almeida Amaral. Featuring the voices of Azul Dahlstrom-Eckman, Carly Severn, Christopher Beale and Paul Lancour for archival material.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Did you know that Bay Curious listeners help choose which questions we answer on the podcast? Each month we have a new voting round up at \u003ca href=\"http://baycurious.org\">BayCurious.org\u003c/a>, with three fascinating questions to choose from. This month…\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Question 1: \u003c/strong>Did the Navy airship America crash land into several houses? What happened to the crew?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Question 2:\u003c/strong> Why is San Francisco home to so many federal and statewide courts? Why aren’t they in Sacramento or Los Angeles?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Question 3: \u003c/strong>I want to learn more about San Francisco upzoning and how people feel about it in the Richmond and Sunset districts.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>Cast your vote with one click at \u003ca href=\"http://baycurious.org\">BayCurious.org\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Henry Lie:\u003c/strong> Bay Curious is made in San Francisco at member-supported KQED.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>Become a member today at \u003ca href=\"http://kqed.org/donate\">kqed.org/donate\u003c/a>. Our show is produced by Katrina Schwartz, Christopher Beale and me Olivia Allen-Price. With extra support from Katie Sprenger, Matt Morales, Tim Olsen, Maha Sanad, Jen Chien, Ethan Toven-Lindsey and everyone on team KQED.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Some members of the KQED podcast team are represented by The Screen Actors Guild, American Federation of Television and Radio Artists. San Francisco Northern California Local.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>I’m Olivia Allen-Price. Have a wonderful week.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"slug": "san-franciscos-historic-relief-cottages-built-after-the-1906-earthquake-are-hidden-in-plain-sight",
"title": "San Francisco’s Historic ‘Relief Cottages,’ Built After the 1906 Earthquake, Are Hidden in Plain Sight",
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"headTitle": "San Francisco’s Historic ‘Relief Cottages,’ Built After the 1906 Earthquake, Are Hidden in Plain Sight | KQED",
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"content": "\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"#episode-transcript\">\u003ci>View the full episode transcript.\u003c/i>\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Jane Cryan walked into a leasing agency on Geary Boulevard in\u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/tag/san-francisco\"> San Francisco\u003c/a> just before closing one evening in 1982.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She was looking for an apartment that could accommodate her grand piano. The flat she was inquiring about had already been rented, but the agent asked if she’d be interested in a cottage out in the Sunset District.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“That started everything,” Cryan said. “That, to me, is my golden moment in all my 44 years in San Francisco.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The cottage at 1227 24th Ave. felt like her own artist retreat. She moved in and played her grand piano night and day for the first several weeks, happy to have her own space where she could do what she liked.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“An elderly gentleman from across the street came over and shook his finger at me, and he said, ‘Young lady, do you know that you’re living in a couple of relief houses pasted together?’”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12066194\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12066194\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/12/251204-EARTHQUAKECOTTAGES00174_TV-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/12/251204-EARTHQUAKECOTTAGES00174_TV-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/12/251204-EARTHQUAKECOTTAGES00174_TV-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/12/251204-EARTHQUAKECOTTAGES00174_TV-KQED-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">An earthquake cottage stands on 211 Mullen Ave. in San Francisco on December 4, 2025. The original shelter was built after the 1906 San Francisco Earthquake and some still house city residents. \u003ccite>(Tâm Vũ/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Cryan was confused. What did he mean by “relief houses?” She had moved from Milwaukee in the 1960s because she was enamored with the Beat Movement and had been writing letters to Jack Kerouac. When she got to San Francisco, all of 18 years old, she threw herself into writing and playing jazz piano, although she made her money as an executive assistant. She’d never heard of the history her neighbor was describing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I had lived in the city all those years and never heard of the [19]06 quake or ‘the fire,’ as everybody who survived it called it,” Cryan said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She was curious to know everything she could about the natural disaster that devastated San Francisco at the start of the 20th century, knocking down 80% of the buildings and displacing thousands of people. She spent nights and weekends obsessively going through newspaper archives to learn all she could about these so-called “relief cottages.”\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>The history Cryan discovered\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>“After the 1906 Earthquake and fire, more than a quarter of a million people are at least temporarily displaced,” said Woody LaBounty, president and CEO of \u003ca href=\"https://www.sfheritage.org/\">San Francisco Heritage\u003c/a>, a nonprofit dedicated to preserving San Francisco history.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Those who had the means left the city to stay with relatives or friends elsewhere. But many poor San Franciscans didn’t have that option. The military temporarily set up tent camps to house refugees in the short term. Women cooked meals on stoves set up in the streets, children went to school in makeshift tent classrooms and people tried to figure out what to do next.[aside postID=news_12065901 hero='https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/10/251016-NIMITZHOUSE-38-BL-KQED.jpg']After a few months, city leaders became concerned about sanitation in the tent camps and they worried what would happen when winter rains came. They commissioned union carpenters to build small cottages out of redwood, cedar and fir to house the refugees. They painted the cottages the same green as city park benches, which became known as “park bench green.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“You basically are talking about the working class,” LaBounty said. “People who don’t have property, don’t have other resources, and need to find work and find shelter.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Overseeing this effort was the San Francisco Relief Corporation, which also coordinated distribution of clothes, food and other aid to the refugees — many of whom the city relied upon to help rebuild the city. The 5,610 cottages were mostly set up in the city’s neighborhood parks like Jefferson Square, Precita Park (then known as Bernal Park) and Portsmouth Square. There were also a large number of cottages where Park Presidio Boulevard is now — back then, it was newly acquired parkland with nothing much around it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The \u003ca href=\"https://www.nps.gov/places/000/1906-earthquake-cottages.htm\">cottages\u003c/a> came in several sizes. The smallest was 10×14 feet — these “Type A” shacks are the most commonly seen today, in part because they are so modular and people combined them to make larger residences. But there were also 14×18 feet and 18×24-feet-sized shacks.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Relief Corporation charged people a few dollars per month in rent for the cottages, but soon it started receiving pressure from Superintendent of Parks John McLaren and other city residents.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12063864\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1950px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/11/RichmondCamp-SFPL-KQED.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12063864\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/11/RichmondCamp-SFPL-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1950\" height=\"2000\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/11/RichmondCamp-SFPL-KQED.jpg 1950w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/11/RichmondCamp-SFPL-KQED-160x164.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/11/RichmondCamp-SFPL-KQED-1498x1536.jpg 1498w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1950px) 100vw, 1950px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The Richmond District, on San Francisco’s northwest side, was largely uninhabited sand dunes at the time of the 1906 earthquake and fires. There was a lot of open space to build refugee cottages like these at the Richmond District refugee camp between Lake and Geary streets. Some surviving earthquake cottages can still be found in the Richmond and Sunset districts. \u003ccite>(Courtesy of the San Francisco Public Library)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“They wanted their parks back,” LaBounty said. “As other San Franciscans were ready to move on from the disaster, they didn’t like the idea that their parks had a community, a village of working-class people living in the middle of their parks.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Under pressure to move cottages out of the parks as quickly as possible, the Relief Corporation ended up returning all the rent it collected to residents when they moved their cottages out of the parks and onto land somewhere else. And just a year and a half after the earthquake and fire, most cottage camps were gone.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It gave people who never would have dreamed, I think, of owning a home a chance to get into that American dream,” LaBounty said. “So, you get the earthquake cottage, you’re a refugee who has nothing, and now suddenly you buy a lot for 100 bucks in the sand dunes of the Richmond, you have pretty much a free house.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12063862\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/11/PrecitaPark-SFPL-KQED.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12063862\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/11/PrecitaPark-SFPL-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1545\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/11/PrecitaPark-SFPL-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/11/PrecitaPark-SFPL-KQED-160x124.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/11/PrecitaPark-SFPL-KQED-1536x1187.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">After several months, residents were encouraged to move their cottages out of the parks and onto a plot of land. Here, a horse gets ready to move a shack out of Precita Park. \u003ccite>(Courtesy of the San Francisco Public Library)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Many of the cottages ended up in the Richmond and Sunset districts of San Francisco because of that large camp along Park Presidio and the prevalence of unclaimed land on the western side of the city. Another hot spot for cottages is Bernal Heights, where people moved their cottages from Precita Park at the bottom of the hill, up onto vacant plots on the hill.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“There was sort of a stigma of having an earthquake cottage for a few years because it sort of signified you were a refugee, you needed help, you were poor,” LaBounty said. “So, people often quickly tried to hide the pedigree of their houses and cover them with shingles.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>People built fences around their cottages, added additional rooms and generally tried to \u003ca href=\"https://www.foundsf.org/1906_Earthquake_Shack_Survivors\">personalize\u003c/a> them. Many people painted over that telling park bench green color, hiding the provenance of their homes.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DcXCRZEkzx4\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The city moved on, too. Just nine years after the Great Earthquake and Fire, San Francisco \u003ca href=\"https://www.nps.gov/goga/learn/historyculture/upload/PPIE-Brochure-FINAL-for-Web.pdf\">hosted\u003c/a> the 1915 Panama-Pacific International Exposition to show the city was back and celebrate the opening of the Panama Canal.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In a spectacle that spread over much of what is now the Marina District, the Exposition drew more than 18 million visitors and boasted innovations in science, technology and art. Whole buildings were erected for the Exposition, including the Palace of Fine Arts.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>An era of ‘shacktivism’\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>When Jane Cryan learned all this history and realized that her little cottage sanctuary was actually three and a half earthquake cottages connected together, she was in awe. She loved that she was living in a piece of San Francisco history, one hidden in plain sight.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Around the time of her research, Cryan got word from her landlord that he wanted to sell her cottage — or worse, knock it down and sell the lot.[aside postID=news_12063643 hero='https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/11/251008-GirlintheFishbowl-01-BL.jpg']“I had to do something,” Cryan said. So, she called City Hall. “And this is exactly what I said, I said, ‘Can you connect me with somebody at City Hall who can tell me how to save a pair of cottages, very important cottages, that are under threat of demolition.’”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That call led her to the Landmarks Preservation office. She learned how to apply for a historic landmark designation and brought her research on the importance of the earthquake cottages to the Planning Commission. Along the way, the media caught wind of what she was doing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The media came to me, and they made what I was doing one of the most important things that ever hit San Francisco,” Cryan said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Cryan started a \u003ca href=\"https://sfpl.org/pdf/libraries/main/sfhistory/archives-and-manuscripts/SPASFRS.pdf\">nonprofit\u003c/a> organization,\u003ca href=\"https://sfpl.org/pdf/libraries/main/sfhistory/archives-and-manuscripts/SPASFRS.pdf\"> The Society for the Preservation and Appreciation of San Francisco Refugee Shacks\u003c/a>, and made it her mission to educate people about the earthquake shacks.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Eventually, she won historic status for her little 24th Avenue cottage, but it was a bittersweet victory. Because historic status limits what a property owner can do with a building, the planning commission also ruled that Cryan had to move out as compensation. From then on, she moved from apartment to apartment, ultimately finding herself priced out of San Francisco once she was retired. She moved back to Wisconsin, where she is originally from, in 2007 after 44 years in the city.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She continues the fight to save earthquake cottages from afar when developers threaten them.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>A very San Francisco treasure hunt\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>It’s still possible to \u003ca href=\"https://www.sfchronicle.com/projects/2021/earthquake-shacks-sf-map/\">find\u003c/a> earthquake cottages when walking around San Francisco. Woody LaBounty suggested looking for a shallow roof line, like a Boy Scout tent. That’s often a good indicator that a small house might be an earthquake cottage. Many other small buildings have much sharper rooflines or flat roofs.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>LaBounty estimates that there are somewhere between \u003ca href=\"https://www.outsidelands.org/shack-list.php\">30 and 50 cottages\u003c/a> sprinkled throughout the city. But it’s hard to know because so many of them have been incorporated into larger houses or are used as sheds.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12063861\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/11/Moving-Cottage-KQED.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12063861\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/11/Moving-Cottage-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1446\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/11/Moving-Cottage-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/11/Moving-Cottage-KQED-160x116.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/11/Moving-Cottage-KQED-1536x1111.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">An earthquake cottage being moved through the streets of San Francisco circa 1906. \u003ccite>(Courtesy of the San Francisco Public Library)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Historical conservationists \u003ca href=\"https://www.outsidelands.org/kirkham_shacks.php\">successfully\u003c/a> saved several earthquake cottages from demolition over the years. Two of them are owned by the Presidio Trust and used to be open to visitors, although they have recently been moved to an out-of-the-way location. Another is in the San Francisco Zoo, part of \u003ca href=\"https://www.sfzoo.org/greenies-conservation-corner/\">Greenie’s Conservation Corner\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“As San Francisco continues to change, it is this visual touchstone to our past,” LaBounty said. “And not only our past, but the most significant event that happened in our past, outside of maybe the Gold Rush.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[baycuriousquestion]\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2 id=\"episode-transcript\">Episode Transcript\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price:\u003c/strong> I want to talk about architecture for a moment – specifically residential architecture. In San Francisco.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>You expect to see stately Victorian homes with their bright colors and fancy decorative trim.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Then there’s Marina style homes with their big windows and stucco facades.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But sprinkled in amidst these grander homes you might spot a few tiny cottages — the original tiny homes.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Charity Vargas:\u003c/strong> I did see two over in the sunset. There was like two close together and I thought maybe they might be them, but I’m not sure.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>Charity Vargas, our question asker this week, has seen some of these small dwellings dotted around the Richmond and Sunset districts near her home. And she’s heard that the cottages are holdovers from the Great 1906 earthquake and fire, but wants to know more.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Charity Vargas: \u003c/strong>How many earthquake cottages are left and you know, are they still used and where they are?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>Today on the show, we’ll dig into the history of San Francisco’s earthquake cottages. We’ll learn how critical they were in sheltering a vulnerable…but vital.. population and learn about modern efforts to save them. I’m Olivia Allen-Price and you’re listening to Bay Curious. Stay with us.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Sponsor message\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>We set out to answer Charity’s question by searching for “earthquake shacks”…tiny homes built out of redwood and cedar after the 1906 earthquake and fire. Bay Curious editor and producer Katrina Schwartz found one high on a hill in Bernal Heights.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Joan Hunter: \u003c/strong>You want a little tour? Ok, this is our tiny kitchen and I believe this rectangle room is the original earthquake shack and this part is added on, but it’s kind of hard to say exactly. I’m Joan Hunter. I live in Bernal Heights, San Francisco, California in an earthquake cottage or earthquake shack, as some would like to say.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Katrina Schwartz: \u003c/strong>I’m standing with Joan in her light filled living room…all that’s left of the original cottage. It’s a modestly sized room, but has tall ceilings and windows that look out over a sweeping view of San Francisco.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>What started out as a one room cottage has been expanded quite a bit…it’s about 620 square feet now, still small by modern standards.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Joan Hunter: \u003c/strong>Okay, so this is a little bedroom we have in the front and all of our rooms, this is a theme for the house, everything is small, very, very small.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Katrina Schwartz:\u003c/strong> Joan’s got two kids…so the house can feel like a tight squeeze at times. But she fell in love with the history of the place.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Joan Hunter: \u003c/strong>what I do know is that the guy who bought it, he was a little kind of like a bachelor. And he met someone who was also single and they moved together and they got married. And it was just a love story.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Katrina Schwartz: \u003c/strong>Joan likes thinking that after they survived the worst natural disaster San Francisco has ever experienced…and been homeless for months because of it…that they finally found some tranquility here, a little piece of San Francisco to call their own.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Music to help us transition\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Katrina Schwartz: \u003c/strong>The Great 1906 Earthquake and Fire leveled 80 percent of San Francisco. The morning of April 18, 1906 Bay Area residents awoke early in the morning to a temblor they’d never forget.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Sounds of shaking\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Kathleen Norris: \u003c/strong>Every picture on the wall is going tack, tack, tack. Everything movable in the house is keeping up that unearthly clatter. You could hear up and down the roads, earthquake. It’s an earthquake. Oh, God help us, it’s an earthquake. of course, it changed the world for all of us.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Katrina Schwartz: \u003c/strong>Kathleen Norris shared her oral history with the Bancroft Library in 1960. There was no audio recorded during the disaster, but anyone who survived it remembered the trauma of it clearly…even fifty years later. Kathleen was in Mill Valley when the earthquake hit…where the damage wasn’t too bad. But she and her brother were curious about how San Francisco had fared…so they found a boat that took them to the city.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Joan Hunter: \u003c/strong>It was something to see. The great, heavy, slow rolls of smoke that were joining hands as they went up.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Katrina Schwartz: \u003c/strong>Kathleen describes refugees fleeing homes that had been leveled, toting their belongings in baby carriages and wheel barrows.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Kathleen Norris: \u003c/strong>We walked over the hot, hot rocks of Market Street. And of course, the cable car lines were twisted hairpins. And the houses were all down. There was nothing saved. Nothing was accepted.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Katrina Schwartz: \u003c/strong>And yet, the image that lingered in her mind…even as the smoke lay heavy over the hills… was of people getting to work to repair their city.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Kathleen Norris: \u003c/strong>And already there were people helping out and organizing, scraping bricks. The bricks were hot. And they were working away. Nobody felt for an instant, oh, let’s go somewhere else. Everyone knew that the city was going to come back.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Katrina Schwartz: \u003c/strong>As indeed it would. Just nine years after the earthquake and fire, San Francisco hosted the 1915 Panama Pacific International Exposition…the reason the Palace of Fine Arts was built…a spectacle that 18 million people visited by the time it closed.. Headlines trumpeted the achievement.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>\u003cem>Voice over reading archival newspaper headline:\u003c/em> \u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Big Fair is Opened. All eyes on San Francisco. President Flashes Signal\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Fair Draws Myriad; All Records For Crowds Fall\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Marvelous Exhibits From All Parts of the Earth Assembled by 42 Countries for the Hugest Conclave of Nations in History\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Katrina Schwartz: \u003c/strong>It was a signal to the world that San Francisco was still \u003cem>the most important\u003c/em> city in the West…one full of invention and achievement.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>\u003cstrong>Voice over reading archival newspaper headline: \u003c/strong>Tower of Jewels Wreathed in Flames. But it’s only to thrill visitors\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Art Smith Sets Hearts Leaping: Aviator’s Loop-the-Loops at Night Traced By Trail of Smoke\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Katrina Schwartz: \u003c/strong>But how did San Francisco go from the absolute devastation of 1906 to showing off the latest advances in science and art on the world stage just nine years later? This is where the earthquake cottages… or shacks as they’re affectionately called…come into the story.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Woody LaBounty: \u003c/strong>So after the 1906 earthquake and fire, more than a quarter of a million people are at least temporarily displaced.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Katrina Schwartz: \u003c/strong>Woody LaBounty is President and CEO of San Francisco Heritage, a nonprofit dedicated to preserving San Francisco history.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Woody LaBounty: \u003c/strong>And now, the powers that be have to decide not only how to take care of all these people, but also who’s gonna rebuild the city?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Katrina Schwartz: \u003c/strong>Immediately after the earthquake and fire, the military stepped in and established tent camps in the city’s parks. But soon a new organization…the San Francisco Relief Corporation…was formed to distribute food, clothes and other aid.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Woody LaBounty: \u003c/strong>That covered many aspects of what you have to do when people are refugees, but also a specific housing effort, and that was the earthquake relief cottages.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Katrina Schwartz: \u003c/strong>Officials were worried about sanitation in the tent camps when winter rains came. So, they decided to build 5,610 relief cottages…built with redwood, fir and cedar… to house people. They were painted “park bench green”…literally the color used on Golden Gate Park benches… and clustered in neighborhood parks like Jefferson Square, Precita Park, and Portsmouth Square. Around 17,000 people lived in them.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Woody LaBounty: \u003c/strong>If you owned property or you had a property that had been destroyed in the earthquake, you rebuilt or you figured out a way to move on. But there was a vast number of people who didn’t have any other resources.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Katrina Schwartz: \u003c/strong>These were San Francisco’s poor, folks who had lived in boarding houses or shared rooms downtown before the fire. City leaders wanted to keep these laborers with the skills to rebuild the city close by. But they didn’t plan to give away the cottages for free.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Woody LaBounty: \u003c/strong>So for all of wanting to take care of the refugees, there was also a fear at the time of creeping socialism. People in power did not want to give anybody anything for nothing. So they thought it would create indigence. And so you were supposed to pay some sort of rent.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Katrina Schwartz: \u003c/strong>Here’s how it worked. Shack residents paid monthly rent of a few dollars while their shacks were in the parks. But the relief corporation returned that money when a resident bought some land and moved the shack out of the park and onto their own property.That generosity was spurred by pressure to move refugees and their cottages out of the parks as soon as possible.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Woody LaBounty: \u003c/strong>As other San Franciscans were ready to move on from the disaster, they didn’t like the idea that their parks had a community, a village of working-class people. Living in the middle of their park. They wanted their parks back.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Katrina Schwartz: \u003c/strong>About a year and a half after the earthquake, in the summer of 1907, most of the shacks had been removed from the parks. Newspapers at the time described the surreal image of tiny homes on wagons moving across the city with people still in them.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>\u003cstrong>Voice over reading archival newspaper excerpt:\u003c/strong> It is a strange sight to see a procession of these refugee cottages moving down fashionable Van Ness Avenue or busy Fillmore Street, faces peering from the windows, and men, women and children going about their household tasks as if their little home was securely perched upon a cement foundation and surrounded by a garden and a fence.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Katrina Schwartz: \u003c/strong>Back in 1907, the Richmond District, a northwestern neighborhood, was mostly undeveloped sand dunes, with lots of empty land. So many shack owners moved their cottages to vacant plots there.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Woody says the earthquake shack program not only got the city working again…\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Woody LaBounty: \u003c/strong>\u003cspan style=\"text-decoration: line-through\">I\u003c/span>t also gave people who never would have dreamed, I think, of owning a home a chance to get into that American dream. So you get the earthquake cottage, you’re a refugee who has nothing, and now suddenly you buy a lot for 100 bucks in the sand dunes of the Richmond, you have pretty much a free house.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Katrina Schwartz: \u003c/strong>Bernal Heights is another place with many earthquake cottages…people just moved their shacks from Precita Park to open land up the hill.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And some of them are still there…like the house we toured at the beginning of this episode.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Woody LaBounty: \u003c/strong>The one sort of key touchstone that you can tell about a cottage is the roof line. It has a very shallow pitched roof, kind of like a pup tent, like a Boy Scout tent. And then that is like your first hint because a lot of small buildings you’ll see have very steep pitched or flat roofs.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Katrina Schwartz: \u003c/strong>Woody says many shack owners quickly made improvements to their new homes — painting, building fences, adding additional rooms.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Woody LaBounty: \u003c/strong>There was sort of a stigma of having an earthquake cottage for a few years because it sort of signified you were a refugee, you needed help, you were poor. So people often, they quickly tried to hide sort of the pedigree of their houses and cover them with shingles quickly.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Katrina Schwartz: \u003c/strong>They wanted to hide that telling park bench green color. Most existing earthquake cottages are surrounded by modern additions. Or sometimes they’re a couple shacks placed together. That’s one reason it’s really hard to know how many still exist in San Francisco, they’re hidden. But Woody estimates between 30 and 50 earthquake cottages are dotted across the city.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Jane Cryan: \u003c/strong>The cottage in the front is made up of three and a half shacks, and then there’s a free-standing mid-size shack in the backyard.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Katrina Schwartz: \u003c/strong>This is Jane Cryan. She rented one of these preserved earthquake shacks in the outer Sunset in the 1980s. Jane is best known as a “shacktivist”…fighting to preserve earthquake cottages from development. But if it weren’t for the Beat movement in the 1950s, she never would have moved here in the first place.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp> \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Jane Cryan: \u003c/strong>The only reason I ended up in San Francisco is that Jack Kerouac, with whom I had correspondence from the time I was 16 years old told me that Milwaukee was no place for a poet. You should be in San Francisco.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Katrina Schwartz: \u003c/strong>By day she was an executive assistant, but writing and jazz piano were her passions.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Jane Cryan: \u003c/strong>And I moved in and I played piano for about six weeks, day and night, and an elderly gentleman from across the street came over and shook his finger at me and he said, young lady, do you know that you’re living in a couple of relief houses pasted together?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Katrina Schwartz: \u003c/strong>Her three room cottage was actually three earthquake shacks pasted together. This was 1982 and Jane had lived in San Francisco almost 20 years. But she’d never even heard of the 1906 earthquake and fire. Her neighbor’s passing comment sparked her curiosity. She spent nights and weekends obsessively going through old newspaper archives to learn as much as she could about the disaster and the earthquake cottages.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Meanwhile, her landlord made it known that he planned to sell her cottage…or worse demolish it and sell the lot.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Jane Cryan: \u003c/strong>Take down our history. So I had to do something.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Katrina Schwartz: \u003c/strong>Preserving these cottages — tangible pieces of such important history — became her life’s work. She took inspiration from one of the 1906 earthquake refugees she learned about in her research, a woman named Mary Kelly. Mary was an agitator, constantly questioning how the relief corporation dolled out aid and whether it was fair. She was such a pain to them they eventually evicted her from her cottage. But she refused to leave, famously saying:\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>\u003cstrong>Voice over portraying Mary Kelly:\u003c/strong> They can’t bluff me. I’ll stay with the house if they take it to the end of the earth.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Katrina Schwartz: \u003c/strong>She rode in her cottage as men hauled it onto a wagon and trucked it away. She stayed inside as they dismantled the cottage board by board. Jane finds Mary’s tenacity — and willingness to stand up to power — endearing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Jane Cryan: \u003c/strong>She was exactly the way I was. If I saw something, I said something. And if I saw something that was not right, I said something louder.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Katrina Schwartz: \u003c/strong>Jane started a nonprofit called The Society for the Preservation and Appreciation of San Francisco Refugee Shacks. She fought hard to get the planning commission to designate her little shack a historic landmark.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And she was successful!\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Jane Cryan: \u003c/strong>Landmark number 171.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Katrina Schwartz: \u003c/strong>But it was a bittersweet victory. The commission also said that Jane had to vacate the cottage in order to compensate the landlord for putting restrictions on his property. Jane bounced around from place to place after that, eventually moving back to Wisconsin, where she’s originally from.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Katrina in the tape: \u003c/strong>What do you miss most about San Francisco?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Jane Cryan: \u003c/strong>Oh, everything! Oh my god, San Francisco is the queen of the Golden West, for heaven’s sake!\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Music\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Katrina Schwartz: \u003c/strong>Historian Woody LaBounty says there are probably more earthquake cottages than we know. They’re hiding in people’s backyards, incorporated into bigger houses or used as sheds.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Woody LaBounty: \u003c/strong>They’re the last sort of most visible, tangible sign of one of the biggest things that ever happened to the city of San Francisco.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Katrina Schwartz: \u003c/strong>Increasingly these little cottages are being bought and torn down to make room for larger homes. But the ones that remain are a reminder of a refugee relief program that not only got people back on their feet, but made them homeowners. An example of San Franciscans coming together to repair and resurrect a beloved city.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price:\u003c/strong> That was Bay Curious editor and producer Katrina Schwartz. Special thanks this week to \u003ca href=\"https://californiarevealed.org/\">California Revealed\u003c/a>, an online database of oral histories and other archival materials. They helped us find Kathleen Norris’ oral history.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Bay Curious is made in San Francisco at member-supported KQED. Right now your membership means more than ever, give at \u003ca href=\"http://kqed.org/donate\">KQED.org/donate\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Our show is produced by Gabriela Glueck, Christopher Beale, Katrina Schwartz and me, Olivia Allen-Price.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Extra support from Maha Sanad, Katie Sprenger, Jen Chien, Ethan Toven-Lindsey and everyone on team KQED.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Have a wonderful week.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n",
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"excerpt": "After the 1906 Earthquake and fire, San Francisco leaders built relief cottages to house the homeless. Some of those tiny dwellings can still be found thanks to historic preservation efforts.\r\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"#episode-transcript\">\u003ci>View the full episode transcript.\u003c/i>\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Jane Cryan walked into a leasing agency on Geary Boulevard in\u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/tag/san-francisco\"> San Francisco\u003c/a> just before closing one evening in 1982.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She was looking for an apartment that could accommodate her grand piano. The flat she was inquiring about had already been rented, but the agent asked if she’d be interested in a cottage out in the Sunset District.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“That started everything,” Cryan said. “That, to me, is my golden moment in all my 44 years in San Francisco.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The cottage at 1227 24th Ave. felt like her own artist retreat. She moved in and played her grand piano night and day for the first several weeks, happy to have her own space where she could do what she liked.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“An elderly gentleman from across the street came over and shook his finger at me, and he said, ‘Young lady, do you know that you’re living in a couple of relief houses pasted together?’”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12066194\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12066194\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/12/251204-EARTHQUAKECOTTAGES00174_TV-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/12/251204-EARTHQUAKECOTTAGES00174_TV-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/12/251204-EARTHQUAKECOTTAGES00174_TV-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/12/251204-EARTHQUAKECOTTAGES00174_TV-KQED-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">An earthquake cottage stands on 211 Mullen Ave. in San Francisco on December 4, 2025. The original shelter was built after the 1906 San Francisco Earthquake and some still house city residents. \u003ccite>(Tâm Vũ/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Cryan was confused. What did he mean by “relief houses?” She had moved from Milwaukee in the 1960s because she was enamored with the Beat Movement and had been writing letters to Jack Kerouac. When she got to San Francisco, all of 18 years old, she threw herself into writing and playing jazz piano, although she made her money as an executive assistant. She’d never heard of the history her neighbor was describing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I had lived in the city all those years and never heard of the [19]06 quake or ‘the fire,’ as everybody who survived it called it,” Cryan said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She was curious to know everything she could about the natural disaster that devastated San Francisco at the start of the 20th century, knocking down 80% of the buildings and displacing thousands of people. She spent nights and weekends obsessively going through newspaper archives to learn all she could about these so-called “relief cottages.”\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>The history Cryan discovered\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>“After the 1906 Earthquake and fire, more than a quarter of a million people are at least temporarily displaced,” said Woody LaBounty, president and CEO of \u003ca href=\"https://www.sfheritage.org/\">San Francisco Heritage\u003c/a>, a nonprofit dedicated to preserving San Francisco history.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Those who had the means left the city to stay with relatives or friends elsewhere. But many poor San Franciscans didn’t have that option. The military temporarily set up tent camps to house refugees in the short term. Women cooked meals on stoves set up in the streets, children went to school in makeshift tent classrooms and people tried to figure out what to do next.\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>After a few months, city leaders became concerned about sanitation in the tent camps and they worried what would happen when winter rains came. They commissioned union carpenters to build small cottages out of redwood, cedar and fir to house the refugees. They painted the cottages the same green as city park benches, which became known as “park bench green.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“You basically are talking about the working class,” LaBounty said. “People who don’t have property, don’t have other resources, and need to find work and find shelter.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Overseeing this effort was the San Francisco Relief Corporation, which also coordinated distribution of clothes, food and other aid to the refugees — many of whom the city relied upon to help rebuild the city. The 5,610 cottages were mostly set up in the city’s neighborhood parks like Jefferson Square, Precita Park (then known as Bernal Park) and Portsmouth Square. There were also a large number of cottages where Park Presidio Boulevard is now — back then, it was newly acquired parkland with nothing much around it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The \u003ca href=\"https://www.nps.gov/places/000/1906-earthquake-cottages.htm\">cottages\u003c/a> came in several sizes. The smallest was 10×14 feet — these “Type A” shacks are the most commonly seen today, in part because they are so modular and people combined them to make larger residences. But there were also 14×18 feet and 18×24-feet-sized shacks.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Relief Corporation charged people a few dollars per month in rent for the cottages, but soon it started receiving pressure from Superintendent of Parks John McLaren and other city residents.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12063864\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1950px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/11/RichmondCamp-SFPL-KQED.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12063864\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/11/RichmondCamp-SFPL-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1950\" height=\"2000\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/11/RichmondCamp-SFPL-KQED.jpg 1950w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/11/RichmondCamp-SFPL-KQED-160x164.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/11/RichmondCamp-SFPL-KQED-1498x1536.jpg 1498w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1950px) 100vw, 1950px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The Richmond District, on San Francisco’s northwest side, was largely uninhabited sand dunes at the time of the 1906 earthquake and fires. There was a lot of open space to build refugee cottages like these at the Richmond District refugee camp between Lake and Geary streets. Some surviving earthquake cottages can still be found in the Richmond and Sunset districts. \u003ccite>(Courtesy of the San Francisco Public Library)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“They wanted their parks back,” LaBounty said. “As other San Franciscans were ready to move on from the disaster, they didn’t like the idea that their parks had a community, a village of working-class people living in the middle of their parks.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Under pressure to move cottages out of the parks as quickly as possible, the Relief Corporation ended up returning all the rent it collected to residents when they moved their cottages out of the parks and onto land somewhere else. And just a year and a half after the earthquake and fire, most cottage camps were gone.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It gave people who never would have dreamed, I think, of owning a home a chance to get into that American dream,” LaBounty said. “So, you get the earthquake cottage, you’re a refugee who has nothing, and now suddenly you buy a lot for 100 bucks in the sand dunes of the Richmond, you have pretty much a free house.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12063862\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/11/PrecitaPark-SFPL-KQED.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12063862\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/11/PrecitaPark-SFPL-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1545\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/11/PrecitaPark-SFPL-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/11/PrecitaPark-SFPL-KQED-160x124.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/11/PrecitaPark-SFPL-KQED-1536x1187.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">After several months, residents were encouraged to move their cottages out of the parks and onto a plot of land. Here, a horse gets ready to move a shack out of Precita Park. \u003ccite>(Courtesy of the San Francisco Public Library)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Many of the cottages ended up in the Richmond and Sunset districts of San Francisco because of that large camp along Park Presidio and the prevalence of unclaimed land on the western side of the city. Another hot spot for cottages is Bernal Heights, where people moved their cottages from Precita Park at the bottom of the hill, up onto vacant plots on the hill.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“There was sort of a stigma of having an earthquake cottage for a few years because it sort of signified you were a refugee, you needed help, you were poor,” LaBounty said. “So, people often quickly tried to hide the pedigree of their houses and cover them with shingles.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>People built fences around their cottages, added additional rooms and generally tried to \u003ca href=\"https://www.foundsf.org/1906_Earthquake_Shack_Survivors\">personalize\u003c/a> them. Many people painted over that telling park bench green color, hiding the provenance of their homes.\u003c/p>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/DcXCRZEkzx4'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/DcXCRZEkzx4'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>The city moved on, too. Just nine years after the Great Earthquake and Fire, San Francisco \u003ca href=\"https://www.nps.gov/goga/learn/historyculture/upload/PPIE-Brochure-FINAL-for-Web.pdf\">hosted\u003c/a> the 1915 Panama-Pacific International Exposition to show the city was back and celebrate the opening of the Panama Canal.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In a spectacle that spread over much of what is now the Marina District, the Exposition drew more than 18 million visitors and boasted innovations in science, technology and art. Whole buildings were erected for the Exposition, including the Palace of Fine Arts.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>An era of ‘shacktivism’\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>When Jane Cryan learned all this history and realized that her little cottage sanctuary was actually three and a half earthquake cottages connected together, she was in awe. She loved that she was living in a piece of San Francisco history, one hidden in plain sight.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Around the time of her research, Cryan got word from her landlord that he wanted to sell her cottage — or worse, knock it down and sell the lot.\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>“I had to do something,” Cryan said. So, she called City Hall. “And this is exactly what I said, I said, ‘Can you connect me with somebody at City Hall who can tell me how to save a pair of cottages, very important cottages, that are under threat of demolition.’”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That call led her to the Landmarks Preservation office. She learned how to apply for a historic landmark designation and brought her research on the importance of the earthquake cottages to the Planning Commission. Along the way, the media caught wind of what she was doing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The media came to me, and they made what I was doing one of the most important things that ever hit San Francisco,” Cryan said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Cryan started a \u003ca href=\"https://sfpl.org/pdf/libraries/main/sfhistory/archives-and-manuscripts/SPASFRS.pdf\">nonprofit\u003c/a> organization,\u003ca href=\"https://sfpl.org/pdf/libraries/main/sfhistory/archives-and-manuscripts/SPASFRS.pdf\"> The Society for the Preservation and Appreciation of San Francisco Refugee Shacks\u003c/a>, and made it her mission to educate people about the earthquake shacks.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Eventually, she won historic status for her little 24th Avenue cottage, but it was a bittersweet victory. Because historic status limits what a property owner can do with a building, the planning commission also ruled that Cryan had to move out as compensation. From then on, she moved from apartment to apartment, ultimately finding herself priced out of San Francisco once she was retired. She moved back to Wisconsin, where she is originally from, in 2007 after 44 years in the city.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She continues the fight to save earthquake cottages from afar when developers threaten them.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>A very San Francisco treasure hunt\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>It’s still possible to \u003ca href=\"https://www.sfchronicle.com/projects/2021/earthquake-shacks-sf-map/\">find\u003c/a> earthquake cottages when walking around San Francisco. Woody LaBounty suggested looking for a shallow roof line, like a Boy Scout tent. That’s often a good indicator that a small house might be an earthquake cottage. Many other small buildings have much sharper rooflines or flat roofs.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>LaBounty estimates that there are somewhere between \u003ca href=\"https://www.outsidelands.org/shack-list.php\">30 and 50 cottages\u003c/a> sprinkled throughout the city. But it’s hard to know because so many of them have been incorporated into larger houses or are used as sheds.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12063861\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/11/Moving-Cottage-KQED.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12063861\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/11/Moving-Cottage-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1446\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/11/Moving-Cottage-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/11/Moving-Cottage-KQED-160x116.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/11/Moving-Cottage-KQED-1536x1111.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">An earthquake cottage being moved through the streets of San Francisco circa 1906. \u003ccite>(Courtesy of the San Francisco Public Library)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Historical conservationists \u003ca href=\"https://www.outsidelands.org/kirkham_shacks.php\">successfully\u003c/a> saved several earthquake cottages from demolition over the years. Two of them are owned by the Presidio Trust and used to be open to visitors, although they have recently been moved to an out-of-the-way location. Another is in the San Francisco Zoo, part of \u003ca href=\"https://www.sfzoo.org/greenies-conservation-corner/\">Greenie’s Conservation Corner\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“As San Francisco continues to change, it is this visual touchstone to our past,” LaBounty said. “And not only our past, but the most significant event that happened in our past, outside of maybe the Gold Rush.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2 id=\"episode-transcript\">Episode Transcript\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price:\u003c/strong> I want to talk about architecture for a moment – specifically residential architecture. In San Francisco.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>You expect to see stately Victorian homes with their bright colors and fancy decorative trim.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Then there’s Marina style homes with their big windows and stucco facades.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But sprinkled in amidst these grander homes you might spot a few tiny cottages — the original tiny homes.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Charity Vargas:\u003c/strong> I did see two over in the sunset. There was like two close together and I thought maybe they might be them, but I’m not sure.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>Charity Vargas, our question asker this week, has seen some of these small dwellings dotted around the Richmond and Sunset districts near her home. And she’s heard that the cottages are holdovers from the Great 1906 earthquake and fire, but wants to know more.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Charity Vargas: \u003c/strong>How many earthquake cottages are left and you know, are they still used and where they are?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>Today on the show, we’ll dig into the history of San Francisco’s earthquake cottages. We’ll learn how critical they were in sheltering a vulnerable…but vital.. population and learn about modern efforts to save them. I’m Olivia Allen-Price and you’re listening to Bay Curious. Stay with us.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Sponsor message\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/strong>We set out to answer Charity’s question by searching for “earthquake shacks”…tiny homes built out of redwood and cedar after the 1906 earthquake and fire. Bay Curious editor and producer Katrina Schwartz found one high on a hill in Bernal Heights.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Joan Hunter: \u003c/strong>You want a little tour? Ok, this is our tiny kitchen and I believe this rectangle room is the original earthquake shack and this part is added on, but it’s kind of hard to say exactly. I’m Joan Hunter. I live in Bernal Heights, San Francisco, California in an earthquake cottage or earthquake shack, as some would like to say.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Katrina Schwartz: \u003c/strong>I’m standing with Joan in her light filled living room…all that’s left of the original cottage. It’s a modestly sized room, but has tall ceilings and windows that look out over a sweeping view of San Francisco.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>What started out as a one room cottage has been expanded quite a bit…it’s about 620 square feet now, still small by modern standards.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Joan Hunter: \u003c/strong>Okay, so this is a little bedroom we have in the front and all of our rooms, this is a theme for the house, everything is small, very, very small.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Katrina Schwartz:\u003c/strong> Joan’s got two kids…so the house can feel like a tight squeeze at times. But she fell in love with the history of the place.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Joan Hunter: \u003c/strong>what I do know is that the guy who bought it, he was a little kind of like a bachelor. And he met someone who was also single and they moved together and they got married. And it was just a love story.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Katrina Schwartz: \u003c/strong>Joan likes thinking that after they survived the worst natural disaster San Francisco has ever experienced…and been homeless for months because of it…that they finally found some tranquility here, a little piece of San Francisco to call their own.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Music to help us transition\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Katrina Schwartz: \u003c/strong>The Great 1906 Earthquake and Fire leveled 80 percent of San Francisco. The morning of April 18, 1906 Bay Area residents awoke early in the morning to a temblor they’d never forget.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Sounds of shaking\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Kathleen Norris: \u003c/strong>Every picture on the wall is going tack, tack, tack. Everything movable in the house is keeping up that unearthly clatter. You could hear up and down the roads, earthquake. It’s an earthquake. Oh, God help us, it’s an earthquake. of course, it changed the world for all of us.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Katrina Schwartz: \u003c/strong>Kathleen Norris shared her oral history with the Bancroft Library in 1960. There was no audio recorded during the disaster, but anyone who survived it remembered the trauma of it clearly…even fifty years later. Kathleen was in Mill Valley when the earthquake hit…where the damage wasn’t too bad. But she and her brother were curious about how San Francisco had fared…so they found a boat that took them to the city.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Joan Hunter: \u003c/strong>It was something to see. The great, heavy, slow rolls of smoke that were joining hands as they went up.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Katrina Schwartz: \u003c/strong>Kathleen describes refugees fleeing homes that had been leveled, toting their belongings in baby carriages and wheel barrows.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Kathleen Norris: \u003c/strong>We walked over the hot, hot rocks of Market Street. And of course, the cable car lines were twisted hairpins. And the houses were all down. There was nothing saved. Nothing was accepted.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Katrina Schwartz: \u003c/strong>And yet, the image that lingered in her mind…even as the smoke lay heavy over the hills… was of people getting to work to repair their city.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Kathleen Norris: \u003c/strong>And already there were people helping out and organizing, scraping bricks. The bricks were hot. And they were working away. Nobody felt for an instant, oh, let’s go somewhere else. Everyone knew that the city was going to come back.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Katrina Schwartz: \u003c/strong>As indeed it would. Just nine years after the earthquake and fire, San Francisco hosted the 1915 Panama Pacific International Exposition…the reason the Palace of Fine Arts was built…a spectacle that 18 million people visited by the time it closed.. Headlines trumpeted the achievement.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>\u003cem>Voice over reading archival newspaper headline:\u003c/em> \u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Big Fair is Opened. All eyes on San Francisco. President Flashes Signal\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Fair Draws Myriad; All Records For Crowds Fall\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Marvelous Exhibits From All Parts of the Earth Assembled by 42 Countries for the Hugest Conclave of Nations in History\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Katrina Schwartz: \u003c/strong>It was a signal to the world that San Francisco was still \u003cem>the most important\u003c/em> city in the West…one full of invention and achievement.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>\u003cstrong>Voice over reading archival newspaper headline: \u003c/strong>Tower of Jewels Wreathed in Flames. But it’s only to thrill visitors\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Art Smith Sets Hearts Leaping: Aviator’s Loop-the-Loops at Night Traced By Trail of Smoke\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Katrina Schwartz: \u003c/strong>But how did San Francisco go from the absolute devastation of 1906 to showing off the latest advances in science and art on the world stage just nine years later? This is where the earthquake cottages… or shacks as they’re affectionately called…come into the story.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Woody LaBounty: \u003c/strong>So after the 1906 earthquake and fire, more than a quarter of a million people are at least temporarily displaced.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Katrina Schwartz: \u003c/strong>Woody LaBounty is President and CEO of San Francisco Heritage, a nonprofit dedicated to preserving San Francisco history.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Woody LaBounty: \u003c/strong>And now, the powers that be have to decide not only how to take care of all these people, but also who’s gonna rebuild the city?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Katrina Schwartz: \u003c/strong>Immediately after the earthquake and fire, the military stepped in and established tent camps in the city’s parks. But soon a new organization…the San Francisco Relief Corporation…was formed to distribute food, clothes and other aid.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Woody LaBounty: \u003c/strong>That covered many aspects of what you have to do when people are refugees, but also a specific housing effort, and that was the earthquake relief cottages.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Katrina Schwartz: \u003c/strong>Officials were worried about sanitation in the tent camps when winter rains came. So, they decided to build 5,610 relief cottages…built with redwood, fir and cedar… to house people. They were painted “park bench green”…literally the color used on Golden Gate Park benches… and clustered in neighborhood parks like Jefferson Square, Precita Park, and Portsmouth Square. Around 17,000 people lived in them.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Woody LaBounty: \u003c/strong>If you owned property or you had a property that had been destroyed in the earthquake, you rebuilt or you figured out a way to move on. But there was a vast number of people who didn’t have any other resources.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Katrina Schwartz: \u003c/strong>These were San Francisco’s poor, folks who had lived in boarding houses or shared rooms downtown before the fire. City leaders wanted to keep these laborers with the skills to rebuild the city close by. But they didn’t plan to give away the cottages for free.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Woody LaBounty: \u003c/strong>So for all of wanting to take care of the refugees, there was also a fear at the time of creeping socialism. People in power did not want to give anybody anything for nothing. So they thought it would create indigence. And so you were supposed to pay some sort of rent.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Katrina Schwartz: \u003c/strong>Here’s how it worked. Shack residents paid monthly rent of a few dollars while their shacks were in the parks. But the relief corporation returned that money when a resident bought some land and moved the shack out of the park and onto their own property.That generosity was spurred by pressure to move refugees and their cottages out of the parks as soon as possible.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Woody LaBounty: \u003c/strong>As other San Franciscans were ready to move on from the disaster, they didn’t like the idea that their parks had a community, a village of working-class people. Living in the middle of their park. They wanted their parks back.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Katrina Schwartz: \u003c/strong>About a year and a half after the earthquake, in the summer of 1907, most of the shacks had been removed from the parks. Newspapers at the time described the surreal image of tiny homes on wagons moving across the city with people still in them.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>\u003cstrong>Voice over reading archival newspaper excerpt:\u003c/strong> It is a strange sight to see a procession of these refugee cottages moving down fashionable Van Ness Avenue or busy Fillmore Street, faces peering from the windows, and men, women and children going about their household tasks as if their little home was securely perched upon a cement foundation and surrounded by a garden and a fence.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Katrina Schwartz: \u003c/strong>Back in 1907, the Richmond District, a northwestern neighborhood, was mostly undeveloped sand dunes, with lots of empty land. So many shack owners moved their cottages to vacant plots there.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Woody says the earthquake shack program not only got the city working again…\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Woody LaBounty: \u003c/strong>\u003cspan style=\"text-decoration: line-through\">I\u003c/span>t also gave people who never would have dreamed, I think, of owning a home a chance to get into that American dream. So you get the earthquake cottage, you’re a refugee who has nothing, and now suddenly you buy a lot for 100 bucks in the sand dunes of the Richmond, you have pretty much a free house.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Katrina Schwartz: \u003c/strong>Bernal Heights is another place with many earthquake cottages…people just moved their shacks from Precita Park to open land up the hill.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And some of them are still there…like the house we toured at the beginning of this episode.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Woody LaBounty: \u003c/strong>The one sort of key touchstone that you can tell about a cottage is the roof line. It has a very shallow pitched roof, kind of like a pup tent, like a Boy Scout tent. And then that is like your first hint because a lot of small buildings you’ll see have very steep pitched or flat roofs.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Katrina Schwartz: \u003c/strong>Woody says many shack owners quickly made improvements to their new homes — painting, building fences, adding additional rooms.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Woody LaBounty: \u003c/strong>There was sort of a stigma of having an earthquake cottage for a few years because it sort of signified you were a refugee, you needed help, you were poor. So people often, they quickly tried to hide sort of the pedigree of their houses and cover them with shingles quickly.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Katrina Schwartz: \u003c/strong>They wanted to hide that telling park bench green color. Most existing earthquake cottages are surrounded by modern additions. Or sometimes they’re a couple shacks placed together. That’s one reason it’s really hard to know how many still exist in San Francisco, they’re hidden. But Woody estimates between 30 and 50 earthquake cottages are dotted across the city.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Jane Cryan: \u003c/strong>The cottage in the front is made up of three and a half shacks, and then there’s a free-standing mid-size shack in the backyard.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Katrina Schwartz: \u003c/strong>This is Jane Cryan. She rented one of these preserved earthquake shacks in the outer Sunset in the 1980s. Jane is best known as a “shacktivist”…fighting to preserve earthquake cottages from development. But if it weren’t for the Beat movement in the 1950s, she never would have moved here in the first place.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp> \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Jane Cryan: \u003c/strong>The only reason I ended up in San Francisco is that Jack Kerouac, with whom I had correspondence from the time I was 16 years old told me that Milwaukee was no place for a poet. You should be in San Francisco.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Katrina Schwartz: \u003c/strong>By day she was an executive assistant, but writing and jazz piano were her passions.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Jane Cryan: \u003c/strong>And I moved in and I played piano for about six weeks, day and night, and an elderly gentleman from across the street came over and shook his finger at me and he said, young lady, do you know that you’re living in a couple of relief houses pasted together?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Katrina Schwartz: \u003c/strong>Her three room cottage was actually three earthquake shacks pasted together. This was 1982 and Jane had lived in San Francisco almost 20 years. But she’d never even heard of the 1906 earthquake and fire. Her neighbor’s passing comment sparked her curiosity. She spent nights and weekends obsessively going through old newspaper archives to learn as much as she could about the disaster and the earthquake cottages.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Meanwhile, her landlord made it known that he planned to sell her cottage…or worse demolish it and sell the lot.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Jane Cryan: \u003c/strong>Take down our history. So I had to do something.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Katrina Schwartz: \u003c/strong>Preserving these cottages — tangible pieces of such important history — became her life’s work. She took inspiration from one of the 1906 earthquake refugees she learned about in her research, a woman named Mary Kelly. Mary was an agitator, constantly questioning how the relief corporation dolled out aid and whether it was fair. She was such a pain to them they eventually evicted her from her cottage. But she refused to leave, famously saying:\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>\u003cstrong>Voice over portraying Mary Kelly:\u003c/strong> They can’t bluff me. I’ll stay with the house if they take it to the end of the earth.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Katrina Schwartz: \u003c/strong>She rode in her cottage as men hauled it onto a wagon and trucked it away. She stayed inside as they dismantled the cottage board by board. Jane finds Mary’s tenacity — and willingness to stand up to power — endearing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Jane Cryan: \u003c/strong>She was exactly the way I was. If I saw something, I said something. And if I saw something that was not right, I said something louder.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Katrina Schwartz: \u003c/strong>Jane started a nonprofit called The Society for the Preservation and Appreciation of San Francisco Refugee Shacks. She fought hard to get the planning commission to designate her little shack a historic landmark.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And she was successful!\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Jane Cryan: \u003c/strong>Landmark number 171.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Katrina Schwartz: \u003c/strong>But it was a bittersweet victory. The commission also said that Jane had to vacate the cottage in order to compensate the landlord for putting restrictions on his property. Jane bounced around from place to place after that, eventually moving back to Wisconsin, where she’s originally from.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Katrina in the tape: \u003c/strong>What do you miss most about San Francisco?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Jane Cryan: \u003c/strong>Oh, everything! Oh my god, San Francisco is the queen of the Golden West, for heaven’s sake!\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Music\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Katrina Schwartz: \u003c/strong>Historian Woody LaBounty says there are probably more earthquake cottages than we know. They’re hiding in people’s backyards, incorporated into bigger houses or used as sheds.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Woody LaBounty: \u003c/strong>They’re the last sort of most visible, tangible sign of one of the biggest things that ever happened to the city of San Francisco.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Katrina Schwartz: \u003c/strong>Increasingly these little cottages are being bought and torn down to make room for larger homes. But the ones that remain are a reminder of a refugee relief program that not only got people back on their feet, but made them homeowners. An example of San Franciscans coming together to repair and resurrect a beloved city.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Olivia Allen-Price:\u003c/strong> That was Bay Curious editor and producer Katrina Schwartz. Special thanks this week to \u003ca href=\"https://californiarevealed.org/\">California Revealed\u003c/a>, an online database of oral histories and other archival materials. They helped us find Kathleen Norris’ oral history.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Bay Curious is made in San Francisco at member-supported KQED. Right now your membership means more than ever, give at \u003ca href=\"http://kqed.org/donate\">KQED.org/donate\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Our show is produced by Gabriela Glueck, Christopher Beale, Katrina Schwartz and me, Olivia Allen-Price.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Extra support from Maha Sanad, Katie Sprenger, Jen Chien, Ethan Toven-Lindsey and everyone on team KQED.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Have a wonderful week.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cp>\u003cem>This article originally published in 2020. It has been lightly updated.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"#episode-transcript\">\u003ci>View the full episode transcript.\u003c/i>\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Bay Curious listener Ben Kaiser asked for our favorite movies that are filmed and set in San Francisco. While we don’t normally take on subjective questions, we figured with cozy season upon us, it was a great time to cuddle up on the sofa with some classics.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ciframe loading=\"lazy\" frameborder=\"0\" height=\"200\" scrolling=\"no\" src=\"https://playlist.megaphone.fm?e=KQINC4565381532&light=true\" width=\"100%\" we asked peter hartlaub san francisco chronicle culture critic and host carly severn kqed senior editor of audience news resident movie obsessive to share their top picks on a recent bay curious podcast episode. they shared the movies would be most likely sit down watch over holidays not necessarily critically acclaimed films. our some favorites too>Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home (1986)\n\u003cp>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QOhoIBkOYf0\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Plot summary from \u003ca href=\"https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0092007/\">IMDB\u003c/a>:\u003c/strong> “To save Earth from an alien probe, Admiral James T. Kirk and his fugitive crew go back in time to San Francisco in 1986 to retrieve the only beings who can communicate with it: humpback whales.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Why we love it:\u003c/strong> This charming, lighthearted movie makes the Bay Area look undeniably fun. One KQED fan said the film was “influential in shaping how I think about the environment and is the Star Trek movie with the most heart in it.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003ch1>Inside Out (2015)\u003c/h1>\n\u003cp>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yRUAzGQ3nSY\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Plot summary from \u003ca href=\"https://www.imdb.com/title/tt2096673/\">IMDB\u003c/a>:\u003c/strong> “After young Riley is uprooted from her Midwest life and moved to San Francisco, her emotions — Joy, Fear, Anger, Disgust and Sadness — conflict on how best to navigate a new city, house, and school.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Why we love it:\u003c/strong> Pixar has dropped Bay Area references in several animated films over the years, but “Inside Out” takes it to the next level. The film takes place in the Bay Area, and features rich and detailed imagery from around the region.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch1>Zodiac (2007)\u003c/h1>\n\u003cp>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yNncHPl1UXg\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Plot summary from \u003ca href=\"https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0443706/\">IMDB\u003c/a>:\u003c/strong> “In the late 1960s/early 1970s, a San Francisco cartoonist becomes an amateur detective obsessed with tracking down the Zodiac Killer, an unidentified individual who terrorizes Northern California with a killing spree.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Why we love it:\u003c/strong> “Second only to Alfred Hitchcock, director David Fincher has a great sensibility for San Francisco,” says Peter Hartlaub. “This film absolutely captures a place in time. The music choices, the visual cues, the production design. Nothing’s wasted. I was a little kid, and I remember hearing about the Zodiac killer, and this movie brought that back so well.”\u003c/p>\n\u003ch1>The Last Black Man in San Francisco (2019)\u003c/h1>\n\u003cp>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C0FnJDhY9-0\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Plot summary from \u003ca href=\"https://www.imdb.com/title/tt4353250/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1\">IMDB\u003c/a>:\u003c/strong> A young man searches for home in the changing city that seems to have left him behind.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Why we love it:\u003c/strong> One of the few films on our list that is a commentary on the Bay Area, and how gentrification has decimated once vibrant Black neighborhoods. The cinematography will absolutely take your breath away. Pause the movie at any point and you might be inspired to hang the still image on your wall.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch1>Basic Instinct (1992)\u003c/h1>\n\u003cp>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4f96x3UpoaQ\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Plot summary from \u003ca href=\"https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0103772/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1\">IMDB\u003c/a>:\u003c/strong> A violent police detective investigates a brutal murder that might involve a manipulative and seductive novelist.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Why we love it:\u003c/strong> “The plot is ludicrous … but it’s a romp. It’s a riot. It also looks way better than it needs to, and it sounds way better than it needs to,” says Carly Severn. “I love the way it uses San Francisco. It goes for all the classic shots — there’s North Beach, there’s Telegraph Hill.” You’ll also find lots of gorgeous helicopter shots in this one.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch1>Always Be My Maybe (2019)\u003c/h1>\n\u003cp>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iHBcWHY9lN4\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Plot summary from \u003ca href=\"https://www.imdb.com/title/tt7374948/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1\">IMDB\u003c/a>:\u003c/strong> Everyone assumed Sasha and Marcus would wind up together except for Sasha and Marcus. Reconnecting after 15 years, the two start to wonder — maybe?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Why we love it:\u003c/strong> “It makes San Francisco look really cool, but it also makes San Francisco look normal. A lot of it is set in the Outer Richmond,” says Carly Severn. “As a resident of the Bay Area there’s such a pleasure in looking at the screen and saying, ‘Oh, I know that! That’s cool!”\u003c/p>\n\u003ch1>Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1978)\u003c/h1>\n\u003cp>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vc_0dlmSq7I\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Plot summary from \u003ca href=\"https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0077745/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1\">IMDB\u003c/a>: \u003c/strong>When strange seeds drift to earth from space, mysterious pods begin to grow and invade San Francisco, where they replicate the residents into emotionless automatons one body at a time.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Why we love it:\u003c/strong> “I think this is the most underrated San Francisco movie,” says Peter Hartlaub. “A lot of directors come in and they love San Francisco, but they shoot from the same seven places — Telegraph Hill, the Golden Gate Bridge, The Palace of Fine Arts. Director Philip Kaufman shot in places I think he always wanted to shoot — the Tenderloin is a huge character in the movie. Civic Center. Obscure places like Pier 70.”\u003c/p>\n\u003ch1>Vertigo (1958)\u003c/h1>\n\u003cp>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z5jvQwwHQNY\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Plot summary from \u003ca href=\"https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0052357/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1\">IMDB\u003c/a>:\u003c/strong> A former police detective juggles wrestling with his personal demons and becoming obsessed with a hauntingly beautiful woman.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Why we love it:\u003c/strong> If you’re going to watch one movie set in San Francisco, a lot of critics would argue it should be this Alfred Hitchcock classic. The plot is woven into the location in a way that few movies can rival. And if you’re wanting to really *see* the city — this film is a hit parade of gorgeous locations.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch1>So I Married an Axe Murderer! (1993)\u003c/h1>\n\u003cp>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yto08I_IiAg\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Plot summary from \u003ca href=\"https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0108174/?ref_=nv_sr_srsg_0\">IMDB\u003c/a>:\u003c/strong> A San Francisco poet who fears commitment suspects his girlfriend may have a knack for killing off her significant others.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Why we love it:\u003c/strong> One KQED fan says it “captures something of the SF that I grew up in” and another calls this film “a love letter to SF.” It highlights many of the city’s most famous sights — like the Golden Gate Bridge to the Palace of Fine Arts and Alcatraz.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch1>Bullitt (1968)\u003c/h1>\n\u003cp>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BsvD806qNM8\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Plot summary from \u003ca href=\"https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0062765/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1\">IMDB:\u003c/a>\u003c/strong> An all guts, no glory San Francisco cop becomes determined to find the underworld kingpin that killed the witness in his protection.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Why we love it:\u003c/strong> Do we need to say much more than “epic car chase scenes on San Francisco hills?” This film features tons of on-location filming, so you’ll get a big taste of the city.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch1>Mrs. Doubtfire (1993)\u003c/h1>\n\u003cp>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3euGQ7-brs4\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Plot summary from \u003ca href=\"https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0107614/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1\">IMDB\u003c/a>: \u003c/strong>After a bitter divorce, an actor disguises himself as a female housekeeper to spend time with his children held in custody by his former wife.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Why we love it:\u003c/strong> We couldn’t leave this film off the list. After all, it features one of the Bay Area’s most beloved celebrities, Robin Williams. After his death, the house featured in this film at 2640 Steiner St. became a pop-up memorial. You’ll spot everything from ordinary streets to iconic San Francisco locations throughout the film.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch1>The Rock (1996)\u003c/h1>\n\u003cp>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6DWu_dT0Phc\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Plot summary from \u003ca href=\"https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0117500/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1\">IMDB\u003c/a>:\u003c/strong> A mild-mannered chemist and an ex-con must lead the counterstrike when a rogue group of military men, led by a renegade general, threaten a nerve gas attack from Alcatraz against San Francisco.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Why we love it:\u003c/strong> Much of the film was shot on in and around Alcatraz, a tall order given the production crew had to do it all while tour groups milled around the site of the former federal penitentiary. Other locations in the film include the Fairmont Hotel, San Francisco City Hall and Pier 39.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>These 12 films are still just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to great movies filmed in the Bay Area. Other audience favorites include: Chan Is Missing, The Conversation, Blindspotting, Sorry to Bother You, The Princess Diaries, Parrots of Telegraph Hill and La Mission. Find even more suggestions on \u003ca href=\"https://x.com/KQED/status/1336822068541734912\">this X thread\u003c/a>, and on \u003ca href=\"https://www.facebook.com/KQED/posts/10157640695916191\">KQED’s Facebook page. \u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[baycuriousquestion]\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2 id=\"episode-transcript\">Episode Transcript\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Hey everyone, I’m Olivia Allen Price and this is Bay Curious. Let’s go!\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Ben Kaiser:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">My name is Ben Kaiser and believe it or not I live in Atlanta, Georgia.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Ben visited San Francisco for the first time four years ago. And as soon as he got here, he felt a connection.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Ben Kaiser:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It sort of seemed like I had been there before or that I belonged there. And I just absolutely fell in love with it. And I’ve been back in four years, probably nine or ten times.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">That’s a lot of flights between Atlanta and SFO. Now, when Ben can’t be here, he’s found a way to visit without leaving his living room.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Ben Kaiser:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Because I don’t live in San Francisco, I want to be connected to it as much as I possibly can. And one of the ways is watching movies shot there.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Anything that can transport him here, even if only for a few hours. Ben’s seen a lot already, but he wants more, so he came to Bay Curious.\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Ben Kaiser:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I asked what were some of the movies set in San Francisco that were actually shot in San Francisco, and which ones are your favorites or your recommendations?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Now we don’t often delve into subjective matters here on the show, but hey, it’s the holidays, cozy season is here, and we thought maybe we could all use some solid movie recommendations. Today’s episode will sound a little bit different from what you usually hear on Bay Curious. We’ve got a panel of local cultural experts here to convince Ben and you how you should spend some time devouring the Bay Area in all its cinematic glory. This episode first aired in 2020 and has been lightly revised for you today. So throw some popcorn in the microwave, cozy up on your couch, and press play. All right, I have to start out this episode with a confession. I, Olivia Allen Price, am really bad at movies, like possibly the last person that you would want on your trivia team during the movie round. So I called in some much needed backup on this one. Here to help me out today is Peter Hartlaub. He was born and raised in the Bay Area. He’s a cultural critic with the San Francisco Chronicle, and he writes the total SF newsletter. Welcome, Peter.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Peter Hartlaub:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Thank you so much for having me.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Yeah. Also, I’ve got Carly Severn here. She’s a senior editor here at KQED and a Bay Curious Reporter, who you are probably familiar with. She’s also a former co-host of The Cooler Podcast and one of KQED’s resident movie obsessives. Hey Carly.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Carly Severn:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Hey, Olivia. Hey, Peter. Lovely to be here.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">So before we get into recommendations, I’m curious, what do you guys think makes San Francisco a good spot to shoot a film?\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Peter Hartlaub:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Internationally recognizable landmarks, Golden Gate Bridge, Alcatraz, the topography. You can get up on a hill and see those landmarks. You can have a chase scene and get a little air. But I think the biggest thing is the weather. And it’s sort of the secret ingredient because it allows a director to convey mood. And then the city sort of becomes the mood of the director. You have the fog coming in, you have the sun coming in, subtle shifts. You can’t do that in Atlanta. You can’t do it in Houston. You can’t even really do that in LA. And I think that’s a big reason why San Francisco ends up being, you know, a top pick if you’re a director and you want to shoot like a thriller or an action film, something like that.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Carly Severn:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I would agree with all of that and I must kind of confess I do have a similar cinematic relationship with San Francisco as listener Ben does. I grew up watching San Francisco on screen as a kid in the middle of nowhere in England and it just seemed like the coolest place in the world to me. So I get it. I get his quest.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Now, despite all these things, all these sort of great attributes that make, you know, San Francisco a great place to shoot, you still don’t see it in films as often as, you know, in New York or in LA or maybe even in Atlanta, even though you don’t necessarily know you’re in Atlanta when you are in Atlanta. A lot of sh movies are shot there. Why do you all think that is?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Peter Hartlaub:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It’s expensive to get a hotel here, much less a bunch of hotels if you’ve got a lot of people coming. People are all crammed in together. And if you’re gonna shoot Sister Act in Noe Valley, or if you’re gonna shoot a car chase scene going through Russian Hill, the neighbors are gonna notice. And I think San Francisco, more than some of those other cities, because it’s sort of compact like that, makes it harder to film. Expensive and compact.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Carly Severn:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Yeah, I think logistically you have all of these issues, but I do think there’s this thematic problem with San Francisco, it’s so in your face. It is it does end up being a character. If you want to just have like any town USA to set your story in, like San Francisco is not the place to come. It really isn’t, because you’ll end up having to do all of this narrative work bending over backwards to kind of explain why it’s a San Francisco story. That’s my take anyway.\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Well, I do want to get on to answering Ben’s question and get to some of your San Francisco movie recommendations, but I thought we’d actually start with his because he has seen a lot of movies and he has his own thoughts.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Ben Kaiser:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Vertigo’s probably my all time favorite movie in the fact that it’s shot in San Francisco. But, you know, a lot of the real common ones, you know, I I’m not embarrassed to say the other night I watched The Rock and enjoyed The Rock. But you know, Mrs. Doubtfire, Milk, The Room, those are just, you know, some of the ones that I enjoy.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">So it sounds like he’s definitely seen some of the classics, which I know we aren’t necessarily gonna talk as much about today in your lists, right?\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Peter Hartlaub:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Vertigo, The Conversation, the Hitchcock films, the Coppola films. If I’m teaching a film class about San Francisco, they’re gonna be right in there. If I’m turning on my TV right now ’cause I just need to chill and escape a little bit, I’ve got a whole different set of films that I’m gonna pick, my favorite films, and that’s what I’m gonna pick today.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Carly Severn:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">A hundred percent cosign. And may I just say to Ben that he never has to be embarrassed about watching the rock. There is nothing to be embarrassed about there.\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Peter Hartlaub:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It’s totally cool to just love the rock and shout it from the rooftops.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">All right, so I asked each of you guys to bring your top three recommendations. And what we’re gonna do is go through all of those and then let Ben decide who has been the most convincing and which movie he is going to watch next. So let’s dive in, Carly. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Let us know what is your number three pick and why.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Carly Severn: First of all, I want to kind of set up my thinking here. I wanted to pay homage to the classic TLC album Crazy Sexy Cool with three picks that make San Francisco look either crazy, sexy, or cool. And so I’m gonna start with cool. It is Always Be My Maybe. It is the 2019 Netflix movie directed by Nahnatchka Khan . It’s got Ali Wong as a celebrity chef, and she returns home to San Francisco, where she grew up, and she reconnects with her childhood boyfriend, Randall Park.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Clip from Always Be My Maybe\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Carly Severn \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:07:18] \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> I love this movie so much. It makes San Francisco look really cool, but it also makes it look really normal. And it’s not the kind of parade of Golden Gate Bridge, Golden Gate Park Ad nauseum. Like a lot of it’s set in the outer Richmond, like the farmers market that they go to. It’s not some bougie little farmer’s market. It’s the like the civic center farmers market. So as a resident of the Bay Area, there’s such a pleasure in in kind of doing that thing where you’re looking at the screen going like, Oh, I know that. That’s really cool. I should admit that so much of it is filmed in San Francisco at these amazing locations that are like super normal and super lived in. But Vancouver, of course it’s always Vancouver. Vancouver actually doubles for a lot of the San Francisco locations. Particularly Goodluck Dim sum, which is where Ali Wong it’s one of her favorite restaurants in San Francisco. She’s it’s on Clements Street. She says it’s where she grew up eating. She really wanted that set there, but they had to double the interior in Vancouver. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Clip from Always Be My Maybe \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Carly Severn: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">She thought that the restaurant would really love the fact that she had given them the shout-out, and it turns out they they kind of didn’t care. She put on Instagram that she had gone to the restaurant, and this is her caption. So the picture is of her waiting in line at this place that she’s just made super famous in a movie. And she’s like, Me, hello, I’m Ali Wong. The dim sum scene in my movie Always Be My Maybe is based on this very place where I grew up eating. Good luck, dim sum staff. We don’t give a bleep. We have no idea who you are. Get in line.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Oh I love that. Tough being famous in San Francisco.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u003c/span>\u003cb>Peter Hartlaub: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">There’s a lot of little things in there that are San Francisco too. Ali Wong got Dan the Automator to do the score and also write the music for the greatest San Francisco band in a movie, Hello Peril, which do three songs in the movie, including the closing credits. My only complaint, and Carly mentioned it, and I don’t want to start like negative ad campaigns here, but we’re winning Ben’s vote, and there’s only one vote. They did the exterior on Clement Street, and they’re walking down what’s supposed to be Clement Street, and it is so not Clements Street. It is so Vancouver. I love the movie, but as a location, San Francisco location movie, I find it to be kind of hit and miss.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">All right, well let’s get on to your number three then, mister Hartlob. What do you got?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Peter Hartlaub: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Mine is \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Invasion of the Body Snatchers\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">. I think it’s the most underrated San Francisco movie. Shot, it came out in 1978, a Philip Kaufman movie. He’s a San Francisco resident to this day. And it was a remake of a 1950s movie about alien pods that come in, they’re replacing the human race slowly, and you can’t fall asleep. And it’s there’s just a lot of intrigue and it’s a thriller and it’s horror. I love it as a San Francisco movie because a lot of directors come in and they love San Francisco, but they shoot from the same seven places. You know, Telegraph Hill, Golden Gate Bridge, Palace of Fine Arts. Philip Kaufman shot in places that I think he always wanted to shoot, that that really add to the movie. The tenderloin is a huge, huge character in the movie. Civic Center. There’s a couple of really cool shots there. Obscure places like Pier 70. Right here, we have Donald Sutherland in a very famous scene where he is revealing himself to be one of the pod people by screeching. The screech is a pig squeal, I believe played backwards. And he’s pointing, he’s pointing at you on the other side of the screen. He’s in the civic center, pointing at you. Great San Francisco movie, great horror movie, \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Invasion of the Body Snatchers\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Carly Severn: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I loved this movie. I actually was ashamed to say that I hadn’t seen it before I started prepping to have this conversation with you guys. And it starts off, you know, like a little bit cheesy, and I was like, oh god, what has Peter chosen? I couldn’t have been more wrong. It is such a great movie. I I could not agree ever with more with everything he said about the way it uses San Francisco, and particularly like a lot of like civic buildings around Civic Center, and just like a lot of it set at the the Department of Public Health, which I always like it when those guys are the good guys in the movie.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">You know, I haven’t seen this movie yet. It’s now gonna be on my list, I will say, but I am I love the idea that there’s a movie that that really highlights some of the lesser used locations around San Francisco. Because I think there is, you know, a divide between how tourists experience the city and how people who live in the city experience the city. Let’s move on to your number two picks, making our way up the list. Carly, what do you have?\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Carly Severn: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Well, I did say I was gonna do Crazy Sexy Cool, and we’re now into the sexy phase of this pick. It is 1992’s \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Basic Instinct\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">. And I thought long and hard before choosing this one because, you know, many parts of it haven’t aged well, let’s be honest. But it is a prime example of the 90s erotic thriller. It is made by Paul Verhoven, and the plot is ludicrous. Michael Douglas is the shady San Francisco detective. He’s investigating this bombshell crime novelist, Sharon Stone, who definitely, maybe almost certainly, killed one of her boyfriends. It’s a romp, it’s a riot, it wants to be a Hitchcock noir very, very badly. So it looks way better than it needs to, and it sounds way better than it needs to. I tried long and hard to find a safe for Bay Curious clip from this movie and failed miserably. So let’s just listen to a little bit of the trailer.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Clip from Basic Instinct \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Carly Severn: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I love the way it uses San Francisco. It goes for all the classic shots, like, you know, there’s North Beach, there’s Telegraph Hill. One thing I should note is that San Francisco wasn’t always thrilled about being the kind of poster child for this movie. Sharon Stone’s character is bisexual and setting a movie with an LGBTQ woman who has a lot of sex and kills the people that she sleeps with in San Francisco in 1992 at a time when AIDS was still so prevalent and claiming so many lives. Like that’s a definite choice. And this isn’t just like 2020 hindsight. The movie was picketed at the time by LGBTQ groups for being kind of prejudice in its representation of that community. So I do feel like I should flag that. A lot of that animosity, I feel like, has gone away over time, but it’s definitely something to note. Also, I think the reason people don’t like this movie is that they take it quite seriously. And I think if you look at Paul Behoven’s back catalog, like Starship Troopers, like Total Recall, like Showgirls, I think he has a sense of humor about what he’s doing. So I think that this movie should be taken as a time capsule and with a hefty fistful of salt.\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Peter Hartlaub:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I love this film. I think it’s a great pick. I think it’s underrated. There are more helicopter shots in this movie of San Francisco, of someone driving a car around a windy road. His embracing San Francisco, making love to San Francisco with his camera budget was off the charts. So I think it’s a great pick. I really like this movie a lot.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Definitely one that makes San Francisco look sexy, Carly. Don’t you agree?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Carly Severn:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Well, okay, so this is where I genuinely want you guys’ opinion, because I have spent the best part of a week thinking about this question. Is San Francisco a sexy city? And I was trying to think of cities that are like off the charts sexy, you’re right. New Orleans sprang to mind. But then I’m thinking, is it just about like sweating? Is it just like the weather? Is is is that all sexiness is to me.\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Peter Hartlaub:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> I gotta say, the the weather is it. You don’t sweat in San Francisco. LA sexy city. New Orleans sexy city. Miami. Miami Vice sexy city. Streets of San Francisco is not a sexy TV show.\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I’m gonna have to disagree with you guys and you are the cultural critics here, so your your opinion has more weight than mine, but I don’t know, I see fog and I wanna cuddle. That’s my take.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Peter Hartlaub:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Yeah, I don’t know.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u003c/span>\u003cb>Carly Severn:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I think Peter and I are of the same mind here where we’re just like It’s step one, guys.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Peter Hartlaub:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It’s a cuddly city. I don’t know if it’s a sexy city.\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Carly Severn:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I cuddle my dog. All right.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">All right. Well let’s get into Peter, what’s your number two pick?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Peter Hartlaub:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">My number two is\u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> Zodiac\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">. It is a David Fincher film. He shot \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The Game\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> first and then \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Zodiac\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> in San Francisco. And second to Hitchcock, I think he’s the one who really is a great sensibility for San Francisco. It is shot also in the San Francisco Chronicle Newsroom. They shot in our publisher’s office, I believe, outside, and they used our lobby and elevator. The story goes that David Fincher came up to our newsroom, walked inside, said an expletive and said this is too much of a mess, walked outside and they recreated our newsroom pillar for pillar. You cannot tell the difference in Los Angeles. But absolutely, absolutely captures a place in time. The music choices, the visual cues, the production design, nothing’s wasted. And honestly, even though they didn’t shoot in the Chronicle Newsroom, the newsroom banter is pitch perfect. Here’s a little bit of it right now.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Clip from Vertigo \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Peter Hartlaub: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">So that’s the way we talk. That’s the way we talk to each other. It’s all like a David Fincher or Aaron Sorkin drama.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Clip from Vertigo\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Peter Hartlaub: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">No, this is this is a great film, and the plot is almost secondary in this film, a killer from the 70s and 80s who they never caught, and I’m giving away the ending, but the ending isn’t the important thing. The important thing is the mood, the city, what it felt like to be in the 1970s and be scared. I was a little kid. I remember hearing about the Zodiac Killer, and this movie brought that back so well. My favorite shot in the film, it is a visual effects shot of them in sped up time building the Transamerica Pyramid, and again, just David Fincher using every little arrow in his quiver to capture that mood of San Francisco at a particular time. It’s a fantastic location movie.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">And I think it’s the only one on this list that is based on a true story unless there’s something I need to know about \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Invasion of the Body Snatchers\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Peter Hartlaub:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I think that’s true. And and and you know, there there’s a little bit of myth in there, but he he’s stuck a lot closer than a lot of other people do to the facts.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I will say as somebody who was not living in the Bay Area at the time of Zodiac, I found \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Zodiac\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> to be really helpful just to kind of I guess get a sense of what it was like to be here during that time, like you experienced, Peter.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Peter Hartlaub:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Yeah, and people remember and if people weren’t around, they know the myth. When when people come to the chronicle and ask for a tour, the two things they want to see are Herb Kane’s typewriter and the Zodiac Files. Can you show us the Zodiac files?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">All right, let’s get on to your top choices. These are top of your list. Let’s let’s hear it, Carly. What do you got?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Carly Severn: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Okay, guys, I’m reaching the climax of my crazy sexy cool plan, which I think paid off. My number one pick, it’s Crazy San Francisco. It’s \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Star Trek 4\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">. 1986. It is directed by Mr. Spark himself, Leonard Nimoy. I almost find it hard to talk about this film kind of critically because I love it so much. Just to quickly tell you about the plot, it picks up where 1984’s Search for Spark, Star Trek III left off. So the Earth of the Future is being menaced by a big alien probe. Only Kirk and the crew of the Enterprise can save the planet by time traveling back to 1980s San Francisco to bring back two Wales to talk to the alien probe and get it to leave Earth alone. You have to go with it. That’s the plot, and I can’t change that, okay? It’s not the best Star Trek movie. That’s The Wrath of Khan. That’s just undisputable. But it is the best Star Trek movie set in San Francisco with Wales, which is to say, it is the only one of that. Where do I start with how wonderful this movie is? People think I’m joking when I say that it’s the reason I moved to San Francisco, and I’m like 5% joking about that. But the other 95% is really serious. Growing up with this movie and watching San Francisco just look so fun, so warm, so crazy, so inviting. Like I wanted to be a part of that. It is totally joyous. Ben, if you’re listening and you haven’t seen Star Trek 4, don’t worry. You don’t need to watch any of the other Star Trek movies. It stands alone, it’s kind of perfect in that sense. The pleasures of watching like the quite serious crew of the Enterprise traverse San Francisco and just have a ball doing it. It’s just great. So I really wanted to play you one of the most iconic scenes, which is Kirk and Spock on a Muni bus that is traveling over the Golden Gate Bridge. Mr. Spock has to take out a young punk on the bus and get him to stop playing his music. And then this happens.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Clip from Star Trek 4\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Carly Severn: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The gag there, of course, being that Jacqueline Cezanne and Harold Robbins. Oh, I had to look up Harold Robbins, by the way. Like, they are not the giants of literature, but it’s just hilarious to think that the people of the future have deemed them to be so. I know of no movie that is like warmer and and sweeter than Star Trek Four. So, Ben, pick me, pick Star Trek Four. The choice is easy. Come on.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Peter Hartlaub: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">You know, I don’t even wanna argue against you, and I’m gonna pick a number one, but I love this film so much. It is just a lovely movie, funny movie, finds all kinds of different ways to explore San Francisco and make it part of the gag, but in a in a funny, warm way. It’s one of the greats, one of the classics.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">All right, and up there with one of the greats must be your number one choice, Peter. What do you have for your number one?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Peter Hartlaub:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">2015 Pixar film Inside Out. It takes place inside the brain of tween girl coming of age, Riley. And then also outside in San Francisco, Riley has moved from I believe Minnesota to San Francisco, and she’s horrified. And what the Pixar people did with animation is so fantastic. They take San Francisco and make it like 10 to 15% more. The streets are a little narrower, parking’s a little harder, street signs are a little more incomprehensible. Fantastic, fantastic use of San Francisco. It’s more of a character in the movie than any of their other movies. They had always kind of flirted around with the Bay Area and maybe dropped San Pablo Avenue and the Incredibles. This one, they really talk about San Francisco. And you don’t see that often. You see a lot of mainstream films set in San Francisco, and San Francisco is a backdrop and it’s almost like a prop. Very few films are a commentary on the city. Last black man in San Francisco, Medicine for Melancholy, and Inside Out. Inside Out is poking fun of the city. It is completely honest. If you live here, you totally get it. If you’re not from here, you’re gonna get some of the humor, including taking just an absolute, absolute dagger stab at our Pizza.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Clip from Inside Out\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Peter Hartlaub:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Honestly, the first time I saw this film, I didn’t love it. I liked it a lot. I’m glad I didn’t review it because I think I would have given it less than the highest rating. Upon rewatch, there’s so many little things that come out. You learn more things, and the San Francisco parts become clearer and clearer. I just think it’s a fantastic film, and it’s a fantastic San Francisco location film.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Well I think Ben is gonna have a really hard time deciding between all of those very compelling pitches for for movies he should be watching this weekend. Peter Hartlob, Bay Area native, culture critic with the SF Chronicle, co-host of Total SF podcast. Thank you so much. Is there anywhere that listeners can connect with you further?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Peter Hartlaub:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Subscribe to the Total SF newsletter, that’s where I explore the Bay Area and pass on all my favorite finds, the best hikes to take, the best tourist traps to visit, where I’m finding the best papusas to eat, and read my work at sfchronicle.com.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Awesome. And Carly, you are my longtime pop culture, I don’t know, guru. You’ve you’ve really helped me with questions over the years. So thank you for coming on the show. Where can people connect with you?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Carly Severn:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Well, you can find my work for Bay Curious in the podcast feed, including my two part series on the Donner Party in the archives, since we’re now feeling the wintry vibes here in the bay. You can also visit kqbd.org slash explainers to see what me and my team are up to every day in the KQED newsroom.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Alright, well thanks to you both. Big thanks to Ben for asking this week’s question.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Ben Kaiser:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Carly and Peter, I appreciate your suggestions for which San Francisco movie I should watch next. Full disclosure, three of them I’ve already seen. Those are: Always Be My Maybe, Basic Instinct and Zodiac, which is one of my all-time favorite movies. So it comes down to the other three, but I’m torn between Inside Out and Star Trek Four. But in the end, my vote is going to go to Star Trek Four. I’ve never seen a Star Trek movie, but it seems to be such a beloved film, and Carly campaigned it very, very well. So tonight, that’s what I’ll be watching.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">This is our last episode of the year, and I wanted to offer a warm thanks to you, our listeners, for your inspiring questions and your steadfast support. If you’re not yet a member of KQED, join us now by making a year-end donation. Details at kqed.org/slash donate. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Bay Curious is made at KQED in San Francisco by Katrina Schwartz, Christopher Beale and me, Olivia Allen Price. Additional Engineering by Jim Bennett. We get extra support from Maha Sanad, Katie Springer, Jen Chien,\u003c/span> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Ethan Tovin Lindsay and everyone on Team KQED. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Some members of the KQED podcast team are represented by the Screen Actors Guild American Federation of Television and Radio Artists, San Francisco, Northern California local. I hope you have a wonderful holiday. I’ll see ya in twenty twenty six.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003c/iframe>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003cem>This article originally published in 2020. It has been lightly updated.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"#episode-transcript\">\u003ci>View the full episode transcript.\u003c/i>\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Bay Curious listener Ben Kaiser asked for our favorite movies that are filmed and set in San Francisco. While we don’t normally take on subjective questions, we figured with cozy season upon us, it was a great time to cuddle up on the sofa with some classics.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ciframe loading=\"lazy\" frameborder=\"0\" height=\"200\" scrolling=\"no\" src=\"https://playlist.megaphone.fm?e=KQINC4565381532&light=true\" width=\"100%\" we asked peter hartlaub san francisco chronicle culture critic and host carly severn kqed senior editor of audience news resident movie obsessive to share their top picks on a recent bay curious podcast episode. they shared the movies would be most likely sit down watch over holidays not necessarily critically acclaimed films. our some favorites too>Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home (1986)\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/QOhoIBkOYf0'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/QOhoIBkOYf0'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Plot summary from \u003ca href=\"https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0092007/\">IMDB\u003c/a>:\u003c/strong> “To save Earth from an alien probe, Admiral James T. Kirk and his fugitive crew go back in time to San Francisco in 1986 to retrieve the only beings who can communicate with it: humpback whales.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Why we love it:\u003c/strong> This charming, lighthearted movie makes the Bay Area look undeniably fun. One KQED fan said the film was “influential in shaping how I think about the environment and is the Star Trek movie with the most heart in it.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003ch1>Inside Out (2015)\u003c/h1>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/yRUAzGQ3nSY'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/yRUAzGQ3nSY'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Plot summary from \u003ca href=\"https://www.imdb.com/title/tt2096673/\">IMDB\u003c/a>:\u003c/strong> “After young Riley is uprooted from her Midwest life and moved to San Francisco, her emotions — Joy, Fear, Anger, Disgust and Sadness — conflict on how best to navigate a new city, house, and school.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Why we love it:\u003c/strong> Pixar has dropped Bay Area references in several animated films over the years, but “Inside Out” takes it to the next level. The film takes place in the Bay Area, and features rich and detailed imagery from around the region.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch1>Zodiac (2007)\u003c/h1>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/yNncHPl1UXg'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/yNncHPl1UXg'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Plot summary from \u003ca href=\"https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0443706/\">IMDB\u003c/a>:\u003c/strong> “In the late 1960s/early 1970s, a San Francisco cartoonist becomes an amateur detective obsessed with tracking down the Zodiac Killer, an unidentified individual who terrorizes Northern California with a killing spree.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Why we love it:\u003c/strong> “Second only to Alfred Hitchcock, director David Fincher has a great sensibility for San Francisco,” says Peter Hartlaub. “This film absolutely captures a place in time. The music choices, the visual cues, the production design. Nothing’s wasted. I was a little kid, and I remember hearing about the Zodiac killer, and this movie brought that back so well.”\u003c/p>\n\u003ch1>The Last Black Man in San Francisco (2019)\u003c/h1>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/C0FnJDhY9-0'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/C0FnJDhY9-0'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Plot summary from \u003ca href=\"https://www.imdb.com/title/tt4353250/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1\">IMDB\u003c/a>:\u003c/strong> A young man searches for home in the changing city that seems to have left him behind.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Why we love it:\u003c/strong> One of the few films on our list that is a commentary on the Bay Area, and how gentrification has decimated once vibrant Black neighborhoods. The cinematography will absolutely take your breath away. Pause the movie at any point and you might be inspired to hang the still image on your wall.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch1>Basic Instinct (1992)\u003c/h1>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/4f96x3UpoaQ'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/4f96x3UpoaQ'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Plot summary from \u003ca href=\"https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0103772/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1\">IMDB\u003c/a>:\u003c/strong> A violent police detective investigates a brutal murder that might involve a manipulative and seductive novelist.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Why we love it:\u003c/strong> “The plot is ludicrous … but it’s a romp. It’s a riot. It also looks way better than it needs to, and it sounds way better than it needs to,” says Carly Severn. “I love the way it uses San Francisco. It goes for all the classic shots — there’s North Beach, there’s Telegraph Hill.” You’ll also find lots of gorgeous helicopter shots in this one.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch1>Always Be My Maybe (2019)\u003c/h1>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/iHBcWHY9lN4'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/iHBcWHY9lN4'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Plot summary from \u003ca href=\"https://www.imdb.com/title/tt7374948/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1\">IMDB\u003c/a>:\u003c/strong> Everyone assumed Sasha and Marcus would wind up together except for Sasha and Marcus. Reconnecting after 15 years, the two start to wonder — maybe?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Why we love it:\u003c/strong> “It makes San Francisco look really cool, but it also makes San Francisco look normal. A lot of it is set in the Outer Richmond,” says Carly Severn. “As a resident of the Bay Area there’s such a pleasure in looking at the screen and saying, ‘Oh, I know that! That’s cool!”\u003c/p>\n\u003ch1>Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1978)\u003c/h1>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/vc_0dlmSq7I'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/vc_0dlmSq7I'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Plot summary from \u003ca href=\"https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0077745/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1\">IMDB\u003c/a>: \u003c/strong>When strange seeds drift to earth from space, mysterious pods begin to grow and invade San Francisco, where they replicate the residents into emotionless automatons one body at a time.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Why we love it:\u003c/strong> “I think this is the most underrated San Francisco movie,” says Peter Hartlaub. “A lot of directors come in and they love San Francisco, but they shoot from the same seven places — Telegraph Hill, the Golden Gate Bridge, The Palace of Fine Arts. Director Philip Kaufman shot in places I think he always wanted to shoot — the Tenderloin is a huge character in the movie. Civic Center. Obscure places like Pier 70.”\u003c/p>\n\u003ch1>Vertigo (1958)\u003c/h1>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/Z5jvQwwHQNY'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/Z5jvQwwHQNY'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Plot summary from \u003ca href=\"https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0052357/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1\">IMDB\u003c/a>:\u003c/strong> A former police detective juggles wrestling with his personal demons and becoming obsessed with a hauntingly beautiful woman.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Why we love it:\u003c/strong> If you’re going to watch one movie set in San Francisco, a lot of critics would argue it should be this Alfred Hitchcock classic. The plot is woven into the location in a way that few movies can rival. And if you’re wanting to really *see* the city — this film is a hit parade of gorgeous locations.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch1>So I Married an Axe Murderer! (1993)\u003c/h1>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/yto08I_IiAg'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/yto08I_IiAg'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Plot summary from \u003ca href=\"https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0108174/?ref_=nv_sr_srsg_0\">IMDB\u003c/a>:\u003c/strong> A San Francisco poet who fears commitment suspects his girlfriend may have a knack for killing off her significant others.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Why we love it:\u003c/strong> One KQED fan says it “captures something of the SF that I grew up in” and another calls this film “a love letter to SF.” It highlights many of the city’s most famous sights — like the Golden Gate Bridge to the Palace of Fine Arts and Alcatraz.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch1>Bullitt (1968)\u003c/h1>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/BsvD806qNM8'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/BsvD806qNM8'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Plot summary from \u003ca href=\"https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0062765/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1\">IMDB:\u003c/a>\u003c/strong> An all guts, no glory San Francisco cop becomes determined to find the underworld kingpin that killed the witness in his protection.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Why we love it:\u003c/strong> Do we need to say much more than “epic car chase scenes on San Francisco hills?” This film features tons of on-location filming, so you’ll get a big taste of the city.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch1>Mrs. Doubtfire (1993)\u003c/h1>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/3euGQ7-brs4'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/3euGQ7-brs4'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Plot summary from \u003ca href=\"https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0107614/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1\">IMDB\u003c/a>: \u003c/strong>After a bitter divorce, an actor disguises himself as a female housekeeper to spend time with his children held in custody by his former wife.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Why we love it:\u003c/strong> We couldn’t leave this film off the list. After all, it features one of the Bay Area’s most beloved celebrities, Robin Williams. After his death, the house featured in this film at 2640 Steiner St. became a pop-up memorial. You’ll spot everything from ordinary streets to iconic San Francisco locations throughout the film.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch1>The Rock (1996)\u003c/h1>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/6DWu_dT0Phc'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/6DWu_dT0Phc'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Plot summary from \u003ca href=\"https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0117500/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1\">IMDB\u003c/a>:\u003c/strong> A mild-mannered chemist and an ex-con must lead the counterstrike when a rogue group of military men, led by a renegade general, threaten a nerve gas attack from Alcatraz against San Francisco.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Why we love it:\u003c/strong> Much of the film was shot on in and around Alcatraz, a tall order given the production crew had to do it all while tour groups milled around the site of the former federal penitentiary. Other locations in the film include the Fairmont Hotel, San Francisco City Hall and Pier 39.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>These 12 films are still just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to great movies filmed in the Bay Area. Other audience favorites include: Chan Is Missing, The Conversation, Blindspotting, Sorry to Bother You, The Princess Diaries, Parrots of Telegraph Hill and La Mission. Find even more suggestions on \u003ca href=\"https://x.com/KQED/status/1336822068541734912\">this X thread\u003c/a>, and on \u003ca href=\"https://www.facebook.com/KQED/posts/10157640695916191\">KQED’s Facebook page. \u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2 id=\"episode-transcript\">Episode Transcript\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Hey everyone, I’m Olivia Allen Price and this is Bay Curious. Let’s go!\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Ben Kaiser:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">My name is Ben Kaiser and believe it or not I live in Atlanta, Georgia.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Ben visited San Francisco for the first time four years ago. And as soon as he got here, he felt a connection.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Ben Kaiser:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It sort of seemed like I had been there before or that I belonged there. And I just absolutely fell in love with it. And I’ve been back in four years, probably nine or ten times.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">That’s a lot of flights between Atlanta and SFO. Now, when Ben can’t be here, he’s found a way to visit without leaving his living room.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Ben Kaiser:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Because I don’t live in San Francisco, I want to be connected to it as much as I possibly can. And one of the ways is watching movies shot there.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Anything that can transport him here, even if only for a few hours. Ben’s seen a lot already, but he wants more, so he came to Bay Curious.\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Ben Kaiser:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I asked what were some of the movies set in San Francisco that were actually shot in San Francisco, and which ones are your favorites or your recommendations?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Now we don’t often delve into subjective matters here on the show, but hey, it’s the holidays, cozy season is here, and we thought maybe we could all use some solid movie recommendations. Today’s episode will sound a little bit different from what you usually hear on Bay Curious. We’ve got a panel of local cultural experts here to convince Ben and you how you should spend some time devouring the Bay Area in all its cinematic glory. This episode first aired in 2020 and has been lightly revised for you today. So throw some popcorn in the microwave, cozy up on your couch, and press play. All right, I have to start out this episode with a confession. I, Olivia Allen Price, am really bad at movies, like possibly the last person that you would want on your trivia team during the movie round. So I called in some much needed backup on this one. Here to help me out today is Peter Hartlaub. He was born and raised in the Bay Area. He’s a cultural critic with the San Francisco Chronicle, and he writes the total SF newsletter. Welcome, Peter.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Peter Hartlaub:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Thank you so much for having me.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Yeah. Also, I’ve got Carly Severn here. She’s a senior editor here at KQED and a Bay Curious Reporter, who you are probably familiar with. She’s also a former co-host of The Cooler Podcast and one of KQED’s resident movie obsessives. Hey Carly.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Carly Severn:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Hey, Olivia. Hey, Peter. Lovely to be here.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">So before we get into recommendations, I’m curious, what do you guys think makes San Francisco a good spot to shoot a film?\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Peter Hartlaub:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Internationally recognizable landmarks, Golden Gate Bridge, Alcatraz, the topography. You can get up on a hill and see those landmarks. You can have a chase scene and get a little air. But I think the biggest thing is the weather. And it’s sort of the secret ingredient because it allows a director to convey mood. And then the city sort of becomes the mood of the director. You have the fog coming in, you have the sun coming in, subtle shifts. You can’t do that in Atlanta. You can’t do it in Houston. You can’t even really do that in LA. And I think that’s a big reason why San Francisco ends up being, you know, a top pick if you’re a director and you want to shoot like a thriller or an action film, something like that.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Carly Severn:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I would agree with all of that and I must kind of confess I do have a similar cinematic relationship with San Francisco as listener Ben does. I grew up watching San Francisco on screen as a kid in the middle of nowhere in England and it just seemed like the coolest place in the world to me. So I get it. I get his quest.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Now, despite all these things, all these sort of great attributes that make, you know, San Francisco a great place to shoot, you still don’t see it in films as often as, you know, in New York or in LA or maybe even in Atlanta, even though you don’t necessarily know you’re in Atlanta when you are in Atlanta. A lot of sh movies are shot there. Why do you all think that is?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Peter Hartlaub:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It’s expensive to get a hotel here, much less a bunch of hotels if you’ve got a lot of people coming. People are all crammed in together. And if you’re gonna shoot Sister Act in Noe Valley, or if you’re gonna shoot a car chase scene going through Russian Hill, the neighbors are gonna notice. And I think San Francisco, more than some of those other cities, because it’s sort of compact like that, makes it harder to film. Expensive and compact.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Carly Severn:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Yeah, I think logistically you have all of these issues, but I do think there’s this thematic problem with San Francisco, it’s so in your face. It is it does end up being a character. If you want to just have like any town USA to set your story in, like San Francisco is not the place to come. It really isn’t, because you’ll end up having to do all of this narrative work bending over backwards to kind of explain why it’s a San Francisco story. That’s my take anyway.\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Well, I do want to get on to answering Ben’s question and get to some of your San Francisco movie recommendations, but I thought we’d actually start with his because he has seen a lot of movies and he has his own thoughts.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Ben Kaiser:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Vertigo’s probably my all time favorite movie in the fact that it’s shot in San Francisco. But, you know, a lot of the real common ones, you know, I I’m not embarrassed to say the other night I watched The Rock and enjoyed The Rock. But you know, Mrs. Doubtfire, Milk, The Room, those are just, you know, some of the ones that I enjoy.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">So it sounds like he’s definitely seen some of the classics, which I know we aren’t necessarily gonna talk as much about today in your lists, right?\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Peter Hartlaub:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Vertigo, The Conversation, the Hitchcock films, the Coppola films. If I’m teaching a film class about San Francisco, they’re gonna be right in there. If I’m turning on my TV right now ’cause I just need to chill and escape a little bit, I’ve got a whole different set of films that I’m gonna pick, my favorite films, and that’s what I’m gonna pick today.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Carly Severn:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">A hundred percent cosign. And may I just say to Ben that he never has to be embarrassed about watching the rock. There is nothing to be embarrassed about there.\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Peter Hartlaub:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It’s totally cool to just love the rock and shout it from the rooftops.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">All right, so I asked each of you guys to bring your top three recommendations. And what we’re gonna do is go through all of those and then let Ben decide who has been the most convincing and which movie he is going to watch next. So let’s dive in, Carly. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Let us know what is your number three pick and why.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Carly Severn: First of all, I want to kind of set up my thinking here. I wanted to pay homage to the classic TLC album Crazy Sexy Cool with three picks that make San Francisco look either crazy, sexy, or cool. And so I’m gonna start with cool. It is Always Be My Maybe. It is the 2019 Netflix movie directed by Nahnatchka Khan . It’s got Ali Wong as a celebrity chef, and she returns home to San Francisco, where she grew up, and she reconnects with her childhood boyfriend, Randall Park.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Clip from Always Be My Maybe\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Carly Severn \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:07:18] \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> I love this movie so much. It makes San Francisco look really cool, but it also makes it look really normal. And it’s not the kind of parade of Golden Gate Bridge, Golden Gate Park Ad nauseum. Like a lot of it’s set in the outer Richmond, like the farmers market that they go to. It’s not some bougie little farmer’s market. It’s the like the civic center farmers market. So as a resident of the Bay Area, there’s such a pleasure in in kind of doing that thing where you’re looking at the screen going like, Oh, I know that. That’s really cool. I should admit that so much of it is filmed in San Francisco at these amazing locations that are like super normal and super lived in. But Vancouver, of course it’s always Vancouver. Vancouver actually doubles for a lot of the San Francisco locations. Particularly Goodluck Dim sum, which is where Ali Wong it’s one of her favorite restaurants in San Francisco. She’s it’s on Clements Street. She says it’s where she grew up eating. She really wanted that set there, but they had to double the interior in Vancouver. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Clip from Always Be My Maybe \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Carly Severn: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">She thought that the restaurant would really love the fact that she had given them the shout-out, and it turns out they they kind of didn’t care. She put on Instagram that she had gone to the restaurant, and this is her caption. So the picture is of her waiting in line at this place that she’s just made super famous in a movie. And she’s like, Me, hello, I’m Ali Wong. The dim sum scene in my movie Always Be My Maybe is based on this very place where I grew up eating. Good luck, dim sum staff. We don’t give a bleep. We have no idea who you are. Get in line.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Oh I love that. Tough being famous in San Francisco.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u003c/span>\u003cb>Peter Hartlaub: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">There’s a lot of little things in there that are San Francisco too. Ali Wong got Dan the Automator to do the score and also write the music for the greatest San Francisco band in a movie, Hello Peril, which do three songs in the movie, including the closing credits. My only complaint, and Carly mentioned it, and I don’t want to start like negative ad campaigns here, but we’re winning Ben’s vote, and there’s only one vote. They did the exterior on Clement Street, and they’re walking down what’s supposed to be Clement Street, and it is so not Clements Street. It is so Vancouver. I love the movie, but as a location, San Francisco location movie, I find it to be kind of hit and miss.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">All right, well let’s get on to your number three then, mister Hartlob. What do you got?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Peter Hartlaub: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Mine is \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Invasion of the Body Snatchers\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">. I think it’s the most underrated San Francisco movie. Shot, it came out in 1978, a Philip Kaufman movie. He’s a San Francisco resident to this day. And it was a remake of a 1950s movie about alien pods that come in, they’re replacing the human race slowly, and you can’t fall asleep. And it’s there’s just a lot of intrigue and it’s a thriller and it’s horror. I love it as a San Francisco movie because a lot of directors come in and they love San Francisco, but they shoot from the same seven places. You know, Telegraph Hill, Golden Gate Bridge, Palace of Fine Arts. Philip Kaufman shot in places that I think he always wanted to shoot, that that really add to the movie. The tenderloin is a huge, huge character in the movie. Civic Center. There’s a couple of really cool shots there. Obscure places like Pier 70. Right here, we have Donald Sutherland in a very famous scene where he is revealing himself to be one of the pod people by screeching. The screech is a pig squeal, I believe played backwards. And he’s pointing, he’s pointing at you on the other side of the screen. He’s in the civic center, pointing at you. Great San Francisco movie, great horror movie, \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Invasion of the Body Snatchers\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Carly Severn: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I loved this movie. I actually was ashamed to say that I hadn’t seen it before I started prepping to have this conversation with you guys. And it starts off, you know, like a little bit cheesy, and I was like, oh god, what has Peter chosen? I couldn’t have been more wrong. It is such a great movie. I I could not agree ever with more with everything he said about the way it uses San Francisco, and particularly like a lot of like civic buildings around Civic Center, and just like a lot of it set at the the Department of Public Health, which I always like it when those guys are the good guys in the movie.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">You know, I haven’t seen this movie yet. It’s now gonna be on my list, I will say, but I am I love the idea that there’s a movie that that really highlights some of the lesser used locations around San Francisco. Because I think there is, you know, a divide between how tourists experience the city and how people who live in the city experience the city. Let’s move on to your number two picks, making our way up the list. Carly, what do you have?\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Carly Severn: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Well, I did say I was gonna do Crazy Sexy Cool, and we’re now into the sexy phase of this pick. It is 1992’s \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Basic Instinct\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">. And I thought long and hard before choosing this one because, you know, many parts of it haven’t aged well, let’s be honest. But it is a prime example of the 90s erotic thriller. It is made by Paul Verhoven, and the plot is ludicrous. Michael Douglas is the shady San Francisco detective. He’s investigating this bombshell crime novelist, Sharon Stone, who definitely, maybe almost certainly, killed one of her boyfriends. It’s a romp, it’s a riot, it wants to be a Hitchcock noir very, very badly. So it looks way better than it needs to, and it sounds way better than it needs to. I tried long and hard to find a safe for Bay Curious clip from this movie and failed miserably. So let’s just listen to a little bit of the trailer.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Clip from Basic Instinct \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Carly Severn: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I love the way it uses San Francisco. It goes for all the classic shots, like, you know, there’s North Beach, there’s Telegraph Hill. One thing I should note is that San Francisco wasn’t always thrilled about being the kind of poster child for this movie. Sharon Stone’s character is bisexual and setting a movie with an LGBTQ woman who has a lot of sex and kills the people that she sleeps with in San Francisco in 1992 at a time when AIDS was still so prevalent and claiming so many lives. Like that’s a definite choice. And this isn’t just like 2020 hindsight. The movie was picketed at the time by LGBTQ groups for being kind of prejudice in its representation of that community. So I do feel like I should flag that. A lot of that animosity, I feel like, has gone away over time, but it’s definitely something to note. Also, I think the reason people don’t like this movie is that they take it quite seriously. And I think if you look at Paul Behoven’s back catalog, like Starship Troopers, like Total Recall, like Showgirls, I think he has a sense of humor about what he’s doing. So I think that this movie should be taken as a time capsule and with a hefty fistful of salt.\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Peter Hartlaub:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I love this film. I think it’s a great pick. I think it’s underrated. There are more helicopter shots in this movie of San Francisco, of someone driving a car around a windy road. His embracing San Francisco, making love to San Francisco with his camera budget was off the charts. So I think it’s a great pick. I really like this movie a lot.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Definitely one that makes San Francisco look sexy, Carly. Don’t you agree?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Carly Severn:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Well, okay, so this is where I genuinely want you guys’ opinion, because I have spent the best part of a week thinking about this question. Is San Francisco a sexy city? And I was trying to think of cities that are like off the charts sexy, you’re right. New Orleans sprang to mind. But then I’m thinking, is it just about like sweating? Is it just like the weather? Is is is that all sexiness is to me.\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Peter Hartlaub:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> I gotta say, the the weather is it. You don’t sweat in San Francisco. LA sexy city. New Orleans sexy city. Miami. Miami Vice sexy city. Streets of San Francisco is not a sexy TV show.\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I’m gonna have to disagree with you guys and you are the cultural critics here, so your your opinion has more weight than mine, but I don’t know, I see fog and I wanna cuddle. That’s my take.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Peter Hartlaub:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Yeah, I don’t know.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u003c/span>\u003cb>Carly Severn:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I think Peter and I are of the same mind here where we’re just like It’s step one, guys.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Peter Hartlaub:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It’s a cuddly city. I don’t know if it’s a sexy city.\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Carly Severn:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I cuddle my dog. All right.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">All right. Well let’s get into Peter, what’s your number two pick?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Peter Hartlaub:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">My number two is\u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> Zodiac\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">. It is a David Fincher film. He shot \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The Game\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> first and then \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Zodiac\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> in San Francisco. And second to Hitchcock, I think he’s the one who really is a great sensibility for San Francisco. It is shot also in the San Francisco Chronicle Newsroom. They shot in our publisher’s office, I believe, outside, and they used our lobby and elevator. The story goes that David Fincher came up to our newsroom, walked inside, said an expletive and said this is too much of a mess, walked outside and they recreated our newsroom pillar for pillar. You cannot tell the difference in Los Angeles. But absolutely, absolutely captures a place in time. The music choices, the visual cues, the production design, nothing’s wasted. And honestly, even though they didn’t shoot in the Chronicle Newsroom, the newsroom banter is pitch perfect. Here’s a little bit of it right now.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Clip from Vertigo \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Peter Hartlaub: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">So that’s the way we talk. That’s the way we talk to each other. It’s all like a David Fincher or Aaron Sorkin drama.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Clip from Vertigo\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Peter Hartlaub: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">No, this is this is a great film, and the plot is almost secondary in this film, a killer from the 70s and 80s who they never caught, and I’m giving away the ending, but the ending isn’t the important thing. The important thing is the mood, the city, what it felt like to be in the 1970s and be scared. I was a little kid. I remember hearing about the Zodiac Killer, and this movie brought that back so well. My favorite shot in the film, it is a visual effects shot of them in sped up time building the Transamerica Pyramid, and again, just David Fincher using every little arrow in his quiver to capture that mood of San Francisco at a particular time. It’s a fantastic location movie.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">And I think it’s the only one on this list that is based on a true story unless there’s something I need to know about \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Invasion of the Body Snatchers\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Peter Hartlaub:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I think that’s true. And and and you know, there there’s a little bit of myth in there, but he he’s stuck a lot closer than a lot of other people do to the facts.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I will say as somebody who was not living in the Bay Area at the time of Zodiac, I found \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Zodiac\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> to be really helpful just to kind of I guess get a sense of what it was like to be here during that time, like you experienced, Peter.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Peter Hartlaub:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Yeah, and people remember and if people weren’t around, they know the myth. When when people come to the chronicle and ask for a tour, the two things they want to see are Herb Kane’s typewriter and the Zodiac Files. Can you show us the Zodiac files?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">All right, let’s get on to your top choices. These are top of your list. Let’s let’s hear it, Carly. What do you got?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Carly Severn: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Okay, guys, I’m reaching the climax of my crazy sexy cool plan, which I think paid off. My number one pick, it’s Crazy San Francisco. It’s \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Star Trek 4\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">. 1986. It is directed by Mr. Spark himself, Leonard Nimoy. I almost find it hard to talk about this film kind of critically because I love it so much. Just to quickly tell you about the plot, it picks up where 1984’s Search for Spark, Star Trek III left off. So the Earth of the Future is being menaced by a big alien probe. Only Kirk and the crew of the Enterprise can save the planet by time traveling back to 1980s San Francisco to bring back two Wales to talk to the alien probe and get it to leave Earth alone. You have to go with it. That’s the plot, and I can’t change that, okay? It’s not the best Star Trek movie. That’s The Wrath of Khan. That’s just undisputable. But it is the best Star Trek movie set in San Francisco with Wales, which is to say, it is the only one of that. Where do I start with how wonderful this movie is? People think I’m joking when I say that it’s the reason I moved to San Francisco, and I’m like 5% joking about that. But the other 95% is really serious. Growing up with this movie and watching San Francisco just look so fun, so warm, so crazy, so inviting. Like I wanted to be a part of that. It is totally joyous. Ben, if you’re listening and you haven’t seen Star Trek 4, don’t worry. You don’t need to watch any of the other Star Trek movies. It stands alone, it’s kind of perfect in that sense. The pleasures of watching like the quite serious crew of the Enterprise traverse San Francisco and just have a ball doing it. It’s just great. So I really wanted to play you one of the most iconic scenes, which is Kirk and Spock on a Muni bus that is traveling over the Golden Gate Bridge. Mr. Spock has to take out a young punk on the bus and get him to stop playing his music. And then this happens.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Clip from Star Trek 4\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Carly Severn: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The gag there, of course, being that Jacqueline Cezanne and Harold Robbins. Oh, I had to look up Harold Robbins, by the way. Like, they are not the giants of literature, but it’s just hilarious to think that the people of the future have deemed them to be so. I know of no movie that is like warmer and and sweeter than Star Trek Four. So, Ben, pick me, pick Star Trek Four. The choice is easy. Come on.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Peter Hartlaub: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">You know, I don’t even wanna argue against you, and I’m gonna pick a number one, but I love this film so much. It is just a lovely movie, funny movie, finds all kinds of different ways to explore San Francisco and make it part of the gag, but in a in a funny, warm way. It’s one of the greats, one of the classics.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">All right, and up there with one of the greats must be your number one choice, Peter. What do you have for your number one?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Peter Hartlaub:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">2015 Pixar film Inside Out. It takes place inside the brain of tween girl coming of age, Riley. And then also outside in San Francisco, Riley has moved from I believe Minnesota to San Francisco, and she’s horrified. And what the Pixar people did with animation is so fantastic. They take San Francisco and make it like 10 to 15% more. The streets are a little narrower, parking’s a little harder, street signs are a little more incomprehensible. Fantastic, fantastic use of San Francisco. It’s more of a character in the movie than any of their other movies. They had always kind of flirted around with the Bay Area and maybe dropped San Pablo Avenue and the Incredibles. This one, they really talk about San Francisco. And you don’t see that often. You see a lot of mainstream films set in San Francisco, and San Francisco is a backdrop and it’s almost like a prop. Very few films are a commentary on the city. Last black man in San Francisco, Medicine for Melancholy, and Inside Out. Inside Out is poking fun of the city. It is completely honest. If you live here, you totally get it. If you’re not from here, you’re gonna get some of the humor, including taking just an absolute, absolute dagger stab at our Pizza.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Clip from Inside Out\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Peter Hartlaub:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Honestly, the first time I saw this film, I didn’t love it. I liked it a lot. I’m glad I didn’t review it because I think I would have given it less than the highest rating. Upon rewatch, there’s so many little things that come out. You learn more things, and the San Francisco parts become clearer and clearer. I just think it’s a fantastic film, and it’s a fantastic San Francisco location film.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Well I think Ben is gonna have a really hard time deciding between all of those very compelling pitches for for movies he should be watching this weekend. Peter Hartlob, Bay Area native, culture critic with the SF Chronicle, co-host of Total SF podcast. Thank you so much. Is there anywhere that listeners can connect with you further?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Peter Hartlaub:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Subscribe to the Total SF newsletter, that’s where I explore the Bay Area and pass on all my favorite finds, the best hikes to take, the best tourist traps to visit, where I’m finding the best papusas to eat, and read my work at sfchronicle.com.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Awesome. And Carly, you are my longtime pop culture, I don’t know, guru. You’ve you’ve really helped me with questions over the years. So thank you for coming on the show. Where can people connect with you?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Carly Severn:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Well, you can find my work for Bay Curious in the podcast feed, including my two part series on the Donner Party in the archives, since we’re now feeling the wintry vibes here in the bay. You can also visit kqbd.org slash explainers to see what me and my team are up to every day in the KQED newsroom.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Alright, well thanks to you both. Big thanks to Ben for asking this week’s question.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Ben Kaiser:\u003c/b> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Carly and Peter, I appreciate your suggestions for which San Francisco movie I should watch next. Full disclosure, three of them I’ve already seen. Those are: Always Be My Maybe, Basic Instinct and Zodiac, which is one of my all-time favorite movies. So it comes down to the other three, but I’m torn between Inside Out and Star Trek Four. But in the end, my vote is going to go to Star Trek Four. I’ve never seen a Star Trek movie, but it seems to be such a beloved film, and Carly campaigned it very, very well. So tonight, that’s what I’ll be watching.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Olivia Allen-Price: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">This is our last episode of the year, and I wanted to offer a warm thanks to you, our listeners, for your inspiring questions and your steadfast support. If you’re not yet a member of KQED, join us now by making a year-end donation. Details at kqed.org/slash donate. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Bay Curious is made at KQED in San Francisco by Katrina Schwartz, Christopher Beale and me, Olivia Allen Price. Additional Engineering by Jim Bennett. We get extra support from Maha Sanad, Katie Springer, Jen Chien,\u003c/span> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Ethan Tovin Lindsay and everyone on Team KQED. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Some members of the KQED podcast team are represented by the Screen Actors Guild American Federation of Television and Radio Artists, San Francisco, Northern California local. I hope you have a wonderful holiday. I’ll see ya in twenty twenty six.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003c/iframe>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"source": "City Arts & Lectures"
},
"link": "https://www.cityarts.net",
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},
"closealltabs": {
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"info": "\u003cem>Code Switch\u003c/em>, which listeners will hear in the first part of the hour, has fearless and much-needed conversations about race. Hosted by journalists of color, the show tackles the subject of race head-on, exploring how it impacts every part of society — from politics and pop culture to history, sports and more.\u003cbr />\u003cbr />\u003cem>Life Kit\u003c/em>, which will be in the second part of the hour, guides you through spaces and feelings no one prepares you for — from finances to mental health, from workplace microaggressions to imposter syndrome, from relationships to parenting. The show features experts with real world experience and shares their knowledge. Because everyone needs a little help being human.\u003cbr />\u003cbr />\u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/podcasts/510312/codeswitch\">\u003cem>Code Switch\u003c/em> offical site and podcast\u003c/a>\u003cbr />\u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/lifekit\">\u003cem>Life Kit\u003c/em> offical site and podcast\u003c/a>\u003cbr />",
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"id": "commonwealth-club",
"title": "Commonwealth Club of California Podcast",
"info": "The Commonwealth Club of California is the nation's oldest and largest public affairs forum. As a non-partisan forum, The Club brings to the public airwaves diverse viewpoints on important topics. The Club's weekly radio broadcast - the oldest in the U.S., dating back to 1924 - is carried across the nation on public radio stations and is now podcasting. Our website archive features audio of our recent programs, as well as selected speeches from our long and distinguished history. This podcast feed is usually updated twice a week and is always un-edited.",
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"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Forum-Podcast-Tile-703x703-1.jpg",
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"order": 9
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"meta": {
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"id": "fresh-air",
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"hidden-brain": {
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"airtime": "SUN 7pm-8pm",
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"source": "NPR"
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"how-i-built-this": {
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"airtime": "SUN 7:30pm-8pm",
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"link": "/radio/program/how-i-built-this",
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"hyphenacion": {
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"tagline": "Where conversation and cultura meet",
"info": "What kind of no sabo word is Hyphenación? For us, it’s about living within a hyphenation. Like being a third-gen Mexican-American from the Texas border now living that Bay Area Chicano life. Like Xorje! Each week we bring together a couple of hyphenated Latinos to talk all about personal life choices: family, careers, relationships, belonging … everything is on the table. ",
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"order": 15
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"jerrybrown": {
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"title": "The Political Mind of Jerry Brown",
"tagline": "Lessons from a lifetime in politics",
"info": "The Political Mind of Jerry Brown brings listeners the wisdom of the former Governor, Mayor, and presidential candidate. Scott Shafer interviewed Brown for more than 40 hours, covering the former governor's life and half-century in the political game – and Brown has some lessons he'd like to share. ",
"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/The-Political-Mind-of-Jerry-Brown-Podcast-Tile-703x703-1.jpg",
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"order": 18
},
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"latino-usa": {
"id": "latino-usa",
"title": "Latino USA",
"airtime": "MON 1am-2am, SUN 6pm-7pm",
"info": "Latino USA, the radio journal of news and culture, is the only national, English-language radio program produced from a Latino perspective.",
"imageSrc": "https://ww2.kqed.org/radio/wp-content/uploads/sites/50/2018/04/latinoUsa.jpg",
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"rss": "https://feeds.npr.org/510016/podcast.xml"
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},
"marketplace": {
"id": "marketplace",
"title": "Marketplace",
"info": "Our flagship program, helmed by Kai Ryssdal, examines what the day in money delivered, through stories, conversations, newsworthy numbers and more. Updated Monday through Friday at about 3:30 p.m. PT.",
"airtime": "MON-FRI 4pm-4:30pm, MON-WED 6:30pm-7pm",
"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Marketplace-Podcast-Tile-360x360-1.jpg",
"officialWebsiteLink": "https://www.marketplace.org/",
"meta": {
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"source": "American Public Media"
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"masters-of-scale": {
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"title": "Masters of Scale",
"info": "Masters of Scale is an original podcast in which LinkedIn co-founder and Greylock Partner Reid Hoffman sets out to describe and prove theories that explain how great entrepreneurs take their companies from zero to a gazillion in ingenious fashion.",
"airtime": "Every other Wednesday June 12 through October 16 at 8pm (repeats Thursdays at 2am)",
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"rss": "https://rss.art19.com/masters-of-scale"
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},
"mindshift": {
"id": "mindshift",
"title": "MindShift",
"tagline": "A podcast about the future of learning and how we raise our kids",
"info": "The MindShift podcast explores the innovations in education that are shaping how kids learn. Hosts Ki Sung and Katrina Schwartz introduce listeners to educators, researchers, parents and students who are developing effective ways to improve how kids learn. We cover topics like how fed-up administrators are developing surprising tactics to deal with classroom disruptions; how listening to podcasts are helping kids develop reading skills; the consequences of overparenting; and why interdisciplinary learning can engage students on all ends of the traditional achievement spectrum. This podcast is part of the MindShift education site, a division of KQED News. KQED is an NPR/PBS member station based in San Francisco. You can also visit the MindShift website for episodes and supplemental blog posts or tweet us \u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/MindShiftKQED\">@MindShiftKQED\u003c/a> or visit us at \u003ca href=\"/mindshift\">MindShift.KQED.org\u003c/a>",
"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Mindshift-Podcast-Tile-703x703-1.jpg",
"imageAlt": "KQED MindShift: How We Will Learn",
"officialWebsiteLink": "/mindshift/",
"meta": {
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"order": 12
},
"link": "/podcasts/mindshift",
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"google": "https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly9mZWVkcy5tZWdhcGhvbmUuZm0vS1FJTkM1NzY0NjAwNDI5",
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},
"morning-edition": {
"id": "morning-edition",
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"info": "\u003cem>Morning Edition\u003c/em> takes listeners around the country and the world with multi-faceted stories and commentaries every weekday. Hosts Steve Inskeep, David Greene and Rachel Martin bring you the latest breaking news and features to prepare you for the day.",
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"onourwatch": {
"id": "onourwatch",
"title": "On Our Watch",
"tagline": "Deeply-reported investigative journalism",
"info": "For decades, the process for how police police themselves has been inconsistent – if not opaque. In some states, like California, these proceedings were completely hidden. After a new police transparency law unsealed scores of internal affairs files, our reporters set out to examine these cases and the shadow world of police discipline. On Our Watch brings listeners into the rooms where officers are questioned and witnesses are interrogated to find out who this system is really protecting. Is it the officers, or the public they've sworn to serve?",
"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/On-Our-Watch-Podcast-Tile-703x703-1.jpg",
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"officialWebsiteLink": "/podcasts/onourwatch",
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"source": "kqed",
"order": 11
},
"link": "/podcasts/onourwatch",
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"google": "https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly9mZWVkcy5ucHIub3JnLzUxMDM2MC9wb2RjYXN0LnhtbD9zYz1nb29nbGVwb2RjYXN0cw",
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},
"on-the-media": {
"id": "on-the-media",
"title": "On The Media",
"info": "Our weekly podcast explores how the media 'sausage' is made, casts an incisive eye on fluctuations in the marketplace of ideas, and examines threats to the freedom of information and expression in America and abroad. For one hour a week, the show tries to lift the veil from the process of \"making media,\" especially news media, because it's through that lens that we see the world and the world sees us",
"airtime": "SUN 2pm-3pm, MON 12am-1am",
"imageSrc": "https://ww2.kqed.org/radio/wp-content/uploads/sites/50/2018/04/onTheMedia.png",
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"source": "wnyc"
},
"link": "/radio/program/on-the-media",
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"apple": "https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/on-the-media/id73330715?mt=2",
"tuneIn": "https://tunein.com/radio/On-the-Media-p69/",
"rss": "http://feeds.wnyc.org/onthemedia"
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},
"pbs-newshour": {
"id": "pbs-newshour",
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"info": "Analysis, background reports and updates from the PBS NewsHour putting today's news in context.",
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"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/PBS-News-Hour-Podcast-Tile-360x360-1.jpg",
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},
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"apple": "https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/pbs-newshour-full-show/id394432287?mt=2",
"tuneIn": "https://tunein.com/radio/PBS-NewsHour---Full-Show-p425698/",
"rss": "https://www.pbs.org/newshour/feeds/rss/podcasts/show"
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},
"perspectives": {
"id": "perspectives",
"title": "Perspectives",
"tagline": "KQED's series of daily listener commentaries since 1991",
"info": "KQED's series of daily listener commentaries since 1991.",
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"officialWebsiteLink": "/perspectives/",
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"order": 14
},
"link": "/perspectives",
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"planet-money": {
"id": "planet-money",
"title": "Planet Money",
"info": "The economy explained. Imagine you could call up a friend and say, Meet me at the bar and tell me what's going on with the economy. Now imagine that's actually a fun evening.",
"airtime": "SUN 3pm-4pm",
"imageSrc": "https://ww2.kqed.org/radio/wp-content/uploads/sites/50/2018/04/planetmoney.jpg",
"officialWebsiteLink": "https://www.npr.org/sections/money/",
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