Cover art from the DVD box for "Municipal Railway Vintage Scrapbook". Click to enlarge.
New Video Highlights First Muni PCC Era
History Spotlight
Photo of the [Past] Moment: Thanks, Mom!
Click to enlarge. Muni PCC No. 1040 on Market Street in 1955, about to turn onto First Street to reach the Transbay Terminal (which would have been shown as "BRIDGE" on the roll signs of the day). Following common practice of the time, the operator has already changed the destination reading to "OCEAN" on the L-Taraval line (revised on later roll signs to "46TH-ZOO"). That’s the Hunter-Dulin Building, home to the fictional detective firm of Spade & Archer, above the car in the background, at 111 Sutter. (It’s still there.) We left the photo uncropped, the better to see the cool storefronts on Market. No, "Navy Blues" is not the predecessor of Old Navy. Several military uniform stores used to be quartered in this section of Market. Photo by Joel Salomon’s mom.
Or, How About “Step Down to Open”?
Happy 120th Birthday, SF Streetcars
On April 17, 1892, the first electric streetcar service opened in San Francisco. The line started at Market and Steuart Streets, a block from the Ferry terminal and just a few feet from our San Francisco Railway Museum. The line of the San Francisco & San Mateo Railway ran out to Holy Cross Cemetery south of the county line, in what is Colma today. The line zigged and zagged through downtown, partly to avoid infringing on other companies’ street franchise rights, but generally followed Steuart, Harrison, 14th St. and Guerrero to reach San Jose Avenue.
This Just In: Muni Used To Be Faster!
F-Stockton streetcar, southbound on Stockton at Vallejo, 1916. Muni Archives photo, displayed in our San Francisco Railway Museum’s Muni Centennial exhibition.
Carl Nolte: The Only One Who Does What He Does
Carl Nolte. Photo by Mike Kapka, Courtesy SF Chronicle
Cheating Muni — in 1916!
Muni scholar’s tickets, about 1916. Market Street Railway Archives. Click to enlarge.
Mustn’t Miss Display at Our Museum – and On Market St.
Poster of 1914 image by John Henry Mentz, part of the Treasures From the Muni Archive Display on Market Street and (in this case) at our museum on Steuart Street, very close to the spot where this image was taken.
Photo of the (Past) Moment: Deja Vu, Chronicle?
Jim Lekas photo, Market Street Railway Archive
Reminder of Our Roots, from Down the Coast
As our members and friends know, our organization is named for Muni’s old private competitor, Market Street Railway Company. That company actually went through several manifestations, starting back in the 19th century, when it was an arm of the Southern Pacific Railroad’s all-powerful “octopus,” famously novelized by Frank Norris.
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