News from the Heart & Soul of San Francisco
NEIGHBORHOOD HISTORY | FROM SF HERITAGE From 1921 to 1972, 2066 Pine Street was home to the Madame C. J. Walker Home for Girls and Women, a community service organization named in honor of one of the United States’ most successful African American businesswomen and philanthropists. The Walker club provided lodging and services to African…
STREET TALK | CYNTHIA TRAINA Since early January, sales at the neighborhood Goodwill store at Fillmore & Post have been climbing steadily — partly due to the economic uncertainty, partly to an operational change set in motion a year ago and launched this year. Bay Area Goodwill stores have reorganized with new merchandising strategies. “We’ve…
STREET TALK | CYNTHIA TRAINA If you’ve passed Mureta & Co. at 2418 Fillmore lately, you may have noticed jewelry hanging on the jade tree out front. It’s free for the taking. The “giving tree” began a few weeks ago when owner John Quillinan, who buys jewelry by the pound, started placing pieces he doesn’t sell onto the tree. No…
By THOMAS REYNOLDS Sometimes it pays to complain. And now there is hope that further destruction of a classic Victorian in the Webster Street Historic District — the city’s first — has been stopped and may even result in something better. The Italianate Victorian at 2229 Webster, like most of its neighbors, was built in…
REVIEW | FRAN MORELAND JOHNS “If two hours of Beethoven won’t lift your spirits,” said conductor Michael Conley, “then nothing will.” He was not wrong. At a Saturday evening concert — billed as “Beethoven!” — a full house at Calvary Presbyterian Church on Fillmore was treated to the Mass in C Major, plus the Fantasy…
STREET TALK | CYNTHIA TRAINA A new year has brought its familiar mix of closings, reopenings, price adjustments and quiet repositioning along Fillmore Street and nearby blocks — plus a turnover in ownership of some commercial properties. The building at 2232 Bush Street that’s now home to Mattina restaurant — created as the home of…
LIFTING THE VEIL a bit on plans to restore Fillmore Street’s historic Clay Theater, the new owners have begun offering small groups of neighborhood residents a look inside — and a preview of what’s to come. Last week project director Cody Allen — point man for local investor Neil Mehta, who put up the money…
STREET TALK | CYNTHIA TRAINA Holiday sparkle is officially here. Window displays are brighter than they’ve been in years, and shoppers are already out hunting for early gifts. At D&M Wines & Liquors, the longtime neighborhood Champagne headquarters, the holiday rush is underway. One-third of their sales this time of year are Champagne — and…
FIRST PERSON | SHELLEY HANDLER My first cooking memory comes from early in my life. It was a Saturday morning, and I was standing on the counter in our ’50s butter yellow kitchen. I was 3 years old, barefoot, in a T-shirt and poofy panties. I had a small red plastic bowl, into which went…
FINALLY THERE’S A proposal to replace the shuttered Safeway grocery store on Webster Street — with more than 1,800 new units of housing. Four buildings that could reach a height of 300 feet, or 30 stories, would replace the store and parking lot, according to a preliminary application developer Align Real Estate has submitted to…