News from the Heart & Soul of San Francisco
FOR THE FIRST TIME in decades, there will be no jazz on Fillmore Street this Fourth of July weekend. The annual Fillmore Jazz Festival has been canceled due to the coronavirus and the ban on large gatherings of people. “Sister! I just want to cry because there’s no festival this weekend,” said jazz vocalist Kim…
FIRST PERSON | BARBARA CORFF I don’t know exactly why the tree in front of Mollie Stone’s first caught my attention. Perhaps it was the tiny, palmate-shaped leaves sprouting at the base of the tree that seemed unusual. Having worked with naturalists in the Presidio developing tours for the National Park Service, I want to understand the…
FILLMORE’S ONLY remaining joint — the Boom Boom Room, hard by the Geary Street bridge — is closed and may not reopen without an infusion of fresh cash. “We are faced with permanent closure without emergency funding,” says owner Zander Andreas in a fundraising campaign seeking to raise $60,000. “The survival of our intimate and…
FILLMORE BEAT | CHRIS BARNETT In 1971, carpenter Mark Johnson moved into a Victorian flat at 2254 Bush Street, just off Fillmore, and stayed for 25 years. “It was not the most attractive place to live in the early ’70s,” he says. “But by the time I moved out, it had changed dramatically — and…
STREET TALK | THOMAS REYNOLDS A great joy of our neighborhood is the number of neighbors you run into walking up and down Fillmore Street. But not so much these days. Much of the street is boarded up — an overreaction, many feel, but then come reports of another break-in. One longs for the slightest…
FRYE BOOTS at 2047 Fillmore Street has become the first neighborhood shop to announce it will close permanently. “We were told last Friday [March 27] that we will not reopen our beautiful store,” says Frye manager and longtime local Cris Mcquay, who formerly managed Kiehl’s on Fillmore. “We will stay permanently closed going forward. We…
EVEN SINCE THE stay-at-home order went into effect on St. Patrick’s Day, some locals find it possible to enjoy a few minutes of togetherness at cocktail hour — carefully spaced six feet apart at tables that remain fixed outside The Grove, with beverages brought from home.
THE LAST TRACES of the legendary Elite Cafe — a beacon of hospitality on Fillmore Street for decades — have disappeared. The lettering on the vintage neon sign has now been removed, along with the wooden booths inside. The Elite’s new name: The Tailor’s Son, in honor of owner Adrianno Paganini ’s father, who was…
DEMOLITION OF THE interior of the 110-year-old Clay Theatre on Fillmore Street began today, with workers hauling out the seats, the projectors and the popcorn machine. Landmark Theatres, the company that operated the Clay in recent decades, has instructed its staff to leave the building empty by the end of the month. The theater closed…