Fortifications

of the

cate, as a curious fact, the rush westward-549 vessels brought into San Francisco harbor over thirty thousand passengers, and during the same months nearly fifty thousand came overland. During 1849, the gold dust receipts at San Francisco were over $1,500,000 and the year following this increased to $3,000,000. In 1852 official shipments of gold dust aggregated $46,599,044, all of which meant wealth and growth for San Francisco. But enough of history. Let us consider things to-day.

The harbor of San Francisco is land-locked, the bay Golden Gate. and its connections extending north and south for about forty miles affording deep water anchorage for the merchant fleets of the world. It is entered through the Golden Gate, a strait five miles long, and one mile in width at its narrowest portion. These straits within the ten years, 1890 to 1900, have been fortified with the most approved modern ordnance, and the fortifications are recognized by military experts as among the best defences of any city of the Nation. Within the bay, several islands are controlled by the Government, and fortified, while at the Government Navy Yard at Mare Island, north of the city, and at the Union Iron Works, on the peninsula, are docks capable of receiving the largest modern war ships.

Suburbs of San Francisco.

Suburban communities have grown up about the city, chief among which are Oakland, Alameda, Berkeley, San Rafael, Belvedere, Sausalito, San Mateo, Menlo Park, and Palo Alto. Electric and steam railways and ferries bring these places in close communication with the city at the lowest suburban railroad rates in the world. There are in the city over 140 miles of electric railways, seventy-seven miles of cable roads, twelve miles of steam dummy system, and ten miles of horse railway. The steep hills caused the invention here of the cable railway, now used in many cities of the world. Market street is the artery from which diverge all principal streets. It is paved with bituminous rock, material used largely on all the streets. The city has a hundred and ninety-five miles of paved streets, and three hundred and five miles of sewers. In the early days the number of wooden dwellings was consider

Schools,
Libraries and
Museums.

Arts and
Crafts
Creative.

able, but builders are no longer hampered by the fear of earthquakes. Brick and stone are being used more largely, excellent stone being found in the Sierra and Coast Range, and business buildings of ten and eleven stories or higher have been erected. Among the notable new buildings are the United States Postoffice, the Ferry Building, Hayward Building, Mills Building, Spreckels Building, Hall of Justice, Hotel St. Francis, Mutual Savings Bank, the Crocker Building, Rialto Building and the Flood Building on the old Baldwin Hotel site.

The population in 1890 was 298,997, and in 1900 it was 342,782. The population to-day (May, 1903) is estimated at 410,000.

In social and educational affairs the city is farther advanced than many communities. There are five daily newspapers printed in the English language, viz.: The Examiner, The Chronicle, The Call, The Post, and The Bulletin. There are eight theatres. Chief among the museums are those of the Academy of Sciences, the State Mining Bureau, the State Board of Trade, the Pacific Commercial Museum, and the Alaska collection, the lastnamed controlled by the University of California. There is also a nucleus of an excellent museum owned by the city and located in Golden Gate Park, the result of the California Midwinter Fair, a successful exhibition held there in 1894, following the World's Fair at Chicago. There are eighty-two public schools, with 1,017 teachers, a total enrollment of 48,517 pupils (June 30, 1902), with average daily attendance of 34,771. The city has in all eleven medical and dental colleges. There are one hundred and forty-five churches of all denominations, one hundred and two charitable and benefit organizations, and forty-four hospitals and asylums.

Few communities of the same age and period of growth can excel this city by the nation's western gate in arts creative and in educational advancement. "It's in the air," is the common saying, whenever one hears of some prodigy of painter or poet whose conception chal.

Padres,

Conservators

lenges admiration. And perhaps it is, for certainly world history shows that the people of the open air, those who have close contact with Nature through nearly all the year, who revel in sunshine and high mountains and impressive forests primeval, lead the people of more artificial surroundings in craft creative, in hand and brain development, in painting, in sculpture, in literature, as well as in all athletic sports and feats of daring.

Besides this natural endowment that encourages of the Arts. originality and development, the character of the pioneers of the State is a partial explanation of the condition of affairs as we find them to-day.. And before the argonauts of '49, were the self-denying, spiritual-minded Mission fathers, conservators of the arts and teachers of men. Rare paintings brought by them from the Old World may be seen to-day well preserved within the quaint buildings that dot the California coast from Loreto to Sonoma.

"Westward the Course of

About San Francisco are centered the chief educational institutions of the Pacific Coast, notably the rich and fastgrowing University of California, the new Leland Stanford, Junior, University, with its munificent endowment; the Santa Clara College, oldest of all California seats of learning; the University of the Pacific, a Methodist institution of high class; St. Ignatius College famed for the scientific attainments of its instructors; and Mills College for women, classed as the Wellesley of the Pacific.

Of all these colleges the University of California, sitEmpire." uated across the bay from San Francisco, at Berkeley, named for Bishop George Berkeley, of Cloyne, whose "Westward the course of empire takes its way" is familiar to all schoolboys, is the chief, and is the keystone of California's well-organized educational system. This university, whose charter was granted March 23, 1868, graduated in 1902 490 students in its academic and professional colleges. Its faculties comprise more than three hundred men, with President Benjamin Ide Wheeler as the executive head. The university colleges of medicine, pharmacy, dentistry and the law are located in San Francisco, most of them in buildings on property given the