Montgomery Block

{{infobox historic site

| name = Montgomery Block

| location = 628 Montgomery Street, San Francisco, California, U.S.

| coordinates = {{coord|37.795047|-122.403122|region:US|display=inline,title}}

| locmapin = United States San Francisco County

| image = File:G. R. Fardon (British - (Montgomery Block, Montgomery Street) - Google Art Project.jpg

| caption = The Montgomery Block in 1862

| designation1 = California

| designation1_number = 80{{cite ohp|80|Montgomery Block|2012-10-14}}

| designation1_date = March 29, 1933

}}

The Montgomery Block, also known as Monkey Block and Halleck's Folly, was a historic building active from 1853 to 1959, and was located in San Francisco, California. It was San Francisco's first fireproof and earthquake resistant building.{{Cite web |last=Kamiya |first=Gary |date=2018-10-26 |title=Iconic SF building was home to Bohemians for decades. Then it was destroyed |url=https://www.sfchronicle.com/chronicle_vault/article/Iconic-SF-building-was-home-to-Bohemians-for-13340080.php |access-date=2022-11-29 |website=San Francisco Chronicle |language=en-US}} It came to be known as a Bohemian center, from the late 19th to the middle of the 20th-century.

Montgomery Block and later the site has been a registered California Historical Landmark since March 29, 1933.

History

File:Historic American Buildings Survey William S. Ricco, Photographer August 1958 INTERIOR LIGHTWELL - Montgomery Block, 28 Montgomery Street, San Francisco, San Francisco County, HABS CAL,38-SANFRA,6-12.tif

It was located at 628 Montgomery Street, on the southeast corner of its intersection with Washington Street, today the location of the Transamerica Pyramid.

The four-story building was erected in 1853 by Henry Wager Halleck, later general in chief of the Union Army in the Civil War, in the "Barbary Coast" red-light district.Leah Caracappa: [http://www.poetrybay.com/winter2005/br_caracappa4.htm The Bohemians of San Francisco's 'Monkey Block'] Poetrybay, Winter 2005 edition The four-stories Montgomery Block was the tallest building west of the Mississippi River when it was built in 1853.{{cite book |author=William Hjortsberg |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ed5qVnkg4TAC&pg=PT149 |title=Jubilee Hitchhiker: The Life and Times of Richard Brautigan |date=1 April 2012 |publisher=Counterpoint LLC |isbn=978-1-61902-045-0}}{{cite book |author1=Matthew Poole |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=y3Jfv2LJUR4C&pg=PA206 |title=Frommer's San Francisco 2010 |author2=Erika Lenkert |date=2 February 2010 |publisher=John Wiley & Sons |isbn=978-0-470-59486-5 |page=206}} It was designed by architect G.P. Cummings. San Franciscans called it "Halleck's Folly" because it was built on a raft of redwood logs.

Also known as the Monkey Block, from 'Monty',[https://www.newspapers.com/image/458558040/?terms=Monkey%2Bblock Herb Caen, "This Old Town," San Francisco Examiner, December 17, 1967, image 105] it housed many well-known lawyers, financiers, writers, actors, and artists. It also hosted many frequenters of Coppa's restaurant, site of Goops murals, and illustrious visitors, among them The Crowd literary group, Jack London, George Sterling, Lola Montez, Lotta Crabtree, Gelett Burgess (and 'Les Jeunes'), Maynard Dixon, Frank Norris, Ambrose Bierce, Bret Harte, the Edwin Booths, and Mark Twain.

On May 14, 1856, the editor of the Daily Evening Bulletin, James King of William, died in the Montgomery Block, having been shot by James P. Casey, a city supervisor who felt slighted by King's anti-corruption crusading journalism.{{cn|date=October 2015}}

For a short time in 1878, the California Supreme Court was located on the Montgomery Block.{{Cite web |date=1998 |title=Historic Sites |url=https://www.cschs.org/history/historic-sites/ |access-date=2024-12-28 |website=California Supreme Court Historical Society |language=en-US}}

The building survived the 1906 earthquake and fire.

Demolition and legacy

The Montgomery Block was demolished in 1959, even though a preservation movement had begun to emerge in San Francisco. It was replaced by a parking lot and later, the Transamerica Pyramid.

Historian Robert O’Brien had warned "Anyone who tears down the Montgomery Block is tearing down more than four stories of bricks: he is destroying one of the last monuments to a brave city, and many are the reproachful ghosts that would haunt him".{{Cite web |last=Carlsson |first=Chris |title=From Fish-Choked Mudflat to the Pyramid |url=https://www.foundsf.org/index.php?title=From_Fish-Choked_Mudflat_to_the_Pyramid |access-date=2024-12-28 |website=www.foundsf.org}} Author Helen Holdredge said "it is incredible to me that San Franciscans should be so little regardful of their past - every room of that building is filled with history".

The building is remembered for its historic importance as a bohemian center of the city. At his inauguration as Poet Laureate of San Francisco in 1998, Lawrence Ferlinghetti mentioned "the classic old Montgomery Block building, the most famous literary and artistic structure in the West".{{Cite book |last=Ferlinghetti |first=Lawrence |title=San Francisco Poems |publisher=City Lights |location=San Francisco |publication-date=2002 |pages=14}}