Jackson Square, San Francisco

Jackson Square
Neighborhood of San Francisco
Hotaling Place at Jackson St., San Francisco--the historic warehouse that gives the alley its name is hinted at left, and the Transamerica Pyramid appears in the background
Jackson Square Location within Central San Francisco
Coordinates: 37.7964°N 122.402908°W / 37.7964; -122.402908
Country	United States
State	California
City	San Francisco
Jackson Square Historic District
U.S. National Register of Historic Places
U.S. Historic district
Location	Roughly bounded by Broadway on N, Sansome St. on E, Washington St. on S, and Columbus Ave. on W, San Francisco, California
Area	14.2 acres (5.7 ha)
Architectural style	Classical Revival, Italianate
NRHP reference No.	71000186
Added to NRHP	November 18, 1971

Jackson Square is a neighborhood in San Francisco, California, bounded by Broadway, Washington St. on the south, Columbus Ave. on the west and Battery St. on the east with any number of nearby satellite buildings and residents outside the bounds that truly belong to the neighborhood.

History

Ad for Coppa's Neptune Palace nightclub, 569 Jackson St., circa 1913. In 1914, "throngs gathered nightly to dance and eat until the police commissioners closed all of these resorts, as well as Barbary Coast."

Jackson Square encompasses the northeastern part of the former Barbary Coast red light district. It was built largely during the mid-late 1800s. The district contains the sole surviving buildings of the early central business district of San Francisco. During the 1850s this newly filled area which directly adjoined the piers to the east was populated by merchants, banks, places of entertainment, professional and government offices, and assembly halls.

Character

Jackson Square Historic District is one of the oldest commercial neighborhoods in San Francisco. Buildings on Jackson between Montgomery and Sansome retain cast iron shutters as protection against fire, but when the city burned, in one case, a warehouse's contents turned out to be more significant in saving the building in the 1906 earthquake and fire:

If, as they say, God spanked the town for being over-frisky,

Why did he burn the churches down and spare Hotaling's Whiskey?

For decades this was the interior designer's district (predating the San Francisco Design Center)