MAGAZINE April-June, 1936 CONTENTS CALIFORNIA: 5 articles with 37 illustrations San Francisco the Improbable Plant Collecting on Lanai GELETT BURGESS \N al, E :11tvs±rot,c,riii F. PAL BERG Boto,Is!, 5i ive rFitt pf Ha wq California's Mountain Thrones Rana Rugosa. Schlegel LAWRENCE H. DA I NCE With onctornicol ficiuresi DR, ARTHG SVIHLA, State College of Washinotor; California: a Drama of People JOHN CUDC A Troublesome Introduced Grass With figures! EDWARD Y HOSA I," A Educational Facilities of Southern Bishop /V\ciseLyn California DR. R. B. von KLEINSMIC, Pan-Pacifica to Discuss Problems s,ersIty of Southern Coliforn;o FREDERICK c.,ImPICEI JR Haiku Poetry of Japan Commonwealth Club of California STUART RICHARDSON S Seed Dispersal in Hawaii English Favored as Philippine Notional W,0-; 5 illustrol,01, CHAS, LE: _ Language Tern Fore,t&-r E's.r_/,[ .1^ NL,c,: - OTHER FEATURES: Fishes of the American Northwest PROF LEONArs:E' LL C News of Pon-Pacific Union affiliates in China. Japan and the Philippines Books received, reviewed; INDEX pccr A. for Mid-Pacific Magazine, 1935,\ Published For the PAN-PACIFIC UNION, 1067 Alakea Street HONOLULU, HAWAII Po: HMLTN CLOSED SINGLE COPIES, POSTAGE PAID, 50c DU 620 :1145 KONA or KOBE Regardless of where you plan to go, see us first . we can save you time and money, procure your transportation over any steamship line, railroad, or air line and furnish much helpful information. CASTLE AND COOKE TRAVEL BUREAU ,\Aerchani Street Honolulu Brancl,ta, in R.J.A,01 H,-],c)I ■ on Ma1:11-10 Hotok Ager- H, T-]r All T ,.;,e, of Iran- nc ,rtot ■ an . Air, Rod. Steamship or Bus Ail Tour; and -Telaahaae 122 The Mid-Pacific Magazine of the PAN-PACIFIC UNION GEORGE MELLEN, Editor Published quarterly by Alexander Hume Ford for the Pan-Pacific Union, Honolulu, Hawaii, U.S.A. Entered as second-class matter at the Honolulu Post Office under Act of Mar. 3, 1879. All members of the Pan-Pacific Union receive the magazine as one of the privi- leges of membership. Single copies 50 cents, mailed to any address in the world. [From the Honolulu Star-Bulletin press.] VOL. XLIX APRIL-JUNE, 1936 NUMBER 2 San Francisco the Improbable By GELETT BURGESS With illustrations from photographs selected by The Editors. ACH one of us cherishes openly or Here was the ideal site for a city—a in secret an Ideal. It may be dy- peninsula lying like a great thumb on namically expressed or it may rest the hand of the mainland between the E inert in some sanctum sanctorum Pacific Ocean and a deep, land-locked below the level of consciousness. But bay, an area romantically configured of when that ideal is encountered in life hills and valleys, with picturesque moun- we realize that thrill which is called tain and water views, the setting sun in Romance. And my first Romance I the broad Pacific and Mount Diablo a found in San Francisco. sentinel in the east; to the northward, Perhaps it was my puritanical though the sea channel of the Golden Gate enlightened training in Boston, the leg- overhung by the foothills of Tamalpais. acy of generations of Mayflower ances- The old town of Yerba Buena was a tors, which made me feel, by vivid little Spanish settlement by the cove in contrast, the freedom, the sincerity and the harbor. Its straight, narrow streets the simplicity of life in the city by the had been artlessly ruled by Francisco Golden Gate. Proselytes are notori- de Haro, alcalde of the Mission Dolo- ously fanatical. Perhaps it was the cli- res. He had marked out upon the mate, the same, we used to say, as that ground, northerly, La Calle de la Fun- of Greece and of Japan, most favorable dacion and the adjacent squares nec- to art expression and individualism. But essary for the little port of entry in primarily it was the unique physical 1835. Four years later, when Governor character of the gray city on its hills, Alvarado directed a new survey of the almost surrounded by water. And so, as place, Jean Vioget extended the original I am going to piece together a picture lines with mathematical precision to the of what San Francisco meant to me in hills surrounding the valley. In 1846 it the purple '90's from my novel, The would still have been possible partly to Heart Line, written while my impres- correct that artistic blunder of the sim- sions were fresh, let me begin with a ple-minded alcalde. But Jasper O'Far- sketch of the growth of the old Mission rell, the civil engineer, had seen military town. service with General Sutter; his ways MID-PACIFIC MAGAZINE, APRIL-JUNE, 1936 81 were stern and severe, his esthetic im- From Nob Hill one sees ships in the pulses, if he had any, were heroically harbor and the lights of the Mission; subdued. Market Street, indeed, he from Kearney Street one keeps the permitted to run obliquely, though it view of Twin Peaks, Telegraph Hill ris- went straight as a bullet towards the ing on the harbor side in a sheer preci- Twin Peaks. The rest of the city he pice over a hundred feet high. And so made one great checkerboard of right- the San Franciscan has always the angled streets in defiance of its natural whole picturesque, improbable town topography. with him wherever he goes. O'Farrell knew no compromise. His That was the fascinating city as I streets took their straight and narrow knew it, almost five decades after the way, up hill and down dale, without gold rush of '49 had overnight changed regard to grade or expense. Where a sleepy Spanish town into a reckless, might have been entrancingly beautiful roaring, roystering gambling center of terraces, rising avenue above avenue to tents and rough shacks. the heights, preserving the master-view In the '90's, though a little sobered of the continent, the streets are hacked down, it was still feverish with dance out of the earth and rock, precipitous, halls and gambling dives and the cli- grotesque. So sprawls the fey, leaden- mate and the outdoor life had flavored colored town over its dozen hills. San Franciscans with a unique quality San Francisco, the Improbable! Its of adventurous boy and girlish tempera- pageantry is unrolled for all to see at ment. It still had the appearance and first glance. In every little valley where the manners of an overgrown town of the slack, rattling cables of her car lines wooden houses and sidewalks. Many slap and splutter over the pulleys, some one and two-story stores remained even great area of the town exhibits a rising in the business districts. Tobacco and colony of blocks of wooden houses butchers' shops with no front walls, stretching up and over a shoulder of the Chinese in colorful costumes. The sum- hill. Atop every crest one is confronted mertime ferries loading and unloading with farther districts lying beneath and joyous camping parties. The famous rising opposite with rival summits. As Coggswell statue was still standing, you are whirled up and down on the surrounded by red, white and blue lamp cable car, the city moves stealthily about posts—till I helped pull it down. Horse- you in valleys and steep declivities. cars were still plodding along "South of Now she is all waterfront and sailors' the Slot". But the bay had been filled in lodging houses and dance halls; in a up to Montgomery Street, covering the trice she turns sandy Chinatown; then hulks of ships abandoned for the gold shocks you with a Spanish, Italian or fields. negro quarter and then surprises you Until the wide sand dunes had been with a terrifying ascent crowned with built upon, the strong Summer after- palaces. Past the next rise you find her noon west winds swept clouds of dust whimsical, fantastic with garish flats through the city, penetrating every and apartment houses. She lurks in and crack in house walls. The Golden Gate about thousands of little wooden houses, Park, one of the finest in the world, and beyond, she drops a little park into stretched its wizardry of gardening your path, discloses a stretch of shim- from Central Avenue to the Ocean mering bay or unveils magnificently the Boulevard. green, gently-sloping expanse of the There were no copper cents, no bank noble Presidio. notes, only silver coins were considered No other city has so many points of worth having, and gold eagles and view, none allures with such originality, double eagles such as we shall probably even oddity. Some cities have single never see again. Generosity, extrava- dominant hills. Rome has seven; but gance like the fog was in the air. I don't San Francisco is all hills. They mount know whether that jovial, carefree prod- north and west and must be climbed. igality is gone. ( I doubt if I'll ever get The important lines of traffic accept teal for two bits again, or a hundred these conditions and plunge boldly up oysters delivered on chipped ice to Rus- and down upon their ways. sian Hill for fifty cents ). But I'm sure "Horse-cars were still plodding along." ment repair gang, right, seems to be Note four beyond cable-car, center, busy. Derby hats, or bowlers, didn't starting up Market Street while, right, care who wore them. Two men on the another on the turn-table is being old Ferry building roof, right, looking headed uptown. Two street sweepers, for the usual leaks, perhaps.—Photo left foreground, are waiting for some- from Chas.