http://oac.cdlib.org/findaid/ark:/13030/c8jw8mpw No online items Guide to the Woodward's Gardens collection Finding Aid Authors: Julian Marasigan and CA State Library staff. © Copyright 2019 Sutro Library, California State Library. All rights reserved. 1630 Holloway Avenue 5th floor San Francisco, CA, 94132-4030 URL: http://www.library.ca.gov/about/sutro_main.html Email:
[email protected] Phone: 415-469-6100 Guide to the Woodward's Gardens M000020 1 collection Guide to the Woodward's Gardens collection Sutro Library, California State Library Overview of the Collection Collection Title: Woodward's Gardens collection Dates: 1872-1877 Identification: M000020 Physical Description: 2.00 Language of Materials: English Repository: Sutro Library, California State Library 1630 Holloway Avenue 5th floor San Francisco, CA, 94132-4030 URL: http://www.library.ca.gov/about/sutro_main.html Email:
[email protected] Phone: 415-469-6100 Administrative History: Robert B. Woodward was born in Rhode Island in 1824, came to California in 1849, and four years later opened a hotel called the What Cheer House on Sacramento Street in San Francisco. The success of this hotel enabled Woodward to buy a plot of land on Mission Street for his estate, on which he built a house and filled the property with plants, animals and art. He eventually opened his estate to the public, which he named "Woodward's Gardens" and moved his family to Napa. Woodward opened his four-acre former country estate in 1865 or 1866, and San Franciscans flocked to this botanical gardens/ amusement park. Woodward's Gardens contained a museum, a zoo, an aquarium, a "rotary boat," and a 5000-seat pavilion.