San Francisco 1905 - 1906 (short form)

In 1905, an unknown cameraman filmed a streetcar trip along San Francisco's Market Street. The following year, the Great Earthquake struck, and he filmed the trip again. This is a five-minute silent film that edits together excerpts of his two films. Footage from the Prelinger Archives, edited by Matt Lake

• Category

  Travel & Events

[jr kelly]

as a third generation born native san franciscan i never get tired of seeing old film like this and wonder what it was like to live back then. you can see hundreds of people traveling along market just going on with thier day much like today and at the very end of market street the ferry building STILL stands, over one hundred years later. just amazing!

[duckman531]

Somehow I think there's a great American Experience or History Channel documentary to be made from this footage! What a find!!!

[Glade Cornelius]

All these people that were helping out would be turning in there grave to find out what SF has become lately an overly political sprawl of a city

[Glade Cornelius]

This is a haunting video

[forwhatitsworth989]

LOL at how much San Fran has decayed since then.

[Austin989891080p]

fun fact : all these people are dead



[sfmarklh]

What insanity for pedestrians, horse and buggy, and autos! There was no regulation about any transit mode. lol! People just wandered in the streets, cars come from every direction and there is no flow of traffic- makes for a lot of accidents. Amazing footage and the earthquake devastation is startling.

[TheFen1000]

And, at that time there were no traffic laws?

[whhrms]

The "unknown" cameraman was William H. Harbeck of Toledo, Ohio, based out of Seattle. He filmed both pre- and post-earthquake San Francisco and is usually uncredited. He was one of the victims of the Titanic disaster.

[Jennifer Brownell]

And we think we have a pedestrian problem in big cities today! It look downright chaotic. =)

[John White]

It's weird to think every person in this is dead.