288 DAYSSan Francisco · 1915
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The Zone · The Zone

The Zone

A 65-acre amusement city strung along one 3,360-foot street from Fillmore to Van Ness, the largest midway any exposition had yet built.

Every world's fair of the era had its midway, and San Francisco's was the biggest yet: about sixty-five acres at the eastern end of the grounds, south of Fort Mason. The name came from a public contest. The prize, a ten-dollar season book, went to a Mrs. J. Cortissoz, who died before it could be awarded, and the name was not applied until late in 1914. Every show fronted on a single paved avenue 100 feet wide between building lines, seven city blocks long. Counting both sides, a visitor walked past more than a mile of booths, rides, restaurants and some twenty-five theaters.

The street was not straight. From the Fillmore Street gate it ran east along the line of Chestnut Street, bent at Laguna Street where Toyland Grown Up faced the Shamrock Isle, and continued along roughly the line of Francisco Street to the Van Ness Avenue gate. Near the east end it opened into a circular Plaza at Gough Street, with Japan Beautiful and its giant gilded Buddha on the north side and a fire station on the south. The Exposition's architects insisted that each show's front announce what was inside without needing a sign. The result was a skyline of Buddhas, pagodas, a 90-foot wooden suffragette, plaster giants, painted cliffs, and the steel arm of the Aeroscope swinging nearly 300 feet in the air.

Behind the fronts was a hard business. Space rented at fifty dollars a front foot for the season, and the Exposition took a percentage of the gross, usually a quarter. The wet spring of 1915 and the European war kept crowds thin for months. Many ambitious shows failed while cheap ones prospered. Todd's official history lists the Zone's hits and flops with a showman's candor: the Panama Canal model, Stella and the Safety Racer made money, while Toyland and the Submarines sank. A Zone carnival on May 27, 1915, with a Queen Zona, a parade of elephants and camels and a battleship blown up off the Marina, drew more than 104,000 people and helped turn the season around.

Nothing of the Zone survives. The buildings were sold to wreckers, and by June 30, 1916 the last trace was gone and its 97 parcels were ready to return to their owners. The site is now residential blocks of the Marina District between Fillmore Street and Van Ness Avenue. They include Moscone Recreation Center, the former Lobos Square (Webster to Laguna, between Chestnut and Bay).

Nevertheless it was a great amusement street, and with its Golden Buddha, its tall suffragette and twin soldiers before Toyland, its Chinese pagoda, the giant holding back the waters of the Dayton flood (while he lasted)...

Frank Morton Todd, The Story of the Exposition, vol. II (1921), p. 155

At a glance

  • About 65 acres; one avenue 3,360 feet long and 100 feet wide between building lines (Todd). The Official Guide rounds the avenue to 3,000 feet.
  • Cost is disputed: the Official Guide claims more than $12,000,000 spent, $8,000,000 of it on 100 principal concessions; Todd says the Zone 'is said to have cost a total of $3,500,000.'
  • Ground rent was $50 a front foot for the season, payable in advance; total frontage was about 6,000 feet, and on Opening Day only 26 feet were unsold.
  • The Exposition's Division of Works designed seventy Zone structures, many by architect E. J. Symmes.
  • Zone Day, May 27, 1915, drew 104,486 visitors.
  • The first Zone building permit went to Frederic Thompson on August 25, 1913, for the Noah's Ark at Laguna and Francisco Streets.

Afterward

Buildings sold to wrecking contractors; by June 30, 1916 the last trace was gone and the 97 parcels were ready to return to their owners (Todd, vol. V). The site is now Marina District housing between Fillmore St and Van Ness Ave, including Moscone Recreation Center (the former Lobos Square, Webster to Laguna between Chestnut and Bay).

The site today

Present-day photographs and video of this spot are being made for the film; each frame below is a slot for one of them.

Today · photograph to comeChestnut at Fillmore, the Fillmore gate and the start of the Zone

Chestnut St at Fillmore, looking east along Chestnut

Have a photo of this spot? Email it to hello@288days.com with code S30 and up to 50 characters of credit. It appears here and in the film.

Today · photograph to comeLobos Square · Moscone Recreation Center

Moscone Rec Center, from the Chestnut St side looking across the fields

Have a photo of this spot? Email it to hello@288days.com with code S31 and up to 50 characters of credit. It appears here and in the film.

Today · photograph to comeThe Zone's plaza · Gough and Francisco

Gough St at Francisco

Have a photo of this spot? Email it to hello@288days.com with code S32 and up to 50 characters of credit. It appears here and in the film.

Today · photograph to comeThe Van Ness gate and Fort Mason

Van Ness Ave at Bay St, looking west

Have a photo of this spot? Email it to hello@288days.com with code S33 and up to 50 characters of credit. It appears here and in the film.

Today · photograph to comeFort Mason, looking west over the whole fairground

The Black Point bluff at upper Fort Mason, above the piers, west edge of the Great Meadow

Have a photo of this spot? Email it to hello@288days.com with code S35 and up to 50 characters of credit. It appears here and in the film.

Today · aerial to comeFrom Fort Mason toward the Golden Gate

Cannot be flown from Fort Mason (national park). Fly from over Aquatic Park's water or from a boat off the Fort Mason piers, at 250–400 ft, looking west along the whole shoreline

Aerial placeholder. Drone footage is flown under permit by the production; not accepting submissions.

Sources