Maps at SFO

When I fly out of SFO and I find myself in Terminal 2 there is always a incredible exhibit just after security. Earlier this year it was vintage board games. This past weekend it was a collection of maps of San Francisco from the David Rumsey collection. It's pretty fantastic.

One of my favorite taglines from the description is: "San Francisco was at once improbable and inevitable."

Or the following: 

"The water is so scarce that it is scarcely sufficient for the few families that reside at the Presidio...timber is found at a distance of twelve or fourteen leagues, and pasturage for the little stock of the garrison is only found at a distance of five or six leagues. Therefore, I am convinced that the worst place or situation in California is that of San Francisco for the establishment of such a villa...:
- Don Pedro de Alberni, in his report to the Viceroy on July 1st, 1796. 

Contrasted with:

"Few cities int he world can vie with San Francisco either in beauty or in the natural advantages of her situation; indeed there are only two places in Europe--Constantinople and Gibraltar--that combine an equally perfect landscape with what may be called an equally imperial position."
- James Bryce, writing in American Commonwealth, 1889.

The bay looks chaotic.

This one is an insurance map breaking down the entire city block by block and noting the sizes and make-up of each building on the block. It'd be pretty interesting to peruse.

Love the title on this one Paradise Found.

I'm pretty certain one of those red brick buildings by the docks is the building I currently work in. Located right below the hill (not quite a cliff anymore) in one of the old ice houses that used to sit on the edge of the docks before the peninsula was built out.