Richmond District, San Francisco, California

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Geary Boulevard, looking eastward from 36th Avenue

The Richmond District (election district 1) is a neighborhood in the northwest corner of San Francisco, California. Lying directly north of Golden Gate Park, "the Richmond" is bounded roughly by Fulton Street to the south, Arguello Street and Laurel Heights to the east, The Presidio and Lincoln Park to the north, and Ocean Beach and the Pacific Ocean to the west. Park Presidio Boulevard, a major thoroughfare, divides the Richmond into the western "Outer Richmond" and the eastern portion, called the "Inner Richmond." Geary Boulevard is a major east-west thoroughfare that runs through the Richmond and to downtown.

Originally an expanse of rolling sand dunes, the Richmond District was developed initially in the late-19th century. After the 1906 earthquake, development increased with the need to provide replacement housing. In the 1950s and most especially after the re-structuring of US immigration law in 1965, Chinese Americans began to replace the ethnic Jewish and Irish Americans who had dominated the district before World War II. The area became known as the "New Chinatown," particularly along Clement Street between Arguello and Park Presidio, which is a bustling commercial strip of restaurants and shops. The Richmond District also features a prominent Russian community with many stores catering to the Russian community along Geary Boulevard and a high concentration of Eastern European immigrants.

Adolph Sutro was one of the first large-scale developers of the neighborhood. He is responsible for building the Sutro Baths, along with his mansion on the western end of the district, near Ocean Beach.

The Richmond district was home to Anton Szandor LaVey, founder and leader of the Church of Satan from 1966 until his death in 1997. His home on California Street, an imposing Victorian known as the "Black House," was demolished in 2001.

[edit] The Avenues

The Richmond District and the neighboring Sunset District (on the south side of Golden Gate Park) are often collectively known as The Avenues, because the majority of both neighborhoods are spanned by numbered north-south avenues. When the city was originally laid out, the avenues were numbered from 1st to 49th and the east-west streets were lettered A to X. In 1909, to reduce confusion for mail carriers, the east-west streets and 1st Avenue and 49th Avenue were renamed. The east-west streets were named after Spanish explorers in ascending alphabetical order in a southward direction. First Avenue was renamed Arguello Boulevard and 49th Avenue was renamed La Playa Street. [1]

Today, the first numbered avenue is 2nd Avenue, starting one block west of Arguello Boulevard, and the last is 48th Avenue near Ocean Beach. The avenue numbers increase incrementally, with the exception that what would be 13th Avenue is called Funston Avenue (named for Frederick Funston, a U.S. Army general who was in San Francisco at the time of the 1906 earthquake and took command of the situation).

Many of the east-west streets are still named after Spanish explorers but there are others, as well. The creation of Golden Gate Park took out the streets previously lettered E through G. The former D Avenue became Fulton, which is the northern boundary of most of the Park. The southern boundary, the former H Avenue, was renamed Lincoln after President Abraham Lincoln.

Otherwise, north of the Park in the Richmond District, the streets are named Anza, Balboa and Cabrillo. South of the Park in the Sunset District, the streets are Irving, Judah, Kirkham, Lawton, Moraga, Noriega, Ortega, Pacheco, Quintara, Rivera, Santiago, Taraval, Ulloa, Vicente, Wawona, and Yorba. Xavier was originally proposed to replace X Avenue, but Yorba was chosen instead due to the pronunciation controversy - thus, X came to be skipped in the horizontal avenues as 13th was skipped in the verticals [2].