 |
| Market Street, 1905 |
On April 18,
1906, most residents of the San Francisco Bay area were still asleep. Those who
were awake were already at work or preparing to begin their Wednesday
activities. At 5:12 A.M. there was a
loud rumbling and the widespread shuddering of a foreshock. Approximately
twenty-five seconds later, this was followed by violent shaking for about 42
seconds. This earthquake would go down as one of the worst
natural disasters in history.
People as far north as southern Oregon, as
far south as southern California and as far to the east as Nevada felt the
quake’s tremors. Bay area residents were knocked to the ground, thrown from
their beds, or trapped under the weight of collapsing buildings. Even though the
epicenter was two miles west of San Francisco in the Pacific Ocean, the
earthquake was picked up by seismometers in Europe and Asia.
 |
| Market Street after the Earthquake |
Estimates
of the magnitude of the quake range from 7.7 to 8.25, with the most widely
accepted value being 7.8 on the Richter scale. The San Andreas Fault ruptured
for a total of 296 miles, with varying degrees of impact along the length of
the rupture, but San Francisco and the surrounding area sustained the most
severe destruction.
The force of the
earthquake damaged and demolished buildings, tore gas lines open, snapped electric
lines, and destroyed water mains throughout the city. Fires ignited by leaking
gas, electrical sparks and in broken chimneys spread quickly without readily
available water in many areas to fight them.
The police destroyed
an estimated $30,000 in alcohol, in order to remove flammable materials
from the path of the flames.
 |
| San Francisco on Fire |
In an attempt to
stop—or at least contain—the fires, the S.F. Fire Department requested dynamite
from the Army base at the Presidio. They planned to create firebreaks by
demolishing buildings. Unfortunately, the fire fighters and the Army troops
that helped them had little experience with using dynamite to fight fire. The
Presidio sent black gunpowder, a highly flammable explosive, instead of
nitroglycerine or stick dynamite. Consequently, the effort to establish
firebreaks only created additional paths for the fire to spread by destroying
buildings and walls that might have helped to stop the flames. Flaming debris
created by the explosions ignited even more fires. Over the three days
immediately following the earthquake, 492 city blocks burned.
But the Army did
provide many crucial services in the immediate aftermath. Soldiers patrolled
the streets to help keep peace and discourage looting. They guarded government
buildings. The quake itself and resulting fires left tens of thousands of San
Francisco residents homeless. Initially, these displaced people established
makeshift camps in parks and in or near burnt-out buildings. As the fires raged
in the eastern part of the city, these people moved west in search of food and shelter.
The Army assumed responsibility for feeding, clothing and sheltering the
displaced men, women and children, housing 20,000 people at the Presidio and
managing twenty-one of the city’s twenty-six official refugee camps.
 |
| Tent City - National Archives |
The refugee
camps were small tent cities, arranged in street-like grids, with dining halls
to serve meals. Some became organized like small towns, with residents
establishing features of regular life, like children’s play groups and social
events in the dining halls. The army oversaw the relief activities until July
1, 1906 when the city assumed responsibility for providing these services. More
than two years later, many of the refugee camps were still in full operation.
As new housing was built, residence at the camps gradually declined.
Overall, around
75,000 people fled San Francisco, between 227,000 and 300,000 people were left
homeless and more than 3000 people died as a result of the earthquake.
Approximately 28,000 buildings were destroyed, along with the infrastructure to
provide utility services to the city. Monetary damages
from the earthquake and fires were estimated at $500 million. This would be
more than $16.5 billion in 2022 dollars.
 |
| Post-quake Destruction - Library of Congress |
The San Francisco earthquake was the first major natural disaster to be extensively documented with photographs and moving pictures. Images of the city before and after the quake provide vivid evidence of the devastating destruction of a thriving modern city in the early twentieth century. It’s often said that “One picture is worth a thousand words.” In this case, that adage is clearly true.
Buy Links: Paperback at Amazon Amazon print or digital
Such devastation in 42 seconds! The before and after photos tell the story. Good for the army, after a shaky start. Thanks for this, Ann, it's history I knew very little about. Have you ever featured it in your writing?
ReplyDeleteThanks, Lindsay. This earthquake is the main event in my work-in-progress. I still have lots of details to research that are unrelated to the quake, so I still have a long way to go, but so far the information has been interesting.
DeleteOne of my favourite cities in the world, and I flew out just before the last big one hit there, too. The scale of the devastation is unimaginable as it was such a densely populated city. I can imagine that you could have written loads more about this.
ReplyDeleteI also love San Francisco. And you're right about the volume of information. I always struggle with what to include and what to leave out when writing my blogs, but this was one of the most difficult.
Delete