Fred Siemer came to San Francisco from Germany and established his own shipyard behind his home at Hunter’s Point. He built two scow schooners for his son-in-law, James Peterson, the Adelia and the Alma. Siemer built the Alma in 1891 and named it after his granddaughter.   Scow schooners carried the freight of the Bay and [...]

Tom Mooney in Prison The United States had been watching the events in Europe in 1916, and although the isolationists remained strong, more and more people had come to the conclusion that American intervention in World War II was on the horizon. The City of San Francisco had organized a Preparedness Day Parade to support [...]

San Francisco is a seaside city, and for much of its history a major port. The wind driven clipper ships were the first to sail into the West Coast port. Since the clipper ships depended on the vagaries of the wind, they often arrived in San Francisco with little or no notice and gangs of [...]

I grew up in Sacramento, California and went to Sutterville Elementary School. “Sutterville” is a reference to John Augustus Sutter, pictured at the left, born Johan Suter in February 1803 in the Kingdom of Saxony,whose father came from Neuchatel, Switzerland. Young Suter moved to and went to school in Switzerland. He joined the Swiss Army and became [...]