Historic San Francisco: A Concise History and Guide [Paperback]

Rand Richards (Author), Richards Rand (Author)

Editorial Reviews

From Library Journal

This combination history/guidebook is divided into ten chapters, each of which provides background information on San Francisco's historic buildings, museums, and artifacts. Profiles of sites or attractions include hours of operation, costs, and a quick biographical sketch of a key figure. Four walking tours, a brief review of the sites, a chronology of events beginning with 1542, a discussion of San Francisco's Victorian architecture, and a review of the earthquake of 1989 are also included. With more versatile and comprehensive guidebooks to San Francisco available, like Randolph Delehanty's San Francisco: The Ultimate Guide ( LJ 6/1/89) and Richard Wurman's practical San Francisco Access (Access Pr., 1991), this is a discretionary purchase for most libraries.
- Susan Fifer Canby, National Geographic Soc. Lib., Washington,
Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Review

"...a wonderfully concise one-volume history of the city...in a remarkably accessible and enjoyable format." -- San Francisco Chronicle

Product Details

• Paperback: 320 pages
• Publisher: Heritage House Publishers (June 1991)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1879367009
• ISBN-13: 978-1879367005
• Product Dimensions: 8.4 x 5.6 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.1 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (9 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #591,587 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Rand Richards is an award-winning historian. The San Francisco-based author's first two books are local bestsellers: "Historic San Francisco: A Concise History and Guide" and "Historic Walks in San Francisco: 18 Trails Through the City's Past." His new book "Mud, Blood, and Gold: San Francisco in 1849," originally released in hardcover, has just come out in paperback.

Rand has lectured before many groups, including the California Historical Society, the San Francisco History Association, and the San Francisco Museum and Historical Society. In November 2010 the latter organization gave him their Award of Merit at a gala $150 a plate luncheon at the Palace Hotel for his "distinguished contributions to the collection, preservation and interpretation of San Francisco history."

In 1995 Rand had the honor of being invited by Mikhail Gorbachev to the first State of the World Forum at the Fairmont Hotel. At the five-day conference for world leaders he gave a lecture on San Francisco history and led tours of some of the City's historic sites.

You can find out more about Rand and his books at his website at www.heritagehousesf.com.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

30 of 31 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Fantastic San Francisco History...., January 12, 2001

By 

James Phillips (Menlo Park, CA USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Historic San Francisco: A Concise History and Guide (Paperback)

This book is a hybrid between a history book and a guide book. Each chapter historically chronicles a meaningful period of time betweensignificant milestones (i.e. the goldrush of 1849 or the earthquake of 1906). Following each chapter is a guide to monuments, landmarks, and musuems that have items pertaining to the preceding information.

There is a fair amount of illustrations and photographs and the writing style of Rand Richards is very readable. I highly recommend this book to anybody living in or planning to visit the San Francisco bay area.

38 of 50 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars what the heck happened to the 70s & 80s?, December 26, 2004

By 

R. Pachman "san franciscan" (san francisco) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Historic San Francisco: A Concise History and Guide (Paperback)

while this is a very concise history of the city, with a lot of material packed into relatively few pages, I find it extremely odd that the author skips from The Summer of Love in the late 1960s all the way to the earthquake of 1989. One has to ask, what informed the author's choice to ignore twenty years of history? Did the murder of mayor George Moscone and supervisor Harvey Milk by Dan White never happen? Did the gay civil rights movement and the development of The Castro neighborhood into the most visible gay community in the world not happen? This seems an irresponsible omission on the part of the author. What a shame.

12 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Extremely good, February 15, 2003

By A Customer

This review is from: Historic San Francisco: A Concise History and Guide (Paperback)

I really can't recommend this book enough. Mr Richards is a fine writer who breathes life into San Francisco's history using an array of colouful (and often hilarious) anecdotes. I've read a number of other books on the the bay area's history and for sheer enjoyment this stands head-and-shoulders above the rest.