San Franciscans love our local history. The City by the Bay is home to a rich and often powerful legacy, and at the top of our stack of truly amazing stories is San Francisco's rebirth following the Great Earthquake of 1906. Now historians can own a piece of that tragic and ultimately triumphant period in the city's past. An album of 265 photographs of San Francisco during the quake and fires will be up for auction at Swann Auction Galleries in New York City.
According to the auction catalog, the album contains an, "all-encompassing images highlighting the extensive damage and destruction caused by the 1906 earthquake. Including post-apocolyptic street scenes showing plumes of smoke rising from the city's downtown buildings, some engulfed in flames, and others reduced to rubble. A number of images show displaced families in temporary encampments, set up in the city's parks, as well as numerous scenes of people waiting in breadlines, and citizens examining the ruins."
Some of the images in the ablum were taken by noted San Francisco photographer T.E. Hecht, who was 31-years-old when the 7.8-magnitude earthquake struck at 5:12am on April 18, 1906. The album will be auctioned on Feb. 14 and is expected to fetch upwards of $4,000. Interested parties can actually bid online.
A long glance through the photographs included in the album reveal the devastation of the earthquake, the resilience of San Francisco's citizens, and yet another reason why a proud phoenix rising from the ashes appears on the official seal and flag of San Francisco.
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