the Value Village Roll

Looking Down Sacramento Street, San Francisco, April 18, 1906 is a black and white photograph taken by Arnold Genthe in San Francisco, California on the morning of April 18, 1906 in the wake of the 1906 San Francisco earthquake.

Looking Down Sacramento St., 1906. [verso:] "San Francisco: April 18, 1906." From As I Remember by Arnold Genthe: This photograph shows "the results of the earth quake, the beginning of the fire and the attitude of the people." It was taken the morning of the first day of the fire. Shows Sacramento St. at Miles Place (now Miller Place) near Powell St.

"I found that my hand cameras had been so damaged by the falling plaster as to be rendered useless. I went to Montgomery Street to the shop of George Kahn, my dealer, and asked him to lend me a camera. 'Take anything you want. This place is going to burn up anyway.' I selected the best small camera, a 3A Kodak Special. I stuffed my pockets with films and started out.... Of the pictures I had made during the fire, there are several, I believe, that will be of lasting interest. There is particularly the one scene that I recorded the morning of the first day of the fire [along Sacramento Street, looking toward the Bay] which shows, in a pictorially effective composition, the results of the earthquake, the beginning of the fire and the attitude of the people. On the right is a house, the front of which had collapsed into the street. The occupants are sitting on chairs calmly watching the approach of the fire. Groups of people are standing in the street, motionless, gazing at the clouds of smoke. When the fire crept up close, they would just move up a block. It is hard to believe that such a scene actually occurred in the way the photograph represents it. Several people upon seeing it have exclaimed, "Oh, is that a still from a Cecil De Mille picture?" To which the answer has been, "No. the director of this scene was the Lord himself." A few months ago an interview about my work--I had told the story of that fire picture--appeared in a New York paper with the headline, "His pictures posed by the Lord, says photographer.""

Arnold Genthe, "As I Remember" Reynal & Hitchcock : New York, 1936; Chapter 10: Earthquake and Fire

"On 18 April 1906, the morning of the great San Francisco earthquake, Genthe, with his cameras and studio destroyed, borrowed a hand-held camera and photographed the destruction across the city. Of his over 180 surviving, sharp-focus photographs of San Francisco, probably his most famous image is "San Francisco, April 18th, 1906," which shows a view from Nob Hill, down Sacramento Street. Enormous clouds of smoke ominously approach, buildings' facades have collapse from the quake, and residents stand and sit in the street, in a stupor, calmly watching the approaching fire."

Mel Byars, N. Elizabeth Schlatter. "Genthe, Arnold"; American National Biography Online Feb. 2000.

And here's the photo, along with a Street View showing the same location now. Click on the image for a high-res version.

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Work is stressful and sleep is hard to find, but I have two new cameras to play with. The first was given to me by my boss's boss, who found he hadn't touched it in twenty or more years and figured I might have some fun with it. It's a Canon T70:

As you can see, it's one of the most special looking cameras Canon has made. As the Camerapedia link above mentions, it won design awards in 1984, which is not a good thing. However, it has good glass, a self-timer and an auto-winder so I imagine I'll have plenty of fun with it. It's also my first 35mm in 8 or 9 years, meaning I can finally use up all the expired film that has been collecting and that I have been carrying around from apartment to apartment over the past decade. I'm going to try to catch the first snowfall on it. Or, rather, with it.

I found Camera #2 at Value Village while looking for an awful Christmas sweater. It's a Kodak disposable, w/ flash:

This camera is not remarkable in any way, except in one way: the film is half exposed. Some curious person took 15-20 photos with this thing before giving it to Value Village for some curiouser person to find. Is it full of vacation photos? Is it part of an Urban Prankster project? Is it simply broken? Is it, well, incriminating? I suppose I'll find out. The folks at West Camera are patient and understanding, and I'm confident I can explain to them the circumstances surrounding this camera and why I must have it developed and that I'm only truly responsible for exposures twenty through thirty-six. As long as cops aren't surrounding the place when I go to pick up the scans I'll post the results on Flickr. I'll also give some sort of special Christmas present to anyone with a guess that's even vaguely correct.

That's all.