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Bird's Eye View of the City and County of San Francisco, 1868

$ 45,000.00
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W. Vallace Gray and Charles B. Gifford
Bird's Eye View of the City and County of San Francisco, 1868 and Key to Gray and Gifford's View of San Francisco, 1869
San Francisco: 1868-69
Hand-tinted lithograph
45" x 41 ½" framed
$45,000

This view was drawn and lithographed by Charles B. Gifford and published incollaboration with W. Vallace Gray. Charles B. Gifford was a prominent artist whom created many Bay Area views during the 1860s, but little biographical information about him exists.The vantage point of this bird's eye view of San Francisco is from the southeast looking out towards the Pacific Ocean, showing the continuous rows of business blocks lining the streets west of Yerba Buena Cove. Ships crowd the San Francisco waterfront.

The landscape towards the Pacific Ocean is bleak and barren, but with the settlement of title claims in the outside lands, Golden Gate Park would begin to take shape. Frederick Law Olmsted had prepared a plan for a system of parks for San Francisco that was rejected in 1866, but in 1870 the city purchased the land for the park and hired William Hammond Hall to plan its 1,013 acres.A numbered map key showing 124 points of interest was published with this view, andincludes landmarks such as churches, schools, cemeteries and merchant trade buildings.